Construction, at times, can be more of an art than a science. Plan changes, altered timelines and supply chain issues are often part of the landscape.

But that’s not to say the process cannot be efficient. Teams that have contingency plans for any potential obstacle and are best prepared to adjust on the fly greatly increase their chances of making the construction process a smooth one.

In many facets of multifamily, tech has become a critical component of creating efficiencies. The construction process is no different, although a balance exists in blending tech with standard building practices.

In a big-picture sense, homes have been built the same way for 2,000 years. Over time, innovations have been developed to attempt to change the way we build—particularly to move away from wood-framed construction. But none of those technologies have necessarily taken hold. Tech, after all, will never surpass skilled workers when it comes to the manual portions of developing a multistory building.

Tech does play a primary role, however.

Construction teams are utilizing tech to track issues, solve those issues and make sure they don’t reoccur in the future. The ability to manage information—and use tech to be more efficient in a sometimes-unpredictable space—has been the biggest improvement in the construction industry in the last 10 to 15 years.

For example, project management software such as Procore can be utilized throughout all phases of the construction process. It can provide leadership teams with real-time updates on any facet of the project. Entire teams can understand the status of any plans or timeline and identify stress points. A project executive can get a report at any time and ask: “Why haven’t these change orders been approved at Project X?”

Tech has also benefited construction teams in the form of security at job sites. Motion-activated cameras can alert teams to any unwanted afterhours visitors at construction sites. Leak detection technology includes audible alarm alerts and, perhaps more importantly, water-loss prevention triggers that can shut off water when too much pressure is identified. This can help prevent potentially catastrophic delays and ensure timelines aren’t short-circuited because someone mistakenly put a nail through a pipe.

With regard to the construction process itself, the tech isn’t quite there yet. Significant advancements have been made with robotics, but no one has yet been able to successfully scale it. Tech has also helped materials to become better and more efficient, but tech itself cannot install those materials precisely where they need to be within a building.

At the end of the day, the most critical component of the construction process is your people. Tech can be used to make them better at what they’re doing by providing them with materials and the information to be more efficient.

While people will always come first, tech will continue to provide value. The new generation of builders—whether superintendents, project managers or assistant project managers—are being trained on technology as much as they’re being trained on construction management. Tech is largely intuitive to them, and they are expected to use it in all facets of the construction process. Over time, the tech component will become even more intuitive and have a more significant impact as it becomes further integrated.

The benefits of an efficient construction timeline are widespread. From a financial standpoint, apartment communities can start bringing in revenue when they were originally projected to —or even sooner if things go especially smoothly. Time is the one thing you cannot get back. The sooner construction teams can move communities to operations teams, the more value it will create for the owner and their investors. Prompt timelines also help operators maintain their reputation as good neighbors in the jurisdictions that they operate in.

The tech helps create a more efficient project. The people make it happen. Construction teams can have the best plans, the best processes and the best sites in the world, but without the right people doing things the right way, it won’t really matter.

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Mill Creek Residential has begun moving in residents into to its Modera Six Pines, a 429-unit community designed around health and wellness. The property is situated in The Woodlands, Texas, a neighborhood 27 miles north of Houston.

Modera Six Pines is a five-story podium-style property built on 11 acres. With an emphasis on the health and wellness of its residents, the asset was designed to include a two-story Life Time Fitness health center, group fitness area, pool and yoga and Pilates studio. Other community amenities include bike storage, valet dry cleaning, electric vehicle charging stations, an on-site library, coworking spaces and a bar area with resident lounge.

“We’re tremendously excited about welcoming our initial residents to Modera Six Pines,” Ginny Hightower, regional design manager for Mill Creek Residential, told Multi-Housing News. “Our two-story fitness center helps underscore the community’s focus on health, and the tree-surrounded location helps foster a serene, relaxed living experience.”

Mill Creek owns two other communities in the Houston area: Modera Flats and Modera Washington. The firm currently has a North Carolina 134-unit property under construction, slated for completion in 2023. In partnership with FCP, Mill Creek broke ground this year on a 800-home asset next to Nova Southeastern University in Broward County, Fla.

View the full article here.

Retaining current residents helps curb turn and marketing costs, builds a sense of community and limits the volume of new residents that teams will have to attract each year.
Apartment operators work tirelessly to attract new residents. They regularly mull innovative ways to appeal to the modern-day renter. But many of those residents who can lead to a robust occupancy rate are already in the building.

When crafting marketing plans and pushing to drive the performance of their portfolio, operators should not overlook current residents. They’ve already done the hard part and sparked their interest—now it’s just a matter of keeping them at the property. Maintaining current residents helps curb turn and marketing costs, builds a sense of community and limits the volume of new residents teams will have to attract each year.

Granted, a healthy mix of renewals and new arrivals is generally ideal. But operators who neglect residents after move-in generally will experience more than their share of one-and-done terms. From Zoom rooms, exemplary service levels, cutting-edge pet policies and a state-of-the-art maintenance approach, operators recently shared some of their tips for keeping valuable residents in
the building.

1. Appealing to the remote worker
As the remote-work boom continues to increase, resident demand for comfortable work-from-home spaces has followed suit. Birchstone Residential, based in Coppell, Texas, aims to keep pace and will soon implement its first Zoom room at Halston on Frankford in Dallas.

“It was a remodeled, somewhat awkward space that didn’t really make sense for anything else,” says Carie Grout, Regional Manager for Birchstone. “We are planning to add calming backgrounds that allow clarity and frosted glass to help with any type of notes or visuals needed, as well as equipment to ensure the work-from-home environment resembles that of an office feel. We imagine that we’ll probably start to see the addition of Zoom rooms at other communities.”

Grout also notes that while package lockers have been around for several years, they have become even more crucial with residents at home more than ever. Originally devised as a solution for residents to retrieve their shipments during off hours, residents now more frequently crave the ability to quickly pick up deliveries as soon as they arrive.

The same spike in demand applies to onsite gyms and fitness centers.

“Fitness centers have always been a crucial part of our communities, but the usage of them has increased tremendously with the new work-from-home cultures as residents do not commute to their jobs as they did before,” Grout says. “You’re seeing many operators really dedicate capital for their fitness centers and make them an attractive, sizable space for residents to utilize more often.”

Birchstone has also observed an uptick in resident demand for convenience-based in-home tech packages rather than those rooted in entertainment.

“Nowadays, the usage of mobile devices is a very big part of everyone’s life, as it gives us the ability to control almost everything from our fingertips,” Grout says. “A resident can be working from home and has the ability to adjust the thermostat or control lighting without disrupting their current activity. They can let someone in the gate or into their home from their phone, as well.”

2. Service excellence = longer stays
Apartment operators set high expectations when they showcase a fantastic resident experience. But as noted by Mill Creek Executive Vice President of Property Management Stephen Prochnow, you don’t want to be the multifamily version of one who’s a great date but isn’t as adept in a committed relationship. In short, that means not forgetting about residents after they move in.

“It’s up to us to make sure we follow through and provide an experience that’s commensurate with the expectation,” Prochnow says. “For us, the key has been focusing on the operational team at the community level. We’ve discovered that a high-performing, customer-centric community team is the key to resident retention. We focus on associate recruitment, training and retention to ensure our teams are equipped to provide exceptional customer service and empowered to encourage resident retention.”

In a competitive employment environment, avoiding turnover and retaining those high-level associates that drive renewals is key. Mill Creek offers a unique set of benefits, including paid parental leave, a sabbatical program, tuition support and much more, but discovered the company needed to further highlight these perks.

“We offer great benefits, but we were finding that even our internal associates oftentimes didn’t realize everything that was available to them,” Prochnow says. “Similarly, we weren’t prominently marketing some of the fantastic benefits to job candidates, so we’ve focused on our recruitment process and messaging.”

Mill Creek constantly analyzes data to ensure the company is hitting its service benchmarks. The company utilizes a scoring methodology to gauge target metrics for customer service at every community. These include scores pertaining to various consumer touch points within the leasing and service-request processes that outline the speed and quality of the response.

Knowing stellar service levels also means offering useful amenities, Mill Creek has remained astute about morphing resident preferences. With the work-from-home propensity ever rising, Mill Creek noticed residents were starting to compete for common-area workspace.

“One thing we’ve tried to do is create more workspaces that are divisible into smaller increments, whereas in the past we would have one large table with eight or 10 seats,” Prochnow says. “Now, many of our workspaces are smaller so they can accommodate one to two people, and it’s yet another place where residents can get different elements of natural light, be part of a buzzier scene with other residents and get to know each other.”

3. Innovative pet policies
Pet policies previously had been regarded as something of a secondary tool to attract residents—at least in the eyes of many operators. But as pet ownership continues to ascend and residents view their pets as part of

the family even more, properties must have something to offer the pet-owning demographic.

An unabashed pet lover himself, Jamin Harkness was eager to disrupt the traditional model. The Executive Vice President of Atlanta-based The Management Group (TMG) was ready to move on from virtually everything contained in the industry’s standard, antiquated pet policies.

He shed breed and weight restrictions in favor of screening pets on an individual basis. He outsourced assistance animal accommodation requests—which became more streamlined after eliminating the restrictions because fewer residents would attempt to sneak in their pets under the guise of an assistance animal. He adopted tech resources to help manage and properly track the growing pet population at TMG communities.

In another bold move, Harkness eliminated pet rent. He had resident renewals in mind when doing so, but he was beyond flabbergasted—in a good way—by the results. TMG communities experienced a vigorous 80% renewal rate among pet owners after making the changes. Looking industry-wide, residents in pet-friendly housing stay 21% longer than those in non-pet-friendly housing, according to a 2021 report from the Pet-Inclusive Housing Initiative.

“We estimate that approximately 53 more residents are renewing at a 250-home property than if we had the industry standard 50% renewal rate,” Harkness says. “I’ll gladly sacrifice pet rent for the cost savings on not having to turn 50-plus homes per year. Plus, it helps build a sense of community when people and their pets remain in the building.”

TMG also hosts several pet functions per year, which include welcoming pet photographers and pet trainers to the property. The company adds fresh mulch to its pet parks several times a year and often stocks them with play toys and pet features. While TMG is a prime example of a truly pet-centric experience, Harkness says that communities without the capital to go all out can still make a genuine impact with a few subtle upgrades.

“We’ve discovered that the most crucial features are a pet park with shade and benches,” Harkness says. “If you can repurpose unused space and offer these simple amenities, it can still equate to an enjoyable, pet-centric experience.”

Harkness notes that onsite pet parks are regularly used more often than the swimming pool at TMG communities, which is as much of an endorsement as any that operators would be wise to continually enhance these spaces.

4. Timely and communicative maintenance teams
Operators agreed that a community’s maintenance team often qualifies as a key component in driving renewals. Birchstone, for instance, aims for a 24-hour service completion time. If the community cannot hit that deadline, teams will make certain to communicate the reason to residents, along with timely updates.

“If it takes a week to get your service request done then when renewal comes up, nine times out of 10 you’re not going to renew,” says Grout, noting that Birchstone includes maintenance techs in the renewal bonus pool. “But if you’re at a property where a request is done with no questions whenever you submit it—or you were communicated with if there ever was a delay—nine times out of 10 you’re going to stay.”

Prochnow alluded to the idea that maintenance teams can be the face of the community because residents might see them most often. Mill Creek is among the operators that make certain to equip and train technicians with innovative tech tools to digitally manage service requests.

“Residents want a convenient experience when something goes wrong,” he says. “Timely communication and swift completion of a request is their expectation. Many times, the work-order process is the deterministic factor during the lease.”

Residents have many reasons as to why they decide to move on from an apartment community. Utilizing the concepts and ideas above, operators can counter with several reasons why they should stay.

Paul Willis is a Content Manager for LinnellTaylor Marketing.

Click here to view the full article.

MFE-ChristineSerlin-9.12.22 — The Atlanta rental market is expected to remain strong due to a healthy economy, a lower cost of living, good demographic trends, and positive rent growth, according to a midyear multifamily report for the metro from Berkadia.

Multifamily starts have increased since the beginning of the pandemic due to recent strong demand. More than 26,000 units have been added since the beginning of 2020, with delivery of 4,500 units in the first half of this year. In all, 11,752 units are expected to be delivered in 2022, with another 20,385 deliveries projected for 2023. According to Berkadia, leasing activity hasn’t kept pace with the deliveries in the first half of the year, with the market seeing a drop in occupancy. However, the current occupancy rate of 95.7% is higher than the pre-pandemic average of 94.5% in 2019’s fourth quarter.

While Berkadia predicts that occupancy will decrease in the second half of the year as more units are delivered, it says this is not expected to deter operators from continuing to raise rents because of the strong fundamentals. Effective rents were up 3.9% to $1,662 year to date in the second quarter, or 17.5% year over year.

“There is a pipeline of oncoming supply that will stabilize the rent growth we’ve been seeing, but that does not seem to be significantly outpacing the population growth of the metro,” says Frank Roessler, founder and CEO of Ashcroft Capital, which owns nearly 3,500 multifamily units in the metro.

The Atlanta metro area boasts strong population growth and employment drivers. According to 2021-22 population estimates from the Atlanta Regional Commission, the 11-county metro area added nearly 65,000 people within the past year, pushing the region’s total count to 5.1 million.

“Atlanta is the pure definition of a growth market versus a barrier market like Boston, Seattle, or San Francisco. Recently, there has been a steady in-migration to Atlanta from other cities,” says Patrick Chesser, senior managing director of development in the Atlanta office of Mill Creek Residential, which has developed over 3,300 homes in the metro. “It’s less expensive and more convenient for companies to do business here without compromising the quality of workers. The jobs and demand for housing follows, which add to the supply imbalance Atlanta already has due in large part to the scarcity of development activity from 2008 to 2012.”

According to Berkadia’s midyear report, year-to-date sales volume was at $3.6 billion for the metro, with 47 transactions and an average cap rate of 3.7%.

“Nationwide, multifamily trades have slowed to a trickle. However, we are seeing quality deals get done in the right markets. And Atlanta’s population growth and exploding economy have provided investors with the confidence to continue to invest. Currently, we have about 25 properties in our investment pipeline, and several are in Atlanta,” adds Roessler.

Click here to view the full article.

Consumers often rely on online reviews before purchasing products or trying new restaurants.Online reviews are perhaps even more important to multifamily owners and managers. That’s because the online reputation of an apartment community impacts not only whether prospective tenants visit and tour it but also leasing rates, rents, tenant retention and valuation of the property.

That’s why owners and managers need to pay close attention to Online Reputation Assessment (ORA) scores, an industry standard that measures a property’s online reputation. Created by Houston-based J Turner Research—an online reputation management firm that monitors the online ratings and reviews of over 126,000 properties nationwide—ORA scores establish a score for each apartment community that’s an aggregate of that property’s ratings across various review sites. The scores are based on a scale of 0 to 100 and are updated every month.

This may seem obvious, but industry executives report that they often have to remind their team to simply ask a resident or prospect to post a review after a positive interaction.

“Whether it’s a new lease-up community or one that we’re rebranding, we’ve found that the first online reviews set the tone for that community,” said Stephen Prochnow, executive vice president of property management. By simply asking for a review, residents feel encouraged to take the time to go online and offer their positive feedback. Full article can be found here.

Part of the charm of the multifamily industry is that a wide variety of tactics can be used to achieve results, and virtually every operator has a unique strategy. Those divergent methods certainly apply to how operators handle their construction processes, as well.

Some completely outsource their construction and renovation projects to various third-party outlets, others use preferred vendors, and some utilize the vertical integration approach by deploying their own in-house construction teams. While all have their advantages, the latter would seem to be the most beneficial for an owner/operator. The decision to opt for in-house construction, however, doesn’t instantly serve as a magic wand to increase productivity at new developments or rehab projects.

“You should only create an in-house construction department if you know you can do it better than your current third-party contractor,” says Frank Roessler, founder and CEO of Ashcroft Capital. “It is a huge undertaking. If you’re doing it for any other reason, then I’d strongly recommend against it, because you can screw it up easier than you can do it right.”

Mill Creek Residential utilizes its own in-house construction team and serves as its own general contractor. The company only uses general contractors in rare instances in select markets.

Chip Bay, chief construction officer, outlines the multifaceted advantages to this approach.

“First and foremost, our interests are completely aligned between the construction, development, and property management teams,” he says. “We’re all rowing in the same direction. Construction is involved from the very beginning. They work with development on design, the intent of the community, and budgeting from the get-go. It allows development to have the best numbers possible during the entitlement process and while they’re securing financing.

“When we’re ready to start the development, we’re better prepared to execute because everyone has been involved since day one. “

Another sizable advantage is risk mitigation. Construction teams involved from the outset are aware of any concerns surrounding the development. They know the intent of ownership and have been a part of the decision-making process since the planning stages and are prepared to execute accordingly.

“Fundamentally what we do in this business is create value and manage risk,” Bay says. “The most risk is often on the construction side. Our job is to manage that risk and minimize it to any extent that we can. By having our own in-house construction division, we have created a team approach on each development, which gives us the maximum amount of control.”

The vertical integration model fosters consistency in approach, makes it easier to adhere to national building standards and enhances quality control. The holistic approach prevents any “we versus them” or “you do your job and I’ll do mine” disconnect between the teams, Bay says. The in-house construction team is more focused on building a world-class community than viewing it as a prime financial opportunity.

Mill Creek has separate teams for ground-up developments and value-add efforts but exhibits the same approach in both types of construction endeavors. The company has been diligent, Bay says, to hire construction personnel that are not only greater builders, but also outstanding business people.

“They are partners in the business itself, so they have a vested interest in the development being successful,” Bay says. “That motivation permeates through the entire organization. It provides professionalism to the construction side that you might not get if you’re outsourcing that effort. The same culture that exists in the construction division exists in the development division and throughout the entire company. They’re one and the same.”

Full article can be found here.

Mill Creek Residential has begun construction on the luxury, mixed-use community Modera Coral Springs, located in the heart of Coral Springs, Fla. Situated at 3250 N. University Drive, Modera Coral Springs will offer 351 units and more than 14,600 square feet of retail space.

The project is part of the greater Cornerstone at Downtown Coral Springs development, intended to inject revitalized living, dining, retail and entertainment choices into the city’s busiest area. The apartment community will welcome first move-ins by summer of 2023.

“The location on University Drive is directly amidst one of the most sought-after locations in the city,” John Grimaldi, vice president of development, South Florida Region, told Multi-Housing News. “The community is positioned near the influx of a large number of existing retail, restaurants and boutique shops that will be easily accessible for our residents . . . The area, which services the surrounding Coral Springs and Parkland communities, is rapidly revitalizing and has a promising future.’”

The property’s wrap-style design aims to make the apartment community distinctive in a market where walk-up, low-rise rental properties predominate. “While the product is unproven locally, it also serves as a great opportunity,” Grimaldi said.

Full article can be found here.

Investors and residents are gobbling up single-family rentals, so developers–both traditional homebuilders and multifamily specialists–are clamoring to feed their growing appetites. According to the National Association of Home Builders, there were approximately 14,000 single-family built-for-rent starts in the third quarter of 2020, a 27 percent increase over the prior quarter.

“’We looked at a few other opportunities, including senior living and student housing, but single-family rentals seem to have the most opportunity,’ said Callum Parrott, President of Single-Family Rentals.

We are expanding into a space that has typically been managed by mom-and-pop operators. ‘Mill Creek is vertically integrated, with construction, development and operation capabilities, and we think the product type, while not easy, will be easier than what we have built in the past.’ Plus, the initial markets Mill Creek is targeting—the Carolinas, Georgia, Florida, Texas and Arizona—are all markets in which the company is currently operating.”

Full article can be found here.

“Securing apartment community networks involves more than just phishing tests.

As onsite processes become increasingly digital, multifamily housing organizations have focused more and more on cybersecurity in recent years. Companies are taking cybersecurity more seriously at the board level as investors have pushed for more stringent data-privacy measures, and many of the practices are funneling to the site level, especially with the emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT).

But significant gaps remain in the industry’s grasp of cybersecurity and data privacy effectiveness and how to improve it. That is regularly evident in the incomprehensive contracts written throughout the industry by different providers. In addition, 80 percent of observed cyberattacks used vulnerabilities reported and registered in 2017 and earlier, according to data from Entrata. More than 20 percent of the attacks exploited vulnerabilities that are at least seven years old.

While the industry has taken steps to promote cybersecurity awareness in several areas, particularly regarding phishing attacks and ransomware, a large part of the shift has been reactive. For instance, when new legislation is introduced—such as the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)—companies are only then more likely to focus on how their data privacy and cybersecurity practices are being upheld.

As 2020 brought a host of new threats from opportunistic infiltrators, many organizations don’t yet have a comprehensive understanding of contract law and the company’s obligation to further secure data. Legal teams are helping to bring awareness to existing and forthcoming threats, but it remains in the early stages in the apartment world.

Following is a look at the current state of cybersecurity in multifamily housing and what the industry can do to better protect itself from cyberattacks that could lead to costly data breaches.”

Full article by Jeffrey Kok can be found here.

Collecting lots of data is one thing. Understanding it is entirely another.

More than ever, the rental housing industry understands the value of data-driven decisions. The industry has done a commendable job of collecting the data—particularly in the past few years—but still must make headway in quantifying it and converting it to actionable business intelligence (BI).

Challenges exist regarding sheer volume, uneven integration and simply not understanding how to unearth whatever business intelligence exists within the data. Fortunately, operators are beginning to recognize these obstacles, improve data management strategies and leverage the data in previously unforeseen ways.

But it is not an immediate process.

“Real estate, like many other industries, is experiencing challenges with data management in general,” says Justin Pardy, Senior Data Analyst. “One of the challenges is collecting and storing the data in a way that is usable and accessible. Cleaning the data is another big issue, although it is also not unique to real estate.”

Apartment operators weighed in on some of the specific challenges and how the industry can do a better job with data management. Effectively leveraging that data often consists of determining what’s important and what’s not, asking the correct questions and properly analyzing the metrics to fuel better decision-making.

The increasing number of partners with the ability to integrate is alleviating some data integrity challenges. Whether a property management system or industry supplier, a seamless, accurate flow of information reduces many of those concerns.

Full article can be found here.