Looking to expand your business but not sure how? Multi family painting represent a good opportunity for painting contractors that are looking to expand their business. Apartment construction has been growing each year for the past 10 years, with more people from every age group choosing the convenience of multi family living than ever before. And since every building (new or existing) has ongoing painting needs, now is the time to consider taking advantage of this opportunity.
Your opportunities within the multi family painting segment
- Property sales leads to refresh projects. This is the ideal time to ask about and secure repaint and capital expenditure projects
- Older properties need upkeep and appearance upgrades, opening the door for add-on and larger maintenance projects
- The high turnover rate for apartment dwellers means a regular need for quick unit turn projects
What to know and where to start
- Identify major property management companies in your area that own a number of individual properties
- Find the name and contact information of the maintenance or construction manager
- Individual property or leasing managers can be good resources for names and can also tell you what projects are handled by the property management company and what are handled by outside contractors
Three pieces of advice for a contractor picking up this type of work:
- Start small. Work on smaller maintenance or unit turn project to become familiar with the property before taking on a capital expenditure project.
- Make sure you have a good understanding of the requirements and project needs when taking on any large repaint. Both interior and exterior surfaces are often in some degree of deterioration. Detailing out and accounting for additional labor, materials, timing, expected results, etc., will help ensure the project goes smoothly.
- Be their one-stop source. Make sure to mention jobs that they may not know you can handle, such as pool deck and walkway restoration, or flat-roof refinishing.
Types of work and what to expect
Unit turn
- Highly concentrated work, a few days per month
- Fast turnaround
- Touch up or wall-to-wall painting
- Odors or stains may be an issue
- May include repairs
- Regular work, but lower margins
Repaint/capital expenditure
- Properties generally due for a large refresh every 6 to 8 years
- Occupied area, must work around tenant needs
- Repairs needed
- Color can be challenging with mock-ups and a larger approval process required
- Specification will need to be created and submitted
- Irregular work, but higher margins
Ongoing heavy maintenance
- Work beyond typical maintenance manager capabilities
- Includes pool deck refinishing, walkway resurfacing, common area repaint, roof coating repair
- Combine with turn business, or use as leverage to gain turn or repaint business
- Irregular but ongoing, offers higher margins
Promote your advantages
Professionalism: Talk about your owned equipment, license and insured services, and experience working in occupied spaces and commercial properties.
Color: Accommodating individual color choice while maintaining community cohesion is a challenge for multi-family properties. Therefore, talk to your paint rep on how they can help you with color rendering and other services that will help make you invaluable to property managers.
One stop problem solver: Detail all the types of work you are able to complete.
Increase operating income: Be ready to talk about how using an experience contractor means better quality, quicker turns and reducing the need for using maintenance staff as painters.
Barriers to entry for multi family painting
Identifying the decision-maker: As you talk to property managers and management companies, be sure to get clarity on who makes the decisions.
Maintenance managers: Many handle unit turn business. So, this presents other types of work. For example, roof and concrete repair, can help you build rapport and reinforce how you can support their efforts.
Profitability/cost: Unit turn is a big business, but may not be profitable enough on its own. For that reason, understand how the number of units and the turn rates for the property will affect margins.
So Amigos, do you have any other tips for multi family painting? Share below…
Also, check out Paint Amigo’s applicator recommendations for multi family painting below (Amazon affiliate links)…
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