Nothing more frustrating than booking a time to show one of your vacancies and the prospective tenant is a no show! Sound familar! Well it’s easy to remedy this, you just need to take control of the appointment!
Here’s what I do and this simple tip will almost certainly guarantee that the Tenant will show up for the viewing. First of all I pre-qualify them over the phone with a few simple questions like when are the looking to rent, have they already given notice to their current landlord, how many pets do they have, etc. If they pass my questions then I give them two pre-determined showing times. Usually the first one is at noon (they could see it on their lunch break) and the second is early evening (after work), in my case usually around 6:00 pm. You will find in most cases they can make one of these time slots and I figure if the can’t then they aren’t that serious or we can schedule for another day. But here’s the tip to make sure they will be there for the appointment. I give them my cell number and tell them to call me 30 minutes before the appointment to confirm the appointment and I make it clear if they don’t call me – I won’t be there! It’s a very simple process and it works like a charm!
Also, don’t stagger showings in time intervals – I have them all show up at the same time! This achieves two things. First it saves me time – if I had people show up in 15 minute intervals it would easily stretch the showing out to a hour or longer. Secondly it creates demand and urgency for the vacancy when they see a suite full of potential tenants – they won’t want to lose out to someone else! I have applications in hand and once one fills out a form, the rush is on! I also believe this helps me to get top rent for my rentals as well!
Follow these simple property managment tips and you will save a lot of time and get higher rent for your properties!
