Ryan McMillan knew he was on to something special after having worked in the real estate industry for eight years.

He noticed a fragmented space in the apartment industry when it came to turn services — cleaning and preparing apartments for new tenants after the old resident moves out.

“During my time in the industry, I noticed the turn process as being a highly fragmented component of that space,” said McMillan. “The space did not have much technology at all applied to it, so I began to think what we could do to provide a solution to the turn process.”

He called two of his longtime college friends, Jonathan Kite and Will Brugh, in 2014 to devise a solution.

McMillan, Kite, and Brugh saw that apartment communities were scrambling to find services to turn an apartment between occupancies. Whether it be repainting walls or refinishing countertops, property management companies were individually sourcing the services from different independent contractors.

This required apartment management companies to hire and schedule multiple different service companies to perform the necessary work in the short time between occupancies. The independent service providers rarely had consistent work as they moved between apartment communities seeking out work.

So the three UNC-Chapel Hill friends put their heads together to develop a platform that would make the turn process more efficient by catering to both apartment management companies and independent service providers.

The trio’s diversity of background provided the start-up with three unique perspectives. McMillan came from experience in real estate, Kite in technology, and Brugh in finance.

Rent Ready Holdings Inc.’s co-founders tried multiple different ideas to determine the optimal platform to deliver their service on. After two years of trial and error, Rent Ready launched in the beginning of 2016.

“It took a little while to get Rent Ready off the ground and get the concept in place,” said McMillan. “It has continued to evolve and will continue to evolve over time.”

Business Function

The leasing and managing of apartments is an industry where managers depend on the speed of turnaround to maximize revenue generation. This maintains occupancy and expedites the process of preparing vacant units.

When apartments go vacant, managers must develop efficient means to flip the apartment to prepare it for its next occupant. Managers look to flip the apartment in the least amount of time to mitigate losses.

Before turning an apartment over to its next occupant, the apartment company has to perform several services. These services include repainting interior and exterior walls, deep cleaning everything from the carpeting to the air vents, and refinishing the surfaces of countertops and bathtubs.

Every day an apartment is empty equates to a loss in revenue for the apartment management company. Decreasing the time between occupancies is crucial to maximize revenues.

“The apartment turn process presents a challenge for apartment management teams to manage,” said McMillan. “They work with multiple vendors to get one apartment ready for a new person to move in.”

That’s where Rent Ready steps in. Rent Ready’s purpose it to provide a single point of contact for the apartment turn process. The company partners with property management groups to provide a platform that encompasses all the services they may need to turn an apartment.

They provide a streamlined platform for both the contractors and the apartment managers to schedule the services needed at the specific times they are needed.

“If you work with Rent Ready, you can schedule your apartment turn with one point of contact, rather than having to go to three, four, or five different vendors to get that done,” said McMillan.

The services that the Charlotte-based company offers include painting, cleaning, carpet cleaning, counter and tub refinishing, and punch maintenance work.

Rent Ready currently operates its services in the Triangle, Charlotte and Atlanta. In June, the company raised $1.5 million in a private stock offering, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“I joined Rent Ready because it was solving a need in the industry that hadn’t yet been solved,” said Amanda Akers, Rent Ready’s marketing director. “I immediately fell in love with the business model, the business, and what they’re trying to do.”

Technology

A key competitive advantage in Rent Ready’s offering is its internal logistics platform.

The platform allows both apartment operators and contractors to interact, streamlining the apartment turn process.

“Our platform is modernizing the service industry as it relates to apartment turn services,” said McMillan.

In the development of Rent Ready, its co-founders saw a chance to improve the lives of several types of individuals through the use of a technology and logistics platform. They founded Rent Ready with the purpose to make the turn process more efficient while providing an increased consistency of work to independent contractors.

“If you’re a painter, you can come and find more consistency around the work that we’re able to provide,” said McMillan. “If you were to work directly with an apartment community, you would have to manage that overhead and administrative burden while earning a similar income.”

Rent Ready provides the contractors with immediate pay, consistency of work, and simplification of work scheduling. After signing on with the company, the contractors no longer have to go out and find work on their own.

Additionally, there are several new requirements from larger management companies. The smaller mom-and-pop type shops have difficulty adhering to the technology and insurance-specific requirements. Rent Ready adheres to these components, which allows smaller mom-and-pop shops to continue to work in the apartment space.

For apartment management companies, Rent Ready reduces the burden that comes with dealing with multiple points of contact throughout the turn process while providing additional standardization to the process.

“We’re excited that we can impact folks lives from the independent contractors to those working at the apartment management companies,” said McMillan.

Looking Forward

Rent Ready will look to scale its business moving forward to other regions in the United States. It currently is located in the Southeastern U.S. but is focused on additional expansion in the future.

It is optimistic that the company will continue to grow due to the standardization and consistency of work that it supports. Over its two years in business, it has developed a workforce that provides superior quality and customer service than that provided by its competitors.

The three UNC-CH graduates came from the conception of an idea two years ago to a full-fledged business currently. They are excited for what the future will bring to the company.

“We’ve been very fortunate in what we’ve been able to accomplish thus far and excited about our future,” said McMillan. “We view what we’re doing as a positive that can provide a positive impact on a more structured basis for folks that are involved in this type of trade.”