Every property manager worth their salt knows that how well a property is maintained and response times to tenant repairs play a huge role in whether or not a lease is renewed. When maintenance requests are forgotten, overlooked or slow, renters get frustrated, angry and move out. In short, people vote with their feet.
However, when you harness technology, you can vastly improve your maintenance process with your tenants to help ensure they renew their lease. Let’s dig into how this plays out in real-world scenarios.
Enforce Maintenance Request Transparency
Paper-based maintenance requests get lost, left on desks and often result in delayed repairs and repair errors. By using maintenance request software you have clear visibility into requests 24/7. The tenant can go online to ask to have a leaky faucet repaired, without having to call the office or fill out paperwork. They can also upload any images to show where the work needs to be done, and provide consent to enter the unit. And, both parties can log in to see the status of the repair, so everyone is on the same page.
Streamline Work Orders
A property maintenance system enables the property manager to assign a repair request and easily convert it into one or many work orders. By harnessing technology, you have a digital record of all communication and work orders. Because it’s now streamlined, it makes it a snap to track time and materials and have insights into work completion. And, when your solution is integrated with accounting you can avoid repetitive double data entry work and get instant tenant chargebacks.
Automate Purchase Orders
To improve repairs and maintenance processes there needs to be a focus on removing manual work, and automating processes to save time, money and effort. When you can streamline and improve daily workflows, you also enable your company to grow and scale while still serving your customers efficiently and effectively. For third-party purchase orders, you can create customized approval workflows for purchase approvals allowing you to reclaim more of your day to focus on the important work rather than the paperwork. And, by automating you can ensure 1-2-3 matching from repair request to work order to purchase order, so that you’re always in compliance.
Ensure Routine & Preventative Inspections
Routine move-in/move-out inspections and preventative maintenance for HVAC and other building systems not only help you ensure your property asset, these repairs help thwart emergency repairs and any issues before they arise, reducing unexpected expenses. Maintenance software gives you the capability to ensure that all building, renovation and health and safety inspections are scheduled and tracked. And, you can link all purchase orders to specific inspections to better monitor costs.
By having a digital record of maintenance requests, property managers can easily pull up reports that look across property portfolios and identify which properties have higher maintenance requirements. This type of analysis is vital to being able to zero in on problem areas. You can use this trending information to predict preventative maintenance or allot the necessary capital investment.
When landlords and maintenance people have to guess about issues or troubleshoot without knowing the whole scenario, it costs valuable time and money. And, sadly, results in unhappy tenants and valuable time lost on your part. Here at Property Vista we give property managers all the tools to streamline, track and improve their maintenance process. See pricing and arrange a demo here.
