Renting an apartment comes with a lot of hassles, from renovations to cleaning up and looking into the financials. However, all of it can become a lot easier if a person knows some insider tips and tricks that most professionals probably wouldn’t openly share with them. A former property manager, Moriah Michelle—who goes by @moriahhmichelle on TikTok, took to the platform to share an insider tip for people who rent an apartment to help them with raised rental charges during renewals.
“Okay, this is for people who rent apartments. I used to work in property management a few years ago, and here’s an insider tip,” Michelle said in her video. “So, if you are renewing your lease and you’re coming up for renewal and they’re raising your rent, like 200 to 300 dollars, they also have the ability to bring your rent down.” Michelle shared how they can either reduce the rent or keep it the same by doing one thing. One just has to know the right person to talk to. “Don’t talk to the leasing consultant, like the person you can see. Talk to the person you cannot see, which is the property manager,” Michelle explained. She emphasized that one shouldn’t even talk to the assistant manager and should get in touch with the property manager.
“They have the ability to go into their computer and there is a screen, while at least the company I worked at, there’s a screen that pops up with like all the rates of the comp rates,” the former property manager explained. “There’s a little box at the bottom that tells them how much they can finagle your renewable price.” However, she added that different property management firms work differently and can have different rules about the same. “But there’s a little box and on the box, there’s a number inside. So it could be like 50, it could be 300, it could be 400, 500. It could be 150, 175. That’s the amount of money I can use to fix your renewal price,” she continued.
“So let’s say, your rent is 1500 dollars currently and your renewal rate is 1750. Then I go into your little thing and then I look into the box and it says 150. I can bring the renewal price from $1750 down by 150 dollars,” Michelle shared. “So anytime somebody says that they can’t do anything about your renewal price, they’re probably lying to you, because they’re obviously wanting to make money.” She expressed that there’s always a way to bring down the renewal price. “So there you go, insider trick,” Michelle exclaimed. The video received over 1.5 million views and more than 174.6k likes. People took to the comments on the video to share their experiences with the same.
@deseremyles22 wrote, “I work in property management, if they won’t keep you at your current rate ask them to update something in your unit for the increase. Especially if they are renovating units in the complex already.” @liacohnnrbl commented, “AND if the property manager won’t, you can also call corporate and speak to the regional manager.” @justdmack remarked, “This is correct. Just negotiate and ask them to go with the budgeted number. I did renewals.” Meanwhile, @iesha_yvette expressed, “Y’all please remember every company is different. It’s good to ask but don’t go in thinking that it can be done anywhere.”
You can follow Moriah Michelle (@moriahhmichelle) on TikTok for more lifestyle content.