6 tips to get your customer ready to move

To help make your customer’s move as enjoyable and exciting as it should be, we have the time to find out what things 'movers' most commonly forget . These oft-forgot items are listed in this article, to help minimise the stress of moving and for renters will ensure they get their bond back. You could also visit us at Direct Connect for full list of Moving Checklist.

Before Moving Day:

• Write a Checklist - Yes, write a checklist! This may be the simplest task to complete, but it?s commonly forgotten because of that simplicity. This is the most important part of organising your move, as it allows you to ensure everything is planned for before, during and after the move. This can then eliminate any concern of leaving behind belongings, or not planning ahead.
  
  When writing a checklist, be sure to add specific details. For example; don't just write boxes as a checklist point; estimate or determine how many boxes you may want or need. You can then mark down how many boxes you use so that there is no risk in losing any of your personal items or belongings.
• Protective Materials - The first protective material everyone thinks of is bubble wrap. However, this isn't always the most appropriate protection material when moving. Items such as moving blankets or rags have more flexibility and are better suited for larger items such as dining tables, coffee tables and couches etc. They allow you to shape the material better to protect the edges of your larger furniture items.
  
  On top of this, when you're transporting furniture or fragile items, you want to ensure that these won't move around and damage one another. Simple materials such as ocky straps, rope or ties are ideal for packing your belongings for travel.
  
  Last but not least, tape. Whether it's masking or regular tape, this is an essential for not only securing boxes but for holding the blankets and rags in place when transporting your belongings.
• Label by location and contents - Labeling your boxes is something that everyone does; however after the large number of boxes you will pack it's easy to forget what contents are in each box. When labeling each box, simply include more detail than just the room or location. For example: label the box 'Kitchen, Bowls'.  This way when you're packing, you save yourself a great deal of time.

Organising Utility Connections:

• Disconnect & Reconnect your current utilities - When it comes to moving home these two tips are constantly forgotten and can quickly become the biggest problem you'll have before moving day. Organising your phone connections, TV connections and other utilities with your provider is essential and needs to be done as early as possible. It's is important to give them as much notice as you can as this will help you have a seamless transition when turning off and turning on your connections.
  
  It's a pain to be charged for a connection when you're no longer living in that household as well as not having a connection to any utilities once you?ve moved into your new place.

Moving Day:

• Give yourself twice as much time - It is very common to underestimate the time that it takes to move. There is an extensive list of jobs and tasks that you need to do prior to the move and on moving day in particular. It's always better to overestimate your time to ensure everything is complete during the time period you've hired a moving company, or for the time you've set yourself to move.
• Don't forget the Small Things - These are the smaller items that are usually of less value, however are commonly forgotten or left behind. Items such as:
• General Items
• Phone/iPod/iPad/Computer chargers and cables
• Power boards
• Door hanging mirrors/hooks
• Any storage items from under the house, storage cupboards or in the garage
• Kitchen Items
• Cutlery trays from your cupboard
• Food from the pantry or kitchen
• Bathroom Items
• Shampoo & Conditioner
• Toilet Cleaners
• Bins
• Cupboard items

If your customer follows these tips, they’ll get into their new place with ease and hopefully without any panic calls to the property manager. 

Article provided by Direct Connect.

Please contact 1300 664 715 or visit http://www.directconnect.com.au/ for an Australia-wide service.

Do you have outcome based conversations?

Do you have outcome based conversations?
by Hermione Gardiner

When you become aware of a conversation you must have with someone, especially an unpleasant or tough conversation, your mind usually comes up with a whole list of things you DON’T want to happen. Thoughts such as “I don’t want them…”

·         to get emotional

·         to lose it and get angry

·         to personally attack me

·         to make a complaint about me

Rather than focusing on what you don’t want to happen, focus on what you DO want the outcome of the conversation to be. In property management it’s important to go into every conversation, whether it’s unpleasant or confronting, with an outcome in mind.

Outcome based conversations are not just essential for property managers, leasing consultants, new business consultants and anyone on the front line dealing with the client. They can also be used when having conversations internally within the business and also in your personal life!

When you worry about what you don’t want to happen, or are not sure of the outcome you are trying to achieve, you end up giving the other person all the power. When you stay focused on what you do want you’re more likely to stay in control of the situation and achieve your desirable outcome.

A lease break doesn't have to be a headache

Hearing the words “I want to break my lease” can bring fear and terror into even the most experienced property manager. These words can almost always predict a headache in one way, shape or form and it can become a stressful situation for the tenant, landlord and of course us as the property manager.
It seems that tenants, and even landlords, breaking their leases are becoming far more common these days. The break of lease situation is not something we are immediately taught to handle, and has traditionally been left unspoken about as nobody wants a client to break their lease.
I learnt very quickly from some mistakes I made when dealing with a lease break, so this week I ran a webinar on this exact topic to share everything I have learned to make the situation the least stressful as possible. In preparation for my webinar session I delved down into how to best handle a break of lease situation, create a procedure and communicate this effectively to your tenants and landlords to reduce stress for all parties involved. 
Beyond the legislation side of things, a few of the main points to take away included:

• A strong procedure – Your break lease procedure needs to be set in stone and consistent across all staff in the business. I need to be able to walk into your business and sit in the property managers seat and know exactly how to deal with it at every step of the way. When you know the procedure it makes it much easier to train on it, communicate it to your clients and leaves less room for grey area.
• Transparency – Being transparent to all parties on their obligations and risks is key, ensuring the person breaking the lease agrees to all the terms in advance in writing and is aware of any risks. Why not even provide the tenant with a break lease form from the sign up meeting (along with a normal vacate form) so the tenant knows exactly what they need to do if a situation does arise. This also keeps communication lines open and hopefully they will be open to talking to you ahead of a potential lease break, and know that you have a process to deal with it.
• Communication – You may think you communicate well normally, however in a break of lease situation you need to step this up even further. Lease breaks are one situation where you need to over-communicate with both parties. Remember to keep both the landlord AND the tenant updated across the leasing process.
• Understanding – Remembering that generally speaking, no one has started their lease planning to break it. There are some really difficult and challenging situations that cause people to have to break a lease - financial, relationships, relocations and more. We need to put ourselves in their shoes and do what we can to make it less stressful. When they are getting fired up, remember where they are coming from and it will help you respond in a better way.
• Keep good records - Keep records of everything from copies of notices down to the number of enquiries received each week, price reductions, reasons for applications not being accepted, comparable properties and more. Keep everything in one place (for a free copy of my checklist on what evidence to keep in-case the break lease escalates click here)
•  Mitigating Loss - Our main duty in the break of lease situation is to minimise any potential loss to landlord and mitigate the tenants potential loss. This means that the methods we usually rely on to get a property leased may not be sufficient. What more can we be doing to assist in finding a replacement tenant? Additional marketing? Rent reduction with the tenant paying the shortfall? 

Would you want to receive YOUR newsletter?

Our clients and members often ask us for assistance with developing their monthly e-newsletter or e-marketing for property management. We can easily help them with content and ideas, we even have an e-book full of great investor tips they can use. However it is the execution and delivery of a regular, ongoing successful newsletter (that actually grabs people’s attention, has a purpose and keeps them reading each month) that is the challenge.

The concept of the newsletter has become somewhat washed out in our digital age (much like the plethora of junk mail and pamphlets that go straight from the letterbox into my bin each week). I can’t even tell you how many “newsletters”, “updates”, “blogs” and “specials”, come in each morning. Today I had over 30 new emails of this nature.  What happened to most of them? Terminal deletion - never to be seen again.

When we see similar subject lines and the same content over and over again we are naturally bored, closed off and less likely to open the email at all. I’m sure you don’t want this for your e-newsletter and e-marketing so it is important before pressing send each month to put yourself in your readers shoes and consider:

• Would you want to receive this newsletter?
• Would you open it?
• Would you read it?
• What benefit would you get out of it?
• Does it educate, inform and excite?
• Would you pass it on or share it with friends and family?
• Would it direct you to do more business with you?
• Would it strengthen your relationship?
• Does it direct traffic to your website?

Building and developing a regular ongoing successful e-newsletter doesn’t have to be a cumbersome process. But in this day and age you do have to be doing it well in order to stay at the front of your clients mind, easily communicate with them on a bulk scale and to be seen as the experts. It doesn’t have to be rocket science however so take a look at our e-Newsletter Procedure – usually only available to our members – which breaks creating a successful e-newsletter down into 10 steps. 

Got a property that won't lease?

Tearing out your hair with a property that won’t lease? Freaking out at the days on market creeping up? Having trouble convincing an owner to reduce their prices? You are not alone. Many of our members and clients around the country are experiencing some tougher times in leasing at the moment and are frustrated in getting their owners to reduce their rents to meet market conditions.

If the property is in good condition, marketed correctly, and available to be shown, as agents we usually know it’s the price that needs to shift. Price adjustments typically aren’t easy and often you will feel like you’re fighting against your owner at this stage of the property management process (despite the fact that effectively you are both on the same team, both wanting to get the best possible rent in the least amount of time).The important word to note here is “possible”.  Securing the best possible rent doesn’t always mean the highest rent the property has ever received. What this means is securing the best possible rent for that particular point in time, given market conditions, tenant options and situation.

The first problem is that often landlords have an assumption that the rent should continually be going upwards. There is a lack of education to these clients surrounding the time of year, market conditions, recent data, and a realistic comparison of their property to others on the market.

The second issue is that because the rental market moves so quickly, the price from a few weeks ago may not be accurate today - but we aren’t educating them along the way so they know this, we assume they know what we know, and it’s usually weeks into marketing the property before we start to speak to the owner about reducing the price to meet market conditions.

In markets like this it’s often not enough to rely on your normal renting tactics – list property online, take enquiry, show apartment, receive application, hey presto -  apartment rented!
You may need to use a few new tactics to communicate smarter with the owner to ensure you can get faster results:

1. Use your data – There is a plethora of data available to you in the property management world that is underutilised at all stages of the leasing process. Days on market, vacancy rates, registered tenants, properties leased by your agent, properties leased by other agents, number of comparable properties currently on the market, properties leased by agency each week, applications, enquiries, property visits. Data doesn’t lie and can be used to paint a very effective picture to your client from the get go, sharing this data means they can go on the journey with you & be more prepared to agree on price adjustments. Most of us have access to this information, but it’s how you use it that will make a difference.

2. Know your numbers – Know exactly what it will cost the owner to wait one more week for a tenancy. Being able to explain the cost of having no rent coming in versus dropping a few dollars a week over the course of a 6 or 12 month tenancy may help them see how important it is to get a tenant in rather than wait for the top dollar in rent. One of my favourite pieces of dialogue surrounding this comes from Andrew Reece of Inspect Real Estate “Mr Landlord – your property is currently rented for $0 per week..” that should get them thinking...

3. Preset your adjustment dates In relationships we all hate to hear the words “we need to talk”. And the same negative emotion can surround the discussion with the owner around “we need to reduce the price”, especially framed weeks into the marketing campaign. Explain to the owner from the initial stages of leasing that you conduct regular reviews of the market and WILL be recommending price adjustments along the way to ensure we achieve the best possible rent for you in this market in the least amount of time. Using the words adjustment, rather than reduction should help your cause too.
These are some points you can use to improve your process surrounding price adjustments in order to get a faster result, but there are many more great ways to think outside of the box to get your properties leased faster. We have a handy checklist guide to give away to you this week.

Click here to get your free copy of the “It Won’t Lease Checklist” and good luck! 

Why PMs need to have the tough talk about landlord insurance

Congratulations! You’ve added a new property to your rent roll. You and the landlord are at the start of a relationship which will, hopefully, be long and mutually rewarding.

As we all know, that relationship can also be a challenge, with property managers potentially straddling the gulf between tenant and landlord when a tenancy goes pear-shaped.

Many landlords are under the happy illusion that having a quality property manager guarantees them no tenant-related problems.

It’s in your interest to set them straight and open their eyes to the benefits of a good landlord insurance policy, which covers accidental as well as malicious tenant damage, like RentCover from EBM Insurance Brokers.

Sometimes drama strikes even the most carefully-selected tenants. Burglars break in.  They accidentally drive into the mailbox. Their washing machine overflows...

And, of course, tenants’ circumstances can change –  if they fall ill or lose a job and end up behind on the rent.

Some landlords also believe they don’t need their own insurance because the body corporate has cover.

This isn’t correct.  Insurance taken out by the body corporate won’t cover anything that happens inside the four walls of the landlord’s own unit, including potential liability.

Property managers often avoid discussing landlord insurance with clients for fear of overstepping boundaries or complicating the situation.

However, industry professionals who sidestep the issue risk exposing their own business to legal claims.

These days, there’s a real risk of a lawsuit when something goes wrong. If you fail to make sure your landlords have liability cover in place, it’s not only the landlord left exposed but also you and your company.

In the absence of landlord insurance, lawyers can recommend suing an agency or property manager in addition to, or instead of, the property owner.

There’s also potential for owners to sue agents for failing to inform them of the protection available and the need for insurance – or to claim an agent was indirectly responsible for the problem.

It can be uncomfortable having the tough conversation with clients but, remember, they will be the first to thank you if disaster strikes and they find themselves protected because of your care and good advice.

Article provided by EBM Insurance. 

Sharon Fox-Slater is the General Manager of EBM Insurance's RentCover

Please contact 1800 661 662 or visit www.ebminsurance.com.au for an Australia-wide service.