An all too familiar term in the multifamily industry is a property lease-up. It’s the infamous period of time in which an apartment community begins the leasing process, starting at its construction all the way up to a year following its opening. Lease-ups are spectacular for the bottom line, but trust and believe, it may take quite a few trips around the rainbow to finally land on the pot of gold.
Though lease-ups are not for the feint at heart, and you may want to dive headfirst straight into the leasing phase, you should take a step back and begin your planning efforts, first.
Here are a few tips that you can use now to improve your chances of success in your lease-up process.
1. Establish your brand.
Anytime you’re introducing a brand new property to the masses, you’ll need to think long and hard about your brand and what/how you want to appear in the marketplace. Included in this process is first knowing who your target renters are. Try narrowing down your ideal renter, based on lifestyle, demographic, income, etc. This will help you streamline your research to learn more about this consumer segment so that you can later create targeted marketing efforts.
Aside from knowing your renter, you’ll need to determine your brand or market positioning. This is where you hone in on what differentiates your community from the competitors and why your ideal renter should choose you. The brand creation phase is also where you will develop your name, logo, and possible tagline.
2. Create a marketing strategy.
Once you’ve identified your target renters and pieced together the elements of your brand, you’ll need to next determine how you’re going to encourage your prospects to sign on the dotted line. As a lease-up, know that you do not have many of the strengths associated with established properties, like pictures or video, so you’ll have to exercise your creative juices even harder to help prospects visualize and buy in to life at your property.
A responsive website can handle many of these challenges for you. As the single most important branding and marketing tool at your disposal, your website will be the place where your prospects receive 95% of the information they need to make an informed decision on if they should seal the deal. Ensure your website includes valuable content, like pricing, square footage, layout, amenities, pictures (when available), etc. and relevant call-to-actions. Remember, this could be the only interaction your potential renters will have with your property, so make it count!
Apart from the website, you’ll also need to evaluate other advertising tactics, such as Google Ads, internet leasing sites, leasing specials/promotions, meet and greets, and local business partnerships to complement and send additional traffic to your site.
3. Think through the operations.
Once you’ve accomplished the first two feats, you’ll then want to think through some operational needs. For instance, how will you collect rent? Will you allow renters the ability to pay online through your website or in office only? What about maintenance requests? Will tenants need to call or deliver their issues to your office, or could they also perform this function online? Whichever you decide, you will also need to determine how your staff and systems will be set up to support these initiatives.
Rentbot can help.
Achieving your lease-up goals does not have to be a painful process. By partnering with Rentbot, we’ll take care of the largest piece of the puzzle for you—the website—so that you can focus on your operations. Because each Rentbot site is responsive, SEO optimized and custom designed to fit your community, your prospects will be able to find you in online and then pull you up on any device.
Additionally, Rentbot sites are designed with modernity and renter convenience in mind, so we’ve also included online rent payment capabilities, online maintenance requests and live contact portals to enhance your property’s leasing experience and give you the upper hand among your competitors.
Let Rentbot help you fulfill your lease-up goals, and use the extra time to “woosa.”
Get started today, and your first 30 days are free.
About the Author
Jonsette Calloway joined the Rentbot team in 2015. With a background in public relations, advertising and copywriting, she has helped a multitude of clients achieve their marketing and communications goals within various fields, but she particularly enjoys working with the apartment industry.