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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pro Show, host Erika interviews Kim Egger, a former banking executive who transitioned into property management. Kim shares her journey of discovering her passion for the service industry after a health crisis, leading her to establish Treasures in Heaven Property Management. She discusses the challenges of starting her business, the importance of building relationships with property owners, and how she balances the needs of both owners and guests. Kim emphasizes the significance of networking, listening to clients, and creating exceptional guest experiences. She also talks about her goals for scaling the business and the importance of training her team to maintain high service standards.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Kim Egger (00:00)
You know, I will say I’m so blessed with the owners that I work with because they allow me to let my creative efforts flow. So a lot of what I do to create an experience for a guest does not cost money. It comes more in the communication with the guest ⁓ and being speedy and responding to the guest. So when a guest makes a reservation immediately,having that response go out, hey, thank you so much for booking with us. We’re so excited to host you. Please let us know if you have anything special going on, birthday, anniversary, any celebrations that we can help you make that experience even better. And we ask them, what are you interested in doing? Do you want to go hiking? Do you want restaurants? Do you want to go to museums? And then we cultivate a customized
itinerary for them.
Erika (02:27)
Hey everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pro Show. I’m your host, Erika, and today I’m thrilled to be joined by Kim Egger, who’s shaking things up in the short-term rental property space. She is running Treasures in Heaven Property Management and she is rocking it. Kim, it’s awesome to have you here today.Kim Egger (02:49)
Thanks, Erika. It’s great to be here.Erika (02:52)
So let’s dive right in, Kim. For those who aren’t familiar with your world, give us the rundown. How did you get started in property management? And what was the leap like that from your previous career?Kim Egger (03:05)
Yeah, so the transition was actually a huge surprise. I came from the world of banking. I started when I was 14 years old. My dad got me my first job. I worked my way up through the banking system. ⁓ All the way, I was in every department, ended my career. was ⁓ vice president of commercial banking ⁓ at a corporate bank near Chicago.and very heavily involved in the sales industry. And in 2022, I had a major health crisis. I had suffered a pulmonary embolism and I took a pause and really thought deeply as to why that just happened and came out of the blue. And I came to this realization that was really, was again, heavily involved in the sales side, striving to be number one, working my tail off and
I realized I really wasn’t following my passion or my heart, which was in the service industry. I really love working with people and serving them and being able to create experiences. So I took a leap of faith and I left my W-2 job. I left Chicago, moved to Sedona, Arizona to immerse myself in the spirituality to try to figure out what my next step was. And I came to the conclusion that
When I was in lending, my favorite part of lending was in the real estate sector. And I noticed there was an opportunity that I could do co-hosting and property management for short-term rental real estate. And I’d be able to eventually make a good career out of that. And so I started with my first property in August of 2022. By August of 2023, I had five. By August of 2024, I had eight.
And then I now have 13 under management within three years and I’m presently onboarding two more properties. And so, yeah, the change really, it just came out of the awakening and the realization that I was not fulfilling my greater purpose, which was to do something more in the service industry that would be more fulfilling.
Erika (06:08)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And with that growth and what you’re doing, have there been any bumps along the way, any lessons that you want to share for our listeners?Kim Egger (06:21)
Yes, so the first year and a half when I made that jump from my first property to growing that up to five properties actually that was a huge learning curve because I had never been involved in the management side only in the lending and acquisition side. So it took me a good year to develop some systems and procedures that would help me streamline my business and my operations.and also to help me build out a sales funnel that I could utilize to bring on new business. you know, I thought I started this thinking, oh, I’m the owner of a business, but I ended up being the operator doing everything. So my day when I started this was like 7 a.m. until, you know, 10 or 11 p.m. just really working in the business.
So the first few years of growing pains, it is just that, trying to figure out what to do and get your procedures in place and how to streamline everything so that you can start in a scaling mode.
Erika (07:23)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. where, you know, starting off, what, was there also like a hurdle with convincing property owners to trust you with their assets or, know, what is that whole process like when you’re starting off?Kim Egger (07:42)
Yeah, that was definitely a struggle was trying to, you know, tell a property owner why they would want to use me as a manager when I had little to no experience. So it ended up being that I figured out that it was all about relationship first. So not starting with the sales process, but really working, working at the, trying to figure out what the pain points were with the current owner.and where I could come in and best service them to overcome those hurdles. So it was basically taking myself, again, I was in sales, so I was very driven to win the business, but this realization that it actually wasn’t that type of a sales industry, it was more of being able to show people that I cared, that I was compassionate, that I was understanding, and that through my actual service and customer service skills, I would be able to
help them grow their business and increase their revenue. So just turning those pain points into PowerPoints.
Erika (08:45)
I love that tagline. So yeah, on the one hand, you’ve got to balance what the property owners want, but then on the other hand, you have to create a great guest experience. How do you balance that?Kim Egger (08:50)
Yeah.Right, right. ⁓
You know, I will say I’m so blessed with the owners that I work with because they allow me to let my creative efforts flow. So a lot of what I do to create an experience for a guest does not cost money. It comes more in the communication with the guest ⁓ and being speedy and responding to the guest. So when a guest makes a reservation immediately,
having that response go out, hey, thank you so much for booking with us. We’re so excited to host you. Please let us know if you have anything special going on, birthday, anniversary, any celebrations that we can help you make that experience even better. And we ask them, what are you interested in doing? Do you want to go hiking? Do you want restaurants? Do you want to go to museums? And then we cultivate a customized
itinerary for them.
right upon the start with the guest, we’ve engaged, we found out what it is that they’re here for, what it is they want to do, and we create the itinerary for them so that they’re not having to struggle to do that. And as a result, our guest review scores are almost 100 % five-star reviews, and we get a lot of repeat business that is off of the Airbnb platform, but rather it transitions to our own private platform.
which saves them money and then it saves the owner money as well because they’re not having to pay the third party fees.
Erika (11:09)
Yeah, yeah, that’s really fantastic and that’s a testament to, you know, the quality of service that you’re bringing too.Kim Egger (11:17)
Thank you.Erika (11:19)
Kim, you were talking about how important it is to build these relationships and that’s how you got the first few properties that you managed, especially starting off. For you, what kind of relationships, or I should say what kind of networking has helped you grow your business? Any advice that you could pass on for people in real estate who are looking to use networking to level up?Kim Egger (11:46)
Yeah, definitely. ⁓I always say your first go-to is going to be friends and family and it’s just letting them know what you’re doing. So, hey, I’ve made the transition. I’m now focusing on property management. If you know anyone that has a short-term rental or if you know someone that’s going to be traveling to my area, please refer them to me. I’d love to chat with them to see if I can either help them manage a property, improve their property, review their revenue, or on the guest side, if they want to travel, we’d love to be able to book them privately.
So just letting friends and family know about that. And then the next step is really going out into the community, meeting with your Chamber of Commerce, meeting with other business owners. A key is having a relationship with realtors in the market as well. The market that I’m in right now, it is a tourist market. And so there is a lot of transition between…
Individuals owning properties so to have a good connection with a realtor that’s knowledgeable in the short-term space and partnering up with them Will will allow you that the opportunity to receive those referrals from them in the sales process right off the bat ⁓ I also recommend joining ⁓ groups online Facebook Instagram and joining local Airbnb host community groups short-term rental groups
⁓ joining travel groups, realtor groups, so there’s tons of ways that you can leverage your own networking and marketing skills that’s very, very simple. And in doing that, it is in conversation with the people you talk to, letting, know, number one, finding out what their pain points are and then letting them know how you can serve them.
Erika (13:31)
Yeah, yeah, that makes so much sense. And it seems like you’ve had a lot of success in a short amount of time, which is really awesome. And on the same time, I’m sure as you know, every business owner has a moment where things get real. Maybe there was a tough client, a property issue, some sort of logistical nightmare. Do you have a time like that that you could share and how you overcame it?Kim Egger (13:59)
I do. So here in Arizona, we all know it gets extraordinarily hot in the summer. And at one of our properties, we did have the AC go out and it was at the end of July. So we had temperatures in the low hundreds and ⁓ we immediatelyWe immediately contacted our service provider. This was on a weekend too. ⁓ Contacted our regular service provider. They didn’t have a technician available, but thankfully in our procedures, we have backup service providers. So just called down the list. The third service provider said, we’ll be out within two hours. And when they came out, they had brought portable units for the guests to be able to use. ⁓
The ⁓ AC was completely blown out, so the lines had froze on it. And so it needed to be replaced. So this was not going to be an easy fix. And so they used the portable air conditioners. And then we had our technician come back out. It was the following week on Tuesday to do the install. to give the guest, to let them know how much we were so sorry this happened to them, we ended up giving them a gift card.
to a local restaurant slash winery for them to be able to go out and enjoy a meal. And then we created a specialized itinerary for them to be able to spend time with their family at some of the local parks that have water features.
So yeah, so we just kind of created this own unique thing that they could do in the interim. And we always, one thing we do too, when there’s a catastrophe like that, we will always allow the guests the opportunity to cancel at no charge.
So we will reimburse their money if they said, you know what, I don’t want to have to deal with portable units. I don’t want to wait a couple of days for the AC to be fixed. We’ll go ahead and cancel that reservation, refund their money, and allow them to book elsewhere that they’re going to feel more comfortable. ⁓ so far, nobody, knock on wood, has actually ever opted for that. They’ve always just gone along with the solutions that we’ve offered.
Erika (16:45)
Yeah, yeah, wow, that’s really great. For our listeners who are newer to the game, what would you say has been the biggest driver for building that trust? And we’ve been talking about that a lot, but we’re talking about where a property owner would give you more properties to work with. What is that process like?Kim Egger (17:12)
Yeah, so the first thing I would say is listen more than you’re speaking. Really hear the owner. Know what their pain points are. Also know what their goals are. We have property owners that they want to be able to utilize their property and just have the revenue coming in. Cover the expense so they’re not like you have to rent this at the highest point possible.and we need 100 % occupancy. It’s like we need to just cover the nut and on the side, we wanna be able to spend Christmas and Thanksgiving and Mother’s Day at the property. So that helps you from a strategy perspective and building trust with the owner as to what you’re able to offer them. So you’re not coming in with a hard sale, you’re just coming in with a solution for what their needs are and to help them meet their specific goal.
Erika (18:05)
Yeah, absolutely. And speaking of goals, what would you say is on the horizons for Treasures in Heaven property management?Kim Egger (18:13)
Yeah, so we’re really excited. We’ve got all of our standard operating procedures in order. We have got a phenomenal team and we are at the point now where we are trying to double the number of properties or owners that we have right now. So we have 13 under management. We’re bringing two more on right now and so we’ll have 15 owners by the end of the month and our goal is to double that by year end.And by having the systems in place, the operating procedures, the technology to be able to run this efficiently and the team will allow us to do that. And so it’s super exciting. We’re looking to more than double revenue by the end of year.
Erika (18:59)
Yeah, wow, that’s really exciting. And what was that process like when it came to building your team personally?Kim Egger (19:08)
Yeah, so it’s tough building a team because you have to make sure that you’re not settling. It’s very easy to put a warm body in the seat and say you filled a position, but does that individual align with what your goals, what your vision is, what your mission is? Do they have a good work ethic? So it did take over a year for me to really build the team to where I felt comfortable enough that I could say,Okay, we’re gonna be able to give our owners and our guests A plus customer service every single time and we will blow the numbers away. So building a team, again, it’s difficult. You have to just make sure you put the A people in the right seat and not just fill the seat because you need somebody to respond to a guest. So it’s very important to understand that person.
Erika (20:01)
Yeah, absolutely. Were there any processes when it came to training to maintain that quality or personal touch that you offer?Kim Egger (20:10)
Yeah, so the training process, it’s ⁓ very hands-on. So ⁓ I like to sit with the individual that I brought on board. And when we’re working through a procedure or process, I’m going to demonstrate how you handle that. Once I do that, then I’m going to the next time ask them to perform that task while I watch them.So then I’m going to watch them perform the task. And then on the third time, I’m going to let them go out on their own and perform it. But along the way, we’re setting up performance standards so that they fully understand, especially from the service aspect, what the expectations are. This is A plus, white glove all the time. There’s no excuse.
I think it’s really important to start off as the owner or if you’re at an executive position to be the one that actually shows. So my having done this process on my own for an entire year and a half allowed me to fully understand my systems and processes so that I could show them and then they would be able to replicate it.
Erika (21:21)
Yeah, yeah, that’s a that’s really great. Well, Kim, it was so awesome having you on the show today. If someone wants to reach out, learn more about what you’re doing, or maybe in their they’re in your area, and they need help with property management, what’s the best way for them to reach you?Kim Egger (21:40)
Yeah, so I would say the best way to find me would be on Instagram or Facebook and that would be at kim.egger.16. ⁓Erika (21:54)
Awesome.Kim Egger (21:55)
And youcan also find our company, our company is at treasures.in.heaven.
Erika (22:04)
Fantastic. Well, Kim, thank you so much for sharing your journey, your insights. I love what you’re doing with your business and, you know, building things the right way. It’s inspiring stuff.Kim Egger (22:16)
Thank you. It was a pleasure being on here and talking with you, Erika.Erika (22:21)
Likewise, and for everyone tuning in, if you got value from this episode, make sure that you’re subscribed to the Real Estate Pro Show. We’ve got more podcasts coming up with operators like Kim who are out there building incredible businesses in the real estate world. We’ll see you on the next episode.
