How Remote Work Is Impacting Property Management Maintenance | Part 2



Summary:

The Property Management Show is back this week to continue our conversation with Ray Hespen of Property Meld. In the last episode, we talked about property management maintenance trends and increasing costs. Today, we’re mostly talking about how property managers can position themselves to have effective conversations with owners about maintenance.

Key Takeaways:

* Talk to owners openly about the fact that maintenance costs are rising. Explain that it’s happening everywhere – not just to them. Communicate. Educate. Don’t leave them to draw their own conclusions.

* It’s costly to lose owners, and to keep them your message needs to be that you can help deliver better ROI, even with the property management fee.

* Owner engagement has to move beyond a simple monthly accounting statement. It needs to be a live updated and ongoing conversation.

* You can prioritize keeping costs down for owners while still making money on maintenance.

Property Management Messaging

We learned last week that a 10 percent increase in costs is likely to drive an owner away from property management in an effort to lower costs by doing it on their own.

Like all of us, most owners don’t like to admit when they’re wrong. So, even if they begin managing on their own and realize they can’t keep costs down, they’re unlikely to return to their property managers.

The property management industry needs to pivot when it comes to messaging.

Stop talking about obvious benefits to property management – like peace of mind.

Instead, the constant message needs to be that you can deliver better ROI by managing lower maintenance costs.

Talk to owners openly about the fact that maintenance costs are rising. Explain that it’s happening everywhere – not just to them. Talk about the things you can do that they can’t:

* Increased buying power

* Access to vendors they can’t access on their own

* Long term relationships with vendors and contractors and suppliers.

* Internal maintenance teams

You have to share the right message and you have to make sure your owners believe what you’re telling them. This is all about perception.

Your owners need to believe that even though prices are higher, you’re still doing it for less than they could do it. Communicate. Educate. Don’t leave them to draw their own conclusions.

Stepping Up Your Owner Engagement

It’s costly to lose owners, and to keep them your message needs to be that you can help deliver better ROI, even with the property management fee.

The only reason anyone wants to manage their own property is because they believe they can do it cheaper than a property manager. Your job is to change this perception. It has to be the conversation you have with existing owners and new owners.

Selling new owners on peace of mind isn’t wrong. It’s true that you deliver peace of mind and protect their investments. But, you have to tell them what else you do. ROI is what matters, and right now you’re losing clients and not getting new clients because of maintenance costs.

You have to address that.

There’s a huge landlord market in the U.S.

Check out these statistics from Ray:

* 8 million rental homes are professionally managed in the U.S.

* 23 million rental homes are self-managed by landlords.

Retaining clients and acquiring new clients line up together behind messaging. If the industry can show landlords that property managers maintain homes at a cost that’s better than what they’re doing, there won’t be a self-managing landlord left in the U.S.

Messaging includes knowing your audience and their hot button issues.

Throughout 2020, property managers had an opportunity to market themselves ...