Am I the only one who is JUST NOW starting to suffer occupancy issues?

Houston/Harris County, TX ~ Am I the only one who is JUST NOW starting to suffer occupancy issues? I haven't had to work a Saturday in over a YEAR (I have to when I'm below 92%), but I haven't had a weekend off in MONTHS!!!
What are we doing for marketing now? I'm trying to think outside of the box. apartments - dot - com √ Fakebook (both local communities & marketplace) √, Google... √...
I've got my boss buying me new flags/banners/signs & such for the drive bys... What else out there is working? What are you doing to succeed?

Eblast locators?
Resident referral program, maybe increase it now in the upcoming months great extra holiday money.
Checking out older prospects ?
I do not have the cure all 1 answer, but i do wish you luck, and IF you do find that magic answer please share.

It's called demand vs supply. When supply increases the way to retain and get new residents is to lower rents, everything else working properly, PERIOD!

Your exactly right. Just like 1985 when everyone built and then the bottom fell out. I remember Houston had entire properties and housing divisions sitting empty. Hopefully we pull out this before the bottom falls out. Doesn’t matter how much marketing we do we can’t do much with over building and a bad economy.

Yep- it’s weird. Just since July almost everyone has dipped in Houston. Very odd. My sites that were always 91-93% are now 87-88%.

Are you gathering resident feedback to understand why you may have retention issues?
How are your reviews online? Reviews drive leasing traffic and so does your score in social platforms like google, yelp, etc.

Austin has tanked officially already, some of their properties are trending 70’s occupancy. Rents and occupancy are down in Ft Worth area. We are having to drop rents and offer 1 month or more specials. Still people up here some are in the mid 90’s but some are in the 80’s. Read an article in the Texas Real Estate magazine we are having an issue identical to the 80’s bust. Occupancy low, over built, owners can’t get financing to buy or sell. I’m praying this isn’t a full repeat and we recover quickly.

Airbnb bubble bursting.
Residents don’t need multiple apartments anymore.

— Vendor Here — in Tomball—- former property management pro—— Digital marketing is where it is now. Happy to chat about it with you, no pressure .

There are a lot of units coming online from construction in Houston and the surrounding areas, 15K to 20K a quarter.
Follow up with text and Facebook marketplace are still working for us and so many prospects tell me no one answers the phone or follows up with them, ouch!🤦‍♀️

Agreed... Just upped our referral program... old prospects? Not a bad idea! Thank you.

Yes... we just dropped rents...

My number one retention issue is eviction due to non-payment, which goes right along with how poor the economy is for everyone. I've got pretty decent reviews, but I'm not going to lie... I'm a little nervous about soliciting reviews right now with these new rules that jut came down. We'll see how that shakes out.

Yeah... Not a lot of apartment building here in Crosby yet, but we're going to see 3000 new homes this year being built all around me. It's crazy!