Property Management Automation: Top 10 Benefits You Can Implement Today

COVID-19 resulted in many new real estate industry trends, but one that is here to stay forever is property management automation.

A property manager's work seems to be never ending. Whether it is dealing with tenants, or owners or just an endless stream of accounting tasks, the days can be exhausting.

Property management is demanding; many companies will have around 800 - 1000 units with only a few property managers managing them. With so much to cover in such less time, property management automation can help property managers breathe a sigh of relief.

While property managers take care of all the complex tasks, property management automation can take care of the more repetitive tasks that consume unnecessary time. There are a lot of reasons to take on automation; but in this blog we will discuss the Top 10 benefits.

What is property management automation? Why do you need it? 

In simple words, property management automation helps property managers in slashing the monotonous time-taking tasks off their to-do list.  

Property management software automates, saves time and increases efficiency, with minimal back and forth throughout the leasing process.

Typically, property managers can save 30 hours a week by leveraging property management automation and smart technology. All this time you save can be reinvested in growing your portfolio, managing owners, or other aspects that require human touch.

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Ten benefits of property management automation  

Property management software designed for leasing operations helps and expedites the responsibilities of a property manager. By reducing the number of tasks, it allows for more efficient management  and gives you more time for growing your portfolio.

Here are a few benefits of implementing an automation-driven property management software:

1. Renter Inquiries' Response Automation  

Fast responses make tenants feel important; it is ultimately the deciding factor in the success or failure of whether someone books a showing. However, most incoming tenant inquiries are after-hours, or on weekends.

With a property management software, you will never miss calls and emails from renters, even on your downtime on the weekends. A good property management software that is active 24/7 is a simple solution to ensure no tenant leads are missed while maintaining high efficiency.  

Not responding to tenant inquiries about listings soon enough can make or break your business. With an ever-increasing number of competitors out there in the real estate business, high responsiveness can serve as a big competitive advantage.

Using a real estate chatbot to automate communication means that you can keep your leads from booking elsewhere simply because they might be impatient when they inquire about a listing and expect an instant reply. An intelligent real estate chatbot responds to every inquiry prospective tenants may have instantly and with more detailed information to keep tenants satisfied. 

2. Leasing Automation

As soon as property managers are done posting ads on listing sites, they are faced with a huge influx of tenant inquiries and emails. Property managers and leasing agents receive hundreds of emails every week, of which only maybe 5% will be from qualified tenants.

Almost half of these inquiries are repetitive, asking the same questions over and over again. On a good day responding to emails wouldn’t seem like a burden, but for property managers and leasing agents who are already juggling multiple tasks at once, responding to inquiries becomes a nightmare.

Time is money for property managers, and your time would be better spent doing things other than micromanaging a property especially when there are a lot of properties to manage. Most agents are too busy to respond to every tenant who is interested in the property and has a question.

These emails and monotonous tasks take up a considerable chunk of time, approximately around 2 hours every day, impacting overall team productivity. A property management software for leasing can make life infinitely simpler by automating these time-consuming tasks in seconds. With property management software you can automate aspects of your business, such as responding to emails, making way for greater efficiency and more available time to be attentive to your owners.

3. Maintenance Requests

Maintenance requests are the second most popular category of messages that property managers find in their inbox. Luckily, property management software companies have figured out a way to automate this process. Renters and property managers/landlords both get access to separate portals. Renters can submit a request for maintenance, specifying what's causing them trouble. In some cases, a renter has to pick the category of professional they need to visit their property e.g. plumber, and the service company is automatically alerted, saving property managers the need to make calls. Tenants can stay updated on the status of their request via the portal till the issue is resolved. The amount affiliated with the service is also available on the portal.

Similarly, for routine maintenance checks, like smoke alarm inspections, alerts are automatically generated sent to tenants.

4. Simplified Accounting

Keeping track of receipts and presenting them to your accountant at the end of the month is not the ideal way to stay on top of your finances. Property management automation gives you the freedom to keep track of all incomes and expenses by entering them as soon as you incur them. Now pay bills online and maintain clean financial records. Never miss a tax deduction again!

5. Automated Property Inspections

We are here to tell you to ditch the clipboard and the paperwork and conduct inspections on your table or mobile device. Gain access to pre designed templates or create one based on your need. Add photographs, short or detailed notes and pre write responses. All data is automatically saved and backed up. Not just this, but comprehensive reports are automatically generated, saving you all the trouble and more.

6. Rent Collection

This may sound too good to be true but you no longer have to approach each individual tenant for rent collection. Automate. It's that simple. Once you activate online payments, it not only makes life easier for you but also for your tenants. Most renters, especially millennials prefer making payments online via credit card or Paypal. This even allows them to set up a direct debit for rent so that payments are made automatically and on time. You attract quality renters and you save yourself the hassle of collecting cheques or cash from each tenant.

It appears daunting at first but PM software companies have worked hard to ensure the security of online payments. You only have to link with your bank account and keep track of all the payments made on your cell phone. Get confirmation notifications and alerts when a payment is made or needs to be made. The transparency of the whole process makes it reliable and secure.

7. Automated Pre-qualification

Thorough tenant screening is the key to finding quality tenants and to a faster lead to lease conversion. However, tenant screening is also one of the most time-consuming tasks of the leasing cycle and can take up a lot of your time, if not all of it, when done manually. But it has to be done correctly because poor quality leads can be challenging to deal with in the future.

A property management software purpose-built for leasing like LetHub, can accelerate the tenant screening process to make property management easier and much more effective. LetHub pre-qualifies interested tenants against your company-specific screening criteria, such as custom credit score and salary requirements for each property. The software filters out poor leads that do not match your criteria and save you time and effort.

8. Deliver Highly-personalized Experiences

Property management software can help with automating marketing which can end up being a critical component in your lead generation strategy. Automation allows leasing agents to deliver personalized marketing messages to prospective tenants throughout the leasing process with automated emails or texts. It will also follow-up with all those leads with properties that perfectly match their criteria leaving little to no room for error.  

9. Improved Team Collaboration

Team collaboration is essential, and it improves the way your team works together and minimizes the bottlenecks in your workflows. A high-performance team drives business growth and a property management software can improve that.  

Smart, automation-driven workflows improve productivity and encourage consistency. With the help of a property management software property managers can also keep up with the rest of their team and provide them with individual feedback with reports on each agent’s performance. It promotes better team collaboration and ultimately improves productivity, which directly impacts the bottom line of your business at the end of the day.

10. Automated Marketing Reports

Property management software can gather post-tour feedback for you; it will automatically follow up with every lead after a showing. One of the most essential ways to encourage bookings is through guest reviews which are often done with a quick and polite email requesting their feedback on your listing’s page.

A leasing automation property management software like LetHub lets you automate the feedback process without requiring prospects to fill out lengthy surveys. All this feedback helps property managers to make improvements accordingly to their units through actionable marketing insights.

Automating routine tasks with an intelligent property management software allows leasing agents and property managers to dedicate their time to focus on growth strategies and client relationships.

Modern technology provides multiple benefits all converged in one place, instant access to data, and customized dashboards and visualizations, enabling growth-oriented property managers to take control and make strategic decisions for the future of their business.