CLASS Leasing: Holiday Apartment Decorating

It's that time of the year to unpack all of those holiday decorations and turn your apartment into a shrine for Christmas! Decorating an apartment is usually no easy task, because you have to get a little more creative without the use of a front yard. Therefore, more decorating efforts should be geared towards the interior of your home, but make sure not to forget to take some time to string those Christmas lights on the balcony or porch. Here are some useful websites to give you additional ideas to help with your holiday decorating:
Decorating A Smaller Apartment For Christmas
Decorating Your Small Apartment
Decorating Your Balcony For Christmas

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Holiday Events

This is typically the time of the year that many apartment communities count their losses and plan on having a "slow leasing" season. Less outreach marketing is usually executed, because it is viewed as being done for nothing and fewer resident events are planned to work towards resident referrals, since no one is looking to move. These thoughts are huge misconceptions and can be detrimental to the upcoming productivity an apartment can see come the early spring time. Just because it is cold does not mean that there are not people moving, because there are always individuals looking to move all year long! If anything there should be a boost in outreach marketing during the winter time, in order to capture every piece of traffic possible. There should be more resident events planned, so residents will be more inclined to invite potential prospects to boost resident referral move-ins. With that being said I have compiled a list, with the help of Resident Events, Multifamily Insiders and Rent Soda, of great holiday community ideas to keep those residents happy and keep that traffic flowing all through the holiday season:

1. Post holiday door hangers on each residents door wishing them a Happy Holidays
2. Schedule Christmas caroling gatherings for residents
3. Have volunteer Christmas present wrappings in the clubhouse for those that are wrapping challenged individuals
4. Hold a kid's night in the clubhouse to allow parents to finish their Christmas shopping in the early evening and not have to worry about getting a baby-sitter
5. Host a resident Christmas dinner in the clubhouse, in which every resident brings some sort of food
6. Sponsor any kind of community service project (i.e., Clothing drive; food drive; toy drive; blanket drive; Salvation Army bell ringers; soup kitchen volunteers; etc.)
7. Instead of just accepting packages in the clubhouse, deliver the packages to the residents in the evenings as a little gift delivery
8. Offer doorstep recycling pick-up for all of the empty package boxes and used wrapping paper
9. Turn the clubhouse into the North Pole with a visit from Santa for any children looking to have their picture taken
10. Put-on a cookie exchange social or a pie mingle, in the clubhouse, in which every resident brings a dozen cookies, or pie, of their choice and have eggnog for the adults
11. Hold a Christmas card contest for all of the children in the community
12. Have a "decorate your balcony" contest
13. Put-on a wreath making event and invite all residents to the clubhouse to learn how to decorate/make a wreath
14. Holiday movie night in the clubhouse/movie room showing any Christmas movie favorite

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Winter Resident Contest

With winter just right around the corner, it is time to switch gears when it comes to resident retention and attracting prospect ideas. One great contest idea either for a resident prize giveaway, or a nice opportunity to offer a prize concession to a prospect is...a snowman building contest! What better way to take advantage of living in an area where there is a large abundance of wintery mix and get residents/prospects involved than constructing unique and festive Frostys'! Announce this as a resident referral game allowing residents to invite friends and I guarantee you there will be a large turnout.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Facebook Facts

Since I just finished reading the Social Network, which I absolutely recommend, I thought it would be interesting to share some impressive statistics about Facebook. When reading these numbers keep in mind that Facebook was created only 6 years ago...

-There are more than 500 million active users on Facebook
-50% of active users log on to Facebook in any given day
-The average user has 130 friends
-People spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook
-About 70% of Facebook users are outside the United States
-The average user is connected to 80 community pages, groups and events
-It's estimated there will be over 630 million users by 2011
-There are only two countries, China and India, that have larger populations

Incredible.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Resident Events

I wanted to do a blog today about some great resident event ideas for the Holiday Season, so like any other search I ever perform, I started with Google. Upon maneuvering my way through the search results, I came across a website that I had never heard of that was linked into Multifamily Insiders. The website is actually called www.residentevents.com and was created by Multifamily Insiders as a way for property managers to search all of the great resident event ideas that have been posted on multifamilyinsiders.com that tend to get lost in the archive. This website and Facebook page are packed full of events that will get residents involved, which will therefore encourage not only resident retention, but also resident referral. Browse through both and see what you can find!

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: Holiday Season Marketing Idea

With Christmas right around the corner, it is time to start making an extra push to get those leases before the holiday season is in full force. There is no such thing as a "slow season," but only a time of the year where you must market a little harder to drive those prospects in the door. With that being said here is a great holiday marketing idea that you can utilize for the season.
Candy canes are very inexpensive treats that are extremely popular this time of the year. Since this candy is basically only recognizable this time of the year, why not use them as a marketing tool? Purchase a large amount of candy canes, as well as ribbon, and design a holiday festive quarter page flyer with your property's information on it. When you've put together the candy canes with your property's flyer, distribute them to any place where people may gather for holiday events, or any place where children may be (i.e., Christmas tree lightings in town center; malls where Santa's may be; day cares; elementary schools; etc.)
Most places should be more than receptive to this holiday treat, because everyone loves a candy cane this time a year!

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing

CLASS Leasing: If You Think Your Apartment Is Small...

There are two big complaints that you will always here from prospects, regardless of what part of the country you are in: price and size of the apartment. In terms of price, the apartment could be offered for free and someone would say that it is too expensive. The apartment could also be 3,000 square feet and someone would ultimately say that it is too small. This is a common occurrence everywhere, so the next time someone objects to one of these two things, just think of this article and smile.

Enjoy!

CLASS Leasing