Industry:
Real estate
Founded:
2007
HQ:
Manhattan, Kansas
Previous provider:
Line2
While attending Kansas State University, founders Bryan and Chris Elsey bought an older property they could fix up and flip as condominiums so they could have more money post-graduation. However, after the recession occurred, their lender wouldn’t loan them money for repairs if they intended on selling the property as condos.
They had to pivot the property into apartment rentals. That loan refusal turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Since finding success with that first community, The Prime Company now designs, builds, and manages multi-family and student housing properties across the U.S.
OpenPhone integrations used:
The challenge
The Prime Company initially had each property’s managers carrying around a cell phone dedicated to work-related calls. They had no way of sharing access to the numbers on those individual devices, making it more difficult to serve prospective and current tenants.
They moved to Line2 so their leasing and on-site management team could answer calls from a shared office number. But the limitations of Line2, like an inability to transfer calls, caused staff to physically hand over their personal phones to a colleague.
“If you had a 19-year-old leasing agent on the phone with an angry student’s parent, they had to take their pink iPhone over to their manager. Then the leasing manager had to continue their conversation while holding this phone with bunny ears hanging off the top,” says Josh.
Josh Adrian
Vice President of Development at The Prime Company
The solution
The growing number of problems caused by the limitations of their provider, led Josh to OpenPhone, which promised to relieve their woes. For instance, staff at The Prime Company’s offices could share phone numbers and see the caller ID of any incoming caller. This alone would streamline their communications.
OpenPhone’s suite of features offered even more ways for staffers to operate efficiently and effectively. Call recordings, for example, could be used for training. And the Zapier integration could automate a lot of busy work that made them less productive.
Most of all, OpenPhone’s focus on being the easiest-to-use business phone solution meant Josh could rest assured staff would make good use of it.
The impact
The Prime Company first tested OpenPhone onsite at Prime Place MHK, their multi-family community in Manhattan, Kansas. “We rolled it out there since it’s close to our corporate office so we can have oversight — and partly because the GM there isn’t tech savvy — if he can use it, everyone else can,” Josh says.
Since adopting OpenPhone, The Prime Company also doesn’t have to worry about the line being busy. Even physical handoffs are a thing of the past now that anyone can transfer any call internally to specific teammates or a shared number.
The biggest difference-maker for Josh and his team, however, has been call recording. “It's not uncommon on the construction side for a sub-contractor to claim, ‘I didn’t say that!’ If they make a claim like that, we point them back to the recording as an efficient way to communicate with them,” Josh says. “Having all the recorded calls, texts, and voice messages in one feed is super valuable.”
While attending Kansas State University, founders Bryan and Chris Elsey bought an older property they could fix up and flip as condominiums so they could have more money post-graduation. However, after the recession occurred, their lender wouldn’t loan them money for repairs if they intended on selling the property as condos.
They had to pivot the property into apartment rentals. That loan refusal turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Since finding success with that first community, The Prime Company now designs, builds, and manages multi-family and student housing properties across the U.S.
"OpenPhone is a great product and a great fit for us. Give it a try.”
Josh Adrian
The Prime Company initially had each property’s managers carrying around a cell phone dedicated to work-related calls. They had no way of sharing access to the numbers on those individual devices, making it more difficult to serve prospective and current tenants.
They moved to Line2 so their leasing and on-site management team could answer calls from a shared office number. But the limitations of Line2, like an inability to transfer calls, caused staff to physically hand over their personal phones to a colleague.
“If you had a 19-year-old leasing agent on the phone with an angry student’s parent, they had to take their pink iPhone over to their manager. Then the leasing manager had to continue their conversation while holding this phone with bunny ears hanging off the top,” says Josh.
Josh Adrian
Along with no caller ID, call transferring wasn’t possible with Line2. “If you had a 19-year-old leasing agent on the phone with an angry student’s parent, they had to take their pink iPhone over to their manager. Then the leasing manager had to continue their conversation while holding this phone with bunny ears hanging off the top,” says Josh.
Their shared number on Line2 also only allowed one staff member to be on an active, outgoing call. “We do renewal parties where we have part-time staff all work the same hours and call tenants to remind them to renew their leases. We could only make one call at a time with Line2,” Josh says.
A big part of using Line2 was the ability to bulk text tenants community updates like fire alarm tests through their Zapier integration.
“That capability with Line2 went away. That was super frustrating as it’s so useful to us and our tenants,” says Josh. “Students don’t check emails or care about that. If you send an email about the water being out and then shut the water off, they get immediately mad.”
As a result, their staff had to manually copy and paste texts to each tenant, wasting extensive time and staff resources on a basic task.
The growing number of problems caused by the limitations of their provider, led Josh to OpenPhone, which promised to relieve their woes. For instance, staff at The Prime Company’s offices could share phone numbers and see the caller ID of any incoming caller. This alone would streamline their communications.
OpenPhone’s suite of features offered even more ways for staffers to operate efficiently and effectively. Call recordings, for example, could be used for training. And the Zapier integration could automate a lot of busy work that made them less productive.
Most of all, OpenPhone’s focus on being the easiest-to-use business phone solution meant Josh could rest assured staff would make good use of it.
The Prime Company first tested OpenPhone onsite at Prime Place MHK, their multi-family community in Manhattan, Kansas. “We rolled it out there since it’s close to our corporate office so we can have oversight — and partly because the GM there isn’t tech savvy — if he can use it, everyone else can,” Josh says.
Since adopting OpenPhone, The Prime Company also doesn’t have to worry about the line being busy. Even physical handoffs are a thing of the past now that anyone can transfer any call internally to specific teammates or a shared number.
The biggest difference-maker for Josh and his team, however, has been call recording. “It's not uncommon on the construction side for a sub-contractor to claim, ‘I didn’t say that!’ If they make a claim like that, we point them back to the recording as an efficient way to communicate with them,” Josh says. “Having all the recorded calls, texts, and voice messages in one feed is super valuable.”
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