My common sense advice: hire a new management company.My experience: try cleaning up the front yard, planting flowers (not this time of year though), install a fancy looking front door, install new windows in the front of the house.

Looked like someone had spent some time fixing and painting, nothing fancy, just basic house.About a month later I'm playing golf with an agent friend of mine who mentions that this place might be in my price range.

If you can't talk to people than you don't need to worry about a fancy marketing plan.

Not fancy but simple and effective.

I've never found that cans in areas like living rooms, bedrooms are much of a bonus, except in fancy houses.Kitchens - absolutely!

Outside of that, you can do niceties like fancy faucets, but you can't really change the important things - location of the house on the lot, safety of the neighborhood, proximity to work/shopping, noise & pollution factors, etc. 

Is there a perfered "dress code"?

I would take the low key approach, no fancy biz cards, just write your name and number on a piece of paper and tell them you can pay cash.

No losses allowed as a result.The "creative" couple rented their fancy house, a former residence, to their friend for 5 days a month, $500/month while finishing a $1 mil rehab.

Nothing fancy in my experience.