CLASS Leasing: Thanksgiving

I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving!!

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Facebook As A Book?

I stumbled upon this ad and really cannot believe that no one has thought of doing this before. Of course it would be an ever changing book, but at the sametime, it was very nicely done by this company and is a very neat idea.

Enjoy and have a great weekend!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Marketing On Any Budget

There are many facets to marketing and how exactly they relate to the apartment industry. Marketing is neither something that should necessarily break the bank for a community, nor is it an area that even requires an exorbitant amount of funds in order to see results. With more and more prospects learning of apartment communities through social media and word of mouth, websites such as Craigslist, Twitter and Blogs are becoming more and more useful. In addition to these websites providing material about communities to the online viewers, they are all also 100% free. Marketing is an ever changing field, but here are some great areas to utilize resources to without having to spend a fortune in doing so.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Holiday Community Events

Getting actively involved in the community is always a great thing, especially around the upcoming holiday season. Since apartment communities have a large abundance of individuals in close proximity, this allows for a large number of people to become involved in any organized holiday activity. In addition to bringing an apartment community together, residents are able to bring friends and family into the mix to help out with these holiday events. Here is an article about ideas for numerous events for the upcoming holiday season!

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Let Your Residents Know You Care

There are many apartment communities out there that do all they can to get prospects to lease at their community and then those same individuals become nothing more than another rent paying tenant. Residents should be just that. They should feel like they are "residing" in a neighborhood and are apart of it, just as they would if they were living in a house on a cul-de-sac. By making residents feel like they are apart of something, this will not only make their living experience that much more enjoyable, but it will also increase the amount of resident referrals a community will receive. There are many things that you can do to add a neighborhood feel to a community, so make sure you're getting your residents involved and watch the positive attitudes that roll through the door!

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Maximizing Google Places

With today's prospects becoming more and more reliant upon online searching for apartment communities, we have began implementing more and more online material into the training course. One such site in particular that we have began to focus on is Google Place Page and what each prospect sees on each property's Place Page. It is important that all of the material on the page is accurate and up-to-date, because this page is typically, or should be, the first page that pops up when a community is searched. Jay Ehret put together a great tutorial about managing a Place Page and allows you the ability to maximize the page's potential.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Keeping A Positive Attitude

To get you through the mid-week lull, here is 10 tips, courtesy of Jim Baumgartner of Rentsoda.com, that are guaranteed to improve your mood and let you radiate that positive mental attitude!

"1. Attitude change. Many scientists theorize that we have the power to catch happiness. In fact, often we are the cause of our own unhappiness. How often do we take the negative spin on an event—be it an election, a co-worker’s action or a series of red lights. When you feel a rush of negativity stop and ask yourself what the positive side of the event is.
2. Watch your self talk—the majority of what we tell ourselves is negative. Self talk is the chatter that goes on inside ourselves; it is how we talk to ourselves. Know that you can handle everything that comes your way. When you own this attitude and learn to trust your ability, you will see these difficult situations as a challenge instead of as a threat. Do your thoughts make you happy?
3. Practice gratitude. When I feel a funk coming on, I stop and start listing all of the things that make me thankful—no matter how small. I am amazed at how quickly I snap out of it. No matter how bleak the horizon, I always discover that I have a long list.
4. So life isn’t fair—or is it? Several years ago my brother pointed to a neighbor’s beautiful house with two luxury cars parked in the drive and commented, “They are golden. Nothing bad has ever happened to them.” I suspect that we all have trials and tribulations that will make us who we are supposed to become. Some of us had our ‘classes’ early; others will have to go to summer school. If you are going through a trial right now, ask yourself, “Okay, what am I supposed to learn from this” and then get the lesson done! Who wants a retest?
5. I am responsible for my HAPPY! Own it. The next big promotion, gift, etc. will not make you happy. If you are not happy now, no job, thing or person will make you happy. What can you do for yourself that will enhance your happiness?
6. Live in the now. There has been a lot of writing about practicing mindfulness and living in the now. It really is powerful. Let tomorrow unfold and quit worrying about what you didn’t do or what you did to screw up today. We always have a second chance, you can’t change the past, enjoy today and tomorrow will unfold.
7. Think of others. Get out of our head and focus on someone else. Helping others puts your problems in perspective and increases your happiness.
8. Find meaning in your life. What gives you purpose? People who are strongly spiritual are better able to cope with difficulties and are generally happier.
9. Expect the best. You get what you expect. If you expect the worst you will rarely be disappointed.
10. Be kind to yourself. Practice some good habits:
-Get enough sleep. Most of us cheat our sleep to get more done. However, our lack of sleep often impedes quick or quality work.
-Find something to laugh at. Researchers at the University of California did a study in which a group of men watched a funny video. Their levels of stress hormones dropped significantly while their pleasure-inducing endorphin levels rose 27percent and growth hormone levels rose 87 percent.
-Do one thing at a time. Most of us are proud of our ability to multi task; however, studies show that this increases our blood pressure.
-Say no to activities that you do not enjoy. This will relieve you of the added stress and free up more time to do what makes you happy.
-Build and participate in community. Numerous studies have shown that those of us with an active social circle are happier and more fulfilled.
-Minimized the ‘little boxes’ in your life. My friend, Theresa Rose (http://www.theresarose.net), talks about getting rid of life’s time-wasters: television, cell phones, computers, video games, etc. Not only do these things sap your energy (she refers to them as ‘Mojo-busters’), they rob you of your most precious gift: time. (And while you are at it, skip the news for a while. Have you ever noticed what a downer that is?)
-Breathe deeply and get outside: bike, hike or garden. If you have a dog, walk it. Did you know that pets buffer stress better than spouses do? Aromatherapy can be beneficial too. (Rosemary makes you more alert and lowers your anxiety. Lavender increases the brain waves that indicate heightened relaxation.)
-Do things to reduce stress in your life (exercise, expressing creativity, maintaining supportive friendships, keep an organized home—a refuge or safe place, etc.)"

Enjoy and have a great Wednesday!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Amenities And Your Prospects

This summer Apartment Guide released a list of the Top 15 amenities that prospects searched for on ApartmentGuide.com. Although this list can't be used as a guide for all apartment prospects and will definitely vary depending on property type and location, it is still an interesting list nonetheless. The surprising thing about this list is the fact that the "bells and whistles" amenities (i.e., Fitness Center and Swimming Pool) are at the very bottom of the list! This proves a terrific point that prospects are looking for things that pertain directly to their actual apartment, because that is where they will be spending all of their time. Here is what Apartment Guide prospects were searching for:

1. Washer and Dryer in Apartment
2. Pets Allowed
3. Air Conditioning
4. Some Paid Utilities
5. Washer and Dryer Connections
6. Dishwasher
7. Balcony
8. Garage
9. Cable Ready
10. Furnished Available
11. Fitness Center
12. Swimming Pool
13. Short Term Lease Available
14. Gated Access
15. Oversized Closets

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Virtual Reputation

Here is another interesting read about the growing topic of handling one's online reputation and not allowing the reputation to be made by disgruntled residents, or others with ill-intentions. This will only continue to become more and more of a necessity for a property to acknowledge and not view the online reputation as a mere formality, or something not worth addressing.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Prospect Demographics

Here is an interesting read from Multifamily Executives about the misconceptions that may be had with three very popular demographics in today's apartment industry.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Apartment Search Engines

With all of the apartment related websites around, it can be a headache keeping up with which ones your property should be listed in. Therefore, I wanted to figure out which apartment search sites were the most highly used by prospects when searching for a new apartment. This would not only be interesting to determine, but it would also be benefecial for a property that is on a tight budget and can only afford to list with a few sites. According to PR Newswire here are the Top Ten apartment search sites for the first quarter of 2010:

1. Rent.com
2. Craigslist.org
3. Apartments.com
4. 4walls.net
5. Forrent.com
6. ApartmentFinder.com
7. Move.com
8. ApartmentGuide.com
9. MyNewPlace.com
10. Google Maps

Pretty interesting list when you consider that two of the top ten (Craigslist.org and Google Maps) are absolutely free to be listed on.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Handling Online Reviews

Here are some additional tips and steps to handling online reviews, courtesy of Mark Juleen:

"1. Respond

- Create an email account like satisfaction@ or info@ that you can use to create an account at ApartmentRatings.com or other sites. Have that email address forward to a central marketing or cust. satisfaction person that can forward the alerts and notices to the appropriate parties. (Be sure to consult with your CIO, Dir. of Communications, or Dir. of Marketing about create online user names)
- Take time to respond to reviews about your properties. Thank people for taking the time to write a review and respond appropriately.
- Apologize when necessary (even if the customer is wrong), and share the email address where they can further discuss their concerns.
- Don't have your on site teams do the responding. Have a dedicated corporate person (ie- regional, etc.) respond as they won't take negatives so personally.
- The idea is to show others that may read the review that you are listening and care, and to attempt to take the conversation away from the review forum by suggesting other channels of communication.
- If you haven't responded before, respond to at least the most recent 3-5 reviews for the property.
- If the review is from someone Anonymous, don't feel obligated to engage further than thanking them for the review and directing them to discuss further at the email address you share in the response.
- Avoid getting into a debate online with a customer. Try to respond just one time, and if you need to write a follow-up response direct the person to engage with you at your email address.

2. Monitor

- Be sure to set up Google Alerts for your property names, and your management company name.
- By replying to reviews on ApartmentRatings.com you can then subscribe to future reviews.

3. Survey

- Don't just sit back and wait for the unsolicited feedback. Survey your customers yourself to get a pulse on how you are doing. Online reviews won't be as shocking if you already know what some issues are.
- Include surveys or feedback forms on your resident portals and/or websites.
- Utilize old school comment cards for service/maintenance feedback.

4. Encourage Online Reviews

- No, I'm not suggesting you "game" the system by asking all your favorite residents to leave a review. However, make it known to everyone where they can leave online reviews.
- NEVER pay for reviews
- Include links to review sites on your website or in email messages. I recommend including links only to review platforms that do not allow anonymous posts. (Sorry ApartmentRatings.com you're off that list.)

5. DON'T JUST IGNORE IT

- I think it is a mistake to ignore reviews. While some of the reviews you will get are not necessarily a great summary of what your property is about, that doesn't mean you can ignore them.
- Keep an open mind and investigate. In the end, you know where you stand on an issue, and you can choose what types of responses (if any) are necessary.
- It's better to leave a response than do nothing at all. (ie- "Thank you for your review. So we can further assist you please contact us at satisfaction@blahapartments.com.")

In general, embrace the feedback. While it's not all easy to swallow, it can be an eye opener. Some of it will be exaggerated and untrue, but don't let it get to you and at least show that you are listening. Use it as a tool to build a better business and better processes."

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: MUST READ Regarding Craigslist Changes

I have been slowly updating everyone on all of the changes that Craigslist has put into place just recently, but up until now, I have not heard the specifics about the changes. This article was just posted Friday on Multifamily Insiders regarding all of the new policies that Craigslist has put into affect. Since we rely heavily on Craigslist for driving in great traffic, everyone please read this article, so none of these things begins happening to your postings.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing