Q&A from a very unique property about resident satisfaction

Dear Resident Keepers,

I manage patient housing. One residence is for bone marrow transplant cases. We have 70 units, but the patients are required to remain in isolation as much as they can, because their immune systems are compromised. Any ideas on how to build community behind closed doors?

Sincerely,

Want a community

Hi Want a community,

This is a situation that I have never thought about. I’m so grateful that you decided to write in. I’m always up for a challenge. First of all my heart goes out to anyone that is forced to be in isolation most of their day and I definitely desire to help you come up with some solutions that would be beneficial to them. If you were to call me in and say Talisa you have two weeks to turn this around I would do the following.

1.    Assess who’s who and what’s what? (from a higher level): I would get a general idea from you of who lives in what unit, what their age, sex, medical restrictions and level of mobility is etc.

2.    Go straight to the source: I would do surveys and interviews with every single resident on the property to find out who they are, who were they before the illness, what do they miss most now that they have restrictions? I’d find out if they have any ideas for making life more enjoyable. I’d offer suggestions. I’d dig in and plot the entire time figuring out whom I could match with whom and how I could create individual and very specific bonds. Not only would I consider resident matches I would figure out if any outside sources within the neighborhood could be of benefit.

3.    Recruit Leaders: It wouldn’t take me long to scout out the natural leaders and community organizers at your facility. I’d figure out who would be good at organizing, speaking, writing, creating, drawing, knitting….I don’t know, the sky is the limit. Remember I believe in allowing people to tell me what it is that they desire. This could be extremely limited or not. That’s the joy in doing the research and being resourceful and don’t forget thinking outside of the box. If there is a will there is a way!

4.    Create Plans: This again is where I hold on to all of the information I’ve gathered. We would have to be careful being mindful of medical conditions and time restraints but with careful thought, consideration and planning we could create some bonds; one on ones, groups of four, same sex, unisex…the sky is the limit.

For example; perhaps Jane in room 3B has the same condition as Mary down in 32 C and they both expressed the fact that they were once World travelers. How hard would it be to set up time for tea for the two of them once per week on the same day at the same time. This not only gives them an emotional bond it gives them something to look forward to from week to week; not to mention the serotonin boost that will take place as they share their old travel stories. 

Now this is just one of countless possibilities that could be created within this community. Don’t forget how valuable technology is. You could set up online games for them all to play together or even utilize Skype, gotomeeting and other social sites so that they could chat and still have the face to face interaction.

These few ideas make me excited for your residents because it gets right to the core of why I created Resident Keepers. Every little thing wants to be loved and we were created to be amongst each other and to feed off of each other. This should be your train of thought throughout this process.

5.    Execute: Just do it! One day at a time create activities, think outside the box, build bonds and improve the quality of your resident’s lives.

I hope that I’ve sparked a fire within you…or better yet added fuel to the fire that you already have because the fact that you took the initiative to write us tells me it’s there. Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions or concerns or even decided that you need our help. Either way, keep in touch. I’d love to hear about your success after implementing this plan.

All the best,

Talisa Lavarry

Founder-Resident Keepers

The Lemonade Project-An Annual Entrepreneurial Event for Your Little Residents

Family friendly properties could truly benefit from adopting a practice of hosting what I like to call “Parties with Purpose” especially when it comes to hosting events for children.

One of my all time fave summer events is one I like to call The Annual Lemonade Project. This event can take up to about a three to six week commitment but believe it or not it takes very little effort to pull off and gives your residents something special to look forward to year after year.

With careful planning, delegation and creativity this will raise the morale within your property for a long time coming.

The Lemonade Project is a fun and exciting lesson in entrepreneurship for the children on your property. It is designed to not only get them involved with their neighbors but to teach them lessons about teamwork, creativity, service and more. The objective is to bring the children together to create their own lemonade stand that will be open for business for one day every year for your residents.

The first thing you want to do is create a schedule. You will need to work backwards and figure out important dates and times as you have to know exactly where you are going with this and when before you present it.

Let’s say you decided on May 3^rd that you wanted to start hosting this event on your property. You would need to give yourself at least a week or maybe two depending on your current resident participation to invite the parents and children out to your “Original planning and kick-off meeting”.

For the sake of keeping things simple I’ve created a mock schedule with explanations for you to review as we move along.

May 3rd	Decide to do the project
May 5th	Announce Kick off meeting on www.myvirtualneighbor.com and via flyers
May 15th	Host Kick-off meeting

During the Kick-off meeting you would explain the project, assign roles, set dates and begin the initial planning of the project. You will want to assign the following roles to participants.

Marketing Director

Marketing Assistants

Operations Manager

Builders

Designers

Customer Service Managers

Finance Director (No worries, it’s all play money)

Sales staff

Hosts

Clean up Crew

Keep in mind that none of this has to be written in stone as we can’t predict the number of participants you will have and you can put your own spin on it even including adult help in some areas, perhaps making the children director. The point is to talk to the children about these different roles and what they mean. You may even assign multiple roles to multiple children depending on your individual situation.

At this meeting you will decide the theme, colors, set-up. Let your minds go wild. Perhaps you could have already purchased samples of decorations and could allow them to vote which décor they choose to use or you could just throw some ideas out there. Perhaps you will hold another meeting where they will create all of the décor themselves…kinda like an arts and crafts party. This is totally up to you.

When you all leave the first meeting you should have delegated all the roles, come up with a theme, name etc. and have a schedule and plan in hand for the upcoming weeks including the marketing plan, building and décor schedule and official date for the final Lemonade Stand day.

Below I’ve drawn the schedule out a bit more in order to give you a visual.

May 3rd	Decide to do the project
May 5th	Announce Kick off meeting on www.myvirtualneighbor.com and via flyers
May 15th	Host Kick-off meeting
May 20th	Lemonade Stand Flyers and play money due for approval
May 22nd	Marketing team starts distributing flyers and marketing online etc.
May 28th	Décor is purchased or created and approved
May 30th	Build and decorate stand
June 1st	The Lemonade Project is open for business

Now the schedule I’ve written is just enough to get your wheels spinning. Take out what you will and add what you will. Physically meet or don’t meet as often as you feel you need to. Do with this what you believe you need to do with it in order to make it successful.

The only thing left to do now is host a great event. Happy Planning!

Talisa Lavarry

Founder

Resident Keepers LLC

What NOT to do with Social Media in Multi-family Marketing

Ever heard the saying, “What goes on in this house stays in this house?” Well there’s a reason it has been and will always be a favorite quote. Personal issues are just that…. PERSONAL. Involving outsiders in things that could and should be resolved within is a recipe for disaster and as successful property managers a disaster of any kind is the last thing you desire.

The other day I found myself scrolling through facebook and I stumbled upon a status posted by a property employee announcing that flyers would be put out soon regarding an upcoming pool party.

While I get the point that they were targeting their marketing initiative from both perspectives…paper and internet, I saw an opportunity for more clear and most importantly private communication. I instantly thought to myself, they need to get their residents signed up for My Virtual Neighbor www.myvirtualneighbor.com.

As I continued to scroll I noticed that they also used the page to post announcements about rent being late and the water system being down. I freaked! Yes, if you know me by now you know that I get quite dramatic about things like this.

I immediately sent them a message letting them know what I’d observed…no I didn’t approach them like I was freaked out, I calmed down first and kept in mind that the reason most opportunities are missed is the fact that we often times don’t see things for what they are when we are in the thick of it. That’s why I love the idea of coming in with fresh eyes offering a new perspective.

What I love most about My Virtual Neighbor http://www.myvirtualneighbor.com/is that it gives your residents a private space to discuss all the things that the public does not need to know. I honestly would suggest not telling anyone outside of the late payers themselves that anyone’s rent is ever late…. private discussion board or not. I could go into a whole other spill about this but I’ll address it later.

If the water is out or the pool is being remodeled My Virtual Neighbor is the perfect space to share the news in privacy while things are in transition.

Your public facebook page should be more so geared towards attracting perspective clients and should be used for displaying finished results. For example you would come on and post before and after pics of a remodeled pool or pictures of smiling residents and a beautiful spread of food from a successful resident party. There is no need for potential residents to see you in action while attempting to produce results. You should be focusing on wowing them with final results.

My Virtual Neighbor http://www.myvirtualneighbor.com/is a free service and proposes to be a huge asset for property managers seeking more effective communication with and amongst their residents. Log on today to learn more about this amazing new feature or feel free to contact me directly and I’ll walk you through the process.

By Talisa Lavarry
Founder
Resident Keepers LLC

The #1 Secret to Rockstar Retention

Lucky you!

You’ve just stumbled upon some good stuff. I’m gonna tell you the absolute number 1 secret to creating, maintaining and maximizing a rock star retention plan. Are you ready??? Come closer, this is worth gold….can’t just let anybody hear it. It’s one word….FOCUS. That’s it, you can turn your retention rate completely around by focusing on it. Sounds too simple? I figured you’d say that so let me explain. I’m gonna borrow some principles from the great Tony Robbins that I like to apply when I’m monitoring property retention; and if you know Tony Robbins you know that he takes you through processes step by step so here goes.

Step 1: GET CLEAR-This should be the start of any project or exercise, business or personal. Assess the situation. Add up what you have and figure out what you need. Determine where you are and make up your mind about where you are going.

Step 2: GET EXCITED- You know as well as I know that when you get excited the energy flows in ways unimaginable and if you are leading the initiatives the excitement rubs off on everyone else involved including your residents. There should be excitement in your retention planning from start to finish!

Step 3: GET THE BEST- That’s right the best support staff, the best outside help (clears throat and points at my domain www.residentkeepers.com). Recruit the best and most loyal residents to be on your resident retention team, then find the best restaurants and best recreational activities in your neighborhood to build strategic alliances with. No need to reinvent wheels where they are already good and rolling….align yourself with the best for the best results.

STEP 4: TAKE ACTION-So you’ve assessed things and made the plans, you’ve even gathered the help that you need, I call it putting a team behind your dream. Now there’s nothing left to do but to do it. Now the it can be tricky because I believe there are NO cookie cutter answers for resident retention. You have to give your residents the opportunity and the privilege to tell you what they want and need. This is the very thing that you base your actions on over and over again. If you do all of these things listed then you have every right to the next and final step.

STEP 5: CELEBRATE-Oh yea baby! We all love to win especially when we’ve worked hard, so grab all of those that helped you reach your goal and party hard!

For more info like this and free tips on creating effective resident retention plans sign up for our mailing list at www.residentkeepers.com