Search Results for: 2011
Surveillance Camera Case Study Will Make You Question Everything
Our guest post comes to us today from Nathan Burnett and his team at Watchtower Security. His Multifamily Case Study blew me away. And, not just because we are a client or the fact we were part of the punch line. Nathan edified the true meaning of what I believe a partnership to be. He is not after business for the sake of business. I have seen him turn down huge revenue boosting contracts just because all interests were not aligned. His philosophy being that the relationships have to stay pure over the three to five years coming. So if there a hiccups or hard feelings at negotiation time – it is simply better to walk away. And with that being said, let me turn it over to Nathan and his team.
Surveillance Cameras – Quick Fix or Long Term Solution
Community wide video surveillance cameras typically sound like a high-tech and quick fix to crime/nuisance issues for multifamily housing properties. For those that have tried it in the past, most have failed miserably or barely met any expectations for what they thought it would carry out for the price tag. Primarily due to the fact that even with the best cameras out there, when the package is sold, there is never any mention to how incredibly time-consuming it is once installed.
Surveillance Cameras in Multifamily are Hard Work
It’s a shame that the sales people never mention that much like your personal computers, surveillance servers/cameras go offline during thunderstorms and don’t always come back up (or for the same reasons your desktop freezes up), cameras go out of focus, and that the systems are not the ‘turnkey’ products sold to you. They take a ton of daily maintenance to make sure it’s all working right! That’s just the tip of the iceberg too…They never explain to you that even when a minor event occurs, finding the culprits on your many confusing cameras, reviewing hours upon hours of mind numbing footage, and then working with the authorities to take action, can literally take up your entire work week! Many times it would be cheaper to just pay the resident to replace the stolen items from their car than review the footage…especially when you add up what your time is worth (and that employees are not leasing/managing units during that time, which is what drives your business). If a property were a typical business with a dedicated systems operator on site, this would be their job responsibility and very doable…but, unfortunately, in our property world we are short-staffed and could never dream of this.
Proof in the Numbers
So, after all this, why would anyone ever consider cameras on their property? Well, because someone has actually figured it out for our industry and has proven it with authority’s crime statistics across the country. We all want proof…
Here is a quick summary of an independent police study conducted at what was once considered one of the “roughest” properties in all of St. Louis. This effort was performed in tandem with a change in management firms (Mills Properties was engaged as the turnaround expert) entering the picture and pushing an enormous shift (with limited funds) from the way business had been conducted at this property for years. Mills Properties deserves a great deal of credit as they upgraded lighting, landscaping, and most importantly operation process/procedures.
The largest of their key initiatives (again stressing with limited funds) was scaling back the high cost of random patrol guard services and engaging a nationwide company (based out of St. Louis) called Watchtower Security. The reason this worked so well, is because Watchtower is solely focused on the multi-family housing industry (and realizes the pitfalls/wasted money of the aforementioned typical camera systems). Watchtower, with the help of Mills Properties and local law enforcement, were able to create a campus wide surveillance system covering all key areas including entry/exit points. Mills Properties was able to engage them on a yearly contract with a set monthly rate far less than what they were paying for part-time patrols. And unlike a typical camera system, Watchtower does everything from maintenance of the systems/cameras, monitoring of systems, repairs, and most importantly, reviews all the video crime footage to work directly with the local authorities to prosecute (even testifying on big court cases on their client’s behalf!). Long story short, Mill’s was able to stay focused on leasing up the property (up over 76% from the previous year of 57%…another staggering stat) while virtually eliminating major crime that was plaguing the community. The independent police study took the most common offense on property (burglaries) from the year before (March 2012) to current (March 2013) and the results are staggering:
Burglaries 2011-2012: 51 (door kick-ins were happening almost weekly)
Burglaries 2012-2013: 7
Those numbers were even hard for St. Louis County (the authorities conducting the study) to believe, but were verified. Amazing results that show that with the right push from management along with the right tools (used intelligently), no property is a lost one…
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MonitorHits
I have a special guest post for you today. It’s on the topic of tracking and more specifically on the tracking Craigslist posts.
It comes to us from Ryan Brockschmitt who spends many of his daytime hours at The Laurel. A downtown St. Louis property that is managed by Mills Properties. Now, I could give you a line or two on Ryan but I think he does a much better job himself:
Ryan is still trying to find his place in life. He went to the University of Missouri-Columbia for journalism like everyone goes to Mizzou for. That journalism passion somehow turned into a Hotel & Restaurant Management degree and five years in the hotel industry. After finding it hard to make a living as a pizza delivery driver, he is trying to find his place in the world of multi-family housing. Ryan runs iLoveSoulard and Welcome2STL in his spare time and can usually be found in Soulard living the high life. He asks that any single ladies who frequently wear sundresses and cowboy boots and happen to read something he has written email him at their convenience.
If there are two things I don’t understand, it’s apartment marketing and dating.
Since this isn’t a dating site, we’ll look at an aspect of apartment marketing. From what I understand and can gather from my brief time in the apartment industry, most companies want multiple posts a day on Craigslist about their apartments. I’ll hold my personal feelings on that back because I enjoy my job and want to keep it.
Ideally, you want someone to read your post and think “I need that”. But how do you make that happen? I don’t think there is a magic pill in apartment marketing. When I was in the hotel industry, I never really had to think of marketing the product. You put your prices in to all of the channels and the people just magically show up. As long as you make sure the people writing reviews are happy, people will keep coming. And really, even if the “Yelp Elites” aren’t always happy, the Priceline and Hotwire folks will continue to show up.
The commitment to stay in a hotel is a lot less than it is to sign a lease on an apartment.
There are plenty of things you could read online and try to emulate, but do you really want to just believe that their market is the same as yours? Circling back to the dating reference, I equate this with sitting at a wedding hearing the bride and groom talk about how they were “so in love” since the day they met and knew they were going to marry each other. If you then go out into the dating world and really think that you are going to meet someone and it will be all rainbows and unicorns for the rest of your life, you are going to be disappointed. You have to live in reality and realize that maybe the people writing that post about what to do and what not to do may be looking at a different market than you.
I wanted a way to track my Craigslist posts and figure out what got people to click on posts and what days/times seemed to get the most views. I ran across MonitorHits.com. It’s a simple script that puts an image in your post that is embedded with a tracking code. From the website, you can track your hits by day/time and by the location of the IP addresses.
I interviewed the guy behind the code, Nick Mote, via electronic correspondence.
How long did it take you to develop the MonitorHits code?
The initial site was coded and launched during a three day weekend last November (2011). I work full time and have continued working on the website on my spare time.
How did you use the code for your own posts?
At the time me and my wife (girl friend at the time) were strapped for cash and needed to sell some things on Craigslist. I started selling electronics including my Kinect, Ipod, Digital Camera, and an old laptop. I really enjoyed getting real time feedback on my listings and soon noticed that this website could be a valuable tool for power users such as car dealers and real estate agents.How many hits were you seeing on them?I lived in a small town, Yakima Washington, for the past couple years. The traffic my personal items generated was puny. I think my old Galant received the most views with around 700 hits a week.What did you learn from using the hits on your own posts?I really learned the power of being on the top of the list. I wrote a small article on my blog called “the Craigslist Drop-off Effect” describing the importance of re-posting after the 48 hour spam filter. I also learned how large the Craigslist audience was and how few people actually translate to potential buyers.Have you done any experiments using the stats that you have gathered from users on the site?I have not. I plan on publishing some overall trend data gathered from Craigslist. I plan on having general user information such as posting time vs. posting traffic and move into more Metro data as the user base continues to grow.How many codes have been used?I estimate we have had over 10,000 unique codes that have been active on Craigslist.How many different people have created accounts on the site?As of this morning we are at 336 registered users.
What percentage of people have used the premium codes?
In the last 30 days premium codes represented 39% of all active tracking codes.What is your background? Location? Education? Other Projects?Me and my wife are newly weds and live in Spokane Washington. I have a Bachelors in Business Administration Specializing in Marketing Management from CWU and am the Assistant Marketing Manager for Tree Top, inc. I’ve been dabbling in app development and hope to launch my first app later this month.Where do you want to take this site? New features?I have some new features in the works that I think will really benefit the real estate and car dealer power users. I plan on incorporating an api where users can dynamically incorporate tracking codes into their template software later this year. I also plan on expanding the site past Craigslist to other platforms such as Ebay, Backpage, Facebook, forums, and email tracking.What’s in your future?I plan on further developing my professional marketing experience with the goal of opening my own company that pioneers and markets new digital services and products.
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Multifamily Monday: SBWA
Mike Brewer · · 1 Comment
What are we talking about on this Multifamily Monday? SBWA. What is SBWA. Supervising By Walking Around.
How many of you get lazy and don’t walk your apartment properties as often as you should? How many of you get lazy and do not walk your market ready product? How many of you get lazy and do not inspect what you expect of your teams.
Don’t be shy.
If it helps, I will admit that I am as guilty of this as much as the next guy/gal. At times, it is simply out of a haste to get on to the next thing that is calling my attention. Other times, it is simply just being lazy.
I admit it not for the reason of calling you or myself out but simply as a matter of getting it imbued in your mind. You, we must do it. It is fundamental to our business. It is what keeps us all true to our standards. If you are not looking at what you expect those standards fall pretty fast. I think we would agree.
Supervising By Walking Around
I wrote a piece on this concept back in the Spring of 2011. At the time my posit was that you could not know your people and or your business if you did not spend any time wondering around in it. Not my novel concept but one made famous in the world of leadership and management by Tom Peters (side note: you could consider me a super-fan of Mr. Peters).
To the Point
Since the purpose of the Multifamily Monday series is to be short and to the point – here it is.
Get our of your office today and walk around your community. Walk alone. Walk with the people in your office. Walk with your service team. Walk with someone that might be moving in soon. Walk with the cable guy. Walk with the landscaper. Walk with someone that currently lives in your community. Walk with a police officer. Walk with a Mom. Walk with a Dad.
GET Up – Walk NOW
Your SBWA multifamily manic,
M
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Apartment Budgeting: Damages
From time to time people vacate apartments and believe it or not they leave the space damaged. It could be anything from a cigarette burn on the kitchen counter top to fist hole in the bedroom wall. Whatever the case may be; it is considered damage and it can and should be charged for.
Fees associated with damages made to an apartment. Charges are applied at the time of move out and are taken out of apartment security deposits. Nearly every company I have worked with and for has a standard set of charges that are applied for specific damages. For example, if the apartment is left full of trash and debris, most companies will charge a fee to bag (per bag) and remove it. If there are pet stains on the carpet – depending on the extent of the damage a charge will be levied. If it is extensive and the carpet has to be replaced charges might apply for a full carpet replacement. There really is no end to what you can charge for provided it is within reason and according to city, state and national law.
Budget Strategy
This one is fairly straight forward. The line is typically built on twelve months of trailing information given the fact that it can and will fluctuate over any bit of time. You take the full twelve months of trailing numbers, add them up and average them. You can then straight line the information. That is to suggest that you can use the average number to budget each month. Another strategy might be to average the numbers quarterly so as to catch seasonality. Either way is appropriate.
Your getting pumped for budget season multifamily maniac,
M
Pic Props to ITSOGS
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No more Apartment Leasing Commissions
I have been toying with the idea for a long bit of time. Then I ran across a report titled: A New Approach to Motivation Mediocre Agents . In reading through it the following quote caught my eye and instantly brought validity to my long-lasting thought about paying zero commissions.
Imagine you could construct a sales robot, programmed solely by the rules in any sales structure. How would it behave? It would steal deals off other sales people, sell customers campaigns they didn’t need, argue with its boss over its commission and back stab its colleagues.” Any of this sound familiar?
Pay Them Right and Treat Them Well
Take the game out of it. And, trust me it is a game. People get down right robot on each other all the time. If they call and I write a guest card and then you show them and they lease, it’s mine. Or, its half mine. Or if they call but show up when I am at lunch and you tour them, it’s yours. Or, any variation you can think of. Every office in America has an unwritten protocol with regard to how commissions get paid out.
Away With The Evil Apartment Leasing Commission
Let’s come up with a good and fair market rate [inclusive of assumed commissions] and be done. It takes the angst out of the picture and leaves everyone to focus on killing people with kindness and good service.
Any thoughts on the subject – would love to read them in the comment box below.
Your – ready to do away with the sacred cow apartment leasing commission – multifamily maniac,
M
Pic props: 365 Prepaid
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