“The biggest benefit of working with Rently: ONE integrated platform to do it all. Rently helps us generate leads from their ILS, offer 12-hour a day self-guided touring, keep our communities secure with innovative access control products, and lets us offer keyless lifestyles for tenants with smart locks and smart home devices. We manage only one vendor, not three or four like before.”
—Chris Gilman, Dunbar’s Director of Asset & Property Management
Overview
Established in 2011, Dunbar Real Estate Investment Management specializes in multifamily property management, overseeing 19 communities with 503 units across 13 cities. Dunbar focuses on creating long-term value by transforming residential properties into modern, smart, and connected-living communities with desirable amenities. Their most recent acquisition highlighted a critical need for enhanced access control. The property’s reliance on physical keys for all gates and doors presented significant security risks due to lost or stolen keys, led to inconvenient key management, increased on-site staff presence, and incurred costly, time-consuming move-ins & move-outs with rekeying and manually updating three separate systems for every unit turnover. Dunbar sought a new, more secure solution to provide management visibility, more convenience and ease of use for residents with minimal management intervention, and, most importantly, included a connected self-guided touring service to attract prospective tenants to their vacant units.
The Solution
After evaluating multiple options, Chris Gilman, Dunbar’s Director of Asset & Property Management, selected Rently for its comprehensive platform that extends beyond just property access. Rently offers an all-in-one solution that supports the entire resident lifecycle from listing, to leasing, to living. Rently enables vacancy marketing, self-guided touring, community and unit access control, and smart home capabilities, all from one powerful platform. Rently’s platform also connects to Yardi PMS software, another requirement for Dunbar. Rently’s user-friendly software interface and app ensured a quick learning curve for both management and tenants.
Currently, eight of Dunbar’s communities leverage Rently’s all-in-one solution. Specifically, Dunbar has implemented Rently’s Access Panel with Intercom at community entrances and Access Panels for its amenities/common areas. To secure individual units and enable tenant smart devices, they utilize Rently’s Smart Home kits, which include smart locks and hubs. For new leases and vacancy marketing, Dunbar relies on Rently’s Self-Guided Tours with Wayfinding, significantly expanding their marketing reach and providing “always-on” unassisted apartment tours 12 hours a day, minimizing the need for constant on-site management presence. Most recently, 14 out of their last 18 signed leases came directly after a Rently self-guided tour.
The Results
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Annual Estimated Cost Savings of $233,000 from Access Control
Prior to Rently, most Dunbar communities used 3 separate systems, losing about 1–2 hours per unit turnover to carry out manual tasks. With Rently’s complete solution, move-outs/move-ins now happen in minutes with 3 clicks of a button and the Rently system does the rest. Estimated reclaimed staff time savings of $32k from 720 hours per year.
Since Dunbar can now remotely unlock their community and units via access panels and smart locks, maintenance vendors are assigned durational codes to enter/exit. Work orders no longer require Dunbar staff to be onsite, saving another 4,032 man hours across 8 communities, an estimated savings of $179k annually.
Offering keyless convenience to enter/exit their community and units, Dunbar has also reduced costs by no longer having to replace lost/stolen keys nor perform time-consuming unit rekeys, an estimated cost saving of $22k annually.
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37% More Leads & 77% of Signed Leases from Self-Guided Tours
Permanent tour signage displayed in front of their communities encourages “tour walk-ins” 12-hours a day, 7 days a week. In addition, Rently’s Internet Listing Site also connects Dunbar with 37% more tour traffic. 79% of their leads tour the same day with an 87% tour conversion rate (tour scheduled/tour completed), and 40% of their tours happen outside of office hours.
On average, 77% of their leases happen after prospects take a Rently Self-Guided Tour, as they automate lead nurtures via tour scheduling, sending reminders, tour check-ins, tour follow-ups, and applications.
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Convenient & Secure Tenant Experience from Smart Home & Access Control
Tenants benefit from the enhanced convenience of Rently’s solutions, including remote unlocking for early guests or package deliveries, a user-friendly intercom system for visitor access, and most notably, a truly keyless lifestyle that eliminates the need to carry physical keys for community and unit entry.
Tenants now have peace of mind knowing their community is more secure and access activity can be easily tracked and monitored.
How It Works
Rently’s Resident Lifecycle Management Platform (RLM) empowers real estate owners and operators to attract, convert, and retain tenants. Rently’s “all-in-one” platform automates every phase of the leasing cycle – from lead generation to self touring, move-ins/move-outs, accessing and securing communities, plus smart home residency and beyond. One solution for the entire tenant lifecycle from listing, to leasing, to living. Rently is not a “point solution”; its ecosystem is completely interconnected, delivering the ultimate proptech advantage: a true end-to-end solution with one login.
Rently also manufactures its own line of access control and smart home hardware. With over a decade of experience, Rently provides world-class installation support and dedicated client success teams to ensure smooth deployments and happy customers. Rently helps companies work better, smarter, and faster.
“Our tenants love Rently! Tenants are now able to grant access to their visitors via the QR-code based intercom system and enter their apartment unit via smart locks right from their smartphone. Nothing but positive responses from our tenants. Our management team also has full visibility and control over the security of our communities and units. Rently makes our jobs so much easier and we’re saving a tremendous amount of time and reducing costs overall.”
—Chris Gilman, Dunbar’s Director of Asset & Property Management
About Dunbar Real Estate Investment Management
Established in 2011, Dunbar Real Estate Investment Management capitalizes on market opportunities and offers tailored solutions for investors who want to partner with real estate investment professionals. They prioritize long-term value creation through strategic investments in high-quality industrial, multifamily, and office assets requiring repositioning efforts through additional capital and/or leasing efforts. To learn more, visit www.dunbarinvestments.com.
