When a resident leaves a complaint, there’s a solid chance that it has to do with a poor experience with a maintenance issue. The reality is that no building is perfect. When addressed proactively, a building’s maintenance can make all the difference between a negative and positive experience for both residents and landlords.
In fact, creating and implementing an effective maintenance plan is one of the most reliable ways for an owner-operator or property manager to minimize liability for injuries, reduce repair costs, improve resident satisfaction, and increase asset value.
Operating a cost efficient property full of satisfied residents requires a strategic focus on specific KPIs in the development of a measurable maintenance plan.
Leading KPIs for Building Maintenance
The following KPIs can help you track how effective your maintenance strategy is:
- Time to Resolution: A defunct air conditioner or squeaky door are minor inconveniences to your residents, should they be dealt with promptly. If left too long, even these minor fixes can quickly become a daily nuisance in your routine and escalate into a costly and potentially long term endeavor. Short repair times indicate balanced priorities and a high level of organization as a property management business.
- Tenant Retention: Satisfied residents equal occupied units. High resident turnover rates affect your bottom line, and are a warning sign that your building maintenance strategy has room for improvement.
- Online Reviews: First impressions matter, and sometimes they occur before a potential resident even sets foot in your building. With many prospective renters conducting their rental search online, the majority scan online reviews for information on properties and property management companies before they decide to move in. By conducting an online audit, you can flag common areas of concern among residents and determine your standing among competitors.
Creating a Property Management Maintenance Plan
How to Build Your Plan and Track Against KPIs
- Determine Priorities: Draft a document outlining maintenance priorities in order of importance. Start with tasks related to resident safety, like fire alarm testing. Then list the tasks related to your highest volume of resident concerns along with standard wear and tear issues, taking into consideration cost and urgency for ongoing maintenance.
- Create a Schedule: Ensure everything on the list is attended to at the right frequency. While waste disposal is an almost daily occurrence, air conditioning inspections or unit fire alarm testing happen annually. No matter the frequency, all are of equal importance to the overall upkeep and long-term maintenance of the property and should be scheduled accordingly.
- Source Reliable Contractors: Finding affordable and reliable contractors to address maintenance issues not only helps decrease wait times on repairs, it’s one of the guaranteed ways to increase resident satisfaction too!
- Mind your Budget: Having a maintenance plan in place, allows you to anticipate repair costs well in advance and set aside the necessary funds in your budget. However, things don’t always go as planned, so you should maintain a healthy reserve fund for emergencies.
- Keep Organized Records: Ensure you have a defined process to keep all inspection reports and repair receipts neatly organized and accessible for easy reference in case a resident or landlord requests a copy and to easily identify recurring issues.
- Measure & Report: Demonstrate accountability to owners while also gaining insight into areas in need of improvement by regularly measuring the impact of your maintenance strategy using KPIs and translating that data into a detailed report.
Managing Property Maintenance Requests with Propra
At Propra, we are helping Canadian owner-operators and property managers elevate the resident and landlord experience. This is done with a modern property management software that minimizes frustrating manual processes and enhances visibility across property asset portfolios. This includes a maintenance request system that:
- Eliminates excessive communications between residents and maintenance operators
- Triages maintenance priorities using smart templates for common issues
- Reduces missed appointments with automatic calendar invites and alerts when maintenance is scheduled
- Automates maintenance request billing
- Enhances tracking for request time, cost, time to resolution, and more!
For more information on how to improve your overall maintenance request time and resident experience with Propra, book a demo today!
