Updated March 30, 2023
As a property manager, one area that's very important to the continuation and success of your business is lease renewals. Before a lease expires, you need to know if the tenant is going to renew or whether they're going to move out.
Renewing more leases helps your property owners make more money (and helps your business grow). However, keeping up with renewals and expirations for multiple rental properties can become overwhelming without the right help.
Automating a lot of the renewal process can help because your system alerts you to the tenants who need new leases and those who may be moving out instead of renewing. However, automation coupled with adding a property management virtual assistant to your team is an ideal way to stay ahead of lease renewals or get a property ready for a new tenant as quickly as possible.
Here are a few of the most valuable points you'll want to consider about lease expirations and renewals to train your virtual assistant on these processes.
A lease renewal does several important things for property owners, as well as your property management company. For example, lease renewals eliminate many of the costs you would otherwise experience to find a new tenant and conduct the make-ready process on a property.
A renewal means you don't have to prepare the property for a new person, find and vet another renter, or spend money on advertising. Those costs add up fast. Plus, if the renter did any damage to the property, the repair and rental-ready costs could be more than you expect. A renewal from good tenants avoids all those hassles and expenses.
Lease renewals also help reduce vacancy times, which means rentals aren't sitting empty or losing money for your owners. Property owners look to your property managers to generate consistent cash flow. Therefore, if your company has difficulty renting the property or renewing tenants, the owner may start looking for a different company to see if they can increase their revenue.
Retaining trustworthy renters and avoiding bad tenants is a win-win for owners and property management company owners! Choosing a well-trained virtual assistant means you have quality help in place to tackle every task of good tenant management and stay on top of lease renewals.
Having a solid track record of lease renewals makes it easier for you to build relationships with the owners who have properties managed by your company, too. They're happy that they have consistent rental income and good people in their properties who are taking care of those properties the right way.
When you have good relationships with the owners you currently work with, they're more likely to suggest your management services to other owners, bringing you more business.
Additionally, choosing a remote assistant to handle lease renewal can also take much of the stress off your employees. They won't need to worry about handling lease renewal processing, which frees them up to focus on other areas of the property management cycle. In addition, since renewing a lease can be handled virtually, your remote team member can work from anywhere and take pressure off your company's employees.
Automating your lease expirations and renewals gives you a way to reduce the stress of the process and makes it easier for everyone involved. You can get custom reporting through software that handles lease renewals, so you can see who's lease is due, who has already renewed, and who you need to reach out to.
An automated system for lease renewals also helps you confirm the lease renewal details and the rent price so everyone is on the same page. In addition, a property management virtual assistant can work through reports generated by your system and keep track of renewed leases, pending renewals, or tenants who've decided not to renew.
With a well-trained VA on the case, they can also coordinate with tenants and vendors for the move-out and make-ready processes.
Depending on the platform you use to find remote help, not every virtual contractor comes with the skills and experience you need to adapt quickly to your processes. With a VA handling leases, a property manager must ensure they understand the legalities of lease agreements, the ideal timeframe to contact tenants about renewal, and how to move quickly when a renter decides not to renew so a rental property doesn't experience a lengthy vacancy.
When onboarding your new virtual team member, focus a portion of your training on specific tasks required for their role, including some "PM101" training to help them get up to speed on managing rental properties appropriately for your location and local regulations.
When you work with a virtual assistant for property management, you can pass along many low-level (yet important) tasks to help keep your business operating smoothly. As we've talked about today, an ideal task for a virtual contractor is handling lease renewals and expirations.
When choosing virtual assistant services through VPM Solutions, you'll find plenty of experienced candidates with property management leasing skills. We provide in-platform training to all VAs through our VPM Academy, free of charge. That way, when property managers need to fill a role quickly, they have plenty of experienced talent available to find the right fit.
Whether you need to fill remote assistant jobs for administrative tasks, managing social media accounts, or data entry, a virtual team member with property management training can ramp up quickly and improve productivity for your company right away.
Are you ready to find quality help with your lease renewals through virtual assistant services? Make sure you have a Free Company Profile with VPM Solutions, and ensure you select a team member with lease renewal and expiration experience! Our well-trained and VPM Academy-certified remote assistants can help your property management company serve clients better!
Download the "Real Estate Virtual Assistant Hiring Kit" for free resources to help you find your next VA!