How to overcome the challenges of scatter as a property manager

Managing rental real-estate properties presents unique challenges, especially as the size of the property portfolio under management grows. From organizing and maintaining documentation, to handling and reporting on financials, to dealing with difficult tenants, demanding owners and issue resolution (just to name a small part of the daily work), property managers have a lot on their plate. Property managers perform knowledge work that requires significant coordination skills. Our team’s market research has revealed that many challenges property managers face have to do with one of the three fundamental wastes of knowledge work: “scatter”.

What is scatter?

Scatter refers to the disorganization and fragmentation of information that occurs in the daily and long-term work of a property manager. It’s the natural result of handling a multitude of tasks and information and its sources, such as receiving instructions, requests, documents, files, notes, messages, and emails. Scatter is born in the moments between receiving any kind of information and making a decision or taking action on it. Scatter leads to inefficiencies and can create significant issues if not managed properly.

How scatter affects property managers

Scatter might be a naturally occurring, “endemic” part of a property manager’s working life, but it is also something that should continuously be combated, decimated, and reduced to the bare minimum allowable. Reducing scatter is one of the primary goals of any digitalization initiative or what some call “digital transformation”. By organizing information and associating it with other, already-organized information, a property manager “unloads” that information from his brain into a digitally organized “place”, reduces his cognitive load of keeping all that information and its mental associations in mind, and can focus on making better-informed decisions and taking actions.

Breek.gr is Greece’s only online software for property management, designed from the ground up to help property managers address many challenges, starting with exactly this one: scatter. By enabling property managers to continuously keep scatter at bay thanks to a considerate and user-friendly UI and rich functionality, Breek.gr makes their work simpler and more efficient. As a property manager, with Breek.gr you can deal competently with the following recurring and constant challenges:

Challenge 1: Making information easy to search, find, and work with, even when it floods you

Information scatter and lost or outdated documentation can create significant issues for property managers. For example, a property manager might lose a critical maintenance record of an electric appliance, or the documentation of a construction intervention on a property, because it was stored as an attachment an old email thread or as a file on a USB stick that has gone missing.

Breek.gr’s basic Capture functionality of a “digital property folder” ensures that property-related data and records can be stored in one place, and can be made easy to search and easy to find and retrieve. The advanced Monitor functionality of our online software for property management makes it possible and easy to associate that and even more information with further records, such as buildings, complexes, tasks, tenancies, financials, property inventories, people, and more. This prevents information scatter and makes it easy to access documentation for legal, financial, taxation and operational purposes, and thus helps property managers to get things done without having to wade into literal paperwork and dusty folders, or to search emails, hard drives and USB sticks for disorganized and unstructured files.

Challenge 2: Remaining efficient, even when the portfolio you manage grows

Tracking various properties, tenancies, tasks and documents can be overwhelming for property managers, especially as success begets success, and the number of properties they manage grows faster and beyond their ability to deal with an constant baseload of things to take care of, and the occassional “shark attacks clusters” . For example, a property manager could risk missing the looming renewal date for multiple tenancies, especially when this date coincides among them, something that’s more likely to happen as the property portfolio grows. Another example is keeping track of different property maintenance schedules, something that can be chaotic and confusing when done manually, or providing a financial overview and reports to numerous property owners across all those properties.

Breek.gr’s centralized online platform allows property managers to keep track of everything in one place. Our advanced Monitor functionality provides automated notifications, such as for overdue rent payments, expiring tenancies and warranties, and incoming task requests. The notifications are sent both instantly, when something relevant happens, and well in advance (based on the user’s settings), ensuring that nothing can be overlooked, and helping the property manager to stay on top of things, even as their portfolio under management grows. You don’t need to actively look into a list of pending and upcoming things to take care of any longer. Instead, lean back, relax, and get notified well in advance of things that require your attention. And, by enabling property owners to join the software platform and gain instant read-only access to the information of the properties they own, the workload for reporting on you, the property manager, is drastically reduced.

Challenge 3: Staying on top of all the things you need to track, even when complexity is a given

Managing a large portfolio of properties can be daunting, but rest assured: it can get similarly daunting even if your portfolio is small but consists of properties that demand your attention frequently, are occupied by tenants who are “high maintenance”, are owned by detail-oriented and performance-focused property owners, or all of the above. All these sources, and more, are key drivers of complexity in property management that contributes to a pervasive feeling of being overwhelmed by the sheer amount of things you need to track and take care of.

For instance, a property manager might struggle to coordinate tasks of and report on the financials of properties across different locations, or even properties that are collocated. You can use our “Property Groups” feature to group properties into a Building (based on collocation, i.e. the same address) and/or a Complex (based on promixity, i.e. the same postal code). It’s also possible to filter transactions, tasks and tenancies based on various criteria, including selected properties, making it easier and more efficient to determine the status of the numerous things you need to track as a property manager: from operations to financial performance.

For example, if you need to check which tenants have overdue rent in a specific building, Breek.gr allows you to filter and identify these tenants quickly, enabling prompt follow-up and triggering reminders by email. Similarly, tracking maintenance tasks by property groups helps ensure that no property is neglected and that all necessary repairs are completed in a timely manner.

Additionally, dealing with utility and service providers for multiple properties can get complicated. Breek.gr allows you to record utility meters’ identification numbers, their status (such as kilowatt-hours, liters of water consumed, and Nm3 of natural gas), and attach photos proving their status and location on the premises. This is particularly useful in multi-storey buildings, where identifying which meter belongs to which unit can be challenging.

Conclusion

Scatter causes frustration and stress, and these can make property management sometimes feel like an uphill battle. Property management comes with its unique set of challenges caused by the scatter that is inherent in the profession of the property manageer, but with the right digital tools, these can be effectively managed. Breek.gr offers a comprehensive solution that simplifies property management, helping property owners and property managers achieve their goals with ease.

As you navigate the complexities of property management, whether you oversee a diverse portfolio scattered across different locations or manage a smaller yet demanding set of properties, Breek.gr stands ready to streamline your operations with precision and ease. Imagine effortlessly organizing maintenance requests from high-maintenance tenants, providing meticulous financial reports to detail-oriented property owners, and efficiently coordinating tasks across collocated properties—all from one intuitive platform. With Breek.gr, you not only conquer the challenges of scatter and complexity but transform them into opportunities for enhanced efficiency and superior service delivery towards property owners who will value your digitally-enhanced diligence and meticulousness.

Imagine the peace of mind that comes with knowing every task is tracked, every document is stored and correctly associated, and every deadline is met without the stress of manual oversight. Breek.gr empowers you to focus on what truly matters: building strong relationships with the owners, dealing with tenants, optimizing property performance and long-term value, exceeding owner expectations, and raising your property management fees. Join the property managers who have embraced the digital revolution with Breek.gr and experience firsthand how our innovative platform can elevate your property management practices to new heights.

Don’t wait any longer—sign up for free and register up to 5 properties with ease, knowing that Breek.gr is your trusted partner in simplifying property management across Greece.