I need input. I recently took on a property in the inner City.

I need input. I recently took on a property in the inner City. This property was known to be drug infested and anyone could move in with no background or credit check. The previous management company kept bad records and we're not making people pay their rents. They had a lot of squatters living on the property. Now the owners have brought in my management company to take over the property and want this property 98% occupied and 90% paying occupancy within 90 days. We currently have over 20 vacancies. We are advertising on our website, with third-party payee programs, affordable housing websites and marketplace. We are running referral specials and holiday half off first month's rent. Anyone have any other suggestions of what we could do to lease up these units to qualifying applicants?

You need 6 months to a year. 90 days is hardly enough time to figure out what you’ve gotten yourself into. Set realistic expectations now.

Ed Trevino the reason that they want 90 days is that they are trying to refinance

Guest Insider that’s their issue. 90 days is unrealistic going into the holidays

Guest Insider - you aren't trying to refinance - it was their choice to purchase a bad asset. You're the only true asset at this point

Guest Insider These are absolutely unrealistic expectations. Someone needs to educate the owners/investors better than they are. Most times they don’t come from a property management experienced background and have no idea what it takes to turn a property around that is in that state. Reputation alone will stop you from leasing to good paying tenants. I have been where you are before. It isn’t easy. Took over two years and going through the raids the police did didn’t help the properties reputation. Good luck.

That's not happening. You're being set up to fail

If it's got a bad element DO NOT offer referral incentives. You need to weed out the bad apples - run credit & criminal on existing units before offering renewals. You'll likely not achieve that goal in less than 4 - 6 months. With a bad reputation they should have already changed the name - of not strongly think about it, if possible. You'll take a hit on the chin in occupancy but be able to increase rents by $100-$200/mo just by those couple of things. It's gonna be hard. You CAN do it

Quit

Programs like Stake and Esusu are great to help drive on time rent payments. (Transunion reported that 81% of residents would be more likely to pay their rent on time with programs that improve their credit or offer rewards)
As most people noted above, you are definitely in a horrible time crunch.
I’d focus less on short burst concessions and use Stake to help drive “resident rewards or cash back programs”.
As for filling vacancies, looking to your ILS partners to help with boosting traffic and if there are records of prospects that didn’t convert from 9months to a year ago, start there and see if they are looking to move again.

I think even six months is optimistic. I bought an asset like that and it took more than a year to turn it all around, although that was partly because there was a lot of damage caused by squatters and it took longer than hoped to get units back online.
Name change is almost a must, in my opinion. To the extent you’re able, establish a new identity and new signage. Definitely get the message out to existing residents that there is a new sheriff in town and that none of the previous nonsense will be tolerated. Make friends with the local PD (bring them donuts!) in case you need their help in rooting out criminal activity.
If the property condition is decent then six months might be achievable but I wouldn’t be surprised if it takes a bit longer.

Everyone is correct 90 days is set up for failure. Hopefully they changed the name of the property and advertise new ownership and changes being made. Wish you the best of luck. Keep the resume updated.

Increase all online reviews!

Your management company should have never agreed to 90 days. If they don't know better than that, they shouldn't be trusted to run a management company at all.

Reach out to Section 8 and let them know you have availability

A cruise ship doesn't just "turn around"

Be sure to advertise new management every where! It can take 90 days just to get word out that you are cleaning up the site. Good luck!

Unrealistic expectations.

I’m in your exact same boat. Literally. Every single part of it. 3 months is absolutely unrealistic! It’s going to take us both 6 months just to get a BASELINE stabilized occupancy again. 98% is not even possible with this market and these kind of properties.

Be sure and verify rental history. Too many companies don’t require this based on the approval algorithms that screening companies use. Too many delinquent residents post eviction moratorium have been allowed to move without their bad debt not being reported to the credit bureaus.

90 days for occupancy can be done if you partner with the local housing authority and veteran affairs.

The delinquency is unrealistic for a 90 day turn around. However, if you partner with your local Social services office, non profits (catholic charities etc) and see if they have any funds for emergency rental assistance. If you evict these residents you will continue to have a vacancy issue and the owner will have a lot of bad debt they will have to write off. Good luck and I wish you great success.