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A new approach to Resident Retention

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A new approach to Resident Retention

 

According to SatisFacts, when residents were asked what can be done to improve the community, Social Activities was ranked 29 out of 30. Some may take this info and think to themselves….OK, let’s do away with the activity budget but a forward thinker would ask why?

The truth of the matter is it doesn’t take a survey or any written research or documentation to admit that the majority of us in this human race love to be social. I’d also like to suggest that it doesn’t take stepping outside of yourself to know what draws you to certain social activities, gatherings, groups, etc. Well the same thing goes for your residents. They know what they like to do, why they like to do it and for the most part how to go about doing it. What they don’t know is that it’s OK for them to do these things amongst themselves within your apartment community and how to go about getting started. This is where you come in.

Have you considered rather than trying to be an expert on good events becoming an expert on finding out exactly what your residents want when it comes to being social and giving them an outlet to do so?

Think about it. What if you stopped planning events and started planning to truly get to know your residents? This totally takes the guess work out of trying to figure out how to entertain them. It also shows them that you have a sincere interest in their personal desires and it allows them to be active and creative creating the environment that they want to live in.

This is a no brainer. Different, out of the box and possibly time consuming at first but definitely worth the investment. Let’s take a look at the chain reaction that comes along with my proposed strategy.

• You begin to question the residents about what they would like to do.
• You begin to engage the residents more including them in the planning and execution of events and activities while making sure they are aware of basic fair housing laws when necessary.
• You begin to make personal introductions to like minded residents while encouraging ongoing connections and offering them an environment that allows them to interact with each other.
• Residents feel important and valued by you.
• Residents feel connected to each other and begin to form sincere bonds.
• Residents begin planning events, groups, and meetings etc. for themselves while your manpower is not being affected.
• Your property takes on a very unique culture that sticks for many years to come with less and less management and leg work required as time goes on.
• Your satisfaction and retention rates go up as your community is happy and well connected.

For more tips on taking an innovative approach to resident retention and satisfaction log onto www.residentkeepers.com and sign up for our mailing list.

Talisa Lavarry
Founder
Resident Keepers LLC.

 

Quotes from our Founder

Consistency and Persistence in Your Resident Retention Approach

Last week I distributed a blog about insanity and reminded you all of how insane it was to keep doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. Someone posed a question to me about when and how to identify, or let’s say self diagnose oneself as insane.

Basically what they wanted me to specify was the difference between insanity and good old persistence and consistency. There is a difference and it is very important to be aware and careful when making the determination.

A large number of businesses of all kind literally do not make it because they lack persistence and consistency. Perhaps many of them suffered from feelings of insanity or even had to deal with hearing such from colleagues and family members so they eventually gave up.

Today I want to talk about the differences and help you to determine if you are in fact insane or if you are fighting the good fight, planting beneficial seeds and waiting for a harvest.

The first thing to do is assess the situation.

What are you attempting to make work? Has it been done before? Have you done the proper research? Is your audience even the least bit interested? Are you setting a realistic goal?

Once you’ve answered all of these questions you may have your answer, if not move on to step two which is to assess your progress. This can be done by asking yourself one question. Are you getting anything from your efforts? Let’s talk about event attendance. If your property just started making an effort to host monthly events then you may find yourself struggling to get the attendance up but don’t throw in the towel on your strategy if you see the numbers increasing each month. This is where persistence and consistency comes into play.

You’ve assessed the situation and discovered that what you are doing makes sense, then you’ve assessed your progress and you see that it is at the very least working. This tells me that you are not insane. This tells me that all you need is to remain enthusiastic and to continue strong in your efforts.

I’m reminded of Thomas Edison. Talk about tenacity, this guy attempted to make his dream of the light bulb work 10,000 times.  The important part to remember is he didn’t redo his experiment the exact same way every time. He took what worked, threw out what didn’t work and kept plugging away at his dream. Had he continued to do it as always never learning from his mistakes I doubt I’d be mentioning him at all today. Another thing to remember is that had he given up the later would still be the same. 

This brings me back around to the point I made a few weeks ago. Don’t throw out the idea of resident events all together. Think about it, they do yield benefits…. the question is, how do you make your efforts worthwhile? Or better yet, how can you connect residents socially in a more effective way.

Innovation is good when it comes to things like this but not only do you have to be innovative to be successful you definitely want to be consistent and persistent.

For more info on resident retention and satisfaction log onto www.residentkeepers.com

You're not an INSANE Property Mananger are you?

The definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. If you’re a property manager that just goes with the flow operating in auto-pilot mode doing what you have to do just to get by and collect a salary then you’re not the property manager I’m looking to share information with; however if you are passionate about your career and passionate about your residents then I have news for you. You cannot keep doing what you’ve always done exactly the way you’ve always done it and expect to be the cream that rises to the top.

I facilitate a self-help coaching practice where I am constantly encouraging Women to push their existence to the limits. To do the things they’ve always dreamed of doing and to live extraordinary lives. I love how those concepts flow right into the message that I have to share with the multi-family industry.

It is my intention to light a fire under any and every one that will allow me to in order to get them to reach their full potential.

When it’s all said and done being the best and rising to the top often times takes taking risks. Those who dare to venture off into the unknown based on intuition, a gut feeling, research or whatever it is that drives them to it will reap the benefits of untapped success.

Why is it that so many feel like getting by and maintaining with absolutely no excitement, no thrill and no potential for greatness is enough? Why has contentment become the norm? Why do so many lack the confidence to be the first or to raise the standards or set the bar?

We could ponder over the question forever and while it bothers me I realize that the best thing I can do towards dissolving this mundane way of life is to have the courage to step up, speak out and offer solutions to other leaders who dare to be their best in all that they do.

My point is if you are doing anything less than reaching for the stars, taking risks and doing things differently while expecting your business to grow you are INSANE. It might not sound pretty and it may be a harsh truth but if you’ve been following me for a while you know that I have no issue with shaking you a bit in an attempt to remind you of your purpose.

STOP procrastinating, STOP doing what’s safe, STOP operating in fear and make some changes that yourself, your direct reports and your residents will all thank you for in the future.

Talisa Lavarry

Founder-Resident Keepers

Birds of a Feather and Residents of Like Mind

Birds of a feather flock together. You’ve heard it before and face it, you know it’s true. Those of like minds always find a way to get together. Those that are surrounded by those that don’t have like minds eventually wonder off and surround themselves with those that do. We’ve made it half way through 2012 and let me tell you this statement is truer today than ever before.

We live in an era where we have more access to likeminded individuals than ever and guess what? We’re becoming more and more comfortable with flying off to where ever we must to meet up with our tribe.

This new generation is not hesitating to do what they have to do to get acclimated with those who assist them with feeling like they belong and even more so like they are living their best lives.

Have you considered this in your thoughts and plans regarding retaining your residents? What if you are losing residents simply because they lack of feeling of connection and belonging? You do realize that if this is the case nine times out of ten you will never know.

What if you put practices in place that allowed you to more closely gauge your residents’ level of satisfaction? What if you were able to take more control in the area of actually engaging them? Well I’m here to tell you that you can.

It frustrates me to no end to see so many property managers continue to do the same thing over and over again expecting different results. In 2010 residents ranked “social activities” as #29 out of 30. I know personally that it wasn’t so much that residents don’t care about connecting socially it’s that they don’t care about managers hosting events that they may or may not hear about and expecting them to come out and have a blast with strangers.

We can’t throw away the idea of doing events all together we have to do it differently, better. We have to do it in a way that it is more effective.

Why are you hosting the particular events you’re hosting? Are you finding some grand idea in an on-line forum and just throwing out there hoping it will stick? Are you creating events based around your personal interests, likes and desires? Are you just doing what you did at your last property only to meet your quota?

Have you considered actually learning what it is that your residents want to do? You do realize that their schedules are all over the place and sometimes trying to get a large percentage of them to come together all at one time is practically impossible now a day? The new way to approach this is to help your residents create their own individual “events” on their own time and to support them and lead them in making this happens.

In a nut shell I’m saying that your residents need you to open the door and give them the OK to create the connections they seek when they seek them and with whom they would rather connect with. This takes a bit of time and focus but once you build this sense of community you will be relieved in knowing that social interaction is going on within your community constantly and not just at some random party that you decide to host.

Your like-minded residents want to meet each other. Be a property manager that cares to connect them. It will be a gift to them in more ways than you can imagine.

For more tips like this or to hire me to come out and assist you with creating communities within your community log onto www.residentkeepers.com