The Importance of Good Rapport - Do your people have something to say?

It may seem a bit odd coming from a person who makes a living, in part, as a professional speaker, but as any of my friends in this business can attest to – I am not a talker. I don’t chit chat. I am perfectly comfortable saying nothing. Our 30^th president, Calvin Coolidge, was famous for this sort of “reserve”. A Hollywood celebrity was seated next to him at a Whitehouse dinner once. This woman was known for being vivacious and lively. She turned to the President and said, “Mr. President, I've bet someone that I could get more than three words out of you,” to which Mr. Coolidge replied “You lose.” So why do I bring this up? Why on earth am I telling you that I am not chatty? Because your leasing people may not be either. I can get away with it. A leasing agent? Not so much.

Growing up and getting my start in the industry in Texas, I have certainly heard my share of chatty Cathy’s. While an unfocused and flighty person is certainly annoying to just about anyone, a person who actually has something interesting to say tends to be a good leasing consultant. Ask yourself, just how good of a rapport do your leasing consultants build with their prospects? What do they do to establish common ground, find a few things in common that they can chat about? Do they try at all? Or are they like Calvin Coolidge at a state dinner?

Nobody likes to be on the receiving end of a script. While it is necessary for a leasing consultant to ask certain vital questions and steer a conversation, a quick way to lose a prospect is to keep within a canned presentation without making any modifications. Sadly, I have found that this is a skill that not all leasing consultants have. Call it self-confidence, worldliness or just the ability to talk to anyone, not all leasing consultants have it. When I used to do property shops, one thing I used to always ask about at the beginning was the tennis court. I explained quickly to the leasing consultant that I played tennis in high school and college and would love to have a court at my new home. Most of the time I just got an “uh, okay.” Nothing else. No questions about tennis. No “Were you any good?” “Do you miss it?” “Did you play at Wimbledon?” Nothing. I mean, come on! Say something! Even “my dog likes tennis balls” would be an attempt. But no, it wasn’t on their script. They didn’t know what to say, what to do. They couldn’t be themselves and they certainly weren’t building any rapport.

Being comfortable at building rapport takes a bit of knowledge to draw from. Your people have to know a little something about a lot of somethings. As an example, I made sure that the leasing consultants at our properties in Houston were well-versed on business issues and each property subscribed to the Business Journal. To those of you who haven’t been to Houston, the only reason that town exists is for business. And Mexican food. Okay, I actually miss it – but I readily admit that it isn’t always a pleasant place to live unless you are an azalea bush. However, it is a business town like no other. People there live and breathe business, too. I wanted my leasing people to know who was moving employees to town, who just bought who, who was in the latest accounting scandal because that stuff mattered in that town. It would come up. But are those the things that people care about in Austin or Orlando? Nope. What about Phoenix? What do your leasing people need to talk about if they live in that market?  I am not sure what I would talk about here, I have never thought people were intended to colonize the sun. They should probably steer clear of the immigration debate, though, because you never know whether people are pro or against felonies. All kidding aside, the point is that different things are important in different markets, rapport will rely on other pieces of information and being “current”. Your team needs to be aware of what is going on, reading the news. Find out what your leasing consultants know, talk about and enjoy. Expand on that if you need to, but be sure they are comfortable and capable of having an off-script conversation about a lot of different things.

How does a person build rapport? Everyone on earth has something in common with someone else – you just have to find out what that is. While we work with our goal in mind, getting the person to lease from us, we should also be working at making that person confide in us, like us. We tend to buy from people we like. People who made an effort to get to know us. Rapport is such a crucial part of the process that I believe you can’t really lease to a person until you have established Rapport. You can do a tour. You could fill out paperwork, but you can’t assess someone’s needs and actually sell them if you haven’t made the effort to get to know them first. That is the hard part, that is the actual “consulting”. What does your team have to say? Are they the ones who stare at their shoes in the elevator, or do they say hello and try and chat? Would they be the ones at the bus stop reading, drinking a coffee, listening to their I-pod and texting all at once just to be sure they didn’t have to speak to someone, or are they engaging?

To make my final point – I am that guy at the bus stop. Assuming we had a bus in Montana. I don’t chat, engage. I don’t make any effort to talk with people on the plane, on the rental car shuttle. But I could. When I leased apartments, I was “on”, just like I am when giving a seminar. I found common ground, built rapport, built a friendship and then sold them. When it is my job to connect with people, I am great at it. I can find common ground with anyone. I can get a rapport going with all sorts of people, sometimes even Democrats. Do your people have this skill? Does your leasing team converse easily with others, or are they shy, timid, and uncomfortable? Break them out of that shell. They don’t have to be “on” all the time, only when it counts. They have to engage, or they won’t lease. Your community’s success is hinging on their ability to get rapport flowing.

Christopher Higgins is The Apartment Guy, a professional speaker and owner of multifamily assets with 19 years of experience in the field. While he may not chat with you at the bus stop, he is always happy to answer questions by e-mail at Christopher@theapartmentguy.net.