What's your leasing process?

Question

Hey BP.

I'm an investor in Phoenix with 60 single family homes. I think there is room to improve our leasing process. I am curious what your leasing process is and what tech you are using (if any).

The marketing part is relatively simple: price it right and blast it out. But how do you handle the incoming leads? Do you live answer your signs/listings or do you let them go to voicemail and call back later? How do you keep track of who you have talked to? How do you determine that a lead is worth setting up a showing?

Any advice or tips would be extremely appreciated!

Brian

Kimberly H. · Answer

In our Chicagoland area, there are a million tire kickers/unqualified renters.  We just started posting a google voice number with the listings, and our google voice greeting that says the property is still available, how much the rent is, when the next rental open house is, and what the property features are. At the end I say for them to call/text my cell if they have more questions, only because I found that you don't always get the voicemails left at Google Voice. At that point, the calls are either do you take Section 8 (in our area its illegal to say in the posting that you don't and I think that would also apply to the Google greeting), if I can show it before the rental open house, or if we will take their 100 lb dog. This cuts down on all the other calls asking what the house is, if it's still available , what the rent is, ect.

We do not say in our listing what exactly our pet policy is, because I have had people lie once they know what it is. When they ask if we take pets, we ask what pets they have.

Google voice keeps track of the phone numbers that have called. The day of the open house, we text everyone who called through Google voice to remind them of the open house. About an hour or two before the open house I have all Google voice calls go directly to my cell phone.

We do rental open houses 2x a week. For safety reasons, we have two people run the open house, and I do not run out to show a vacant house to a stranger I have never met and I tell people that when they want to see the house right away. Most people understand that.  I have considered making exceptions to that when they have a scheduling conflict with the next open house by asking prescreening questions over the phone, when I have, the people haven't met the phone prescreen anyway. Most people who have to move asap are not going to meet my screening criteria

I don't prescreen those who will go to the open houses since its more work with no upside; and having a lot of people at the rental open is a good thing as it creates a sense of urgency in those looking when they see all the other potential applicants walking around.

Roy N. · Answer

@Brian Coughlin

We advertise primarily on-line and set-up a unique e-mail address for each of our advertisements.   When a potential tenant makes first contact via e-mail, we send have an automailer send them a reply thanking them and providing more information on the property, our application and screening process (including a form), and a list of available viewing appointment times (if the unit is occupied, we show by appointment, but group all appointments into blocks on one or two days) or the next open house (if the unit is vacant).  The response also provides a follow-on phone number and e-mail address should they have further questions.

We find this weeds out most of the tyre kickers we normally get when first contact is made by phone.   Those who schedule a viewing or turn-out for the open house already know the application fee, process and criteria for selection.

The mail server automatically tracks all first contacts via e-mail and we track all follow-ons in a CRM.

Shera Gregory · Answer

I do have all the calls coming to my cell phone and I try to answer if I can. I make sure they know about the requirement for household income to be three times the rent. I ask what they are looking for to be sure it really fits. Then, if we already have a day & time planned for an open house I let them know about it.

One thing that I have found helpful is that I immediately create a contact in my phone right off of their calling number. I give it a name starting with the property (ie Main Street contacts = Main Bill, Main Susan, etc). If I have made arrangements to meet them on a specific day & time I put that into the contact info in an easy to see field like the e-mail address. Then later on I can follow up with individual text messages or even a group text message to everyone. That has been very useful when I wind up having an open house that I didn't have planned at the time I spoke with the person. And if someone later tells me they aren't interested I just delete the contact.

Sam Leon · Answer

You could set up a web site of your rental properties and have potential candidates register interests.  A "Please keep me updated as this property becomes available" check box would suffice.

I never bothered as I always assumed tenants look for places to rent when they need it and not much advanced planning is involved.

Roy N. · Answer

Tracy:

We are experimenting with this as we have had waiting lists for some of our properties.  At the moment we are using simple CRM where we record the prospect and the unit(s) at which they initially looked.  Whenever we have a vacancy coming up, we generate a list of those prior contacts who were interested in a similar unit and let them know about the vacancy.

Another thing we do is notify our existing tenants of upcoming vacancy and we've had tenants move from a student house to a 1-bdrm; from a 1-bdrm or bachelor to a 2-bdrm; etc.

Tracy Spencer · Answer

We are in Phoenix too and use a combination of techniques mentioned above.  My personal experience has been that anyone who can't get more information about our house through their kid's smart phone will be a pain in the neck later because they can't pay online, or we can't communicate via email which is how my lease says all notices will be sent.

I insist all applicants use our online application process (via Buildium, our property management software) since that means I get every blank filled out legibly on the application, and the app fee gets paid via ACH.

We use a google voice number forwarded to our cell on our signs and a web address, and refer everyone to the website for a property video, the application criteria and online application.  We get a surprising number of applications before they have seen the house.  I've been experimenting with the driveby app where people send a text message to a number for more info, but it seems to have limited appeal in our neighborhoods.

The one thing that I want to figure out how to do better is to start collecting a database of prospective tenants so I can market new vacancies to them either via SMS or email, but I haven't figured out a good way to do that, so if anyone has any ideas...

Yiv L. · Answer

For me, I advertise mainly on CL and newspaper with calls going to my cell directly. I try to pick up as many calls as I can, but on busy days, I only call back to those who show they are more serious by leaving a voice message.

- During call back, I tell more about the property. Tell what are the requirements such as income, background checks and fees. The steps are to weed out the tirekickers as many as I can.

- Once looks more promising, I set up a date and time to show the property and ask them to bring their ID, proof of income and fund for background check. I reminder them to call or text one hour before the set time.

- Just like @Shera Gregory, after setting up the time to show, I immediately add the caller to the contact on my phone with "Property: Name" for upcoming communications. The only different is I do NOT delete these contacts so that for my next property listing in the area, if the person call again, I sort of have some existing data to work with.

- If the person does not call or text back one hour before the showing, I sometimes text to get confirmation at around 30 min before the showing. If they do not reply immediately, I won't go to the property.

Jassem A. · Answer

@Brian Coughlin

It's tough as it is for me to find decent tenants in the areas I rent in so I am more permissive with who I will let move in

I don't operate on the assumption that someone coming to look at one of my rentals has access to the internet or the patience to fill out a lengthy or complex application or to even pay an application fee

Also, I can't afford for my properties to be vacant for long because people will steal HVAC equipment, copper and wiring if left vacant for long enough

I generally just check to make sure they have some kind of income coming in and that they don't have recent rental judgments or felonies

If they do have recent rental judgments sometimes I will still rent to them with a double security deposit as long as they didn't destroy the last person's property

Brian Coughlin · Answer

Thanks for the beenverified tip. I haven't heard of it but I like that you can screen on your phone. We use a paper app or direct them to our online site. We also require them to submit proof of funds, ID and pet pictures. I wonder if I lose tenants because a less pre-cautious landlord doesn't require them to jump through the extra hoops. But then I wonder if I even want a tenant that won't follow a few extra instructions?

Jassem A. · Answer

@Brian Coughlin

I use beenverified app on my android phone for screening.  It allows for up to 10 checks a month for judgments.  Once I run out, I look up court records online.  I'm 20-40 minutes away from my rental properties so I don't want to keep running back and forth all the time so I set up a time for every one to show up.  This may not work as well for hot markets where there are going to be a bunch of applicants.  Then again if you have that problem then your rent price could be too low.

What's your leasing process?

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