Boss Talks: Episode 81 with Megan Orser

This episode focuses on Megan Orser's insights into the multifamily industry, emphasizing the challenges and opportunities for independent rental owners (IROs).

1. Independent rental owners play a crucial role in the housing market, owning a substantial portion of rental units.
2. Technological integration is vital for optimizing property management, even for smaller portfolios.
3. Authentic engagement within the industry and with tenants is crucial for success.
4. Legislative and public perception challenges persist in the multifamily housing industry, needing strategic public relations and advocacy.
5. The episode underscores the importance of continuous learning and adapting in a fast-evolving field.

1: Introduction

Evan introduces Megan Orser and sets the stage for a discussion about the multifamily industry, particularly the roles and challenges of independent rental owners. Evan Happel: "Today we’re diving into the intricacies of the multifamily industry with Megan Orser, a pivotal figure in understanding the nuances of independent rental ownership."

2: Megan's Background

Megan shares her journey in the multifamily industry, from her initial reluctance to her deep involvement and advocacy for better resources for independent rental owners. Megan Orser: "I inherited the passion for this industry from my mother, turning what started as reluctance into a deep-seated commitment."

3: Challenges for IROs

Discussion on the specific challenges faced by independent rental owners and the solutions provided by technology and community support. Megan Orser: "IROs face unique challenges, but through technology and community, we find robust solutions that push our industry forward."

4: The Future of Property Management

Exploration of future trends in property management, emphasizing technology and data-driven decision-making. Evan Happel: "Looking ahead, technology will increasingly dictate the efficiency and effectiveness of property management across the board."

1. Engage authentically within your community and industry to build trust and rapport.
2. Utilize technology to enhance property management efficiency, even if you're managing a small number of units.
3. Stay informed about industry trends and legislative changes that could impact your business.
4. Invest time in community events and industry associations to expand your network and influence.
5. Advocate for fair representation and resources for independent rental owners at industry events and in legislative discussions.

Welcome back to another episode of Boss Talks, where we delve into the minds of industry leaders, innovators, and trailblazers. Today, we're thrilled to bring you an exclusive conversation with the dynamic Megan Orser, the smart chick behind Smart Solutions, including Smart Apartment Solutions and Smart Moves LLC.

Megan's entrepreneurial spirit is encapsulated in her leadership at Smart Apartment Solutions and Smart Moves LLC, companies renowned for their insightful, solution-oriented approach to multifamily living and management. Megan's knack for delivering valuable industry insights, free-of-charge tips, while also running a business, underscores her commitment to enhancing the multifamily landscape.

A significant part of our discussion centered on the Independent Rental Owners (IRO) community and its profound impact on the multifamily industry. Megan, an active participant and advocate within the National Apartment Association (NAA), shares her invaluable perspectives on the challenges and opportunities facing IROs. Her involvement in shaping awareness and support for IROs highlights the crucial role these owners play in the industry.

Our conversation took a lively turn as we explored the fascinating world of GIFs. Megan shared her journey into leveraging social media through animated GIFs, enhancing brand engagement in a visually compelling and accessible way. Her success story in harnessing the power of GIFs for branding and communication is both inspiring and instructive for professionals looking to elevate their digital presence.

Evan takes a moment to introduce Community Boss, a pioneering solution designed to streamline the management of parking, amenities, and community spaces in multifamily complexes. The platform encapsulates the essence of making multifamily living spaces enjoyable, convenient, and revenue-generating for property managers and residents alike.

Reflecting on her experiences, Megan expressed her admiration for Community Boss's innovative solutions, predicting her eventual collaboration to enhance the living experiences within her purview. Her enthusiasm speaks volumes about the transformative potential of leveraging such platforms to address common challenges in multifamily living.

In an industry where community and belonging are paramount, Megan shares her simple yet profound approach to building both personal and professional networks: showing up. Her emphasis on consistency, whether in attendance or support, underscores the significant impact of presence in fostering relationships and driving success.

As we wrapped up this engaging episode, it was evident that Megan Orser's journey is a testament to innovation, determination, and the power of community in shaping the multifamily industry. Her insights into the IRO community, coupled with her explorations into digital engagement through GIFs, offer valuable lessons for professionals seeking to make a mark in their fields.

Join us next time on Boss Talks for more inspiring conversations with industry leaders who are redefining the landscape of multifamily living and beyond. If you're passionate about your work and have a story to share, we'd love to host you. Connect with us and become part of a community that celebrates leadership, innovation, and success in every form.

Until then, keep being the boss of your journey.

People

Megan Orser, Evan Happel

Companies

Smart Apartment Solutions, Smart Moves LLC

Guest Name(s):

Megan Orser

Content Warnings:

None

Speaker A

Hello and welcome to Boss Talks, a weekly podcast where we chat with the bosses of the multifamily industry. Who are these bosses? They might be a manager of many, a leader with no title or just passionate about what they do. Join our host, Evan Happel, director of marketing at community Boss, as he talks with this week's guest. Hello, everybody, and welcome to Boss Talks.

Evan Happel

I'm your host, Evan Happel. I am going to guide you through this episode today. We have a great guest for this episode 81, Megan Orser, or smart Chick Megan, as she calls herself and others call her, predominantly due to the fact that her companies that she is CEO of are called smart Apartment Solutions and Smart Moves LLC. So she is somebody that's always giving tidbits of information to others free of charge so that we can make this industry a better place for everybody. And she has a business, too.

So let's not get me wrong. She does charge for things. It's not all free, but she does do a great job of helping others be better in this industry of multifamily. And today we're going to talk about a few different things. We're going to talk about the Iro community or the independent renter owners and bring some more awareness and information around that.

And I know I'm going to benefit from this discussion because I don't know a lot about this part of the industry, but she herself is a big part of it. She actually is one of the people that is, from the NAA standpoint, very involved and I believe on a committee or some kind of, yes. Committee. She's shaking her head yes for that and goes to a lot of the different events. Advocate apartmentalize.

She spoke at a lot of these different events as well. So she is somebody that is well informed and also just helping others to be informed as well. But it's not going to all be just serious business. We're also going to get Giphy with it. And if you don't know what a Gif is, you will by the end of this call.

I actually had the privilege of being on a call with her and I believe the mentor matchmaker group where she went over some of her tips and tricks on how to do gifts in and why you should even care. So we'll get into that as well. Before we get into it anymore, though, I work with community boss, we have a great solution to help manage your parking, your amenities and mapping, wrapping it all together for a great way to manage your physical spaces, generate revenue, make it a good place for your residents to enjoy where they live and make it fair and also bring attention to all these great amenities and different aspects of your community that so often they get enticed with when they are being leased, but then they move in and they forget all about all these great parts of their community. So let's make sure they're using it but have the opportunity as well. So have any questions, let me know.

But today we're getting into it with Megan. Megan, thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much, Evan and community boss and boss talks and the universe for letting me be here. And I have to say I'm a big fan of community boss and all of their stuff. I don't get to use them yet, but I know someday I'm going to get to use your services and feel the magic because I have been in a situation where parking is awful and it's hard to manage and that would have been like a dream come true to me.

Megan Orser

So thank you for what you're doing. Thank you for all the love you give us. Even though you're not yet a user. I've seen you in pictures just wearing the boss bling out and about at, I think, one of the NAA events here recently, you were speaking wearing it proudly. I very much appreciate that and I love it.

Evan Happel

And you're wearing it right now and. Yes, and I keep it safely in my business card holder in my backpack, and I always forget to bring jewelry. So it's always, I'm always happy that I have it because I'm like, yeah, I always have my boss bling. I can put it on. People always ask me about it, so they're excited.

Megan Orser

So it gives me an opportunity then to tell them about you guys and why they should get to follow you and engage with your brand. And I haven't found anybody that's been like, that was a waste of my time, so just keep doing what you're doing. And I also appreciate the love you've given us. Like on I don't really seek it out very much. Probably should do a better job.

Evan Happel

I'm learning as I go when it comes to podcasting. Even though this is almost two years into it, I still only have a few reviews on Apple podcasts, but I know people are seeing the show one way or another, whether it's on LinkedIn, YouTube, podcast, however they can consume it, it's all good. But I really appreciate your feedback and your review that you gave. Even just today, you did another one. And honestly, it really does speak a lot to me.

And helps me continue, because doing this every week can be a lot, but I really do appreciate it. And we appreciate it, too. And you can go find the comment, but essentially, for the audience and for the podcasters, I found your podcast late to the game. And when I did, I was lucky enough because I had almost, like a year and a half of content that I could dive deep and listen. So as I drove to the trade shows or was going to the airport, I was able to just listen back to back.

Megan Orser

And I love every single one. There's a few of them that I listened to a couple of times that just were like, yes, I do. And I tell my mom, she's on the comments. She adored. I adore the necklace.

I adore you. So I adore what you guys are doing, man. I'm blushing. Like, that's so nice of you to say that and think that. And actually, I don't think there's anybody else that's probably listened to every single episode except for me, because I edited it all.

But, yeah, I'm a little creeper. I guess. I'll go deep on people. I'm sorry. Like, when I am a big fan of a brand, like, it's.

I'm that person. Sorry. No, it's good. If you find something good, you might as well know about it. And I go, I tend to be like that, too, on things because I.

Evan Happel

I like to understand what it is that's important about things. So, no, I appreciate it. Okay. Before we get any further into the show, though, there are my three questions that I like to ask. I'm sure you know them well because they haven't changed.

My first question is, when it comes to building community professionally and personally, how is it that you go about that? Yes. So this is the, like, the question that I think I've lost some sleep over, because I'm like, oh, what do you say? There's so many good things. And how do you just put this into one pretty package?

Megan Orser

I look at it as a recipe. I think you definitely have to have some of the hits that the other folks, the other bosses have said. Authenticity, trust. But for me, personally, I think it's showing up. And I think a lot of people think that's REalLy simple.

You just show up. But Woody Allen said 90% of success is just showing up. And I think in some cases, with mental health and just the challenges that we go through in life, sometimes just showing up is all we can do, and that's enough. And that's what I like to do, is show up and be there. Even if I have the podcast on or the live stream on in the background and I can't participate one week I want to be there to show support.

And I think when I find a person or a brand or just something that I really lean to, it's, I do go all in and then it's, I want to just show them like I'm here. Let's support. Let's go. Let's do this. That's awesome.

Evan Happel

Yeah. And I think just from what I've experienced, just observing you, just your involvement in the industry is you're authentically yourself. Like you said, you do some fun things that a lot of people don't do. Meme yourself. Not everybody's doing that, but it's fun and like, we're going to get into it or gif.

I guess people are, they're going to learn a little more about that, but we can't take ourselves too seriously. Right? Like I, on this show, I've had to get over myself pretty quickly and. You learn a lot, too. And I think that's something I've learned in the journey of pushing myself and doing hard things and showing up is trying new things is learning.

Megan Orser

But I don't want to rob myself of that journey. And I learned so much. And I think you'd say the same thing. You've got two years of consistently showing up week after week. And I even remember you saying when you used to stream to Instagram and Streamyard isn't friendly to Instagram and going and learning all of those things and wanting to call it quits and you didn't.

We appreciate you as your community, but I think that's even the beauty that journey and learning, and it's just, there's just so many awesome things that can come from that. And I love that. I love our industry and I want to show up authentically. I want to push the envelope if I can. I think smart is, that's what we're built with.

That's what I inherited from our leader, my mom. And yeah, we love this industry. We're going to show up big. We're going to show up loud and authentically and that's what we're here for. Yeah, it's great.

Evan Happel

Yeah. And we can get into that a little bit, too, because you are a. How many generations? Second generation. Yeah, I would say that.

Megan Orser

I say I don't do math in public and that feels math like. But yes, my mom, Dawn Ford, who is a legend in the industry, part of the Avatar's mentor, matchmaker group, started the business in 2008, a recession in Michigan, which just doesn't make a lot of sense to a lot of people. But just out of frustration, she had several years as being a property operator. She owned her own management company. She worked in commercial HOA.

She did all the things and she started to do some consulting and it just naturally turned into smart. And on her birthday on January 14 of 2008, she started smart apartment solutions. And I dabbled. I was working on site at a really large property in Detroit right out of college, actually, and I worked. I didn't really know what she was doing, honestly.

She just was always, let's just go 100%. And in 2012, I went full time. I left the operation side and went full time with smart and I know I couldn't. I'm very gen, I'm very fortunate to have gotten to work with my mom and I still do. She still hangs around and deals with me on a regular basis and helps me out with the math with the CFO stuff as she is lovingly nudging me into that.

But just very fortunate because I grew up in the industry, I got a lot of exposure to it and I got to see how to do it right. And she's always been involved in the associations and given back and gotten her credentials. So I'm just very fortunate. And I purchased the business from her in December of 2022. And yeah, she's been there to support, but we've done some wild things.

We've gone remote. We have virtual assistants that work for us. It's wild. And we run a management company. She's our broker.

She's a broker for some other operators. So. Just living the dream. Yeah. No, that's awesome.

Evan Happel

Yeah. Someday I imagine I'll fully work for myself. I've run things, but I've never owned anything. And so I'm always, when it comes to that, looking at other people, looking at owners, looking at people that have gone fully on their own. Yeah, there's risk and it can be scary, but at the same time it's, it just means you care more and you put more effort into it because it means something.

Megan Orser

It's wild. I'll tell you, I thought working directly under her and getting ready for the succession, like I, I know what it's like to be a CEO. I know what the risks are. Like, I know what it feels like. I didn't know that until I actually stepped into her shoes and it was humbling.

And I have a lot more respect. I always have a lot of respect for her, but even more, because it is. It's wild. It's wild to just have. You are the.

At the end of the day, like, the buck stops with you. Like, you wonder all the time, am I making the right decisions? Am I going to screw this up? Are people going to trust me? All of the things.

So it's wild, but it's worth it. And I can tell you that you could. You're investing in yourself and what you believe in and the people that you have and the mission and the vision and the goals. 150. And that feels awesome.

That feels like being in a race car. That's awesome. All right. I'm going to jump in that race car someday. So my next question is, when it comes to hospitality, how is it that you would bring that feeling of welcomeness and you belong here to some people that were visiting or whatever it is through food?

Yes. So I can cook. Okay. I don't think I'm the best, but if I let you come over to my house, which is rape, and I didn't do takeout, I can make a pretty decent, what we call crock pot ribs. They're super easy.

I figured out how to do it in COVID. One of my cousins writes me all the time for the recipe. But you just essentially wash them, season them, look, let them sit overnight, drop them in a crock pot with a huge cut up white onion, maybe an ice cube or two, and you let them slow cook, and they are fall off the bone. It's. They're easy.

So I just. That I would do some macaroni and cheese, and I have been into, like, what they call icebox desserts. So if we're in the midwest here, so it's usually like, layers of cool whip and, like, vanilla wafers and bananas and anything like that I probably would put together. And that's. That would be how I would show hospitality there.

Hopefully. I would try to just not be like, why are these people in my house? And I don't know. I don't know. I just am a weird.

I don't know. I think when Betsy Kirkpatrick talked, she's. It would really stress me out. And that just spoke to me. Yeah, I think I would have an event somewhere else, and I would maybe bring food there or cater it, but, yeah, they.

It's like I said, it's like being in a race car and house is the same way. And you can. Hospitality can mean a lot of different things. It could mean that you host them somewhere else. It could mean you get takeout.

Evan Happel

It doesn't really matter. It's really like foods and aspect, and it could be a food that you love, that somebody else makes. Yeah. And those ribs, I'm telling you, I get them at Aldi's when they're on sale or Costco, and you just. It's just.

Megan Orser

No better way to do it. Yeah. No, actually, I can concur. I didn't ever do the boneless, but my dad always made, or, sorry. He always made the boneless.

Evan Happel

Not bone in, but in the crock pot. And he would. What is it? He would put it in the broiler first, stick it in the crock pot, put the barbecue sauce on them and then just let them. So that was another way he went about it.

And they were always really good and just fall apart and delicious. Yeah. Just don't have to work that hard, guys. Work smart. That's right.

Yeah. It's all about smart, right? Yeah. Yeah. All right.

And then final question. When it comes to your caffeinated beverage of choice, what is your go to? Yes. So I am, I feel like I'm pretty simple. A good Americano.

Megan Orser

Typically, the coffee mug typically is more where I'm at. Some of them have sentimental meaning to me, or they just fit all of the needs. They're a certain size. They can hold a certain amount of cup. I have a Denver Broncos mug that my mom actually has now that was gifted to me by my best friend's dad when he passed away.

And I'm from Colorado and just, it meant a lot. He never let anybody drink out of that cup. And he now I have it, or my mom has it at her house. And so I like the nostalgia. I like that feeling.

If it's in the afternoon, I tend to drink like a v eight splash or a cellulose or something, but I can go to bed right after I drink caffeine. So I am one of those people that I can, I do have to drink it or I get a headache. And I do feel laggy in the morning, but I can go right to sleep. Geez. So it makes you feel normal?

Yeah, I think it does. It does. Yeah. It doesn't necessarily do the same thing as it's supposed to for everybody or keep me up for sure. Yeah.

Evan Happel

All right. Thanks for answering. So we do have a little bit of a audience here. Stephanie Linton, thanks for joining us. Your mother is on Jodi Anderson from Oklahoma.

Actually, he's somebody I used to work with. I don't know if you know Jodie. I don't but fun fact, I was actually born in Oklahoma City. Oklahoma Midwest City hospital. Awesome.

And then, adrienne, thanks for being here. And then Adam. Adam. Adam. Yes.

Last name? I don't because hopefully I didn't butcher Adam, but adam is actually a friend of mine on Instagram, and he was in my very first get giphy with it class when I led that with giphy artist izzy from izzy Studios. Okay, nice. Awesome. All right.

And then before we get into it too much more, let's just address what might be roaming in the background every once in a while. Boomer. Oh, he's sleeping, so we'll. We've got his stuffy ready, but, yeah, he's sleeping, so hopefully he doesn't bark, but you might see his head pop up if you do. Boomer.

Megan Orser

He's my english mastiff. 221 pounds. Oh, my goodness. And you were telling me before the show that fully extended, he can get on top of the refrigerator. Yeah, yeah.

He likes to counter surf. He's just. He's a whole experience. He has a lot of personality, and he is very food driven. So you just have to know if you just know if you leave food on the counter, he is going to 100% try to get it 100%.

Just don't do it. Is he slow moving or is he. If he needs to or wants to, he'll get up and go. I think the only time he's slow is when I need him to go somewhere or we're on a walk. But no, when he has food, he's quick.

He's like a shark. When he sets his eyes on it, before you know it, he's attacking it, and it's. He's got the food. He once on my mom's counter, like, we had a. We had for Christmas dinner at her house, and there was, like, part of a prime rib there.

And he kept circling in the kitchen and coming back, and we. You have to tell him, leave it. And we started to eat dessert, but we left it out. And mister accountability, he jumped up and got it, and within a matter of a split second, had eaten, like, half of I don't even know how many pounds, but, like, several pounds of a prime rib. A very expensive prime rib.

Evan Happel

Oh, my gosh. That's. Wow. You didn't get sick because he is like the Terminator. Yeah.

I'm sure he eats a lot of food. Not really. He would like to. And that's maybe. Maybe that's what's causing his search for food.

Megan Orser

The vet won't let me feed him more than four. Four cups a day. He probably gets a little bit more than that. And we supplement with some, like, vegetables. Cause I just feel bad for him.

But they said, because he's not an active dog, like a golden retriever, he just doesn't need as much food. And I disagree. 21 pounds is a lot of weight to carry around on a very small diet. Yeah, no, seriously, that's me. Okay.

Evan Happel

I'm just going to tell everybody how much I weigh, basically. But I must say. And when you're sedentary, which I typically am, because I do this and sit on the computer all day long. Yeah, you got to watch what you eat. But it seems like he could eat a little more.

Megan Orser

He. He thinks so, too. The household here agrees, but the vet is. No, they said that he needs to lose weight, and that's. It's a challenge, if I'm being honest with you.

He's what they consider a giant breed dog. And then there's. So there's like, small dogs, medium dogs and large. And that is what the rest of, like, the world kind of understands. Giant breed is a little different.

Mastiffs, you don't see them a lot. Not a lot of people have them. And so vets don't always. I'm not going to say that my vet doesn't have experience, but the commonality of them treating them is a lot less. And so sometimes they get stuck in the.

They shouldn't weigh this much because dogs don't weigh 221 pounds. And it's when they're solid muscle. He's like a bull, honestly. So he does. Yeah.

Evan Happel

No kidding. Don't body shame him. Yeah. No, no kidding. Yeah.

He could take most of us on, AJ. He's 221. I weigh 180. Yeah. And he's really.

Megan Orser

He is very gentle. But what he is, what he was bred to, their breed way back in the day, was to guard royal children. And so it's funny when you, when he sees children, he just gets very calm and docile and sits like a statue and stares. And he only wants to watch them and be around them. But he's not a violent dog, even in the case, they say if he was, someone was to try to break into our house, he would just lay on them, he would pin them down.

So he would use his weight to his advantage until someone could come address the issue. So he's not going to bite them, which is enough. Yeah. And he's intimidating. I'm sure if he coupled that with his loud bark, it would be all very much intimidating.

Yeah, absolutely. All right. Thank you again. Boomer in the back supporting, currently laying down on the job, but nonetheless he's there. Megan, I'd love to just get into it.

Evan Happel

You spoke a little bit about your history getting into the work you're doing, but I'd love to pick it up and talk about what it is. Your company, you have multiple what they do companies do, and, and then we can get into where you play the independent rental owners world. So. Sure, yeah, take it away. So, as I shared, my mom started smart apartment solutions in 2008, but I think our career really started before that.

Megan Orser

She is one of the only people I know that went to college for real estate management. She did that back in the eighties at Ferris State, and her first job was in Oklahoma City, managing some assets there. And that's where I came in to the picture. We quickly moved, probably at six months to Phoenix, and then at two, I moved to Colorado Springs. And that's where I grew up.

And we just always were in property management. She had her management company and she managed real estate on the side in Colorado Springs. It's a big military town, and so she managed a lot of condos and houses and things for deployed military people. And so while they were overseas handling their business, she would take care of their homes. And then when they would come back, they could keep it as a rental or move back into it.

And so I just always remember real estate being in our life. When I was 16, she went back on site to work with one of the first tax credit, the tax credit attorneys. So one of the attorneys that wrote the tax credit, the LIHTC law that we practice today, the very first community in Colorado Springs. And she did the lease up there and cheap labor. She had me do cleaning.

So I was cleaning apartments, and I came in, I think, to get some more supplies, and I saw this couple standing there, and everybody was out on tours and really busy. And so I thought, I don't like to see people standing there. My mom taught me that just, you always help people, you always answer the phone, you always greet people just how it always is. And so I had been in the vacant apartments and the models, and I knew essentially where things were. And so I showed them around and they leased the apartment.

They had a dog, so at that point, we didn't take dogs, but they started taking dogs because I didn't know that. And I was 16, I leased my first apartment and I was like, great. I don't ever want to be in that business. I didn't have any interest in real estate. I didn't want to do it at all.

I think my mom wanted me to. And I was like, I wanted to make commercials. I loved at that time, like the Budweiser frogs and just really funny commercials, Super bowl commercials. And so I set my passion into communications, real estate, journalism, public relations. And I was going to make commercials.

And I went to the University of Northern Colorado and I got in the marketing department and I did okay, but I just, I could never get into the college that I wanted to. And at that time, we went through 911 and my mom moved back to Michigan, where she's from. And I took a hard look at my life and thought, I don't really want to stay this far away from family in Colorado. And so I moved back to Michigan with her and I went to the University of Northern Michigan. I'm sorry, in Flint.

And that changed everything for me because I didn't realize at that point you could transfer into a university with pretty decent grades and right into the program that you wanted. So, fun fact, if you haven't made the college jump, I would tell you to maybe not start at the college of your dreams and try to get in the program unless you meet. But I got into a marketing program and I. I had wonderful instructors and I struggled with math and learned that marketing really had a lot to do with statistics. And I didn't really know if that was what I wanted to do.

I wanted to make commercials. And so I got to do some work with some of the advertising firms and some of the, my alma mater that had worked at Campbell Ewald, which is one of the largest advertising firms in America. And I just decided that was not something I wanted to do. I had some obstacles with my school that stood in my way, but it turns out in advertising, you don't really get to be part of the big project. You might work on one small thing.

It's very cutthroat. People seemed really stressed out there. And I had been at that time in college working temporary staffing, actually on lease ups and as a leasing consultant. And so it just naturally worked. When I graduated from college, I got placed as a leasing manager and marketing director, and the property was 1145 units.

It had golf course, had a marina on a lake. It had some wild occupancy. I think we had 200 vacancies at the time. Just a lot of stuff going on and I learned a lot. So after I left there, I went and worked as a troubleshooter, worked down in Naples, Florida.

That's where I dealt with a bunch of parking issues. Turns out Florida has a lot of parking challenges. I found out, hey, I wish community boss would have been there back in 2009, but that was fun. 2009 was, we were still in a really bad recession, if you guys remember, and Naples got hit really hard. They were giving, I think, three months away for concessions.

The service industry, no one was going to the Ritz Carlton there or building beachfront houses at the time. And so we had to get really creative. And that's when I got to really lean into a lot of the things that my mom had taught me and really what I had learned in my career and kind of carve out some of our practices. And so I worked at smart apartment solutions. Like I said, I went full time in 2012.

In 2014, we actually started the management company smart moves. And that was just out of frustration. We had some properties that came to us that no one would take because they were too small or they didn't fit the big property management plan. And so the owner still needed management. And that's where we got smart moves.

And that came out of frustration. We started smart moves. Fast forward a couple more years. My mom and I are at Capitol Day in Lansing, and we're talking to our local representatives. And he happened to have rental property that he didn't want to manage.

And he asked my mom at the time, would you consider doing it? And we did. And so we managed for that representative for a couple of years. And then when he decided to sell his property, we purchased it. And my mom and I became independent rental owners.

And at that time, I had just joined the independent rental owners committee at the National Apartment association. And I wanted, I first went there because I wanted to understand what was an independent rental owner. I knew that they existed in Ann Arbor, in our market, heavily, but I didn't understand really how they worked. I had worked in big operations and I wanted to understand more of their challenges so maybe we could bring better membership. That was really my goal.

What I got was a network and a wealth of knowledge and a community that really circled around and helped us through the processes as we've grown. That's where we've gotten our property management software with the sponsor who sponsors our committee with Iroh. And I just fell in love with them. Some people say that their conversations are dry because they do really talk about daily operations. But I'm a nerd.

I love that stuff. I love this industry. And I want to learn and hear that just makes it better. Then that helps me think about what are some tools that I can maybe create or someone else can create to make their lives better. But I started to notice there was this theme where people didn't really want to work with the IROs because they thought they're too small or they don't bring a lot of value because they only have a couple of units or a couple of doors.

And so we even found that problem when we were trying to get software. We kept being told, let us know when you hit 100 units and we'll work with you and it's okay. But what do we do? One between one and 100? It's still a lot of work to manage and to try to manage it through Excel.

I don't really understand that. We don't. We're still trying to get off of Excel. So I think that's really where I started to get more passionate about it because I saw that. I don't want to say it was mistreatment, but it definitely was some stereotypes.

It definitely was. We didn't necessarily have the tools in the toolbox to play with and have all of these features. And when you come from big operations, you're used to having tools, you're used to having good screening and good property management software and all of this technology and systems, and to be told, no, that's not, you can't do that till you reach this, it just didn't go well with me. So I stayed on the committee. I got more involved.

And Stephanie Anderson at the time was our liaison on the committee, and she said, you should really consider leadership. You should consider going for the chair position. And so that was in 2019. I let them know that I was interested. They started bringing me into the leadership fold.

And in 2023, I served as the vice chair of the independent rental owner committee, and I now serve as the chair this year. That also came with a board position with NaA, which I did not know. But that's okay. That's okay. I'm happy to be there.

I'm happy to be a board member. Learning as I go is what it's like to be on a very big board. I'm used to working on small boards, but what people need to understand and what I'm hoping that they understand and take from the iros this year, and my mission being the chair, is give us a second look. We are a very educated, informed group. We love technology.

We love efficiency. We love things that are going to help make our lives easier, just like the big operators. And when you look at our industry, they break us up into these buckets. And there are the ten and above doors. And there are the ten and below doors.

And the ten and up doors make up about 30% of our rental housing industry. But the ten and below doors, the independent rental owners, make up over 70% of our industry. And so we really do need to look at the power. Even though we seem small, we are mighty, we are connected, and we're being activated, which is a good thing for us. But we want resources, we want membership, we want to be brought into the fold, we want to be considered when these decisions are being made about technology, about leases, about legislation.

Because these are me, this is my mom, we are the owners of these properties. One of our other owners is a truck driver. So these are real people. They're not bottomless pits of money, and they're really taking a leap on life. And I think when people start to understand that's what an Iro is, and that they might, you might be looking at one right in the mirror and not even realize it, then we should start looking at that from a more holistic approach.

And so we're connected with legislation and we're excited. We're excited to be part of the conversation at Na this year. So I could talk for hours, but I know you don't have all that time. No, I appreciate you bringing that up. So in Iro, is it a ten and under?

Evan Happel

Is that typical of the size? So we do definitely have an identity crisis. And we have been working over the last couple of years. And actually chair Canabi, Kurt Kanabi, he served twice and in his first term, that was one of his missions was to help identify or even just give a definition so we could even start category categorizing and seeing what our industry looks like. What we were able to land on is that it is, yes.

Megan Orser

It's typically the ten below doors, but we have a lot of iros that maybe started with one door and have grown to 10,000 doors. And they still identify as an Iro because they're still really involved. So we also, we also have fee managers that consider themselves Iros because the owner is really involved. I would say if you are an owner operator or you are an, you work for an owner that is heavily involved in the daily operations, then you are an independent rental owner. If you work, if your owner is, you don't know who they are, they don't ever talk to you.

It's maybe an enterprise, then that's probably going to be more of like the ten and plus, and you're going to see the bigger, larger communities. What I'm used to working on the 300 units, the 1145. The Iros are going to be made up of single family homes, duplexes. We have a four plex, usually this ten, maybe 100 units or below. Could even be considered an IRo.

So I know that's a big cat like net to cast, but all are welcome. All are welcome. If you identify as an IRo, you have a place with us. Got it. How much does NAA dedicate to that part of the industry versus.

Evan Happel

You're also involved with Irem, right? Yes. Yes. So does Irem typically do a little bit more in that world, or. I don't actually know that much about.

Megan Orser

Irem, so, yeah, it's different because Irem and NAA are both great organizations, and that's why I say, don't put all your eggs in one basket. But NAA really focuses on the unit counter, and they look at the supplier members, so they count supplier members, and then they count the number of units. And so I think that's why it's been focused on the bigger operators. Irem hasn't really ever looked at unit count. They've always focused on the actual, like, the credential holder.

So to be a member of IRem, you either need to have a credential, so an arm or a CPM, or, I think a CCIM, or you need to be an industry partner. So a supplier partner that's a. That's joined as an industry partner. So it's different. I think that with Irem, you get a good mix of commercial and residential.

It is very heavily driven, based on the local chapter in the market. When my mom was the president of her local chapter in Irem in Colorado Springs, it was a very, like, split mix of apartments and commercial. I think here in Michigan, it's gone based on who's the president. Sometimes it's more residential if it's a residential president. If it's a president that's more commercially based, then it's more hoa or condo or commercial, so it's hard to say, and that's why I say, don't just go to one.

I would say that NARPAM probably traditionally has been more of a place where the independent rental owners have hung out because they have had a model for single family homes and managing that type of model for a little bit longer. But I think for NaA, they're definitely paying attention to it. It's been a huge part of conversation. The last quarter of 2023 was a big focus for the board, and as I'm a board member, but even with the executive committee is how can we bring iros into the fold? And so they are doing some surveys actually right now that they did with the affiliates all across the country, asking, what can the local apartment association affiliates do for iros?

Do they have iros in their area? Do they need help setting up access or toolkits? What are resources? Maybe we could give or offer to iros to bring them into our membership so we can bring this 20, these 22 million into our membership so we have more power on the hill. Totally.

Evan Happel

That makes sense. So when it comes to being in the role you are and you've been involved for a while now, when it comes to NAA and all that, what are the biggest things that you see being barriers or challenges or opportunities for our industry? You think? That's your question? Yeah, I think for me, I think the public perception has been a real challenge the last couple of years, and that has been a dark horse that's been coming, and people have been telling us for a while that we've needed to work on our public relations.

Megan Orser

Overall, we get a bad rap. The common perception, especially when on TikTok and Instagram, and some of the comments, are that landlords are a really bad word and that we are just out to just take people's money and we have no hearts. And that really bugs me, because when you do go to Irem and when you do go to Naa, that is, that's not the case. You couldn't find more giving people that are trying to give back and be ethical and give really good housing and understand they're building a community and they want people to be able to thrive in that. And although they make mistakes, I think they learn from them and try to adjust once they're aware of a blind spot or an issue.

So I would say the public relation is number one, and I think that leads into legislation and why we're getting so much pressure and heat, which means it's just more important for people to get active, to pay attention to this, to rally around that. And then I also think that there's a barrier of how we sell our industry to the general public and recruiting people into our industry. I hear it every day. I fell into this industry. Like, I just stumbled onto this multimillion dollar asset job, and I'm like, let's not do that anymore.

You manage a multimillion dollar asset, own that, be the boss of that. Boss up. I am a bad boss. I manage this multimillion dollar asset. I manage it.

I learn how to grow income. Like, I'm protecting it in legislation. And so I think we could sell it better to the folks that are looking at our industry and wondering if this is a career for me, because they do see it as just like a pass through industry. I can just fall into it. I can just like, I probably thought, I'll do this job till I find something better.

And then once they're in it, they're like, I don't ever want to leave. I have. There's so many opportunities, so many avenues. So I would say that's a big problem. If you're looking as, like, more of on a granular level.

And what's keeping people up at night besides legislation and rent control fraud? Application fraud has just been rough, and I've even experienced that. I say I. We've experienced that with smart moves. It's definitely been a huge uptick in the last two years, and it's.

I'm the one that screens the application, so it falls on me, and it's a lot tougher. I can say that from being in the trenches, it's not the same as it used to be. Yeah, that's true. I know there's a lot of new tools, though, so if you need any recommendations, I know a few people that work in that way, in that space. So I've heard them on the podcast, and I wrote them down, and that's when I learned about the.

I think it was the approval princess on TikTok, and I've leaned into some of those tools and shared them, and I also love that about our industry, because I think we're really good, especially the prop tech community, at paying attention to the threats that we're talking about and then coming up with opportunities and solutions to fix them. And that's what makes us better. I think if we get better with sharing the data and making that more friendly, and I know that's been a huge conversation about freeing multifamily data. I think when we find those avenues to connect and do that, we're going to get the information quicker, and we'll be able to solve these solutions better. Smarter, totally.

Evan Happel

Yeah. And I think the more we come together collectively, not just supplier versus operator, that we view it as more and more like, certain aspects of the supplier community are so ingrained in what you're doing now that it needs to be. We work together, Evan. That's something that is, yes. That is something that is, yes.

Megan Orser

And I think that we should have more of those conversations, because I don't really understand why there's this line in the sand of, you're a supplier, you can't play in this, this toolbox, or you can't come to this meeting or talk to these people, serve on this. I just don't understand that. I think it's borderline treating people differently based on where they work, and that's just wrong. It's wrong. We should be celebrating people based on the merit and what they bring to the industry.

And I shared that, I think, on Adrian, one of Adrian's polls, when they're talking about apartmentalized and how do these sessions get picked? And there are a lot of barriers for suppliers to be able to present at apartmentalize. All suppliers are like, amen. And I find that very confusing, especially when we're having conversations. The prop tech especially would be the experts around those conversations, and yet they're not being invited to that conversation, and the people that are talking about it are not experts on it.

And I just. I don't understand that. And that's not going to bring people to the audience. Right. That's why they're having conversations outside about things they want to talk about.

Evan Happel

Yeah. And as an observer, as somebody that's been in the supplier world for a little while now, I think the biggest thing that's frustrating is it's so pay to play that you have big companies that are always being seen. Always in order to be seen, you have to. It's almost like you have to raise money to be seen because you're, like, competing for the marketing space versus. I have a really good idea that could help everybody.

Let's talk about it. Right. And that just doesn't happen unless you pay somebody to be able to. I created this space so that I didn't have to pay people, and it's genius. And I think.

Megan Orser

And people are thriving and following to it. So I do think that the bigger associations will pay attention, and they. I don't want to throw shade. I have sat in seat, as has my mom, on the education advisory board, and it is not an easy task to do. And there are a lot of hoops to jump through and things that you're paying attention.

And one of the things that always makes me crack up is year after year, they get feedback from the conference that people want less panels. But as someone who is reviewing those submissions, all that are submitted are panels. And so it's. You say you don't want it, then stop submitting that. Yeah.

Evan Happel

Okay. So they want independent, just people facilitating a training, like giving information. And I don't know. And Don can probably chime in. I don't know that they really even tell you what they want, but they don't want to see four and six people up on a stage talking and doing what they've always seen.

Megan Orser

I think they want more, maybe breakout, brainstorming tables where they're working with smart individuals, where they really could solve and come up with a solution and collaborate, in my opinion. I think that's more of what people are leaning towards. Yeah, I think it'd be cool to have that, where you have just, you have a bunch of tables, and maybe the tables are a subject, and then you have subject experts, and those could be a combination of suppliers and on site operators, and then you have this. They're like facilitating conversation, but people can come and they can give their feedback and learn that kind of stuff. It builds more of a community aspect, and it also has a better transference of knowledge versus the couple people talking.

And I think, again, and I say there was a lot of submissions this year on AI technology, and it's. I love. I'm a property professional, too, but I am in no way an expert to talk about AI adoption or even the technology that's out there adopting it on my community, and to not have the prop tech community that actually provides the AI to be able to talk and the experts around that, to have that conversation is bizarre. I want to go to the conversation where the experts are talking and working, collaborating with each other, and I want to hear and learn from that, because I think that's, like you said, community. We're going to learn so much quicker, so much better, so much.

Just so much more as a team, as a community, and not just having someone speak at you. All right, we're gonna be at Naa. We're not speaking. I didn't even try. I know that if I wanted to speak, I would have to be invited to be a part of a panel and maybe facilitate or something, but like.

Okay, yeah, if you want to speak by yourself, I'm not gonna say that will never happen. I would say it is more difficult, but you can always put together a panel together. Just make sure that you've got property professionals on it. If you're going to do a panel, try to make your panel smaller. And they do like it to be regional.

I. I have written a lot. My mom has written a lot. As a company. We have written a lot.

We have had a ton rejected, too. So even though we have three, I think three sessions, we'll be speaking at this year in apartmentalized. Wow. We had a lot of no's. We all, but we also submitted like eight in collaboration with other people.

So it is a quantity game. And so you're like, I got no's, but I also got yeses. And our personal goal this year was to really, and it has been for the last few years, are to get new speakers, people that have never been on the stage or have not that have wanted to speak at apartmentalized that haven't. We've been able to partner them with seasoned speakers so that they do get that opportunity, get an opportunity to be at the table and share their voice. So there are many avenues you can get there.

You just talk to me, talk to us. Several of us are out there that will help it become a reality, if that's what you want. Yeah. I don't even know what I would say. I don't know.

Evan Happel

I. I could think of something. But you do a podcast every week, so I think you could do it. Yeah, I'm gaining lots of knowledge. I will say that I'm talking a lot of people.

I'm learning a lot. I have a lot of insight. I feel like I'm getting from various parts of the country and people and levels. So it's been good from that span point. For sure.

For sure. So what are the three, what are the sessions you're going to be leading this year? Oh gosh, I should know. And I'm not going to be all three of them. I look at it as smart altogether.

Megan Orser

I am doing a session with Mary Gwynne and Eddie Labouf on indicator lights with maintenance. So talking about metrics and technology and we're going to be featuring snapshot, which I heard about on your podcast. So one of those see, it happens talking that technology. We're also going to be working with Betsy from BG and Mike whaling from 30 lines, talking about staffing and some of the challenges, big operators, small operators, that whole conversation. And then Don is going to be leading a really cool session with one of our owners, the truck driver Gordon, giving his perception as an independent rental owner.

And she also has Kevin Dillon, who's with Bercadia. And if you're not familiar with who brocadia is, they are like the main broker here in Michigan, but they have their nationally known, they broker a lot of multifamily deals. So he's going to be joining the conversation, talking about deals, how that's going. How are they financing these deals? How are independent rental owners getting some skin in the game and getting a seat at the table.

Evan Happel

Awesome. That's cool. Look at you all over the place. Yeah, we stay busy. We do.

Yeah, we'll have fun. And hopefully, in the midst of all your busyness, you'll be able to stop by our brunch that we do, or if not that, our, you know, Booth. The things that we're doing. I will definitely be there this year. Awesome.

Now, the really important thing to get to before we run out of time is the gifts, because it has been such a thing that you have dove into and gained from. So I would love to just talk about that and, like, why did you even start? Yeah. So, again, out of frustration, a lot of things come, but in the COVID mist, we were really leaning into Instagram, Instagram stories, and I was frustrated generally in TikTok and Instagram that we couldn't brand our digital. And so I had noticed in stories, gifts, and stickers, and I noticed realtors and not celebrities, not Coca Cola, not big brands that had these reaction gifts.

Megan Orser

And I'm like, so somebody can create these. These. These are not, like, unobtainable. And I put it out there in the universe, right? So I happened to be on Clubhouse, the audio only app, and I was in a room, and Izzy, the Giphy artist, happened to be in the audience, and she stepped on stage, and she talked about the power of gifts and how she uses them for education.

And I messaged her, and I just said, could you do our logo? That's really all I was interested in at that point. And she, I think it was like a budget of, like, $25. She gave us, like, 50 gifts. We did some reaction stickers.

So I did the heart and all of the things that you see that I use in our repertoire. And she loaded it on our giphy account, and we used them passively on. On social media. And that was really it. Fast forward.

I opened it a couple of months later, and we had, like, 4 million views. And I'm like, what the heck? We've never had millions of views on any of our stuff. This is crazy. And so we started leaning into it more.

We started uploading more of our canvas. We figured out you could do, you can animate canvas and upload them into giphys. So we started uploading some of the educational stuff we had already created. And before we knew it, we had hit 13 million views. And we just kept growing.

The more we lean into it, the quicker we grow. So fast forward today, we are. We had to take some down because they weren't relevant anymore. But we're at just about 33 million views on our Giphy account. And we use it in everything.

We use it in our email blast, we use it in our signature block. We use it in our comments. We've got the Giphy keyboard. We're always getting giphy with it and it has started so many good conversations. I get such positive feedback from it.

I have been talking to people at NAA, at apartmentalize and had them run across the trade show floor and say, hey, I saw you in a sticker on someone's Instagram story. Tell me about that. And so I just love that branding and love that in to be able to talk to them. No, that's awesome. Yeah.

Evan Happel

And I, like I said, I was a part of your session the other day and immediately following we created a Giphy account and then uploaded a bunch of stuff. I will go check it out. But yes, and use them and keep creating. It's a great community over there too. And if you want to learn more, you can always follow me.

Megan Orser

But Izzy Inc. Studios on Instagram, that's our artist. She does do work. So if you ever need help with that. But she gives great ideas on her Instagram, on things you can create or how you can use them.

Evan Happel

Yeah, one, and something that maybe people don't realize is they're really great for things like email, like you said, because you can't put a video in email, but you can put a gif in the email. So you can, and it have to be a certain size. But if you put subtitles on a video and turn it into a GIF, now you have a video in your email with the words they're saying just no, no sound. And I think there's even sound now. I don't, haven't figured that out yet.

Megan Orser

But yeah, they've got clips now. So you can actually upload an mp4 with audio and actually have a sound bite too. There is that capability as well. So there's, I think there's just so many uses. And you're right, Evan.

It uploads and you can upload it as a picture, as an JPEg essentially. And it'll work in most formats. I've even had it work on some of our Internet listings. Yeah. And movement and pictures like that look like a video, are way more interactive and do better than something that's just a picture or so it's actually very handy.

Evan Happel

And you don't even have to put it on Giphy. It can be just, you create a gif, it's a file, you add it to a, something like a email. Absolutely. Yeah. And you can upload them into tenor too.

Megan Orser

So that's something that we're leaning now as we're starting to upload our gifts into a tenor account like we have with Giphy so we can build out and get more views there. Why not? Nice. Yeah, no, that's fun. Yeah.

Evan Happel

So get Giphy with it, people. Go start a giphy account. A tenor account, or just start making gifts. You can make gifs on, let's see, canva. You can make gifs.

I don't know what other platforms, I'm sure other Photoshop platforms allow you to do it now too, but it's pretty easy, honestly. Yeah, it's. Sometimes it's just saving it as a different file. It can be that simple. It's just, instead of saving it as a PDF or JPEG, you save it as a gif and it does it.

And it just brings some fun. You can put a bouncy version of yourself or movement or like you did with the heart, you can put that over the, interlace it with other content or as a layer or whatever it is. So it just brings some fun to the mix, too. I agree. I agree.

That pretty much covers everything. I think we nailed everything for the most part. You said something about learning diversity and meeting people. That kind of goes with a lot of what we were talking about. We didn't explicitly say it as that, but I would say that basically covered it as well.

I just want to say thank you for being here and being a guest. I'm just so happy to have you because I'm thankful for you've told people about our company, you've worn the boss bling, and like I said, in random places, and I see these pictures and I'm like, this is fantastic. And so I just really appreciate you. And I wanted to say thank you. And I want to say thank you by having you on boss talks.

Megan Orser

Thank you, Evan. And thanks boss talks and community boss. And keep doing what you're doing. It went by so quick. I had fun, so I appreciate it.

Evan Happel

Yeah, no, I appreciate you being here and taking the time to be here. And for everybody that watched, thank you for participating and giving us comments and liking and all the things and just viewing it. And for all those that watch after the show, thank you as well. But if you want to be on boss talks, you can. This is an open platform.

I want people to have the opportunity to share why they're a boss, why they're a leader, why they are passionate about what they're doing. And you don't have to be a CEO, but you can be. But you could just be a leasing agent starting out brand new in the industry like she was back when she just got started. So if you are passionate about what you're doing, where you are, I'd love to meet you and talk to you and give you a platform. So reach out and we can do that.

But this has been boss talks. 81 make sure you tune in next week for another great episode, and thanks for watching.

Speaker A

To show, be sure to like, share and follow us on your favorite podcast platform. You can also watch the podcast live every Wednesday at 12:00 p.m. PST on the community, community, boss, LinkedIn or Facebook pages. Until next time, manage like a boss.