Marketing lease-up apartments can have significant challenges that you might not experience when marketing traditional multifamily properties. This is due to the fact that the building is still under construction. But, by implementing a few effective offline and online marketing strategies, you can increase your lease-up apartment’s occupancy. Let’s understand these tactics:
What Is A Lease-Up Property?
A lease-up is an under-construction property that is not finished yet but is planned to be completed soon. It means that although the construction of the building is underway, prospective residents can still sign a lease.
15 Lease-Up Marketing Strategies
Hard hats, cranes, fences, safety nets and temporary leasing offices can make an apartment lease-up quite difficult. How do you market it? How do you get prospective residents to visit you and enquire about your apartment? Here are a few strategies you can follow:
Online Lease-Up Apartments Marketing Strategies
1. Create a website
Your first step should be to create a website that would drive traffic and generate leads of potential residents. Your website should include the following:
- A property description which includes a list of amenities, location of the property, and other benefits that will make your lease up property more appealing.
- A contact form where prospective residents can give their information. This information should, of course, be protected and used only to follow up on enquiries, questions and feedback.
- Information about floor plans, square footage and rental rates.
- Construction and completion timelines.
- Information about the neighborhood, its walkability score, and nearby necessities like hospitals and clinics, grocery stores, restaurants, schools and parks.
2. Implement SEO
Simply creating a website is not enough; to improve your website’s rank on search engines and to increase the number of website visitors, you need to implement search engine optimization (SEO) strategies. By ranking higher on search engines, your website will capture the interest of users who are searching for rental apartments and lease-up properties.
3. High resolution photos
As you know, first impressions matter a lot. High quality photos of your lease-up apartments will definitely attract prospective residents and nudge them to come see your property in person. Please don’t use your cell phone to click these photographs – spending money on a professional photographer will pay off in the long run.
4. 3D renderings
A major drawback and one of the most challenging aspects of lease-up apartments is the fact that you have nothing to ‘show’; since it is still under construction, there’s no way for prospective residents to visualize the end product. Thankfully, technology can come to your rescue. 3D architects take the blueprints of your property along with the construction files, work their magic on them, and convert them into 3D renderings of your apartment. A 3D rendering shows a photorealistic image or video of your apartment. It clearly portrays the apartment’s design, layout and space.
5. Include floor plans
It is important to have updated floor plans available on your website. This not only helps prospective residents to understand the layout of the building, but also helps them in knowing about the number of units available and the area dedicated to common amenities. Note that when done improperly, floor plans can confuse residents and not convince them.
6. Social media management
Creating a social media community for your lease-up can help connect with potential residents. A social media presence can be used for:
- Sharing relevant content
- Displaying features and amenities
- Hosting giveaways, contests, offers and promotions
- Creating urgency
- Implementing a CTA that can possibly convert into occupancy
- Leading prospects to your website
- Hosting resident events and building a community
7. Update local listings
Updating local listings is an important strategy you just cannot ignore. It can potentially lead your lease-up to be full occupancy apartments! Regularly updating your Google My Business, Bing, and Yelp listings and ensuring that your property is well-represented can help people find you and contact you. Make sure your local listings have your address, website link, contact information, location map, photos of the property, and construction updates.
8. Create an email marketing strategy
Your online marketing campaigns and your website’s contact form will begin to organically build an email list of people who have shown interest in your lease up property. When you feel like you have a substantially large list, an email marketing campaign would be the perfect strategy to follow. It’s a great way to keep in touch with prospective residents as well as residents who have already signed a lease with you. A few benefits of email marketing include:
- Increasing leads
- Increasing occupancy
- Generating traffic to your website
- Creating personalized content
- Reaching the right people at the right time
- Self-promotion
- Collecting feedback
Offline Lease-Up Apartments Marketing Strategies
9. Involve local businesses
Local businesses play an important role in lease-up marketing; since the businesses are located in your neighborhood, they might inform a variety of people about your property and give great endorsements. The next time you visit your under-construction property, stop by the local businesses and give them information regarding your lease-up. You can also request them to display your flyers and pamphlets. Remember, the prospective residents you are looking for are dining, shopping, and visiting these local businesses.
10. Provide the latest amenities
Prospective residents will want to know about the various amenities you would be offering once the construction is complete. The more amenities, the merrier. Some amenities you should consider are:
- Laundry facilities
- Reserved parking
- Pet considerations
- Appliances
- Balconies
- Common community area
- Wi-Fi
- Outdoor spaces
11. Print media
Another lease up marketing strategy that works is to take full advantage of print media. Although digital media is prevailing, old-school print resources such as pamphlets, brochures, and business cards still are powerful marketing tools. In fact, a brochure or information booklet that catches the reader’s eye can help with good brand recall. Either get your print material designed by professionals or use tools like Canva to do it yourself.
12. Host an open house
Another tactic to turn your lease-up into full occupancy apartments is to host an open house. Who said your property needs to be completed in order to host an open house? Many prospective residents actually like looking at the progress; some even start planning ahead about how they’d decorate their home. During an open house, make sure you share precise and perceptible information such as:
- Construction timelines
- Floor plans and
- 3D renderings
13. Move-in offers
With so many properties on the market, property owners have to find creative ways to make their properties stand out from the competition. One way is to have move-in offers. These offers not only attract more attention, but also help you tackle the ups and downs of the real estate market. Here are some examples of move-in offers:
- No rent for the first month
- Fee waiver
- Low or no security deposit
- Low rent for the first 3 to 6 months
- Free goodies such as TV, gift cards, gift baskets, washing machine etc.
14. On-site signage
What’s a great way to transform a dull construction site into a marketing tool? On-site signage of course! On-site signage such as sign wraps for construction gates, digital/ multimedia signs, banners, billboards, pylon signs, Neon channel letters, and A-frame sidewalk signs are excellent ways to grab eyeballs and create a buzz. Note that your on-site signage should include information such as your website’s URL, site address and your contact information.
15. Hire a property management expert
Leave your lease-up apartment marketing to professionals like us. We at BFPM have a dedicated team of experts that can help you attract the right residents. Not just this, we also manage your properties – right from construction management and repositioning to utility management and cost reimbursement, and everything in between. To know more, feel free to schedule a quick 15-minute consultation call with us.
Trevor Henson
Trevor Henson is an experienced entrepreneur (10+ highly-successful start-ups) and property investor with a demonstrated history of building and leading teams in investment property management environments, maximizing returns for property owners, and optimizing properties through construction management and re-positioning. He…Learn more about how we can help. Customized solutions for large portfolios!