8 Up-and-Comers to Watch in the Residential Leasing Industry:

As technology continues to improve, evolving processes in the leasing industry, more and more leaders are ceasing the opportunity to provide innovative solutions for both renters and leasing professionals.  Read on to learn about 8 emerging leaders in the residential leasing industry today.

Nathaniel Kunes:

Nathaniel Kunes is one of Forbes.com's top real-estate writers and is a member of the Forbes Real Estate Council. He expands on the concepts of leasing in 2018 and trends that will affect the leasing market well into the future. Forbes.com is a respected and authoritative source of information within the financial industry, covering topics like how the current economy and financial situation of the country will impact effect the leasing market.

Sara Strochak:

Sara Strochak is one of the leading researcher assistants on the residential housing market. In her work with the Urban Institute, she has found that leasing frequencies have gone up about 30% in just the last 3 years alone. Her findings found that leasing has become more common because owning a home (plus the costs associated with ownership) is becoming more of a pipe dream for many Americans. Owning a home isn't seen as the foolproof choice it once was before so many people lost their residences to the housing bubble that burst in 2008.

William Rice:

William Rice is the President of the Web Marketing Association which recently received a reward for their "365 Connect" software program - a recent leader in the leasing industry. The program even won an International WebAward for its cutting-edge ability to help landlords and associations manage their multi-family units that require leasing. Rice helped design the program which uses the modern cloud to streamline operations without sacrificing the user experience. 

Zach Aarons:

Zach Aarons is the co-founder of MetaProp NYC in a market which sees about 60% of their residents renting properties. MetaProp is intended to help property managers explore the next frontier of leasing properties to potential tenants. The program has a built-in AI bot that takes data and turns it into actionable emails sent to both potential and current tenants. While some action is still required, the idea is to eventually automate all work that property managers have to do at their desk. High five for setting agents free!

Robert Scaglion:

Robert Scaglion is the executive managing director for the First Serve Residential New York and operates 11,165 units for lease throughout New York City. Scaglion points out that while the current leasing market is growing at a 6-8% rate, the slowdown is nearing where the market may grow at most 2% on average. Scaglion shares how he is combating this when leasing his properties: by simply raising rents minimally if at all on his tenants who renew their property. Keeping rates consistent is likely to keep tenants as faithful, long-term tenants.

Richard Barton:

Richard Barton is the Executive Chairman and Co-Founder of Zillow.com. Zillow has become an authority in the leasing market throughout the US. Renters can search by zip code, monthly leasing costs, bedrooms/bathrooms, amenities offered, or pets. Allowing potential tenants to look for exactly what they want helps them find units for lease that meet their priorities and needs. Since the founding of Zillow, many other websites have elaborated on this concept and come to offer websites that will perform similar functions for potential tenants.

Douglas Pope: 

Douglas Pope is the Co-Founder of HotPads.com, a Zillow Group company, and one of the first sites to be dedicated specifically to leasing units. Whether you are looking to lease a unit or have units you want to be leased, HotPads.com will have a way for you to list your unit on their site. The site matches potential tenants with units that meet their needs and help landlords get their units in front of tenants to increase their chances of having their units leased. TRIVIA: Did you know HotPads is one of the 50+ partner sites Intellirent automatically syndicates to for leasing agents?

Danielle Hale:

Danielle Hale is the Chief Economist for Realtor.com and she states that only 41% of all Americans live in a household where they could afford the median-priced home in their geographic area. This means that over half of households cannot afford the average-priced home in their area, another indicator that renting is a more affordable way of living.

Hale says that we are at the point where interest rates are low and incomes are increasing. This means that prices are going up, making homes harder for many people to afford and renting a more affordable option. 

Intellirent's Perspective:

These are 8 of the up-and-coming professionals in the residential leasing industry at the present time. As AI continues to improve (we're here for it!) and help automate more of the industry, leaders will be emerging rapidly.

Interested in how Intellirent has adopted AI technologies to automate screening process and improve the daily life of leasing agents? Sign up today.