Spring is Nearly Upon Us!

From the desk of Leah Calnan, Director of Metro Property Management...

Before & After Pics of Reception Area

Wow so it is August and isn’t it a little warmer? And with the sun setting a little later in the day it feels like Spring is just around the corner. Spring cleaning is already happening at our office, to be exact a freshening up/renovation of our reception is starting to come together. Gone is the pink and purple carpet and we are loving our beautiful new tiles and the repositioning of the reception desk means more room for our new client couch and chairs which we will have very shortly. We have had some lovely comments so far and we will continue with carpet replacement throughout the office in the coming months.

In other news at Metro as mentioned last month myself and Samantha Taylor of our office will be attending the ARPM Conference in Sydney this month. Speakers include professionals like Fiona Blayney, Director of her own real estate business development and recruitment firms and highly sought after speaker who’s energy and passion never cease to amaze me, Paul Tonich who will speak on Social Media and it’s impact, Jonathon Handford - Managing Director of Newman Estate Agents who will speak on the UK’s approach on property management and then there’s James Castrission & Justin Jones who became famous for crossing the Tasman Sea in a kayak who will speak on their challenges and how to overcome adversity. These are just a few of the speakers and their topics so as you can see it will be a real mix of ideas which is really very exciting and we hope to get a lot out of our time there.

A couple of months ago now I gave an interview for which myself and the team were filmed for Business Victoria they approached me as they had discovered that our team had embarked on some tailored Customer Service based training last year and were interested in our team culture for a short video for their website (known as a Vodcast). My assistant Melissa and I attended the launch of this Vodcast and it was great to see and meet the other businesses that were involved in other Vodcasts being launched. There were so many different ideas and great advice given that other small to medium businesses can access via these Vodcasts that will be put online shortly, we will of course keep you posted of the link once they are up. Some of my team were quite shocked to learn they could soon be ‘stars’ as around 800 people per month had viewed the previous series of Vodcasts on the www.business.vic.gov.au website.

And finally a big thank you to all that came along to our recent Self Managed Super Fund Seminar and for all of your fabulous feedback. I was so thrilled that so many of you attended and got so much out of listening to Nicholas Don from Metro Wealth and his colleague Paul Kusli on the night. I wish you all the best in continuing to grow your wealth and am happy to have introduced you all to some new ideas. Again, we will keep you posted on our next Seminar evening in the near future.

Until next time...(enjoy the warmth, albeit temporary)

Busy Bees this July!

From the desk of Leah Calnan, Director of Metro Property Management...
And here we are at July. As usual much has been happening and will be happening this month here at Metro PM. The first weekend of July saw the team head out to the Red Emperor for a beautiful Chinese banquet as a reward for all of their hard work this year. Many laughs and stories were told and a great time was had by all.

Leah & Matt

Rebecca, Eleanor & Melissa

Josh, Hayley, Tracey & Dave

June, Chen, Rod & Merryn

Peter & Jan

This month we continue with the office renovations – out go the carpets in the foyer and meeting rooms and in goes the crisp white tiling and funky new seating for our guests. Later in the month we will be also carpeting throughout the office entirely which will be lovely as we have lived with the pink, grey and mauve carpet for quite sometime now and you know what they say, ‘a change is as good as a holiday’.

Our team have been busy little bees as it’s all hands on deck putting together our End of Financial Year Packs from the 1st July onwards and we aim to have them all out by the 14th of this month, so keep an eye out in your mail box. In your specialised EOFY folder you will find the Annual Statement for your property/s 2010/2011, as well as some information on Metro Wealth and a handy checklist to help you prepare for your tax return.

In other news Samantha Taylor from our office and myself will be off to Sydney early August to attend a fantastic event called ARPM or the Australasian Residential Property Management Conference. The event runs over 2 days and I am looking forward to hearing from some world class property management and real estate gurus. I am also excited about discovering what fantastic new ideas myself and the team can implement into Metro Property Management in order to keep us at the top of our game in providing the best possible service to our clients. So we’ll keep you posted of what comes about from our little trip interstate.

Until next time...