I've said it before and I will say it several times more: With traffic at an all time low, we must shift our focus to resident retention.  It's easy to forget about our residents after they sign on the line and initial on pages 3, 5, and 7, but if we expect them to do it again a year later, we're going to have to give them a good reason to do it.  In a market where there are more vacant apartments and concessions per square mile than potential renters, you've gotta have some serious persuasion power to look better than 4 months of free rent.

I offer up today a few resources to help you close the backdoor on your occupancy!

1) Beyond Wine And Cheese Marketing 

If you aren't already working with this amazing Seattle based vendor, you're missing out on something special!  Besides offering free resident retention tips on their website, they also provide an amazing service to property management teams.  They've taken the great step of moving communication with our residents beyond MS Word and Clip Art to some well designed and thought out marketing campaigns, and resident retention tools to match!  Everything from maintenance door hangers to retention reminders to resident surveys.  Check out what Tracy and Chad have to offer to you!

2) Multifamily Insiders

It is THE premiere site for social networking in the property management industry and a great place to read other awesome blogs, get amazing tips, and find thoughtful answers to your questions about property management. Membership is growing daily and best of all, it's FREE!!!

You can't pass up FREE, now can you? Go!

3) I also offer up for your use a helpful little sign.  If you would like a PDF of the image, I'd be more than happy to email it to you.  Just drop me a line :)     Do the Math!