Multifamily communities are finding themselves in an interesting situation. Apartment building occupancy rates are high. Units are full or already leased out. With that, many communities are taking a closer look at how to improve resident satisfaction. How can they get their current residents to resign their leases?

It can be a significant challenge to convince residents to resign. Many of your residents’ needs change over time. They may decide to buy a home, change jobs, or any number of factors you can’t control. What you can control is how satisfied they are while living in your apartment complex. One of the most effective ways to manage that satisfaction is through video.

Here are three great ways to use video to build on and maximize your apartment resident retention strategy.

Be authentic and Transparent with Communication

The easiest way to show authenticity and transparency with residents is how you communicate with them. Transparent communication with your existing residents should be the cornerstone of your apartment resident retention strategy.

That doesn’t necessarily mean to over-communicate with your residents as no one needs to hear from their property team THAT often. However, communicating with a steady cadence is critical. It’s also where you can keep the human-to-human component alive – showing excitement, empathy and realness.

Among the best ways to communicate effectively and transparently with residents is by using video. First of all, video works in terms of effective communications. Whether you’re communicating via text, a resident app, or through email, video gets clicks. It’s what your residents are more likely to open, view, and retain than plain text.

Then, when sharing information, video can create the environment of authenticity and trust you, and your residents, are looking for. If it’s an actual person, a property manager, or another member of the on-site team, on-camera conveying the message, they’ll be able to portray emotion and personalize the message. That emotion and personalization are what will connect with the resident and make it feel real.

Engage Your Residents

Apartment events are likely a part of your existing apartment resident retention plan. Whether they are virtual resident events or in person, they can be a great way to engage residents. It helps residents engage with each other, showcase the amenities, and interact with the property team.

You could bring together residents for intramural sports teams, have meals together, host fun celebrations for major US holidays, or even just have an impromptu game night. However, even the best apartment event ideas won’t work if people don’t show up. You’ll need to send invitations to residents in advance.

If you really want residents to come to your events, use video as a way to invite them. It can help build up the excitement for whatever you have in store.

And don’t stop there! While the event is going on, use video to capture the fun, the energy, and the overall atmosphere of the event. Then, send a follow-up email with a recap video to create a little FOMO for the residents who couldn’t make it. That can help to maximize attendance at the next event, building excitement well in advance of the next event.

Streamline the Management of Maintenance Requests

Now, this may seem a little less exciting than our other two apartment resident retention ideas. But, trust us. It’s an important and incredibly effective one. When it comes to maintenance and general operations requests, that can be one of the biggest headaches when it comes to living in a multifamily community. Being able to streamline your teams’ responses to those requests, and their subsequent completion, is going to be one of the biggest ways to positively impact resident retention.

So many communities are finding ways to streamline and fulfill maintenance requests by leaning on video. They are putting the maintenance team in front of the camera to record the very simple how-tos for care tips that people may not know. For example, the team can record videos around caring for in-unit washer and dryers, garbage disposals, how to program the HVAC, and how to turn on a tripped breaker. Then, many maintenance request tickets can be closed out and checked off by simply sending a video. Residents are empowered to resolve their issues themselves and it helps them get to know their maintenance team a little bit better.

See how this maintenance team turned headaches into streamlined processes

It’s become a game-changer for many multifamily property teams by streamlining operations and improving the resident experience overall – and the resident may learn a little something they can take with them.

We hope these three ideas can help maximize your apartment retention strategy. They are by far not the only ones, particularly when you’re using video. Whatever works to make your multifamily community feel more like a home and a real community to residents is what is most important and what will make residents want to re-sign their lease.

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