Day in the life: A resident walks out of their home to start their day and encounters a member of the community's onsite team in the parking lot, who smiles, waves and greets them by name. Talk about a tone-setter for a happy resident experience!

Now, picture this scenario: A resident who moved in a couple months ago needs some extra storage for their work items (they're a photographer with lots of accessories). This resident, hoping to rent a storage unit, heads to the office to complete the process. Unfortunately, the on-site team is busy (you know…tours, resident retention conversations, package acceptance, answering the phone …insert anything else a leasing agent has to do here). While the leasing team would love to help, they're so preoccupied that they aren't able to even acknowledge the resident who needs the storage unit. The resident gives up and leaves. Now you have potentially lost income in several places— a vacant storage unit, a bad review, and a new unit to lease in 10 month's time. 

Phew…sound familiar?

Both scenarios play out every day in leasing offices across the country. According to data from Widewail, onsite teams are mentioned more than 60% of the time in positive Google reviews, which is 3.8 times more often than the second-most common topic, location. Yes, I'm still a believer in the 'centralization' movement but, wow, do positive interactions with on-site teams move the needle or what!? These memorable encounters are critical for resident satisfaction, but they can't happen if employees spend their time on complaints and other mundane tasks. Operators have the opportunity to lean on automation (where appropriate) so property teams can focus on what matters. In the second situation described above, automation would have allowed the residents to handle the situation and rent a storage unit on their own, leaving the onsite team to focus on building relationships.

The Happiness Ecosystem

We can all agree that both resident and employee satisfaction are important to maintaining the balance in happiness within a community, just as balance is important in any ecosystem for it to thrive. When leasing teams are overwhelmed, they can't provide those critical social interactions with residents. Their time is further consumed by people who might have issues to deal with or other to-dos.

When residents don't feel a connection with the community, they are less likely to renew, putting additional stress on leasing teams to fill units. Negative reviews can make it more difficult to obtain qualified leads, further increasing the pressure on teams. An unhappy work environment results in higher employee turnover, and what also makes residents unhappy? Yep, it's frequent changes in personnel.

When this ecosystem thrives, owners and operators will see lower turnover, improved reputation scores and lower costs, all of which add up to much healthier net operating income. Automation can help achieve this by giving employees the time they need to build relationships and a community. 

Automation Can Bring Balance

There are so many great ways for automation to impact a positive experience in a community. Who here loves storage units? Who here loves parking spaces? I'm still waiting to see if any hands raise…

Yet, reducing or eliminating parking and storage challenges and taking these issues off the plates of leasing and management teams can help balance the ecosystem, reduce stress, increase efficiency and ultimately strengthen relationships between residents and teams. An automated solution puts the power of reserving spaces and obtaining rentable amenities in the hands of residents, allowing them to decide how and on what terms they want to pay for services, rather than setting a mandatory monthly fee that only decreases satisfaction.

Operators should also consider more than parking spaces when selecting an automated solution. Garages, storage and party areas (how about those WFH desks that were built recently!?) can all be customized for specific rental periods.If it's rentable, that rental process can be automated. Improving resident satisfaction comes from utilizing every available amenity.

Implementing these solutions means your teams are spending less time managing parking and related amenities, fielding fewer complaints around the issue and devoting vital attention to their relationships. A happier community keeps its residents, reducing turnover and the associated costs, as well as making it easier to find qualified leads. Reputation is positive as residents leave reviews highlighting the attentive and friendly teams. Less stress means leasing professionals stay at an organization and grow within it. All around, costs are reduced and revenue stays strong.

It can be easy to examine problems individually, but it's important that owners, operators, property managers and onsite teams clearly understand how all of these things are interconnected and how automated solutions can be a game-changer, creating happier residents, happier teams and ultimately happier owners.