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Tell landlords they can offer the service to tenants for $10/mo. Split proceeds 50/50. Call every landlord in town. Landlords love upselling tenants (parking
by pud 14y ago
Tell landlords they can offer the service to tenants for $10/mo. Split proceeds 50/50.
Call every landlord in town.
Landlords love upselling tenants (parking spaces, storage space, etc.)
- weaksauce 14y agoThis is great advice but it also brings up a point; why do these systems require a local number in order to operate? It seems that a firmware upgrade could possibly decimate the op's business. Edit: I want to point out that I am in no way, shape, or form saying that the op could not make a decent amount of money on this(though, 10/month is a touch steep for someone living in an apartment) but I was just curious why the manufacturers of such devices limit them in such a way.
- mmetzger 14y agoGuessing they want a local number because the apartment complex doesn't want to pay for long distance calling.
- anigbrowl 14y agoI haven't paid for long distance calling since the 1990s. I think it's just people being lazy and choosing poor defaults.
- mcpherrinm 14y agoHow many of these buzzers have remained unchanged since the 1990s? Also, long distance appears to be at least $20/month extra on a standard small business landline here (Bell Canada). That's not much, but I can see it happening for something the landlord would think of as a non-feature: Because why wouldn't you have a phone number in the area you live?
- anigbrowl 14y agoI'm not sure a small business line is the best comparison for an apartment building, and I think most landlords are familiar with the existence of cellphones by now. But it's true that many buzzers like that have been in place for a long time - but I do think that that's the landlord's problem, like any other non-working fixture.
- sopooneo 14y agoFor us it was specifically because they didn't want people opening the door remotely. They wanted you to be local.
- randallsquared 14y agoSome of them don't. I currently have an out of state number and the door entry system has no problem dialing it.
- stephengillie 14y agoA firmware upgrade could probably decimate the OP's business, but the whole value is that this service may be a lot cheaper in terms of mental effort and stress for many landlords.
- davemel37 14y agoIf I was paying rent, and now I had to pay more money to open the door, that would probably deter me from renting from this building. Almost like a protection racket... You might be a tenant, but cough up extra money to get into your apartment... I would strongly discourage a landlord from trying something like this. This is not a typical upsell, if anything the tenant blames the landlord for the problem in the first place...
- mseebach 14y agoRead the article. The service is for an enhanced way of opening the gate, not for opening it in the first place.
- davemel37 14y agoThe perception of offering charging for any type of access to your apartment enhanced or not would be perceived negatively. Consider an apartment where the landlord charged you $1 every time you want to use the elevator, but you can always walk up the stairs. While one might be an enhanced way, I think people would still view it as the landlord double dipping. I think this product is much more suited to be a promotional feature subsidized by an outside delivery company (pizza joint) or the landlord to show off fancy bells and whistles in his building to entice new renters.