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Today we sat down for a Q&A with two of Suntide’s senior property managers, Rebekah Buck and Jennifer McCall, to talk about what they do in emergency situations. Learn why property inspections, on-call maintenance technicians, and filing incident reports is such an important part of commercial property management.
What are examples of emergencies that might take place at a commercial property?
Jennifer: The most common emergency, especially in Minnesota with our changing seasons, is pipes leaking or breaking. If an HVAC system goes out and the building is either too hot or too cold, that could be an emergency.
Rebekah: There are also nuisance issues such as traffic violations or public disruptions. Fires are less common, but it’s good to have a procedure in place for when something of that magnitude takes place.
Jennifer: Basically, an emergency is anything out of the ordinary that requires immediate attention. Owners of commercial real estate often have their own business to run, or perhaps they live in a different town or a different state. That’s why it’s so important to have a property manager on call who has experience and can handle emergencies for you.
How do you prepare for emergencies in advance?
Rebekah: The first step is to inspect the property on a regular basis. At Suntide, property managers do weekly inspections where we visit the property, walk the grounds, and check the commons areas. Regular inspections are key – both by the property manager and by outside vendors. You have to have your sprinklers working, for example. That requires taking the time to set up those annual inspections and following through with them.
Jennifer McCall
Years in Service: Over 20
Square Feet Managed: 785,000 SF
Specialty: Suburban office, large retail, downtown office/retail
Rebekah Buck
Years in Service: Over 20
Square Feet Managed: 617,000 SF
Specialty: Large class A office, light industrial, and retail
Rebekah: And the people. Because so much of emergency preparation is about building good relationships. The tenants, the site pick up team, the building engineers, the janitorial company – all these people can notify you in advance of issues so that you can tackle problems before they happen.
Jennifer: It’s also important to have your preferred vendors and emergency contact lists up to date. You might not need to call a restoration company until after a flood. But having that relationship in advance is so important.
How do you determine preferred vendors?
Jennifer: Whenever possible, Suntide tries to keep vendors who are already familiar with the property. If we take on a new property, and a vendor is providing good service, there’s no reason to change them. Having a long-term relationship with a vendor who is familiar with the property is so important.
Rebekah: We also communicate with other property managers at Suntide to find out about vendors who specialize in certain tasks. If, for example, if I know that Jennifer knows a restoration company who has experience in foundation repair, we can share that information by word of mouth or through Suntide’s vendor database.
Jennifer: Suntide is a smaller company, so it’s easy to get ahold of one another, share stories and recommendations, and build a collective knowledge of vendors around the Twin Cities.
How are emergencies handled at Suntide?
Rebekah: During regular business hours, I encourage tenants to call me directly. If something happens, such as a broken water pipe or faulty HVAC, I can immediately get in touch with Suntide’s in-house maintenance technicians. Suntide has professional maintenance technicians on staff and we can handle most things in house.
After hours, tenant calls are routed to an emergency hotline where the technicians who are on call are dispatched. But from a property manager’s perspective, it makes no difference when an emergency happens: you’re always on call. During an emergency, it’s important that tenants can see that the property manager is present and that you are responding.
When emergencies happen, Suntide property managers assess the situation and dispatch repair technicians.
How does technology play a role during emergencies?
Jennifer: When an emergency call comes in, Suntide’s property managers have a program called AppFolio on our phones. We can put in a work order that dispatches the information to our in-house technicians. Then we work together to determine what can and should be done immediately. We also determine if the situation requires an outside vendor, and how quickly.
Rebekah: We also keep an up-to-date contact list on our phones with the vendors who are familiar with the property. That way when I call, they know who I am, they have been to this property before, and we’re all working together as a team to resolve the situation.
Jennifer: There is an inclination to believe that we should be physically at the location during an emergency. But in those first few minutes, it’s more important that we are on the phone making calls.
What is an example of an emergency you’ve had to deal with?
Rebekah: One time, a few years ago, I had a sprinkler system go off in a retail garage – in the winter. I got a call at 5:30am and the maintenance technician and I went out there. The fire department had already arrived.
The first thing we did was turn off the water. Then we spent the next few hours bailing out water with buckets. And I was at Target at 7am buying salt bags for the sidewalk to avoid fall hazards. The fire sprinkler vendor came out and the fire doors needed to be raised back up.
After the initial emergency was taken care of, there was a lot of work to find out why it happened and make sure it didn’t happen again. In that case, it was supposed to be a dry system: water goes through a pipe and it was supposed to alert me first and then follow up if the fire department. So we had to revisit the process and streamline it better for next time.
When emergencies occur, it’s important to have a plan in place.
How do you help the tenants and property owner after an emergency?
Jennifer: The first thing is communication about how you are going to solve the problem in the short term. For example, if the power is out, can it be restored temporarily with generators? If there is a flood, where can the tenant office in the meantime? First up, answering those questions and tackling those situations. The tenant’s safety and ability to continue their business operations is very important.
The next step is going to be tackling questions about who is going to pay for repairs. The tenant’s insurance company will take care of issues that took place within their own suite. This includes carpet, paint, furniture, and computers. As property managers, we help them navigate those situations.
Property managers take photos and write up incident reports for owners and their insurance companies.
What do you think is the central idea for a good emergency preparedness strategy?
Rebekah: I think the most important thing is having good reliable vendors and systems in place before an emergency happens. When an emergency happens, time is of the essence. So it’s about having your contacts and inspections up to date so everyone is familiar with you, your property, and what to do in an emergency situation.
Jennifer: I also think communication and tone are so important. Tenants want to know that you are in control. Be present, be available, show them that you care about them and will take care of things. And when talking to vendors, have a cool head, be professional, but convey urgency about the situation. I call it ‘getting in the zone.’ So much of property management happens behind the scenes. But when an emergency happens, that is when you are the most valuable and that is when that investment pays off.
For more information about Suntide property management, call 651.603.321.