#doorgrowshow - Property Management Growth

Want to make your life easier when it comes to property management? Once it’s adopted, try the National Association of Residential Property Managers (NARPM) Standard of Accounting. It’s going to positively change the industry! Today, I am talking with Brad Larsen, who played a major role in the development of the Standard of Accounting. Also, he’s the founder of RentWerx (formerly Larsen Properties) and host of the Property Management Mastermind podcast. You'll Learn... [04:28] Why: Standardize language and charter accounts for industry. [05:15] How: NARPM participation and vendor selection of ProfitCoach. [08:33] Going from General to NARPM Accepted Accounting Practices (GAAP to NAAP). [09:31] System/process to get it adopted; won’t be a perfect solution immediately. [10:38] NARPM’s value add and thank you to industry; training provided at conferences. [12:45] Embezzlement: It’s going to happen to you as your business grows and scales. [14:05] Examples of how to use NARPM Standard of Accounting. [17:56] Goal

Are you a renter struggling to find a place? Feeling frustrated? Or are you a property manager/owner who would like to be able to manage, monitor, and show your properties without having to manage, monitor, and show your properties? No problem, you just need self-showing technology. Today, I am talking with Pini Lackner and Edward Gonzales of Rently, which allows prospects to visit rentals themselves when it’s a convenient time for them by using self-showing technology. Rently’s technology helps optimize and systemize the showing process to lower operational costs. You'll Learn... [05:18] Statistics show that 70-80% of people looking online for places to rent tend to be window shoppers; can be frustrating and time consuming for managers to reach them. [06:08] Property management involves building/keeping relationships with prospects. [06:48] After self-showings, Rently performs an application follow up to get feedback on a property without having to rely on an agent. [07:23] Some are concerned that there’s to

Are you a business owner whose background is focused more on sales than marketing? Do you only have a minimal understanding of property management? You’re not alone, and that’s why Kasey McDonald founded a property management training academy that educates business owners. Today, I am talking to Kasey about business development manager (BDM) growth and marketing strategies. She has 20 years of real estate experience, predominantly in property management. Kasey shows business owners how to set up and structure their property management businesses, as well as what is needed to in terms of BDM to focus on growth and profitability. She’s passionate about property management and wants to do what she can to improve the industry and other people's businesses. You'll Learn... [03:30] Four Doors to Revenue: 1) Deals; 2) Doors; 3) Duration; 4) Dollars. [04:23] BDM is not just about the landlord/investor, but retention with tenants; know importance of a service to consumers. [07:10] Kasey’s education and coaching proces

Are you an entrepreneur trying to figure out what you’re going to do with your life? Going from company to company to make money and find something you enjoy? During your career journey, you can learn a lot and build a network of people who come to you one day and ask for your help. You may end up with too much demand and work 80 hours nonstop every week. Today, I am talking with Taylor Hou, who faced some of the same struggles. Clients kept coming back to him. Why? He discovered that there is great demand for people to clean up businesses’ financial and accounting books. The majority of property managers aren’t bookkeepers or don’t have accounting backgrounds. So, Taylor realized that if clients were willing to pay him to do their bookkeeping as a service, he could start a scalable company. APM Help now offers several services to more than 25,000 units. You'll Learn... [05:15] Property management industry’s accounting duties are regulated via bank reconciliation (bank recs) where every bank account transacti

Today, I am talking with Mark Smukler of Bixby about property management and technology. Bixby is a building amenity platform/tenant portal app that helps management be more efficient by streamlining communication, work order management, payments, document storage, and any other component of tenant-related activities. Also, it’s a virtual/mobile concierge for tenants to find services, such as housekeeping, dry cleaning, moving, storage, and public transportation. It’s a win-win for everybody! You'll Learn... [06:40] Bixby’s end-user interface aggregates different tools into a single platform that costs less and is specific to the real estate business. [08:35] Bixby is modular and flexible with features that you can turn on or off. [10:08] Bixby’s development principle is that it doesn’t build anything that it’s not asked to build; every single thing in its product was a direct request from a customer. [11:10] Bixby integrates with smart home devices and creates a world where property managers and tenants have

Nobody knows the rental market better than a property manager, and nobody better than a property manager who does real estate knows how to help real estate investors. Today, I am talking with Sam Kwak about real estate investing as a property manager. Sam’s philosophy is: I don’t manage anything that I don’t own. He prefers to buy properties and manage them or at least understand how the business works. You'll Learn... [03:35] People who don’t necessarily have anything in terms of wealth can become real estate investors, buy properties, and rent them to create income. [05:25] As a partner, Sam is part of the everyday operation of property management; he’s in the office, sees what’s going on, and does consulting and advising. [05:58] Property managers need to understand their numbers, cash flow aspects, possible expenses, macroeconomics, microeconomics, and the market. [06:35] Property managers have a better understanding of where to invest; if they understand the market, they know what to buy to have a health

Are you a property manager? Is maintenance your biggest cost or time suck? Does it keep you from growing your business? You can't expect to grow a company when you're stuck in the operations piece of it every day. Today, I am talking with Ethan Lieber of Latchel, which helps property managers with maintenance and growth. You can get stuck where you have to hire and hurt your margin or you're growing and just can't keep up. You're behind on work orders and that's not good for anybody. It's not good for your business, tenants, and property owners. Latchel builds solutions and services to try and fix that problem. You'll Learn... [07:10] When thinking about the growth of your business, that comes from the way you acquire your customer scalable and how you get scalable lead generation. [08:00] Frontend/Backend Scalability: If you're only bringing in new customers and increasing units, there's going to be a problem if your operation can't handle that growth. [08:25] Latchel focuses on making maintenance scalable;

As an entrepreneur, how can you build a sizable, significant business? Is there a problem you can solve for customers? Save them time and money? If you can offer a good, quality product and there's good margin in it, then you may have a great idea for a new business! Today, I am talking with Thad Tarkington of FilterEasy. He describes how his company started due to personal experience with filter issues. He had no background in air filters, but saw an opportunity and jumped at it. After all, entrepreneurship is like skydiving without a parachute, and sometimes you have to make the parachute on the way down. You'll Learn... [05:08] How Thad went from being a solo-preneur to having a team; started his company in 2012 with one partner and now has almost 120 employees. [06:25] You don't know everything when you start a business, so find good mentors; the dollar amount you pay them is miniscule compared to your company’s ROI and growth. [07:06] As an entrepreneur, you start by doing everything; you slowly hand off

Property management is like a Rubik’s Cube - you solve one side, which makes you feel great. Then, you go onto the next side. When you fix it, you mess up the first side. How do you get all sides to work together? Today, I am talking with David Kerner of TouchPoint Property Management. David sold real estate for about 15 years before investing in his own doors and handling rentals. He shares some tips on how he developed systems and processes to grow his number of doors. You'll Learn... [03:48] Difference between doing real estate and property management; going from cold calls to find new business to rental properties that offered residual income. [04:55] Vertical income streams: Managing properties could feed David’s sales business, and the sales business could feed his property management business. [05:20] Property managers fear realtors getting into and doing damage to the property management industry; David was successful because he had a mindset from both sides. [08:15] David successfully transitioned fr

What are four pillars that successfully build and grow a business? Transparency, value propositions, stellar customer service, and aggressive pricing. Today, I am talking with Scott Brady. Despite being told by everyone to not become involved with the “Toilets, Tenants, and Troubles” of property management, Scott started Progressive Property Management in 2012. In a short period of time, he has grown his business phenomenally by rebuilding his website, marketing, and company to target self-managing investment property owners. You'll Learn... [05:38] Seekers are just starting out in property management; they get stuck by doing everything on their own instead of using marketing dollars effectively to hire others. [07:23] Scott built his company of the four pillars to make the floodgates open for generating leads; set up virtual offices and branches to help handle workload. [09:05] Real estate used to be a structured business, so the challenge was knowing how to get doors; SEO and ads are used to get doors for r

Is it possible to integrate real estate and property management? Today, I am talking with Jay Berube of the Encompass Group about property management being a great lead generation machine for realtors. You'll Learn... [02:45] Jay realized that asking questions and listening to answers is the most important part of sales. [03:10] Jay helps people figure out what’s the best situation for them; sell a property, rent it out, or get a reverse mortgage. [04:00] Sharing and giving value; give people value first to build trust and for them to know what you have to offer. [04:30] Difficult to have both real estate and property management and produce at a high level. [05:55] People usually don’t know what they need, but think they know what they want. [07:40] Being in alignment with your clients/lead is key to sales; create a win-win. [08:50] Velvet Hammer: Be transparent by delivering the brutal truth in a good way. [10:30] People’s initial reaction is to avoid realtors; many view them as annoying and pushy - just hun

Are you into technology? Do people always ask you to help them set up their tech devices? Do you take on roles and jobs where technology helps industries? That’s how Sean Miller from PointCentral describes himself. He was able to take home automation and build it into an enterprise platform for residential property managers to run their businesses better and provide an amenity that residents want. You'll Learn... [02:48] PointCentral focuses on residential property management; its software is designed for short- and long-term single- and multi-family property managers. [03:21] Some vendors target both property management entrepreneurs and consumers, winding up undercutting and competing with the property managers. [04:47] Convenience and operational benefits to home automation technology. [05:05] PointCentral built an operational benefit with its system for property managers and owners; that’s the base of the ROI, and the rest just adds to cash flow. [05:15] Operational benefits and savings through locks and

Years ago, James Alderson of OnSight PROS witnessed challenges in property management. So, he decided to step in and step up to help property managers get better at what they do.  James wanted to develop a user-friendly and easier way for tenants to do walkthroughs. The missing piece is a new app called MyWalkThru. You'll Learn... [06:10] MyWalkThru app nags tenant to do walkthrough. [06:40] 3 options on MyWalkThru: Doors are 1) not applicable, 2) observed with no problems, or 3) picture and comment of problem. [08:15] App solves various problems by making sure tenant does what they need to do. [08:39] MyWalkThru is contribution focused and fills a need. [08:56] How does it compare to other software? MyWalkThru is tenant-driven. [09:50] Add a charge to cover cost of MyWalkThru for property managers. [10:16] When a tenant is set up in MyWalkThru, tenant info (as well as property info) stays in app account. [12:15] If you want to be a MyWalkThru member, you have to be given permission. [12:36] DoorGrow listener

Do you feel misunderstood? Not like others? Crazy confused? Alex Charfen knows how you feel. He knows what you need to hear. Begin your journey of personal development. Get a business coach to help you out. They can help you increase your revenue, and make your life easier. Alex is my business coach, and in today’s episode, we talk about the entrepreneurial personality type (EPT). Successful people are stubborn and obsessive. They don’t give up. The most successful people in history are different and unique. You'll Learn... [10:20] Everyone around you are aliens; or are you the alien? [11:08] Garage sale game changer; act of generosity. [12:41] All an entrepreneur needs is someone to encourage them a little bit. [13:40] Use social media to encourage people; feel return of momentum. [15:10] If you feel broken as a business person, learn how to have relationships and build each other up. [17:50] EPTs are asynchronous learners and developers. [18:50] Most available coaching is disappointing and abusive. [19:58]

Today, I am talking to Andy Propst, who runs a national single and multi-family property management company called HomeRiver Group. The company is on a mission to become the first nationally branded property management firm in the country. For Andy, he can’t grow his company fast enough and big enough. Learn more about what Andy did to grow so many doors, so quickly. You'll Learn... [10:00] HomeRiver Group shifted to multi-family properties for rent investor products. [11:20] Biggest opportunity for property managers is to build their own products. [11:55] Rental demand is high, but supply is shrinking, which is bad for property managers, investors, and renters. [12:30] HomeRiver Group is a matchmaker; it bring investors and builders together for build-to-rent projects. [14:38] Builders want to build, so it is not difficult to get a builder to pay attention to you; find stats and information that tell a story and generate interest. [16:50] If you want to grow your business and be successful, you can’t be pass

Property management business owners sometimes have to deal with hoarding problems. They may have tenants who pack the property full of stuff and then have to deal with the costly cleanup afterward. Today, I am talking to Marnie Matthews, a licensed clinical social worker specializing in hoarding and clutter. She is intrigued by the mental health piece of hoarding, which has many factors tied into it. To Marnie, success is when everybody wanting help has easy access to affordable and professional help. You'll Learn... [04:36] Types of Hoarding: Hoarding disorder, hoarding behavior, and excessive clutter. [05:10] Hoarding Disorder: Somebody who has extreme difficulty/inability to let things go. [05:33] Hoarding Behavior: People who can address their hoarding after handling mental health issues, such as depression. [06:01] Excessive Clutter: Depending of the level of clutter, someone may have hoarding disorder or just be chronically disorganized. [06:28] Clutter you can clean up quickly and easily; does not impa

Do you ever change your home’s air filter? Do you know when or how often you need to change it? Do you just forget about it, or are you just lazy? Do you know what size filter you need? Thanks to FilterEasy, there’s no excuse to not change it. Today, I am talking with Mark Brandt from FilterEasy, which was created to meet a simple need - help homeowners remember to change their home’s air filter and what size of filter to use. Mark helps initiate and grow the property management side of the business. You'll Learn... [04:10] Property management side of FilterEasy is based on a simple concept in service: Starts with a need. [04:50] Tenants are even more less likely to change the air filters because they do not have a vested interest in the property; FilterEasy makes it easier for them. [05:33] This service helps property managers and their team during inspections and walkthroughs to hold the tenant accountable and provides a burden of proof. [06:28] FilterEasy listens to property managers about the need and awa

Make your own decisions rather than dealing with unnecessary pain and doing what the world dictates. Find a way to hit the inspiration point, rather than the desperation point by focusing on four cores! Today, I am talking with Preston Brown, who started in real estate as a home flipper. Now, he has seven divisions of property management: Roofing, real estate, brokerage, home flipping, hard money lending, title company, and home warranty insurance. He invests in business, but also in his body and mind. You'll Learn... [03:28] Preston found DoorGrow online when looking for franchise property management opportunities. [04:20] Cycles, models, and understanding the dynamics of various industries. [04:50] Impact of embezzlement on Preston’s businesses. [06:00] Low cost of DoorGrow services that offered so much value and showed how to avoid the Cycle of Suck. [07:55] Preston did a study to show clients their options and costs with his companies vs. other companies; shows differences between price and value. [10:11]

Providing proof of funds is a problem that most property management companies face with tenants. Every property manager and landlord can benefit from better data faster. Technology can change the game of verifying tenants. Today, I am talking with Robert Hsu, of FinRET, about how you can use the latest technology to digitally verify your applicants’ income, account balances, and cash flow. He is someone who has combined his two passions and areas of expertise, real estate and technology, into an entrepreneurial business. You'll Learn... [06:20] Issues property managers deal with regularly. [06:45] How FinRET works with banks to prevent fraud. [07:10] FinRET instantly provides better and more data. [07:35] How FinRET gathers financial data from smaller or international banks. [09:04] FinRET is able to get expense and cash flow data that was previously inaccessible or difficult to obtain. [10:07] It allows you to make informed decisions about whether to accept an applicant. [10:14] FinRET will eventually let yo

Do you come from humble beginnings? Only have a high school diploma? Want to own and operate your own apartment buildings and real estate firm? Anything is possible. Just ask Bryan Chavis! Today, I am talking to Bryan, who is a best-selling author and founder of The Landlord Property Management Academy. He is the author and creator of one of the top online property management designation certifications. Also, Bryan has a blog for real estate professionals and is a property management coach for Keller Williams. He coaches real estate professionals and consults for large housing authorities. You'll Learn... [02:35] Bryan’s background in multifamily real estate leading to a school and speaking. [05:40] From being a poor student to transitioning to be an entrepreneur. [07:37] Writing a manual while working on a job to figure out how things work in property management. [09:53] Building a brand, partnerships, and relationships to manage and own properties. [10:34] Absorbing, learning, and teaching property manageme