Since late in the month of February 2020 and into early March 2020 when COVID-19 became well known in the United States labeled as a pandemic, PM Residential Management was taking steps to protect the safety and well-being of the employees and residents of our communities.
We started by educating our residents on recommended best practices per the Center for Disease Control (CDC), state and local health departments, and goverment officials as to what steps individuals can take to best protect themselves from spreading Covid-19. Basic hand washing, social distancing, and staying home when sick were communicated to residents via our Active Building resident portal, postings at the community’s common areas (mail boxes, offices, etc). Then we took the step to close our leasing offices to all walk in traffic. Our teams of employees were still on site, however behind a closed office door, accepting phone calls and serving residents on an emergency basis as needed. All leasing transitioned to online leasing and residents were encouraged to make payments online.
Our partnership with RealPage has been most important during this time as the products they provide allow us to operate in a socially distanced way by handling all leasing and renewal paperwork online, taking payments online, and accepting service requests online.
Our employees were also required to wear required Personal Protective Equipment (masks, gloves, booties on shoes, etc.) and were advised to conduct ongoing routine cleaning of all equipment, tools, and hands before and after every encounter.
Additionally, initially when states were ordering stay at home orders, we closed all common facilities such as swimming pools, fitness centers, and laundry rooms along with our leasing offices.
These steps have allowed PM Residential Management to continue our property management operation without much interruption, however, we are looking forward to opening our offices in June 2020 with continued restrictions as recommended by the CDC and local health departments in the communities we serve.