Hose Bib Lock
A few years ago, we took on management of a 5-unit apartment building in Westwood. Upon the management transition, we examined the property’s Profit & Loss Statement from past years and noticed an unusually high-water bill for only 5 units. We thought that this may be attributed to an unnoticed leak or running toilets so we thoroughly inspected each unit to see if we could find the culprit. In this inspection we did not find anything that would have led to water waste.
We continued to be on the look out and complete our weekly property walk-throughs. One week during a property walk-through we found one of the tenants excessively watering the property’s garden even though we had a weekly gardener come to the property and water all the plants sufficiently. Upon learning of where the excess water bill was coming from, we spoke with the tenant about the matter and installed hose bib locks as to restrict access to only those who should be using the property’s water. This weekly property walk-through led to the owner saving 20% on their water bill from the previous year.
Leasing for $200 above
We have had tremendous success with our marketing strategy for vacant units. As an example, we took on management of a property that had a recently renovated vacant unit. Before marketing the unit, we had a professional real estate specific photographer take pictures of the interior and exterior of the unit. We take these pictures as to present the units we manage in a better light and more professional manner than most rental marketing services.
After receiving the professional pictures, we ordered the pictures in an order that tells a story and wrote a detailed description about the best features of the area and the unit itself. We created an advertisement and starting the marketing process. The unique part about the way we marketed this property was that we directed prospective tenants to go to the same showing as to create as much competition as possible. We had a full house and the prospective tenants saw that there was a lot of parties interested in the unit. By creating an atmosphere in which there is the most competition possible, the prospective tenants feel that they need to act quickly and somehow make their offer better than the others.
That day we received three applications. One of the applications offered $200/month above the asking price for a two-year lease term. Our ability to create a competitive lease-up led to the most profitable outcome for the landlord.