Protech is evolving faster than ever. It’s one of the surprising positives that came from the pandemic.
Property managers around the country learned that they have no choice but to implement cutting edge technology in order to ensure owners weren’t left with a bunch of vacant homes and units. Self-guided tours, smart access control systems and even interactive maps were implemented to make sure residents could tour and lease without ever interacting with a leasing agent.
It was a game-changing time for the property management industry, which (let’s be honest) has always been a little behind the technology curve. Now, that we’ve almost completely caught up, what’s next for property management in the technology realm that’s going to propel us into the future.
- 100 percent site-unseen leasing through immersive virtual experiences. Yes, it’s coming. Maybe not today, but in the not-so-distant future, people will be empowered to lease a home without ever setting a real foot on real carpet (or hardwood). Before you completely dismiss this possibility, do some research on how many people bought a car during the pandemic and immediately afterward without a test drive. I did.
- Approachable, map-and-asset-based data dashboards. It might seem a little esoteric … until you’ve seen it as a property manager or owner. Think about it. The last time you looked at a spreadsheet of data as a property manager or owner and thought, “this is going to take forever to analyze.” Imagine being able to see the rent rate in a multi-unit building or a market of single-family homes on a three-dimensional satellite image Google map. You could see the rents of every home in nearby submarkets on a single map, alongside the construction zones and the location amenities. How much easier would it be to make a rent rate decision in that environment? It’s not in development though. It’s already available.
- CRM systems that map the entire prospect and resident journey and every touch. One of the most difficult things for a property manager and an owner who manages their own properties to do is determine what lead sources to utilize. Sure, you can just post your listings on every online site possible. But that isn’t always the most efficient way to advertise a home. You’re probably wasting a lot of money. But if you could see the exact path that every prospect took before leasing your home (or at least an aggregate of it), you could optimize your advertising spend and make sure your properties are always leased at the lowest cost to you possible. Well, it’s coming.
The time has come for property management to truly become tech forward, rather than tech laggards. As an industry, we need to think as big as the consumer products industry if we want to see results that truly make a difference for our owners and our residents.
