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SKYLINE 2008

Build Your Pricing Strategy on Tangible Value

To distinguish your apartment units from your competitors, you need to create value for prospective tenants. Traditional marketing strategies typically focus on price and giveaways. In today's fiercely competitive market, that's just not enough. Now, innovative leasing agents are closing more deals by using an "amenity value package" as their main sales strategy.

The foundation for building your "amenity value package" is to demonstrate value by highlighting the amenities you offer - not burying them in your pricing strategy. The value you place on your amenities should be based on what it will produce in the marketplace - not on what it will cost. To determine the value, you need to identify market trends, know your target market and then select the three or four amenities that will resonate favorably with your market.

The SKYLINE Residential Amenities-Based Pricing Module can help you maximize the profitability of your sites by generating "amenities based pricing" for your units. It's simple. Just select whatever amenity you feel is important to your market, assign a value to it and SKYLINE will automatically add this to the existing base rent for each unit. You can run several model scenarios and analyze various results. Once you are satisfied, SKYLINE will update the pricing with a click of a button….how easy is that?

Amenities screenshot

Key to the superior functionality of SKYLINE is an integrated and comprehensive database that leverages the reporting power of the Pervasive SQL server. The 32-bit, ODBC-compliant database design allows you to integrate with and maximize many other state-of-the-art applications important to your day-to-day business success.

By linking data with each table, the SKYLINE advanced database design ensures accurate and precise data retrieval. You can attach data stored in the SKYLINE database to Excel budget spreadsheets, property pictures, and building floor plans. As your business grows, so does SKYLINE’s flexible and scaleable client-server design.

SKYLINE Modules
SKYLINE offers a complete, fully integrated property management and accounting system. Use SKYLINE’s Property Management Module to maintain property, unit and occupant data, handle cash management and billing. The General Ledger and Accounts Payable modules provide a complete financial accounting system including Job Ledger capabilities.

SKYLINE also offers integration with other modules including:

  • Breakpoint for retail properties – Automates your retail lease management, including overage rent and sales analysis.
  • Report Writing using Report Center – Creates custom reports and queries.
  • Cumulus Financial Report Writer – Builds detailed financial reports from your SKYLINE data.
  • Escalations and Recoveries – Calculates and schedules complex escalations and passthroughs such as CAM charges, taxes, insurance, and CPI increases.
  • Residential Property Management – Prospect and applicant management along with lease creation and property marketing.
  • Imaging – Provides instant access to all of your property documents through the electronic storage.
  • MICR Check Writing – Automates your check printing and signature process.
  • Lockbox – Automates the use of bank collections and cash receipt service.
  • SamTrak for SKYLINE – Integrated work order management and maintenance solution.
  • ACH – Automates tenant receivable using an ACH banking service.

The structure of the SKYLINE Property Management module allows you to capture data regarding historic, present and future activity. The Property Management module functions as both a filing system (a database) and an accounting system. As an intelligent filing system, it is used to track each property that you manage, including data on your specific units and tenants. As a powerful accounting system, it is used both to bill specific occupants and to document and process cash received from occupants.

The Property Management module streamlines the administration of all tenant leases, billing, cash management and property performance analysis by providing:

  • One-time entry of data
  • Retrieval by tenant name or unit
  • One-time scheduling of lease charges
  • EDGE™ user-defined fields, which let you customize
  • SKYLINE to meet your specific needs
  • 100 lines of comment for each tenant and space
  • Tracking of tenants over time as future, current and former tenants
  • Transfer of tenants to new spaces

SKYLINE organizes your properties for you. You can designate a property type for each unit such as commercial, apartment, condominium, or multi-tenant; and a state, such as future, current, or former. This feature allows you to track data regarding the future and past "residents" of the physical units. Occupants are also designated by the same type and state.

Retrieving information about both units and occupants is simple. Either can be retrieved by using the unit’s name (the unit reference number) or the occupant’s name, if the unit is occupied. Automatic "Move-in" and "Move-out" functions within SKYLINE quickly transform the status of these relationships. For example, a move-in transforms a future occupant residing in a future unit into a current occupant occupying a current unit. Your records will automatically be kept up-to-date saving you valuable time.

Accurate Billing Made Simple
SKYLINE helps you manage and automate monthly billing, whether you are invoicing one-time charges, monthly charges or setting up date-sensitive invoicing. The system enhances your cash flow by automatically calculating late charges and printing late notices. Revenue that may have "slipped through the cracks" with other systems is under control with SKYLINE.

SKYLINE billing is also flexible, enabling you to easily handle any charges outside of your monthly billing cycle. The Billing options allow you to invoice a single tenant, group of tenants, or an entire property. SKYLINE can print credit memos automatically, calculate service tax and even print on pre-printed multi-part forms.

Cash Management
SKYLINE gives you the security of tight cash control at your fingertips. On-line session processing delivers convenience, accuracy and security to the tasks of recording payments, removing NSF checks, adjusting deposits and reversing transactions.

Amounts of any size may be applied to charges, deposits or credits for any tenant or property – all in one simple session, and in any order you choose.
SKYLINE can help you manage your cash, and increase cash flow. With SKYLINE you can:

  • Save an unfinished session for later completion or approval
  • Edit incorrect session entries before recording.
  • Use a password for security when editing session totals.
  • Pre-fill payment amounts based upon amount owed.
  • Record entries only after you review and approve the session’s report.
  • This report also serves as an audit trail.

In addition, SKYLINE’s time saving Hot Bill feature reduces the number of credits from pre-payments, which increases cash flow. You can create a new charge for the tenant while still in the Cash Receipts function.

The Hot Bill feature is also available when making cash adjustments and forfeiting or refunding deposits.

Changes to deposits or cash received appear in the Adjustments Journal providing you with accurate and detailed audit trail reporting.

General Ledger
SKYLINE’s sophisticated General Ledger system easily handles multiple properties with complex ownership structures, eliminating the possibility of a single accounting error at a single property interfering with other properties.

SKYLINE can keep either individual or master charts of accounts for each property, consolidate properties into portfolios, and pay expenses from a single fund or from individual property checking accounts.

SKYLINE will also maintain several versions of a budget for simple, yet detailed, comparison reporting and analysis. It can also archive and retrieve budgets from prior years for comparison. SKYLINE’s flexible General Ledger system allows for:

  • Multiple budgets and prior years
  • Simultaneous cash and accrual books
  • Automatic mapping
  • Extensive audit trails
  • Auto allocation

Job Ledger
The Job Ledger enables you to track expenses for tenant improvements, rehabs and build-outs. It provides for expense tracking and detailed or summary budget comparisons. Also, you can adjust order security to track change orders and control expenses.

Accounts Payable
SKYLINE’s Accounts Payable system delivers time-saving conveniences while enhancing security and financial control. SKYLINE automates the payment of recurring invoices, drawing from a single fund or property account. An aging report indicates when payments are due, while pre-check selection gives you control over payments to be made.

Easy to set up security controls allow you to select the members on your staff that will be allowed to review outstanding invoices, select invoices for payment, and approve check runs. Again, you make the choices as to who should and should not be allowed to read or write in any part of SKYLINE.

In addition, with SKYLINE’s real-time checkbook, account balances are always accurate, up-to-date and readily available. Combined with SKYLINE’s MICR check printing capability, you’ll never have to write or sign a check again…a time consuming process made easy!

 

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