A Year of Impact - Value Added in 2023
Authored by: Danielle Miner
Sunbelt Properties - Chief Executive Officer
Delivering on our Commitments
Through its Sunbelt Funds, Ballast Rock invests in workforce multifamily apartment buildings in the Southeast. Sunbelt Properties is the in-house property management group for all Sunbelt Funds properties. While the primary focus of our funds is delivering successfully for its investors, we also pride ourselves on providing safe, clean, and comfortable homes at attractive and attainable rental price-points for our residents.
This is not a trivial exercise in workforce housing. It requires building, motivating, and rewarding the right team that goes above and beyond to help improve the broader communities in which we live, invest, and work in every day.
As we look forward to the year ahead, I wanted to take this opportunity to highlight some of Sunbelt Properties’ key wins from 2023. Our team has reached incredible heights this year, and we hope that by reading this, you will understand why I truly believe Sunbelt Properties is a best-in-class property manager.
Sunbelt Properties Culture
My leadership team and I spend a lot of time focused on enriching the culture at Sunbelt Properties. By establishing several initiatives over the past couple of years, we have ensured that employees can learn important skills while having access to the necessary tools to advance their careers. As part of this effort, we have:
Partnered with Nectar, an employee-recognition and social platform. This allows our remote employees to interact with their managers and staff at other properties and allows team members’ achievements to be publicly recognized and rewarded. The platform helps Sunbelt Properties create and promote a culture of celebrating success, while helping to retain staff through positive affirmation and real-world rewards.
Provided access to Gracehill, a real estate technology company offering courses such as: property management, financials, business writing, and dealing with difficult people. This training allows our managers to develop essential skills to help increase property performance, reduce operational risk, and provide a remote and cost-efficient way to foster top talent.
In addition to these two technology partners, Sunbelt Properties focuses heavily on promoting a culture of “mentor managing” rather than “micromanaging”. The goal is for regional managers to lead by example, encourage employees to ask questions, and place an emphasis on professional development.
All these initiatives are designed to boost employee retention and promote an inclusive environment, so that we can develop and retain top management talent.
Which is why it was so gratifying that, in November 2023, Sunbelt Properties was honored with an award for #23 Best Places to Work Multifamily and #42 Best Places to Work Multifamily for Women nationally:
Best Places to Work Multifamily Award 2023
Ranked by both the number of submissions and the scoring of responses from a detailed and anonymous employee survey, the award provides a wonderful validation of the culture we have worked so hard to build.
Community Engagement
The Sunbelt Properties team believes in doing what we can to help improve the fabric of the communities where we invest. See below for some of the initiatives the team has undertaken over the past year:
Move-in bags for our new residents, which included items such as essentials for their first night in the apartment and coupons donated by local shops and restaurants.
Opening newly renovated pools/starting pool season with a pool party.
Trunk-or-Treat Halloween events in October.
Inviting local food trucks to set up once a week for residents enjoying our pools.
Hosting “Screen-on-the-Green" movie nights.
Relocating a mother and her son when issues with their existing unit meant they were unable to decorate or prepare for Christmas.
Hosting back-to-school drives
Assisting some senior residents who were pushed out of a local senior living facility when it was taken over, and prices increased exponentially, by transitioning them into some of our local properties.
Our GA/AL Regional and Coleman Place management/maintenance teams visit the Alabama Institute for the Deaf and Blind (“AIDB”) each Christmas, where they spend time with students and hand out toys to celebrate the holidays. (One of our regional managers already has a closet full of toys lined up for this year’s holiday handout!).
Fayetteville management team collected canned and non-perishable foods to donate to the Fayetteville chapter of Urban Ministries.
Building a sense of community with events like Trunk or Treat, Maintainance Appreciation days, and free school supplies for kids.
Individually these may seem like small things, but collectively they help produce a better product and living experience for our residents. Below is just one of the many positive reviews our team has received from a resident at our Georgetown Apartments property:
In fact, Georgetown Apartments was just named Moultrie GA’s “Best of the Best” apartment complex for the third year in a row.
Improving our Properties
While community engagement helps us attract and retain good, long-term residents (and reduces costs associated with turning units), our ability to drive rental growth centers largely on capital-intensive projects typically associated value-add in real estate: renovating internal units, repairing common-areas, adding amenities such as dog parks or swimming pools, etc.
When completing renovations, it is common for apartment owners to cut corners to get a temporary rent bump without making lasting changes to the units or improving tenants’ living experiences. That is not how Ballast Rock does business. We take pride in the quality we offer to our residents and believe that, by focusing on capital expenditures that offer meaningful improvements in asset quality, our investors are rewarded over the long term, as the value from boosting our community reputation goes well beyond just the physical improvements these projects provide.
Below are some examples of the types of interior and exterior value-add projects we undertake at our properties. These before-and-after pictures highlight the quality of the upgrades we make, which is why we can consistently realize rent increases across our portfolio – we are continually improving the end-product we offer to our renters.
Below is an example of the renovation at one of the units at our Gleneagle Apartments. We added new white cabinet door fronts, vertical hardware, faux granite countertops, black/stainless appliances, vinyl flooring and a subway tile backsplash.
Bathroom, Kitchen, and Dog Run renovations
Energy Efficiency
In partnership with Duke Energy, our team spearheaded the installation of energy-efficient LED lights, shower heads, bathroom and kitchen sink aerators and water heater pipe insulation at our Bentree, Basswood and Landmark Wood assets in Florence, SC. This helped make the units more energy and water efficient and saved our tenants money on their utility bills—and it has all been done at zero cost to Ballast Rock… win, win, win!
Aluminum Wiring Remediation
Aluminum electrical wiring was a commonly used material in the construction of 1960s and early-to-mid-1970s real estate, as it was cheaper than copper wiring. However, aluminum wiring increases the risk of electrical fires. Stone Brooke apartments in Dalton, GA, which we acquired in the Sunbelt Fund II in early 2023, had aluminum wiring. Typically, this is something other sponsors would ignore. However, we take tenant safety seriously, so, following the acquisition, we remediated the problem, completing the removal of the aluminum wiring last September. As a result of the project, we not only improved resident safety, but we will also lower our insurance premiums for the property to reflect the reduced fire risk.
Conclusion
The Sunbelt team goes above and beyond for our residents, employees, communities, and properties because we believe that doing the right thing for our residents is ultimately better for our investors.
Property management is complex, and it is easy to get wrong. Building the right team allows us to create a virtuous cycle: We can attract and retain the best talent to help improve the quality of our properties, which then allows us to attract the best tenants, ultimately helping to create longer term value for our communities.
Author: Danielle Miner, CEO Sunbelt Properties
