Parks Associates Top 10 Insights - Multi-dwelling Units (MDU) Living

Check out Parks Associates Top 10 Insights - Multi-dwelling Units (MDU) Living

1. The future of housing is connected. Consumers increasingly expect their homes to have smart solutions that are convenient, green, and secure and built upon a reliable and high-performing home network. Multi-dwelling unit (MDU) property owners and managers, made up of smart apartments and smart condominiums, senior living, and student housing, are evaluating and investing in technology that opens a new generation of property management and resident experience.
2. Always-on connectivity and smart home tech offer new ways for property managers to differentiate and add value. The highly competitive rental environment creates a more pressing need to attract and retain residents.
3. ?The most significant benefit of installing smart home devices in MDUs is rental rate increases. Other benefits include reduced complaints from current residents and a boost in attracting new ones, along with many others.
4. ?Resident requests are a key motivator for property managers and owners in deploying smart home solutions. The top five most requested features are automated lighting, smart appliances, increased levels of security in common areas, increased broadband speed and remote access to residential units.
5. As technology continues to be added, AI-based parking could become a fundamental part of the experience. Dynamic messaging can be incorporated to help improve the experience. As EV adoption continues to grow, consumers look to apartments to provide charging stations; property developers will turn to sensor-based technologies to manage the experience.
6. New tech solutions in MDUs can reduce risks from theft and losses or damage from inclement weather or malfunctioning equipment. The extent of these use cases depends on the equipment and levels of integration, but they offer a variety of opportunities to secure the property. While the main benefit is mitigation from loss, some insurance companies are starting to offer discounts for smart solutions, notably in the single-family housing sector.
7. As competition increases, after-sale support is an important offering and differentiator. As connected devices increase, greater centralized control is required, especially if the devices use different communications technologies (e.g., Z-Wave, Zigbee) beyond Wi-Fi.
8. Service providers have an inherent advantage in that they have an existing relationship with the MDU, particularly if they already supply bulk internet services. With the new FCC ruling to prohibit exclusive revenue sharing agreements between ISPs and MDUs, bulk internet agreements allow MDUs to re-capture this lost revenue stream while improving the resident experience. Since bulk internet deployments, including managed Wi-Fi networks, facilitate MDU adoption of smart home devices, ISPs that offers these services have market advantage.
9. More than one-half of MDU renters live in low-rise buildings, composed of four stories or less. Low-rise MDU properties are often spread over larger areas of land than high-rises, are frequently composed of multiple buildings, and physical access points for residential units are commonly located on the outside of buildings. This increases resident demand for access and security solutions such as smart video doorbells, security cameras, and smart locks.
10. Working with vendors is necessary for MDU owners/managers to deploy new tech. MDUs must ensure that IoT ecosystems are not fragmented. This includes both the backend and front-end. MDUs must verify that devices and solutions can integrate with backend systems, either locally, through API connections, or via a cloud-to-cloud connection.

Parks Associates today announced the topics and call for papers for its inaugural event,?Smart Spaces: Apartments, Hospitality, and Community Living, being held?in-person on April 17-18 at the Hilton Granite in Plano, Texas, and virtually July 20, October 5, and November 30.

The firm’s latest research on tech innovations and deployment in the multifamily, MDU (multi-dwelling unit), and SMB (small-to-medium business) markets finds 77% of property managers and building owners who have installed smart home devices report the added tech led to increased rents in their properties.

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