5 Ways Property Managers Can Improve Resident Retention

Building long-term, positive relationships with apartment residents is a primary goal of any affordable property management organization. Poor resident retention means spending more of your budget on new leads and costly processing measures.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Property management software can dramatically improve resident retention rates and make property management duties and responsibilities more affordable and effective.

Let’s explore how.

#1: Upgrade Communication Channels

Communication is fundamental in the relationship between management and tenants. Poor communication leads to tenants feeling ostracized, unable to raise their concerns, and ultimately likely to look elsewhere. Meanwhile, needless overcommunication gives tenants the impression that you're watching their every move, even if you don't mean to give off this impression.

Happy residents know their property manager is there whenever they need them and is actively interested in maintaining their property. So how do you achieve this?

Finding a Balance

The first step is to identify the most relevant communication goals. It is essential to understand when your residents want to hear from you and when they can benefit from feeling independent.

Whenever you’re planning to communicate, ask yourself:

• Does the tenant need to hear this?

• Will knowing this make them happy?

• Is our organization spending time and money issuing needless communications?

Communication should always be relevant. Most residents don’t want to chat—they want competent, effective property management. Taking measures to ensure you aren’t bothering otherwise happy residents with needless, costly communications is a huge step toward increasing resident retention.

Understanding Concerns

The most important property manager duties and responsibilities involve listening. If a tenant is frequently communicating with you and you can’t figure out what they want, it’s time to flag this as a priority.

There are two possible cases:

1. You’re missing something. Check with every member of your team who has contacted this tenant. Find out as much as you can about the communication history and why the resident keeps raising concerns. This might help you identify a solution.

2. The tenant is being unreasonable. Unfortunately, this is sometimes the case. However, communication is also the answer. A full review of your correspondence with a problematic tenant can give you grounds to issue a warning that they need to stop or they’ll have to move. This can save your organization time and money that could be spent on ensuring that you’re giving happy residents the service they deserve.

Having accurate, easily accessible logs of interactions with residents is vital. Let’s find out how property management software can help you solve this issue.

Implementing Property Management Software to Improve Communication

The bespoke property management software provided by ExactEstate is designed to optimize communication with tenants and build resident retention. A key factor is the Resident Portal - this means that residents can communicate concerns through the appropriate channels. Their requests will be dealt with quickly and effectively rather than passed around the office.

High-quality software can reduce the money and time you invest in your property manager duties. Automated services can also help you keep track of your tenants and deal with their concerns more efficiently.

#2: Train Staff on the Organization’s Goals

The importance of your staff can’t be overstated when it comes to resident retention. If you could answer every query in person, would you? Of course, you would. But your staff are the first voices your residents hear when they call you, and those voices matter so much. 

Why We’re Here

Consistent resident retention relies on happy residents and happy staff. If a resident calls up and hears a disgruntled voice that doesn’t want to listen to their concerns, they’ll look for the first moving van out of there.

Your staff needs to understand how their jobs make a difference and why their contributions are valued. This means implementing good staff training practices that focus on the end product rather than simple procedures.

This helps reaffirm your staff's role in making a difference for happy residents and ensures that your tenants get a good response when they call.

Staff Should Know Tenants

Another advantage of using property management software, specifically ExactEstate, is keeping detailed electronic files for each property you manage. This acts as a memory aid for staff and helps them build familiarity with residents.

This familiarity is so important—residents want to feel known by the people taking care of them. Property management software can help your team members develop an effective rapport with residents, leading to improved resident retention.

#3: Streamline Maintenance Responses

Addressing maintenance issues should be the bread and butter of any property management organization. However, too many organizations struggle to keep track of effectively prioritizing the most urgent maintenance needs. This can make tenants feel abandoned or unheard and are a poison pill for resident retention.

The property management software from ExactEstate helps you assign priority to urgent cases and keep track of which issues have been addressed. It also makes it simpler to get in touch with the appropriate contractors and schedule dates that work for all parties.

More streamlined, efficient maintenance responses help by:

• Improving resident retention - if tenants’ concerns are addressed promptly, their faith in you will be much higher!

• Reducing the cost of labor - efficient management of maintenance needs means that not only do your staff spend less time addressing repetitive issues, but you don’t end up sending out a contractor twice for no reason.

• Reducing the chance of expensive damages—High-priority issues such as leaks need to be addressed immediately. They can cause significant structural damage that is expensive to repair and demoralizes tenants.

Using software to help with your property manager duties and responsibilities can make you more effective and help your organization cut costs. This is a huge boost to resident retention.

#4: Address Problems Before They Arise

When a tenant moves out of a property, you should be asking yourself two questions:

1. Why did the tenant leave?

2. What can be changed to improve resident retention next time?

The space between a resident leaving and attracting a new lead is the ideal time for reflection. If you arrange a thorough inspection and address issues, it pays you back in the long term. You’ll avoid expensive repairs when problems don’t fix themselves, and improved resident retention saves you from processing costs.

You can arrange annual or bi-annual inspections to identify issues tenants might hesitate to raise. Always encourage residents to raise issues - you’ll only have to address them later when they’re worse and more expensive.

Happy residents know that they’re being cared for. It’s not just part of your property manager's duties and responsibilities. It’s cost-effective and can be made so much easier by scheduling via the property management software provided by ExactEstate.

#5: Make Payments Easier

Payments should be easy to make on time. Modern property management software can make keeping payments up easier for your residents - nobody enjoys making a late payment. Feeling consistent helps your tenants become more consistent.

Using bespoke software from ExactEstate makes payments easier for your tenants and cheaper for you to process. The software reduces processing costs and helps guide your tenants through the relevant payments whenever they need to be made. This means they won’t miss deadlines and feel more in control, substantially improving resident retention—it helps everyone.

Final Thoughts

Resident retention is the endgame—keep it in sight. Every step you can take to achieve it deserves to be treated with the utmost respect, whether improving communication or boosting staff morale.

You can request a demo at any time to learn more about how property management software from ExactEstate helps boost resident retention in the multifamily and affordable housing industries. If you are interested in reading more like this, subscribe to our blog.