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Property Management Virtual Personal Assistant

Generalist Virtual Assistants to Help Your Property Management Business Run Smoothly

Property Management Virtual Assistants

Goal:

The goal of a generalist Virtual Personal Assistant for your Property Management Company is simple:

Keep your back-office running smoothly & save on costs with lower overhead by outsourcing menial repetitive Tasks to an Overseas Virtual Assistant.

This type of Virtual Assistant will have plenty to do, because the Property Management business is full of repetitive Workflows, triggered by certain events or dates (new tenant move-in, unit vacancy, late rent reminders, etc).

When you effectively implement (a) Virtual Personal Assistant(s) in your business, you can delegate & outsource these Tasks to run on autopilot, leaving you free to focus on more important matters.

How It Works:

A Property Management Virtual Personal Assistant is a type of ā€œcatch-allā€ term for the type of menial, repetitive Workflows common among Property Managers the world over.

This includes tasks like:

  • Collecting rent (and reminding people to pay their rent)
  • Running credit & background checks
  • Receiving service requests (via phone, email, and/or web chat)
  • Dispatching workers / contractors
  • Making follow up calls to verify completed work
  • Handling invoicing, payables, and receivables
  • Managing your property management software (Propertyware, RenTec, Appfolio, etc)
  • Helping with data entry & research tasks

Using a Virtual Personal Assistant for literally any of the above tasks is almost guaranteed positive ROI, because —- so long as you take a mostly “process-based, not people-based” approach — you will get nearly the same quality of work as you would handling the same Workflows locally (for a fraction of the cost).

While there are certain types of Tasks that require someone’s physical presence, and therefore can’t be outsourced (like in-person showings, property maintenance, contract signing, etc)…

… there are also several tasks in your Property Management Company that are ideal candidates for outsourcing to a Real Estate Virtual Assistant.

Think of it this way:

If your local team — who is probably making at least $15 – $18 per hour (if not significantly more) — can hand-off just 2 Work Hours Per Day to the Overseas Virtual Assistant…

You’ll be potentially saving $40k – $50k per year!

Pros:

The Property Management Business is so filled with menial, repetitive Tasks that are perfect candidates for outsourcing. It’s extremely easy to start seeing significant cost savings immediately.

Plus, since many of these recurring, repetitive Tasks are always predictable & function the same way every time, you can easily build detailed, step-by-step Standard Operating Procedures that allow you to scalably & stably outsource the work (without sacrificing quality).

Finally, since much of Property Management functions the same, regardless of whether you’re in New York City, Des Moines, IA, or Round Rock, TX, it will be comparatively easy to find Virtual Assistants who understand the business and already have training & experience.

This type of work provides a perfect opportunity to gain the benefits of outsourcing with very little of the downsides.

Cons:

The biggest difficulty with using Virtual Personal Assistants in your Property Management Business will be role defining & initial set up.

What exactly is your Virtual Assistant responsible for?

And how do they know exactly how to do it, up to your standards?

Successfully answering these questions will be the critical factor for success or failure with your Overseas VA.

The best approach is always starting with 1 – 2 Workflows at a time, building detailed step-by-step Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for the Assistant to follow, and training them until they’re managing those Tasks so smoothly that they require very little oversight.

This set up “learning curve” will typically take anywhere from 2 – 4 weeks, during which time it’s probably best to hold off on adding new Workflows to the VA’s plate.

In general, you should expect a slow & steady ramping-up period of building out documented SOPs, training your Virtual Assistant, and growing their daily workload…

… which, while labor & energy intensive from your end, will be a one-time investment that pays dividends for years to come.

Work Estimate:

The Work Estimate for a Virtual Personal Assistant in your Property Management Business, similar to other Personal Assistant roles, can be viewed in 2 main ways:

  1. Repetitive, SOP-driven Workflows, and…
  2. Free-flow, one-off Tasks.

In the Property Management Business, you’ll see the best results focusing as much of your Virtual Assistant’s time on #1 as possible.

Since there are so many menial, repetitive Workflows in Property Management, you can reap the benefits of working Process-Based more than most in the real estate industry.

Therefore, you’ll get the biggest bang for your buck by delegating work to your Overseas Virtual Assistant that follows detailed, step-by-step Standard Operating Procedures, and leaves little up to their discretion.

This makes the position very scalable & stable if you ever have to replace a Virtual Assistant.

With this highly documented, systematized backdrop, we can look at Work Estimates for a few specific, common Property Management Workflows:

  • Late Rent Reminders: ~10 Work Hours Per Month for every 5 – 15 late payers.
  • Tenant Pre-Qualification: ~1 – 2 Work Hours Per Tenant (assuming they pass the initial screening & actually go through your application process).
  • Keeping PM Software Up-to-Date: Depending on complexity, you can roughly use the back-of-the-napkin math of ~1 Work Hour Per Month for every 10 – 20 Doors Under Management.

Of course, there are plenty of other types of work your Virtual Personal Assistant might handle, and it’s not going to be practical to attempt a Work Estimate for all of them here.

However, as a general rule, you can also keep in mind that an equally qualified full-time Virtual Assistant will almost always be more productive on an hour-to-hour basis when contrasted with a part-time VA, because working full-time will ensure that Assistant is more closely aligned with your Team and how you work.

Therefore, you’ll see the best results when you can arrange a 40 Work Hour work week, with a combination of documented, process-driven Workflows… where you give the Virtual Assistant enough time to learn each Task before overloading them with too much new information.

With this mentality, and the willingness to replace VAs if you don’t find the right one, you are nearly guaranteed to see a positive ROI on your Property Management Virtual Personal Assistant.

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