Its important to understand the value of our apartment homes.

We need to be prepared to explain how a service or a feature translates to a dollar value for a prospect or a resident,.  This will help our prospects understand that choosing to rent an apartment home has many benefits.

Challenge your prospects.

“Dare to Compare.”  Present the shopping list of items that demonstrate how your apartment homes stack up to the the competition.

This often occurs when we compare one apartment to another community, or we compare a rental home to a single family home.

As a leasing professional; its critical that you are prepared to explain the pricing for your community.

Comparing to Other Apartments

Let’s start with the comparison to other apartment communities.

• Amenities
• Features
• Square Footage.  Being able to discuss your apartments as a price per square foot will be helpful.
• Utilities.  Which utilities are included versus resident paid?
• Parking Privileges
• Lease Options

Each of these items  has the potential to justify pricing points for an apartment home.  We must know our product  and our competition to convince our prospect that our apartments have the value they are look for.  Our prospects will absolutely be quick to identify any competition that has rates less than ours.  We have to demonstrate why our apartment home is the better value.

I Could Buy A House

We often have prospects that compare an apartment lease to the potential cost of a mortgage payment on a home.  Any one who has owned a home can tell you, they wish the mortgage payment was the only payment they had.

In addition to a mortgage, a home owner has

• Property taxes
• Liability insurance
• Every utility -water, sewer, trash, natural gas and electricity.
• Every repair is the home owners responsibility.
• If you’re “handy” not so hard, but there are the big expenses like a roof, replacing HVAC systems.
• Amenities.  Apartment communities offer pools, fitness centers, play areas.  For a home owner, it’s a major investment to add this to a home or maintain it.
• Services.  Pest control, lawn mowing , fertilization, snow plowing-as a home owner this will be a time consumer, in addition to the requirement of purchasing equipment to do this work.

Both renewal and leasing prospects will suggest alternatives to their choice to lease an apartment at your community.  With a little bit of local research, you can quickly demonstrate why the pricing for your apartment homes are a value to them, and how it is a better value than another apartment community or purchasing a home.

Quick Change

In addition, today, for many reasons, individuals want to be able to make quick changes.  Move to a new location, either for career, family or just general interest.  Owning a home in many markets can limit your ability to make a  quick change .  Not being able to move until a house sells, even a house that sells quickly, is a 60 day exercise at best.

The value of an apartment home doesn’t end at the monthly rental rate.  The value of convenience, amenities and services quickly add up.  When we take the time to identify that each of these have value over and above the space of the apartment home.