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Is it possible to boost bottom line apartment revenue by 20% or more this year? Even though we expect this to be another tough year, it just might be possible. This special report discusses how. Log in to your account to read the complete article.

• (Note: This is a detailed, 16 page article. We recommend printing out a PDF of the article once you log in, using the PDF link at the top right of the article.)

First, an admission. Patty and I like movies. Looking at this year's list of Academy Award nominees for Best Picture, we realized the nominated movies told us a lot about apartment market performance.

Here's why. Let's call this article An Education of sorts. It’s a discussion of operating expenses based our annual review of line-item revenue and expenses in The Apartment Expense Report. We’ll call the line-item costs our Inglourious Basterds and the revenue items, well we’ll simply call them Precious. Expenses were Up last year, in fact they were way Up in the Air. You know they were. I’m not joking. After all, I’m A Serious Man.

Anyway, we don’t have to explain to you what’s going on. We know you already feel like you’ve pulled a full tour of duty in the Hurt Locker. And we know you were ready for a rough year. Nobody was going to hit you on The Blindside in 2009. Nobody. You were ready.

But that was yesterday. It’s still a tough market. So now we’re all just hoping we’re not reduced to eating cat food instead of prawns. And we are at least a little worried that if we decide to pull a "James Cameron" and hold our breath until the market gets better, we all might turn blue permanently.

That would be bad. Then we’ll walk down the street and people will look at us and say, "Who Dat?" (That’s our Saints thing; with a name like Dupre we can’t help it, so cut us some slack. It took the Saints 43 years after all, and we’re so happy to lose the brown bag.)

Our own awards

This got us thinking about creating our own awards for apartment expense trends. Winners will receive the coveted "Return on Investment" award, or ROI (pronounced Roy). That's our answer to the Oscar. The first ROI, for best performance in a cost savings drama, goes to... well, actually nothing made the cut. But we could award the much less awesome "bomb award" to real estate taxes. They were up 11% in 2009, which helped put investors in the hurt locker, so to speak.

Next, the ROI for best revenue enhancer of 2009. Nothing comes to mind. So we'll give a bomb to the economic vacancy rate, which almost doubled from 5.2% in 2008 to 10.1% last year.

Look on the bright side

This is a pretty negative discussion. We get worried that we're getting crankier as we get older. So let's shift gears.

Instead of focusing on how much expenses went up last year, or are likely to increase this year, this article discusses 80 ways to cut apartment expenses or boost revenue. These tips were sent to us over the past two weeks by 72 investors, managers, and others active in our area's apartment market.

We estimate that if you implemented all of these tips, you could increase your net operating income by 20% or more. Even if you've already implemented a lot of these tips, there's still an opportunity to boost bottom line performance significantly.

So, as a teaser, if you wonder how these five tips will make you money, you should read the article to learn about them and the other 74 tips investors shared with us.

• Tip 34 - Learn a new accent
• Tip 73 - Lights, camera, action
• Tip 29 - Tanks for the memories
• Tip 21 - Money laundering
• Tip 28 - Grab the goodie bag

You be the judge

At least some of these tips deserve our new, highly prized ROI award. When you finish reading this article we would like your feedback. Tell us what you think of the tips listed in this article and which of these tips deserves a ROI award. Or, better yet, nominate a tip of your own. Tell us what you are doing and how it impacts revenue and expenses.

Sponsors

This special report is sponsored by the Rental Housing Association of Puget Sound and the Washington Multi-Family Housing Association.

Apartment expense tips participants

The following apartment investors, professional property managers, and other real estate professionals shared their experiences cutting apartment expenses. We appreciate the time they took to share their ideas for our benefit, and encourage you to reciprocate by participating with your own strategies.

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Comments

March 8, 2009: My vote for the ROI award goes to whom ever submitted #13. This is a great resource link! Thank you. (Tina Pletsch, Woodspear Properties)

• Expenses: capital expenses and replacement reserves