How property maintenance delivers value to all stakeholders

Tenants and property owners alike seek spaces that are secure, comfortable, and well-maintained. Today’s advanced property maintenance software simplifies operations by centralizing data in the cloud. This approach ensures the data is both secure and easily accessible. By providing a unified platform for everyone to work from, it reduces delays, minimizes errors, and unlocks greater potential for transforming raw data into practical insights.

For building owners, property maintenance is a critical investment that safeguards and enhances the value of their real estate assets. Properly maintained properties can attract higher rental rates and achieve better sale prices, positively influencing overall profitability. Regular maintenance also helps identify and resolve small issues early, preventing them from escalating into significant problems, minimizing unexpected disruptions, and reducing repair expenses.

Property maintenance also ensures adherence to safety regulations and building codes, reducing legal risks. For large organizations managing multiple facilities, it adds substantial value by preserving the condition of the properties, enhancing tenant satisfaction, and maximizing return on investment.

What is property maintenance?  

Property maintenance involves the proactive management and care of a building or facility to keep it in excellent condition, maintain its value, and ensure its functionality. This includes:

• Regular inspections 
• Preventive maintenance 
• Repairs and replacements 
• Capital projects and improvements 

Routine maintenance prolongs the lifespan of assets and systems, including HVAC, plumbing, and electrical infrastructure, reducing the need for expensive replacements. Additionally, it improves the property’s visual appeal and safety, which are crucial for ensuring tenant satisfaction and fostering long-term retention.

Property maintenance enables facility and maintenance teams to detect and resolve minor issues early, preventing them from developing into significant problems, minimizing downtime, and lowering repair expenses. Additionally, it ensures compliance with safety regulations and building codes, reducing legal liabilities. But what activities are included in property maintenance?

The teams in charge of property maintenance are responsible for both the building itself and the surrounding grounds, including: 

• Maintaining all assets and equipment, including plumbing, electrical, security and safety systems, and HVAC  
• Landscaping 
• Pest control and removal  
• Cleaning all common areas, including lobbies, restrooms, and corridors  
• Separating and removing recyclables and garbage  

Generally, they are not responsible for the small repairs tenants are expected to take care of themselves. For example, in a residential building, the property maintenance team doesn’t replace burned-out light bulbs. 

What are the benefits of property maintenance?  

Property management plays a key role in maintaining a safe and comfortable living or working environment for occupants. Regular upkeep and timely repairs address issues that could affect comfort or safety, such as heating, cooling, or plumbing malfunctions. Additionally, professional management ensures clear communication channels, enabling tenants to report concerns easily and receive prompt resolutions.

Property managers often provide emergency services, ensuring peace of mind for tenants and owners alike. They also manage lease agreements and renewals, offering valuable guidance on legal rights and responsibilities. Furthermore, property management can help build a sense of community by organizing events and encouraging neighborly interactions, a benefit that applies equally to office spaces and residential units.

For property owners, engaging a management service can save time, reduce costs, and ensure legal adherence. These professionals manage routine tasks such as vetting tenants, collecting rent, and overseeing maintenance. They also apply their knowledge to enhance marketing efforts and leasing tactics, aiming to keep units occupied and increase revenue from rentals.

Property managers help keep operations in line with housing laws and standards, mitigating legal exposure. They also focus on preventative care and prompt fixes, safeguarding the asset’s worth and cutting down on future costs. Additionally, they deliver consistent financial updates, assisting owners in monitoring their financial inflows and outflows for better strategic choices.

How does facility management software help with property management?  

Contemporary facility management tools allow you to plan tasks, delegate them to appropriate staff, and monitor completion. With current data at your fingertips, you can trust the information to produce insightful operational reports. Understanding your expenditure patterns enables more effective budget management.software features budget analytics tools more examples

Cloud computing  

Using old-school methods, you’re left managing everything with paper or spreadsheets, each with its own set of headaches.

Paper records are a nightmare for generating data, and they’re prone to loss. Every work order must be handwritten, increasing the chance of errors or omissions. Once you’ve created that single work order, it’s the only one in existence. Handing it off to a technician means you’ve lost your only record, risking it getting lost or misplaced.

Spreadsheets, on the other hand, make it easy to produce data but tough to keep it current. You can quickly create multiple copies of a work order, but these soon evolve into different versions, like twins who’ve led separate lives. When changes are made to one copy, they don’t update across all others, leading to discrepancies where your version might not match what the technician sees.

Cloud-based solutions eliminate these issues with a single, centralized database. Your data is now secure, searchable, and accessible from any location. Everyone uses the same data, ensuring everything stays updated.

From this unified data source, the software can provide numerous features that enhance and streamline your maintenance operations.

Open request portal  

With traditional manual systems, tenants face the hassle of finding contact details. Even if they know where the maintenance office is located, they must make the effort to go there, hoping to find someone available amidst work orders.

Moreover, despite the time spent on submitting a request, it often lacks effectiveness. Tenants might not know the exact information maintenance needs, leading to omissions. For instance, a report on a leaking pipe might neglect to mention where the leak is or its severity.

Contemporary facility management software features an accessible online portal where individuals can easily log maintenance requests. Once received, the maintenance team can utilize the software to review and approve the request, after which they can create, prioritize, assign, and monitor a new work order in real time.

Data-packed work orders 

With a modern system, the team can generate work orders packed with everything techs need to work efficiently and close out quickly, including:  

• Comprehensive asset maintenance and repair histories 
• Step-by-step instructions  
• Customizable checklists  
• Associated parts and materials  
• Digital copies of images, schematics, and warranties  
• Interactive site maps and floor plans  

When a tenant reports a leak in the ceiling of the underground parking garage, technicians arrive fully prepared, knowing exactly what needs to be done and how. They come equipped with all the necessary parts and materials.

Once the maintenance or facility manager creates and assigns the work order via the software, the technician gets an immediate alert on their maintenance app, allowing them to access the details of the job directly.

Scheduled and tracked PMs  

Proactive property management hinges on the importance of preventive maintenance. By implementing a regular schedule of inspections and upkeep, property managers can effectively identify and address potential issues before they escalate into major problems, thereby safeguarding asset value and ensuring smooth operations.

Consider the HVAC system within a commercial building as an illustrative example. Implementing regular preventive maintenance practices, such as timely filter replacements, thorough coil cleaning, and comprehensive system checks, can significantly extend the lifespan of the equipment while maintaining peak performance. This proactive approach effectively mitigates the risk of unexpected breakdowns, which can lead to undesirable consequences such as uncomfortable indoor temperatures, tenant dissatisfaction, and even temporary business disruptions. Furthermore, a well-maintained HVAC system operates with enhanced efficiency, resulting in reduced energy consumption and consequently lower utility costs.

By effectively utilizing the features designed for preventive maintenance, maintenance professionals are empowered to establish and schedule inspections and tasks (PMs) that are comprehensively equipped with detailed instructions, comprehensive checklists, and a complete inventory of associated parts.

Robust reports 

Comprehensive reports provide valuable insights into maintenance activities, associated costs, and emerging trends. This data empowers maintenance teams to identify recurring patterns, track performance metrics, and optimize resource allocation.

For instance, consider a maintenance team responsible for a portfolio of apartment buildings. By meticulously analyzing data from monthly maintenance reports, they might uncover a recurring issue – frequent water leaks in specific units, resulting in substantial plumbing repair costs and significant tenant inconvenience. Further investigation reveals that these units share a common installation date for their plumbing fixtures.

Equipped with this valuable knowledge, the team proactively addresses the issue by replacing the aging fixtures in all units from the identified installation period, rather than reactively responding to individual failures. This strategic approach leads to a reduction in the overall number of service calls, minimizes the extent of water damage and associated repair expenses, and ultimately enhances tenant satisfaction.

Reports empower maintenance teams to shift from reactive to proactive management, enabling them to anticipate issues, allocate resources effectively, and ultimately enhance the property’s overall condition and value. 

Leveraging BIM data for property management 

In modern property management, building information modeling (BIM) data can play an important role in streamlining operations, enhancing efficiency, and reducing costs. By integrating BIM data into different workflows, facility managers and building owners can gain a comprehensive understanding of their assets, enabling better decision-making and proactive maintenance. 

BIM data provides a detailed, three-dimensional digital representation of a building, including its structural, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems, which can be used to create a digital twin — a virtual replica of the physical building. Digital twins are not just static models.

They are dynamic, real-time simulations that can be updated with live data from sensors and other Internet of Things (IoT) devices, empowering facility managers to monitor the building’s performance, identify potential issues, and optimize operations in real-time. 

One of the many advantages of using BIM data in facility management is the ability to perform predictive maintenance. By analyzing the data from the digital twin, managers can anticipate equipment failures and schedule maintenance before problems occur.

A proactive approach reduces downtime, extends the lifespan of assets, and minimizes unexpected repair costs. Facility and maintenance teams can also use BIM data to simulate various scenarios, such as energy consumption patterns or the impact of renovations, helping managers make informed decisions that improve the building’s overall efficiency and sustainability. 

They can also use BIM data to ensure compliance with safety regulations and building codes. By maintaining an accurate digital record of the building’s systems and components, managers can easily track maintenance history, identify areas that require attention, and generate reports for regulatory bodies. This not only simplifies the compliance process but also mitigates legal risks. 

The value of modern property maintenance 

Both tenants and property owners prioritize properties that are safe, comfortable, and functionally sound. Modern property maintenance software streamlines operations by centralizing all data within a secure cloud environment. This centralized approach enhances data security and accessibility for all stakeholders. By working from a unified data source, teams experience reduced delays, minimized errors, and increased opportunities to enhance overall property performance.