PropertyManager.com

Using Excel Instead of Property Management Software Is Risky Business

Posted on 30. Aug, 2010 by Mary Girsch-Bock.

It’s no secret that there are a lot of Excel users in the property management community. An outstanding spreadsheet program, Excel frequently plugs in the gaps commonly found in accounting programs. But there’s a group of property managers that may find themselves relying on Excel a little too much.

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Your Paperless Office: Five Great Reasons to Move Payments Online

Posted on 28. Apr, 2010 by Jim Semick.

A single check seems small enough. But added up, the checks your property management company deposits or prints can ultimately bury your staff under a mound of paper. If you are on the way to a paperless office but haven’t yet tackled electronic payments for receivables and payables, you are paying more than you need to run your operation.

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How Property Managers Use Social Networking to Grow Their Business (Apr. 22 Webinar Recap)

Posted on 26. Apr, 2010 by Aimee Miller.

In this April 22nd webinar video recording, Mike Whaling, social media expert for the residential property management industry, talks about how property managers can use social media (think Facebook, Twitter, blogging) to connect with current and prospective residents as well as prospective owners.

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Rent Week Pain Relief: What’s the Best Online Payment Solution?

Posted on 24. Mar, 2010 by Jim Semick.

It’s rent week again, and all hands are on deck. If you’re like many other property management firms, you have an unwritten rule: no vacation during rent week. You realize that rent checks cost your company time and money with unnecessary handling, data entry, errors, staff frustration and other inefficiencies. Surely there has to be a better way.

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Seven Reasons Why Rent Checks Cost More than You Think

Posted on 11. Feb, 2010 by Jim Semick.

More property management firms are discovering that they can save a significant amount of time and reduce headaches during rent week by moving their resident rent payments online using ACH (automated clearinghouse) and other electronic methods.

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Ditch That Rent Check: A World of Online Payment Options

Posted on 28. Jan, 2010 by Jim Semick.

Sure, the lowly check will be with us for a while. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t help send checks the way of the dodo bird. According to a Federal Reserve System study, check usage is in steep decline, and checks now represent only 30 percent of all non-cash payments. Electronic payments are now the clear winner with consumers.

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SoftwareAdvice.com Survey: How Are Property Managers Using Technology?

Posted on 23. Dec, 2009 by Aimee Miller.

SoftwareAdvice.com recently sent out a survey to learn more about how property managers are using technology in their business.
A few interesting highlights:
1. Almost half of the companies surveyed grew their business last year – either growing by increased revenue or more units. This is great to hear in a struggling market! But how did they [...]

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Preparing Your 2010 Property Management Marketing Plan (Dec. 15 Webinar Recap)

Posted on 17. Dec, 2009 by Aimee Miller.

On December 15 AppFolio hosted a joint webinar with Multifamily Insiders and brought in a special guest speaker, Lisa Trosien. In the video below, Lisa shares her perspective on marketing trends, social media, tips and creative ideas from around the country to help you create a great plan for marketing your vacancies and property management [...]

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Keeping up with the Jones’s: Compare Away!

Posted on 21. Sep, 2009 by Aimee Miller.

Here are three sites I’ve found that help property managers compare things that are worth comparing:

Average rental rates
This is a helpful tool from RentBits (link). It lets you compare rents for apartments and houses in many geographic areas. It has an easy interface and you can see both the average and median prices over the [...]

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Moving Marketing Online: Interview with Nick Scarabosio, Jackson Group Property Management

Posted on 14. Sep, 2009 by Aimee Miller.

I recently had the chance to speak with Nick Scarabosio from Jackson Group Property Management in San Francisco, CA. San Francisco is a competitive market and you have to be thinking of creative ways to reach your audience…and Nick is pretty creative!
Aimee: How has your property management marketing changed over the past couple of years [...]

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5 Steps to Get More from Your Online Marketing (Aug. 26 Webinar Recap)

Posted on 31. Aug, 2009 by Aimee Miller.

Our webinar on Wednesday 8/26 (5 Steps to Get More from Your Online Marketing) was a great success!  Thanks to Brent for co-hosting this event and to Mike Whaling from 30Lines for being so knowledgeable and fun to listen to. Here is the entire recorded webinar including the audio.
Mike did such a great job – [...]

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Get More Done, In Less Time. Step Three – Use Google Docs

Posted on 21. Jul, 2009 by Albert Oaten.

This is the third of a three part series on how you can move to free, web-based Google tools and find more time in your busy day. In part one we went over how to set up and use Gmail. In part two we covered how to use Google Calendar to manage your office schedules.
Week [...]

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Get More Done, In Less Time. Step Two – Use Google Calendar

Posted on 13. Jul, 2009 by Albert Oaten.

In our first of three Google articles, we covered how property managers can benefit from using Gmail. For our second article, we’re going to show you how to set up and use Google Calendars so you can work more efficiently and free up some valuable time.
Week 2 – Get going on the calendars: Google Calendars [...]

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Get More Done, In Less Time. Step One – Use Gmail

Posted on 06. Jul, 2009 by Albert Oaten.

Here are some videos we’ve created to help you get started using free collaboration tools from Google. These will help you find ways to work better, faster and get more done (it is truly possible!).
The great thing about these collaboration tools from Google is that they are free and web-based so you don’t need to [...]

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Web-Based Tools for Property Managers – Increase Productivity and Save Some Cash

Posted on 13. Jun, 2009 by Aimee Miller.

How can you grow your business this year without growing your staff?
In a recent poll conducted during an AppFolio webinar we asked property managers if they were planning to add more properties this year and if they were planning to increase their staff to accommodate an increased workload. The majority said they are planning to [...]

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