How we recommend bringing Clara into your operation: what we heard, the three steps we propose, the first 30 days, and how we work together.
A centralized team, a scattered portfolio of small buildings, AppFolio as the system of record, one main phone line. After hours, maintenance calls go to an outside call center and leasing calls and guest cards wait until Monday. Renewals have no defined process. Policies differ by building and by person.
What not to do: no new system for your staff to learn, nothing that bypasses AppFolio, business-hours calls stay with your team.
Three steps. The first 30 days are about the first two.
Clara answers the maintenance line 24/7, takes the request, logs it in your AppFolio against the right building and unit, and gives residents a status update when they call back.
Clara covers the after-hours leasing gaps: the calls and guest cards that today wait until Monday. She answers the prospect's questions, works the guest card in AppFolio, and books the tour. Business hours stay with your team.
Clara works renewals under your policies: sends the offer ahead of lease end, follows up, answers the resident's questions, and brings anything outside policy to a person. Offer terms are chosen so leases end in your strong leasing season rather than in winter, for example offering 15 months instead of 12 to a lease that would otherwise expire in November.
| When | Call center | After-hours leasing | What we need from you |
|---|---|---|---|
| This week | We prepare: study how your team handles calls, texts and emails across the portfolio today, so Clara fits how you already work. | — | |
| Sep 8–12 | Set up on your portfolio. Stand up the test line loaded with your real portfolio data and the test property in your AppFolio. | Set up on your portfolio: lead capture, questions, tour booking, on the same test line. | Create the test property |
| Sep 15–19 Eileen back | Test together on the test line. Fix what we find. | Working session on tours and availability, then test together on the test line. | One hour each: testing, policies, tours |
| Sep 22–26 | Live for the whole portfolio. | Live for the whole portfolio, nights and weekends. | Your go on each switch |
| Sep 29 – Oct 3 | Both settle in on live traffic. Weekly check-in. Renewal-policy working session scheduled. | Pick the day for the renewals session | |
Policy-alignment session and first weekly check-in the week of Sep 15. Dates shift with what testing finds. Going live is a decision we make together.
Settled in a session, then policy. Our starting recommendation is marked; you decide.
| Decision | Options | Session |
|---|---|---|
| How Clara enters the phone line | A. Clara answers at the top level and routes every caller by what they need, no menu. B. Keep today's menu; Clara takes one option first (maintenance), the rest unchanged. recommended to start Move to A once B has run cleanly. | Week of Sep 15 |
| Which property a caller belongs to | A. Match on the phone number on file only. B. Trust what the caller says, confirm the address, then match. recommended (people move, share phones and change numbers.) | Week of Sep 15 |
| What counts as an emergency after hours, and who gets called | The list of situations (no heat, flood, lockout, fire, gas, no water…), the on-call order, and how long Clara waits before trying the next person. | Week of Sep 15 |
| How tours are assigned to staff | A. A fixed person per building or cluster. B. Whoever is free, by calendar, nearest first with travel time between buildings. recommended C. Clara proposes, a person confirms before the prospect is told. | Tours session, week of Sep 15 |
| How Clara knows what is available and when | Today the answer lives on the whiteboard in the leasing office. A. A shared sheet your team keeps, Clara reads it. B. A "ready to show" mark on the unit in AppFolio, with a date. recommended C. Your published listings, with Clara flagging anything that looks stale. | Tours session, week of Sep 15 |
| Renewal policies, exactly | When the first offer goes out (e.g. 90 days) and how often Clara follows up · how the new rent is set against market and the floor (never below current rent) · unit transfers: fee or not, and who approves · what Clara may answer and what goes to a person (negotiation, hardship, special cases) · lease terms offered (12, 14, 15 months) so expirations land in your leasing season and not in November–February · which residents get no automatic offer. | Renewals session, early October |
Needed once terms are agreed. This list unlocks each step.
| Phase | What | Why |
|---|---|---|
| 1 · Call center | AppFolio Reports API access (your Plus plan includes it; requested from AppFolio support, we send the steps) | So Clara reads units, residents and work orders directly. |
| A named user account in AppFolio for Clara | Every work order and note she writes shows under her name in the activity log. | |
| A test property in your AppFolio | The dry-run environment for every phase. | |
| Forwarding of the maintenance line after hours to Clara's number, and who controls your phone system | The switch that goes live in week three. | |
| The after-hours emergency contact order and any spreadsheets your team keeps outside AppFolio | So Clara follows your rules, not ours. | |
| 2 · After-hours leasing | Read access to your leasing team's calendars | Tour booking against real availability. |
| Where guest-card and listing-site leads land (the leasing inbox) and forwarding of the leasing line after hours | So Clara sees every after-hours lead the moment it arrives. | |
| The availability source you pick above | So Clara never offers a unit that is not ready. | |
| 3 · Renewals | The renewal policies from the session, in writing | Clara works inside them. |
| Where market rents and any incentive tracking live today | So the offer is priced from your numbers. |
Renewals start on a date we set together, opened by the renewal-policy session in early October. Beyond these three steps we keep it open on purpose. There is a long list of things Clara could take on, and the right order will be clearer once the first two are running. We decide together.
Companion: what your 2026 activity shows — the analysis behind this recommendation.