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Which U.S. Housing Markets Are Most Vulnerable to Coronavirus Impact?

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Nearly half of the 50 most vulnerable counties are in New Jersey and Florida. ATTOM Data Solutions released a special report on April 7 spotlighting U.S. housing markets at the county level to show which areas are more vulnerable to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. According to the report, the Northeast region of the U.S. has the largest concentration of the most at-risk counties, with clusters in New Jersey and Florida. On the other hand, the report indicates the West and Midwest regions are least at risk of housing market challenges. Markets are considered more or less at risk based on the percentage of housing units receiving a foreclosure notice in fourth quarter 2019, the percent of homes underwater (LTV 100 or greater) in fourth quarter 2019 and the percentage of local wages required to pay for major home ownership expenses. Rankings were based on a combination of those three categories in 483 counties in the U.S. with sufficient data to analyze. Counties were ranked in each category, from lowest to highest, with the overall conclusions based on a combination of the three rankings. The full methodology can be found on the ATTOM Data Solutions’ website. “It’s too early to tell how much effect the coronavirus fallout will have on different housing markets around the country. But the impact is likely to be significant from region to region and county to county,” said Todd Teta, chief product officer with ATTOM Data Solutions. “What we’ve done is spotlight areas that appear to be more or less at risk based on several important factors. From that analysis, it looks like the Northeast is more at risk than other areas. As we head into the spring home buying season, the next few months will reveal how severe the impact will be.” Northeast Vulnerabilitiy Housing markets in 14 of New Jersey’s 21 counties are among the 50 most vulnerable in the country, according to the report. The Top 50 also include four in New York and three in Connecticut. The 14 counties in New Jersey include five in the New York City suburbs: Bergen, Essex, Passaic, Middlesex and Union counties. New York counties among the Top 50 most at risk include Rockland County, in the New York City metropolitan area; Orange County, in the Poughkeepsie metro area; Rensselaer County, in the Albany metro area; and Ulster County, west of Poughkeepsie. Additional High-Level Findings The 10 counties in Florida are concentrated in the northern and central sections of the state, including Flagler, Lake, Clay, Hernando and Osceola counties. Other southern counties that are in the Top 50 are spread across Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Louisiana and Virginia. Among the counties analyzed, only two in the West and five in the Midwest (all in Illinois) rank among the Top 50 most at risk. The two western counties are Shasta County, California, in the Redding metropolitan statistical area and Navajo County, Arizona, northeast of Phoenix. The Midwestern counties are McHenry County, Illinois; Kane County, Illinois; Will County, Illinois and Lake County, Illinois, all in the Chicago metro area; and Tazewell County, Illinoic, in the Peoria metro area. Counties in the Top 50 with a population of at least 500,000 people include Bergen, Camden, Essex, Middlesex, Ocean, Passaic and Union counties in New Jersey; Lake, Will and Kane counties in Illinois; Delaware County, Pennsylvania; Prince George’s County, Maryland; and Broward County, Florida. Texas has 10 of the 50 least vulnerable counties from among the 483 included in the report, followed by Wisconsin with seven and Colorado with five. The 10 counties in Texas include three in the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area (Dallas, Collin and Tarrant counties) and two in the Midland-Odessa area (Ector and Midland counties). Eighteen of the 50 least at-risk counties have a population of at least 500,000, led by Harris County (Houston), Texas; Dallas County, Texas; King County (Seattle), Washington; Tarrant County (Fort Worth), Texas; and Santa Clara County, California, in the San Jose metro area. Counties where median prices ranging from $160,000 to $300,000 comprise 36 of the Top 50 counties most vulnerable to the impact of the coronavirus. Counties with median home prices below $160,000 or above $300,000 make up 14 of the Top 50 most vulnerable to the impact of the coronavirus. Those with median prices below $160,000 are among the most affordable in the nation to local wage earners, while those where median prices exceed $300,000 have some homes with the highest equity and smallest foreclosure rates.  

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From Boots to Suits and Back Again

When I graduated college, I realized I had a choice: suit and tie or construction boots. I chose the latter. Subconsciously, this may have been my first step toward becoming an entrepreneur and eventually the founder of Walnut Street Finance. I wouldn’t say that my career path was always a calculated journey. Sometimes I just plowed ahead toward what I thought would bring success. But one thing I did consistently was throw myself completely into every job, no matter how big or small. I turned each opportunity into a learning experience. I know it may sound cliché, but there is no better way to understand your customers than to have walked in their boots. Perseverance and Thirst for Knowledge My first boots-in-the-mud job was on a real estate development site called Ashburn Village. It wasn’t far from where I lived in Virginia. I remember riding my bike through the dirt of construction sites around where I grew up. There was rapid development sweeping Washington, D.C., suburbs, so real estate felt natural to me. I graduated with a degree in economics from George Mason University in the 80s with the know-how to use computers, which were just making their foray into businesses. Looking for a job after graduation, I knocked on the trailer door of the development site of Ashburn Village. I didn’t have an appointment. I offered to digitize the firm’s finances using Lotus 1-2-3 and told them they could fire me whenever they weren’t happy. They hired me on the spot. Over the next four years, I worked on the finances while soaking up as much real estate knowledge as possible. Through a combination of perseverance and luck, the next 10 years laid substantial groundwork for who I am today. For this next stage of my journey, I had to put on a tie. Before the Great Recession, there was the savings and loan crisis in the late 80s and early 90s. I joined the Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) just as it started to collect and sell assets. I was ready to tackle this Wild West home mortgage disaster. Of the hundreds of billions of assets the RTC liquidated, I was active in the sale of $14 billion in real estate. I quickly realized there was a whole other side of landholding that I had no idea about. This was a crazy time. I walked away from this experience with an overflow of information on how mortgages worked, the risks of savings and loans, asset valuation and trustworthiness—all of which would play a major part in my decision to start my own business. After spending five good years with Sunrise Senior Development, building across the mid-Atlantic and southeast and helping take that firm public, I was ready to put my boots back on—on my terms. Thinking Outside the Bank At this point, I realized real estate investors had to think outside the bank and lenders had to take underwriting into serious consideration. The snowball repercussions of being too risky with money could be devastating to so many. In 1997, I took the entrepreneurial plunge and formed Walnut Street Development. We built single-family detached houses and townhomes as well as some commercial properties. Our goal was $1 million in revenue for the first year. We hit it with our first two projects. During the next 10 years, we were building nonstop. I developed a deep appreciation for what our future Walnut Street Finance borrowers would experience. We did it all—from acquiring to zoning, materials sourcing to permitting, and everything in between. There were a lot of growing pains, and I was often flying by the seat of my pants. Looking back, I am grateful for my mentors and my family for keeping me grounded. You Can’t Do It Alone The next thing I knew, we were peaking at more than $250 million in revenue. But I wasn’t doing any of this alone. Not only did I have my own trusted construction team, I had formed partnerships with The Carlyle Group, Lehman Brothers and Trammell Crow. This trifecta of private equity, investment banking and international real estate powerhouses helped me deliver more than 1,200 residential units and 200,000 square feet of commercial property in the D.C. area. By this point in my journey, I’d learned a few incredibly valuable lessons. The first was that I needed to be sure my construction boots are always at the ready. The second was that we don’t ever succeed alone. One man building a company is a fool if he thinks he doesn’t need smart, experienced, independent thinkers and doers around him. I also strive to keep a personal touch on the business. It was important that I was boots on the ground during our builds, putting faces to names and roles, resolving pain points and understanding every stage of a project. The Big Twist By 2008, the market turned. We decided it was best to go from sell to buy. We scooped up 100-year-old row houses in D.C., which we fix and flipped. We did it again and again, with great success and excess capital. By pivoting from building to lending, we came out of the recession relatively unscathed. We made our first few loans—using a pen and yellow pad—to our previous flipping competitors. We had just two employees. Four years later, we originated more than 350 loans. Last year we generated over $70 million in loans and had more than 15 people on staff. We proactively nurture a culture of quality and service. We’ve built this company by doing what we say we are going to do—with our customers, fund investors and one another. Most important, we can serve our customers best because we know what it is like to walk in our customers boots. We never forget where we came from.

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The CARES Act and Your Retirement Investing

The coronavirus stimulus could mean good things for your retirement accounts. When President Trump signed the $2 trillion coronavirus relief package into law March 27, 2020, most people’s attention was squarely on the small-business relief loans, the COVID-19 stimulus checks and how they might have their rent waived or their mortgage payment suspended. The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act also offered a number of other benefits to Americans, especially Americans in a position to stimulate their local economies in the weeks and months to come. For example, the legislation included some very big benefits for the owners of individual retirement account (IRA) plans, including the ability to make some contributions and withdrawals that normally are prohibited or heavily penalized. While many have accused policymakers of including these benefits as a way to sneak in loopholes for “rich investors,” the reality is that every single person who has a retirement plan needs to take a close look at how these changes might affect their retirement investing returns for the better. In some cases, these provisions might allow them to help their families through a very tough economic time as well. “The CARES Act is an unprecedented bill that will help many Americans impacted by COVID-19navigate economic uncertainties,” said Reneika Lightbourne, a business development specialist with Advanta IRA, a self-directed IRA custodian with more than $1 billion in assets under management. Reneika noted the legislation contains provisions that could help individuals and families experiencing financial hardship as a result of a coronavirus diagnosis. But she emphasized the importance of consulting trusted legal and tax advisors before making any withdrawals. “There are a ton of opportunities in this new code provision, and it is going to take everyone some time to unpack all of this,” warned Tim Berry, a self-directed IRA and 401(k) attorney with more than 20 years’ experience working with self-directed investors and their accounts. “We are all going to benefit from and hear about this legislation for years to come.” Changes in Distributions and Loans One of the provisions of the CARES Act that will have an immediate financial impact for IRA holders is penalty-free early distributions of up to $100,000 from retirement plans. Taxes on that distribution are due in three years, however, and are spread out over the three-year period. Berry noted that this three-year window creates an unusual and possibly beneficial scenario for investors. “If you qualify for that early, penalty-free withdrawal and take a distribution now that normally would have cost you a 10% penalty, you could save a lot of money,” he said. Berry cited an example of an investor who was already facing the decision of whether to withdraw money from his IRA account before the benchmark age of 59½ because doing so would allow him to purchase an investment property in his own name rather than in the self-directed retirement account, creating a significant advantage. Because the investor qualified for the penalty-free distribution, he was able to save almost $10,000 on the transaction, benefiting both his current and his future financial situation. “Another big benefit of this law is that taxes on distributions will be automatically spread out over the next three years instead of the client having to pay taxes on a $90,000 distribution in tax year 2020,” Berry said. “That means you might effectively lower the tax bracket your distribution is taxed on, and you effectively receive a three-year loan to pay the lower taxes.” Do You Qualify? Remember, no one automatically receives these benefits under the CARES Act. The benefits of the CARES Act are reserved for individuals who meet certain eligibility standards. According to the CARES Act itself, distributions must be coronavirus-related in nature. This is relatively broadly defined as: You are a taxpayer who has been diagnosed with coronavirus. You are also eligible if your spouse or dependent was diagnosed with the virus and, as a result, “suffered adversity.” Eligibility extends to individuals not formally diagnosed who suffered adversity in the form of quarantine, furlough, job termination, reduced work hours, or inability to work due to inadequate child care. Berry said, “I’m guessing that nearly everyone could say they have had their work hours reduced due to the coronavirus. It’s a pretty broad definition in the new law.” If you are unsure whether you are eligible or if you have a conventional retirement account that is sponsored by your employer, you may need to check with the plan sponsor. However, most sponsors say they are relying on employees to “self-certify” their eligibility. If you plan to take a loan from your 401(k) under the CARES Act, you will need to check with your sponsor (if applicable) and take that loan before Sept. 23, 2020. Investors should note that the ability to borrow against your 401(k) is not new, but the maximum amount permitted is higher than previously allowed. Before the CARES Act, you could take out $50,000 or 50% of your account balance. The new legislation permits you to take out $100,000 or 100% of your account balance. If you are unsure whether you qualify for CARES Act-related benefits, ask your trusted legal or tax professional. Although your company plan sponsor may be able to tell you whether they are permitting account holders to implement these strategies, neither your sponsor nor your custodian can necessarily provide you with full guidance regarding your eligibility. Only a tax or legal professional familiar with IRA and 401(k) policies, laws and tax code can do that.

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Regional Spotlight: Columbus, Ohio

In Uncertain Times, the Columbus Market Holds Steady Just a few short months ago, at the end of 2019, real estate investors talking about Columbus, Ohio, would likely have mentioned the city’s Top 20 ranking as a business-friendly environment, its highly educated workforce, a local government dedicated to public-private partnerships and development, and the many parks, bike paths, restaurants, museums and community gathering places found in “The Biggest Small Town in America.” Today, thanks to the worldwide spread of COVID-19, Columbus is more likely to make headlines as the first city in Ohio to have a confirmed coronavirus-related death: that of a 76-year-old attorney who had recently traveled to California. Despite the uncertainty and ongoing economic and financial volatility catalyzed by the coronavirus, Columbus remains one of the strongest housing markets in the country. That’s thanks to a sound geographic position, diverse economy and jobs market, and a real estate environment that encouraged investors to place their capital in projects that would not just cash flow, but also offer some degree of equity. “The inventory in Columbus has been and continues to be very low. That has created a built-to-rent investing strategy in the area that has led to new construction coming into more areas of the market,” said Brandon Guzman, president and CEO of MFS Supply, a provider of preservation and renovation supplies with a major branch located in the area. “We are seeing more and higher-end rentals enter the market these days, which increases competition throughout the market.” Guzman recommended being “cost-conscious with upgrades” when renovating existing properties for rent or resale because of the additional new-construction dimension in the single-family sector. However, the multifamily sector in Columbus is also booming both inside the city proper and in the suburbs. “From a cost standpoint, there were a lot of banks willing to finance multifamily developments,and that led to a lot of multifamily growth in areas that had previously been primary single-family,” Guzman said. Fortunately for those developers, there have been plenty of new Columbus residents moving into the area over the past decade. Those new residents have happily purchased and rented homes across the spectrum. Bryan Blankenship, CEO and founder of Columbus-based Venture Real Estate Group, has worked in the area for more than a decade. His company specializes in a wide assortment of properties ranging from single-family turnkey rentals to multiunit properties to historic homes. The COVID-19 crisis did not slow Venture Real Estate’s acquisitions pace. Midway through the “15 Days to Slow the Spread” initiative, Blankenship continued to conduct transactions in the Columbus area, albeit virtually instead of in person. “We acquired a nice, large historic home with a $400,000 ARV that I’ll be passing on to a DIY buyer to do the rehab themselves and a small condo with a $140,000 ARV,” Blankenship said. The company failed to make the closing deadline on a duplex it already owns, but Blankenship was not worried. “The condo will be a 12-day rehab and then go back on the market. The historic home is super-hot and should list and sell immediately. When the duplex does close, it is pre-sold to a cash buyer still committed to keeping it as a rental,” he said. Community Attracts and Retains Talent Since 2010, Columbus has periodically made headlines for attracting large-scale, foreign investments to the area. Those investments have occasionally also spurred conspiracy theories and instigated bouts of hyperactive investing by investors hoping to “follow the money” to the next big boom. At the height of the EB-5 visa program, Chinese investors poured capital into the Midwest, focusing on Columbus and Toledo, particularly. Those funds have ebbed since the program’s peak in 2014, but they left a lasting legacy of infrastructure, development and momentum that has continued to build, thanks to incoming capital from American investors, large corporations and even public funds. “This is a community with amenities and attractions that both draw in and retain talented citizens,” said Harding Easley, an account executive with Yardi Matrix and managing director of The Harding Group, a consulting firm for real estate investors and small businesses. “This community has everything: open parks, walkways, bike paths, restaurants, museums, an 18-hour mixed-use district that boasts 1,700 residential units and hundreds of thousands of office, retail and restaurant space, an incredibly pro-business and pro-investor environment offering state and city tax-credit incentive packages to help expand your operations, and an educated workforce stemming, in large part, from the five universities located in the Columbus area,” Easley said. At the start of 2020, Columbus boasted a population of more than 892,000, and that population has been rising steadily since the 1830s. In fact, Columbus has not experienced negative growth rate, overall, since the U.S. Census started tracking its data in 1830.Its lowest per-decade growth rate on record is between 1850 and 1860, when the population rose only 0.37%. These days, the area’s population growth is hovering between 1.5 and 1.8% annually, mainly due to the presence of powerhouse employers in the aviation, banking and finance, national defense, medical research, technology and energy, and fashion sectors (see sidebar). Columbus is also home to five insurance companies, including Fortune 500 Nationwide insurance, as well as Safe Auto and State Auto. Global Shocks and Aftershocks Even before the coronavirus hit the U.S. in force, Columbus was dealing with issues related to U.S.-China tensions. Tariff and trade tensions had a clear impact on the area. “We saw materials shortages cause a direct increase on plumbing, lighting and cabinets across the board,” Guzman said. Chinese cabinets had been the leading factor in fix-and-flippers’ ability to make a house look beautiful on a budget. Guzman noted that “prudent” investors had started finding ways to fix their costs, such as making spec lists of materials for their investments and, in particular, addressing changes in how cabinet materials are priced. He said that in addition to the coronavirus, dumping lawsuits and tariffs will affect the availability of materials for five or six months after those

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Old-Fashioned Standards, Modern-Day Success

Fay Servicing CEO Ed Fay believes every good relationship is long-term and evolutionary When Ed Fay, founder and CEO of Fay Servicing, discusses best practices in mortgage servicing, he likes to talk about the “something old” his company offers customers and clients. “We are about ‘old-fashioned’ standards in our business: talking to people, understanding what the situation is, trying to find the best solutions and just working out distressed loans,” said Fay. “We started out exclusively as a special servicer, and everything we have done since then stems from our efforts to expand the aspects that people like most about us: the quality of care we provide on both the investor side and the customer side.” Fay Servicing was founded in 2008 to meet the biggest industry challenge at that time: handling an expanding onslaught of past-due mortgages. Fay’s previous decade in the servicing industry working with household names like Countrywide and HSBC gave him unique insight into the ways the industry was changing—and not always for the better—in the wake of the housing crash. Fay hoped to avoid the financial losses to investors that come with a “collection-shop” approach to mortgage servicing. His clientele clearly appreciated the effort. Today, Fay Servicing is active in all 50 states. Its affiliated businesses, such as its renovation and fix-and-flip contracting services, operate in 49 of 50 states. “We do not try to be all things to all people, but we do try to treat every single person we work with the right way,” Fay said. “We work with different styles of loans than most servicers, and our style is a little different from other servicers as well.” Fay is particularly proud of his company’s customer satisfaction ratings, which hover just over 98% even though many customers at the company are in some level of mortgage distress when they first encounter the company. He credits that high level of satisfaction to his company’s dedication to helping borrowers work through their payment issues, including figuring out ways to bring loan payments down when refinancing is not an option. Fay Servicing also helps customers visualize foreclosure alternatives, such as selling and downsizing, rather than simply accepting the default. Each customer is assigned to a specific company representative rather than being treated as a case number and bounced through an automated system. As a result, Fay Servicing is often able to create winning situations out of losing ones. For example, in Chicago, the company was able to work with the owner of two homeless shelters to avoid foreclosure on those properties. Another customer who bought her home in 2006 and faced litigation and delinquency shortly after, described Fay Servicing getting her mortgage as “a blessing” due to the efforts of her personal account manager. “Foreclosure is, frankly, not good for the community. Our core business is being a servicer, and both our servicing business and our affiliated businesses support that,” Fay said. “Having additional ways to help people makes a big difference.” Creating Long-Term Relationships Fay focuses on flexibility, and his company structure demonstrates that. In addition to servicing performing and nonperforming notes, Fay Servicing’s affiliate companies have done more than 4,000 flips, served countless insurance clients and made thousands of sales. They take pride in always helping investors and borrowers look at challenges and opportunities from every angle. “We wanted to create a unique situation for our customers and investors that helps them cover all their bases,” said Fay. He emphasized that his company is a servicer first and a flipper second. “I never compete with my clients, but it is my job to make sure I meet my fiduciary responsibility to tell my client what the payoff will be if they repair a home first compared to selling quickly,” he said. “Once they make that decision, we are positioned to help them make repairs, make the sale and, if they want to source properties, we can help with that as well.” Al Roti, president of Construction Renovations LLC, the construction and contracting affiliate of Fay Servicing, explained how his company works with Fay Servicing to provide that wide-angle perspective to investors. “We do things differently thanks to our phased workflow. We break down the renovation process so each specialist is focused on one phase of the workflow: multiple stages for pricing, comps and actual repairs; a billing team; and a management team once the renovations are complete,” he said. Roti believes A-to-Z asset managers who handle procurement, construction and then sales or renting are simply spread too thin to perform at optimal levels for their clients, even if they are experienced in all of those areas. To combat this on behalf of investors, Roti’s experts obtain multiple opinions, present them to investors and leverage their own specialized expertise to create a winning scenario for the project. Fay explained that Roti’s unique approach to his side of the business is the kind of trait he looks for in every member of his staff and servicing team. “Every time I am looking to add opportunities for our investors, I go out and I look for the smartest people in the country and the brightest people in the industry,” he said. “We have a number of different companies, and the thing that ties them all together is hard work, good people and a willingness to integrate to serve the customer and the investor.” Key to Future Success That integration that Fay holds so dear has been a driving force in every angle of Fay Servicing’s evolution since he started the company out of his house in 2008. “My primary goal has always been treating people the right way,” he said. “Part of that includes having integration in the business.” To Fay, integration is also the reason real estate investors and professionals survive economic downturns—or the reason they don’t. “Whether you earn your experience the hard way or you hire it, you have to have very good, very detailed knowledge about the space in which you are

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Digital Certified Funds Automate Rent Payments

Digital innovations in property management reduce the risk of late payments and chargebacks. Landlords have long required new residents and those with a history of late payments to pay with money orders and cashier’s checks. Both are known as certified funds. Now, with the help of real-time financial verification data, residents of multifamily properties who are required to pay with certified funds can do so without leaving the comfort of their homes. And, property managers can streamline receivables collection. How it Works Digital certified funds, also known as online certified payments, give multifamily property operators a fully-automated front-office platform—and a paperless process. Residents can make online certified payments via a mobile device or desktop browser to pay their rent. The process starts by verifying user identity and bank account ownership. Next, the user’s transactional and behavioral data is analyzed in real time in order to authorize a certified transaction. This then allows the capture of funds from the user’s financial institution and settles the funds risk-free to the property. Automated Payment Logic The latest technology can also do the heavy lifting and minimize the manual overhead when it comes to preventing and processing late payments. Certified funds are typically required upon move-in, but property managers understand they are often used for residents who have a history of late payments. With the latest rent payment technology, property managers can use certified payment logic to set parameters that only present certified payment options to residents based on their past behavior. With this new automation, operators have the ability to avoid returned late payments by only accepting digital certified funds once a payment is deemed late. Additionally, operators can customize different settings based on each property’s needs, such as easily accepting prepayments from residents, which is beneficial when residents head out of town before their rent is due. Chargeback Protection Chargebacks were introduced more than 40 years ago, designed as a consumer protection effort to instill confidence in credit cards. Yet, the increasingly fraudulent consumer use of chargebacks is having a significant impact on property bottom lines. Recently, a multifamily regional property manager in northern California reported that they faced a loss of $15,000 in credit card chargebacks within a single month—from just two residents. One resident disputed six months of rent charges, and the other resident initiated a chargeback on several months of rent as well. As a result, the owner requested they stop accepting credit card payments altogether. However, using digital certified funds, the property manager was able to continue accepting credit card payments while removing all the risk from future potential chargebacks. Unfortunately, these aren’t isolated incidents. A 2019 study found that 81% of individuals admitted to filing a chargeback out of convenience and a considerable percent of the dispute cases were lost. While it is less common to see chargebacks on rent payments, these often occur with rental application fees and other property add-on services. In fact, Verifi, an industry leader in end-to-end payment verification, did the math on chargebacks. They found that every dollar lost to chargeback fraud costs the property an estimated $2.40. So, $100 in chargebacks can cost the property $240. Even for a single property, chargebacks can have a marked effect on net operating income while taking a material amount of time for property managers to resolve. However, those that have moved to modernized rent payments platforms have been able to avoid them. Cash Equivalent Payments  Because of widespread risk management practices among property management companies, cash equivalent payments are often required for certain situations. For example, a resident must obtain a traditional money order at a kiosk. Because money orders typically have caps on their value, a renter may need to obtain several money orders to reach the value of the payment. Another form of digital certified payment is also offered by MoneyGram, allowing residents to make payments via digital money orders from any MoneyGram kiosk. With more than 30,000 kiosks accessible in private and public locations, residents can now send all types of payments, at any time, without being subject to paying in person during the property manager’s office hours. MoneyGram comes with some market-leading built-in risk protections, including automatically attributing all payments made with MoneyGram to the correct apartment unit, thus eliminating the need to disclose additional sensitive informationwhich is often the case with cashier’s checks and paper money orders. Ultimately, paper money orders and similar forms of payment aren’t as safe as once believed. Repeated incidents of fraud over the last decade shows they can be easily stolen or tampered with. They also require manual processing, leaving them prone to errors and increased processing time. When payments went missing or were stolen, residents had to send the property manager another form of paper payment while the issue was being resolved. By sending and processing certified digital payments, renters and managers are assured zero risk. Digital money orders ensure lower liability since they require less handling, improved data accuracy because they eliminate manual payment processing, reduced theft and fraud, and immediate payment confirmation. Digital innovations are having a marked impact on traditionally manual financial processes, and they are reshaping the way property owners and investors manage their P&Ls. The combined benefits of these tech innovations deliver an opportunity to improve and exert some control over resident behavior and mitigate risk while protecting the bottom line for owners and their investors.

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