In our area, amongst several real estates mostly offering the “same old thing” in Property Management, the iPhone app Field Agent for routines is definitely one of our differences, as well as having an option for landlords to be paid weekly instead of monthly.

These are 2 small things but the iPhone app itself will make us stand out alot more. I love what you do in relation to vacant properties Brenda – nice customer service.

Maxine, we love that Field Agent is a winning tool for you. Hopefully in the not too distant future, property managers everywhere will be shaking their head in disbelief and saying “remember when we used to do inspections with a clipboard and a camera”!

Weekly rent disbursements, now that is a point of difference. Can only imagine your landlords love that! Who wouldn’t!

Property Managers as a general rule take a great deal of pride in their career, which we think is just brilliant. Here the community touched on some tenant gift ideas but its such a great question Brenda, lets ask it again. What is your point of difference?

Thanks Jen – yes some love the weekly rent credit but then got a little confused in the beginning about why the amount fluctuates. Now we’ve gotten over that hurdle – because obviously it’s affected by tenants paying on time and bills for maintenance and repairs we’re paying out – and some people still prefer monthly, but there you go!

We used to – and should get back into it – leave chocolates and a hand written card for tenants on routine inspections, who presented the house immaculately.

Hey all,

In my mind, it’s important to think about the POD as benefitting those who you are talking to/selling to.  For eg. if i was speaking to an owner, i might say that our POD is that our average rent is higher than the average rent for our area as stated by the RTA and show them the evidence of this.  I might say, that out proactive lease renewal procedure guarantees at least one month’s written notice, so you’ll never be over a barrell with tenants and will have the luxury of choosing the best tenant for your circumstances.  It might be that we ‘buyer match’ tenants and I can show you exactly who is looking for property like your property right now.  If I was speaking to tenants, it might be that we provide rent certificates upon 6 months of good rent history at routine inspections.  It might be that we allow 24/7 access to their rental ledger through console. There’s a whole heap of things.  The important thing is to ensure it is actually different – I’d have a look at other industries and see what they do for their customers.  The Carlton Ritz is a great company to look at – their customer service is just amazing!!

I recently purchased a car and I loved that while my service is being done, they’ll drop me off and pick me up.  How could we translate this to PM? – We could offer that while an owner is moving out of a property that’s about to be rented, that we offer storage space for them to start storing gear, or we get the gardening done for them – who knows…it’s only limited by our own imagination and lack of researching other successful companies in other industries! 

How about actually inspecting the work before blindly paying the contractor? Preparing a budget for owners (based on the previous year’s expenditure)? A little bit of communication with the owner on a monthly basis (eg ampmosphere newsletter)?