As an apartment owner your biggest concern should probably be getting tenants into your apartments as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, whether you’ve recently renovated, just purchased the complex, or just converted or built the apartments, you might not have any idea where to start placing ads. Unfortunately for you, most people looking for places to stay don’t know where to look either, that means it’s up to you to make sure that potential tenants know your apartments are there. Of course, you could also hire a Sammamish property management company to handle the marketing for you, but if not, here are a couple of tips.
Consider Your Own Website
If you have a lot of units then a website makes sense. When properly search optimized and perhaps advertised, you can actually get a lot of traffic just from people looking for apartments online. However, websites take time and money to set up properly, especially if you want to do it right. Consider how much you have to spend, and how fast you need it before you actually decide to get a website. While websites can be great for your apartment complexes, they only really make sense if you have a lot of units. Once you have it, you can use a website to advertise for new tenants, update current tenants on new rules, laws, and schedules, and even alert people as to when your maintenance schedules are.
List Your Units Online
There are plenty of websites designed for advertising apartments to renters. The upside of these websites is that they already have established traffic, can list your unit within 24 hours of posting, and are almost guaranteed to get you hits. The downside is that tenants can easily see if anyone offers a better deal than you, and you might get unwanted hits from those who are either not serious or who are talking to multiple landlords at the same time. Great sites to list your Sammamish apartments on include Zillow.com, Hotpads.com, Trulia.com, and Padmapper.com.
Take Out an Advertisement
You can also choose to advertise in the local newspaper. Because Sammamish is a suburb of Seattle, you can actually advertise in Seattle newspapers as well. Consider the Sammamish Review, the Issaquah Reporter, The Sammamish-Issaquah Patch, and the Issaquah Press as very local newspapers. You can also go outlying areas in Seattle to place advertisements including in newspapers and on billboards depending on how large your budget is. Usually the larger the newspaper, the more they charge to print an ad, but if you get enough tenants from it then the investment is worth it.
Put Up Signs
Last but not least, it never hurts to put up signs on empty units advertising that they are for rent. Make sure your signs are highly visible, say who to call, and that they don’t break any local regulations. For example, only fundraising signs can go in the right away. However, signs on your windows should mostly be okay as long as you don’t fill every window with advertisements.
Advertising for a large number of units is a lot of work, especially if you don’t have the time or contacts to sit down and answer emails and take calls all day long. Instead, you might want to consider hiring a Sammamish property management company that can handle everything from advertisement to tenant screening for you.