Resolutions don’t have to be made at the beginning of the year. The beauty of self-driven resolutions is that you can create and act on them at any time. While it’s common for people to write personal resolutions that include action items such as exercising more and going to church, our professional desires for the future should never go overlooked.
By definition, a resolution is a firm decision to do or not to do something, with the goal of solving a problem or creating a positive outcome as a result of that action or inaction. So, creating a list of the outcomes you would like to experience as a property manager would be the best place to start. For the purpose of this blog, we’ll assume some common goals, to include: increase in occupancy, increase in revenue, better tenant relationships.
Once you know your goals, you create the resolutions necessary to reach them. Following are the resolutions we’ve created to encourage the outcomes stated above.
- Evaluate the competition—Take an active approach to understanding your competition. What do they have to offer? How do they market? What do they charge? By understanding how your property compares to what’s available on the market will help you make better informed decisions about what tenants want and how to position your own property to appeal to them.
- Focus on tenants—Make a concerted effort to meet tenant needs. This includes acknowledging requests, responding in a reasonable amount of time, and delivering on promises. Remember that keeping tenants is far less expensive than recruiting new ones. Take action to ensure occupancy is retained.
- Increase level of marketing—What you currently doing to market the property? In this day and age, proper property marketing means four things: intuitive website, social media interaction, blogging, and plenty of media posts (images and video). Find the holes and then fill them in. If you’re already doing all this, make a resolution to do more of it. Always ensure you’re using analytics to track performance and traffic patterns as well.
- Revisit the lease—Never allow a lease to stale. Read through it thoroughly and make the adjustments necessary to clarify wrongs/rights. You should always be aware of any language (inclusion or exclusion) that could potentially provide a loop hole to the not-so-good tenants, therein punishing the ones you want to keep.
- Be consistent—In all you do, be consistent. This means treating all tenants the same—from rent charged to rule application.
If one of your resolutions is to find the help you need to manage your property or properties, Class A Management can help. Contact us today to learn how we can work together to make the most of your multifamily property investment. Call 817-295-5959 or send an email to info@classamanagement.com.