Fine Homes

Austin Apartment Guy asked:


Let’s talk about apartment locators versus apartment magazine publications. Are Apartment Locators really Free? The Answer is Yes Apartment locators in Texas are a Free Service. Apartment Locators get paid by by aparmtent communities out of their advertising budgets. It is much easier and more efficient for an apartment community to pay a Real Estate agent to bring them people than it is for them to use other advertising mediums etc.

Many apartment communties use paid advertisers such as the Apartment Guide, Apartments.com, etc as well. However the problem with these types of publications are plenty. For one these types of magazines are paid per subscription. Therefore will NOT speak with you about your Apartment search, cannot advise you professionally as to what you may want to look out for or what questions to ask the leasing agent when inquiring about their property. They simply want you to pick up their magazine and look at their out of date pricing info and go to as many apartment communities as possible and tell them that their magazine is what brought you in. Then the apartment guide or whoever’s sales people go into the office when it is time for them to renew and ask what percentage of their monthly traffic was there because of their magazine. Then at that point the publication’s sales people get the apartment communities to resubscribe with ease based on the percentage number of traffic created by their book.

The problem for the consumer with these types of publications is that A. The pricing info is usually months behind and inaccurate. B. They have no mention of any types of specials and in some cases void out more valuable specials that the apartment community may be offering hence why they offer typically a $300 rebate to their users. C. There is no advantage to a consumer to use one of these books to search for an apartment then just going out to look at them and driving around stopping at apartment communities without one. To find the right apartment you need detailed info on pricing and availability. These two factors in leasing change frequently.

Typically I will try and contact properties for a client as close to their move in date as possible in order to maintain the integrity of the info I get. As pricing and avaiability are subject to change at any time. But don’t get me wrong using an apartment locator can be the best experience of your life or the worst experience of your life. The biggest problems that clients have mentioned to me lately about their previous apartment locator experiences are as follows; I have had several; clients tell me lately that they have gone out with apartment locators who have tried to push $1200 apartments on them when they ask for $1000 options..?? This boggles my mind. I have no idea why anyone would do that other than trying to boost their own commisions. If someone starts showing you units outside your pricrange it should be clear at that point that there is a problem. Another problem that runs rampid with apartment locators in this city is the fact that there are so incredibly many of them and the fact that a large percentage of them are just people who were failing at life and decided to get their Real Estate Licenses. Many of these people have no intentions of doing this as a career and absolutely no idea what they are doing but are rather supplementing their time between classes as they go to school. Then effectivley the consumer ends up with a complete moron and usually ends up picking an apartment that is far from what their best option may have been.

When soliciting an apartment locator ask them how long they have been in the business or better yet ask them to estimate how many people they have leased in their time doing this. Anyone with less than 2 yrs experience simply is not going to be as efficient as one of us old timers. I have been in the business for a little over 8 years and have leased thousands of people. Another thing to look out for when choosing an apartment locator is the fact that 90% of the local firms are small mom and pop shops do not even have a searchable database in order to review your options. My company plugs your criteria into a database containing the most accurate pricing info in the city, and all of your options come up. Then I narrow those down to the most fitting and begin to contact them. Just because they are in your area, pricerange and you like them does not mean they have an apartment available for your timeframe. You have to call them.

Another problem with these small apartment locating companies is that many of them have a numbered amount of places that they can work with. This business is a contract based business. If you do not retain a Broker’s agreement with these properties in order to ensure payment then you have no reason to work with them. If that happens then for the consumer their options are limited to only places that pay their crappy apartment locating firm. Effectively they will only show you options out of the 40% of places that pay them and that may cut out alot of other places that would have been your options, immediatley. I know it’s not fair. But that’s the real deal. Our company works with 90% of the available properties for rent in the Austin Metro plex area. The other percentage would cover complete crap and/or private owner listings, rooms for rent etc. Apartment locators are not miracle workers although I have performed a few for some tough clients, and we do not set the market. We have nothing to do with pricing availability etc. We simply have the tools to analyze the market and hopefully the knowledge to find you the best place possible. If you would like more info on apartment options in the Austin Texas area or just more info in general regarding the leasing process or how apartment locators work then let us know we’d love to help you out. You can contact me (Austin Apartment Guy) @ http://www.austinapartmentguy.com/ anytime. Take care and good luck!!