Multifamily Women Who Build Tech, Teams, And Trust

Change moves fast, but your teams don’t have to break to keep up. We sit down with Kim Senn Cross, Founder and CEO of The KSC Group, to unpack three decades of multifamily technology, the art of fear management during implementations, and how to build a tech stack that truly serves residents and staff. From orange and green screens to AI copilots, Kim explains why the real win is turning people into reviewers instead of doers and how tight integrations cut friction for leasing, maintenance, and accounting.

Kim also shares why sponsoring the Multifamily Women® Summit has been an easy yes since its inception. Having built her career in an era when women in technology leadership were rare, she believes it is a responsibility to lift the next generation. She reflects on the power of safe spaces, vulnerability, and her experience stepping onto the My Stage, My Story platform in 2025. For Kim, investing in women leaders is not optional. It is how ceilings stay broken and confidence compounds across the industry.

Kim shares a vivid case study where AI powered document processing transformed commercial lease onboarding, slashing manual hours while improving data accuracy. She breaks down her Goldilocks theory of proptech. Avoid too little. Avoid too much. Insist on systems that actually talk to each other. The conversation gets practical. Whole company listening sessions to surface hidden Excel work, staged rollouts with 90 day support cycles, and the rise of AI champions who set prompt standards, protect data privacy, and help teams ask smarter questions. The payoff is real time visibility for executives, cleaner accruals and T12s for brokers, and fewer headaches for site teams.

We also dive into purpose. Kim’s work in the community can deliver more than NOI by training and placing candidates facing homelessness into leasing and maintenance roles paired with discounted housing. It is a powerful reminder that the right systems and the right support can change careers, families, and communities.

If you are an operator overwhelmed by rapid change, or a leader ready to audit your stack and grow with less chaos, this conversation offers a clear path. Start with people. Choose core systems wisely. Phase the rest. Measure what matters.

If this resonates, follow the show, share it with your team, and leave a review.

Connect with Kim on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimsenncross/

Learn more and connect with The KSC Group: https://thekscgroup.com/

Connect with Multifamily Women®:

Multifamily Women® Summit: https://multifamilywomen.com/
Carrie Antrim on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carrieantrim/
Be a Guest on the Podcast or at the Summit: https://apps.multifamilywomen.com/speakingrequest
Multifamily Women® Leadership Series: https://apps.multifamilywomen.com/join

Transcript

Warm Welcome And 80s Vibes

Speaker 1 0:20

Welcome to the Multifamily Women Podcast. I'm your host, Carrie Antrim. And today I'm so excited we've got Kim Senn Cross in the studio here in Scottsdale with us. Kim is the founder and president of the KSC Group. She brings decades of experience in multifamily technology and operations. She's worked inside property management companies. She's led business application teams, supported major software deployments at RealPage, helped build consulting teams at Intrata, and founded the KSC Group in 2013 to bridge the gap between operations and technology. Kim has also been a longtime sponsor of the Multifamily Women Summit. She's a champion of our whole platform. And in 2025, she even took the stage in the My Stage, My Story project. And so we're so grateful for her leadership in the industry. And I'm so excited to have here in her here in the studio with us. Kim, welcome to the show. I'm so happy to be here. And I'm loving this, the whole look is just can we address this first? Yes, not on the note card. Yeah, no.

Speaker 1:24

If you know me, you know I love fun outfits. And um, you know, I'm getting in touch with my 80s. So I just celebrated last year was 35 years in the industry. You know, 80s, 80s was my time, and uh so I call this like my Joan Jet look. Yeah, I love it. I was looking at 80s music. I was listening to all the 80s music dancing around while I was coming over here.

Speaker 1 1:48

80s is the best type music. I mean, I still will go.

Speaker 1:52

Shoulder pads would come back, you know? It made me look like I had great shoulders.

Speaker 1 1:56

Exactly. So well, thank you so much for being here, especially in person. It's great to have you here in Scottsdale.

Speaker 2:02

I love Scottsdale, it's one of my favorite places. Well, I love to come to the conferences. Yes, yeah, but uh now I'm here for fun.

Speaker 1 2:09

Yes, I love that too, that you're mixing in a little of this with some fun. Yeah, business and fun. Yeah, absolutely. So you I mentioned in your intro you've sponsored the Multifamily Women's Summit, I think every year that we've had it. I love it. And why is that? Why is it such an easy yes for you?

Speaker 2:25

Um because when I started women had a ceiling, and I was in technology, and there was very few women that, and there definitely weren't any IT leaders. And I feel like we've emerged as women, but yet we need to support each other, and we are leaders and um involved in companies and charting their path, and and now all the ceilings are removed, but we always the those people who were there in the beginning have to be there to bring up the next leaders, and I think as people definitely, but definitely as women, when we come together, we become vulnerable and we share imposter syndrome. We have these conversations where while we come across these confident, amazing people, uh, we feel like maybe we don't deserve. And um I think being a mom and and raising kids and also being in all the different positions, it's my responsibility to go back and say, you're amazing and you're wonderful, and call me whenever you need something, you know, and and that is such a great environment, the guest speakers that you have um who tell their stories, or even the my stage, my story where people got up and shared their vulnerability. Um it connects and it's uh it's just we're all in one space. And then all of the social times and networking and things like that, where you get to talk and and and be around people, it's people leave there revitalized, comp truly confident, uh, embracing all that. And so big proponent. Well, be there this year, be there every year. It's just on the agenda. Like that's a no-brainer.

Speaker 1 4:34

I love that. Thank you. Yeah, every year, you know, I have women who reach out who are like, I'm a I've never attended before, I'm coming by myself. I, you know, I don't know what to expect. And I always tell them, don't worry, like there's no mean girl syndrome happening here. And I point them to leaders like you who have been and you're so welcoming to everybody that comes in. I always tell them, like, take a deep breath. It's everything's gonna be okay. You're gonna come in, you're gonna be welcomed with open arms. Literally, people will be giving you hugs, even if you're such a hugger.

Speaker 5:07

I tell people, I said, be aware. I even had a boss and you told me up front I'm not a hugger. I said, you will be in about a month. You haven't met me yet. You haven't met me yet.

Tech Evolution From Modems To AI

Speaker 1 5:17

Um you mentioned, we mentioned the My Stage, My Story. So this was a new thing that we started in 2025, and I felt like it was a beautiful session. It was two sessions that we had because we had 10 women that came up on stage and and had five minutes to kind of present their story, how multifamily has changed their life, you know, in a positive way. What did that mean for you? Because you shared a very personal story with the whole audience, and I'm sure you received amazing feedback afterwards from the attendees. What did that mean for you personally?

Speaker 5:48

I think that's truly where you can actually become vulnerable because each woman that was up there had a different story. I felt like you you selected the stories and put them together perfectly. Because when they meet us, they come away with a perception of who they think we are. But when you get up on stage and you start talking about the things you overcome or the challenges, or uh then they they relate. There's something in their life that they can relate to. And while they might not have related to me, they could have related to another person, and then they feel like a safe space to come up and say, This is what's really going on in my life, instead of having that mask that you wear at work that says, Oh my gosh, if you really knew I could lose my job. Right. That's what we're afraid of.

Speaker 1 6:45

Right.

Speaker 6:45

You know, I can't tell you what's going on. And and at that moment, at that time, they're in a safe space. None of us are gonna go back and post it on social media and say, Oh my gosh, this woman after shared her story. It's more a powerful moment. Right. And um, and and like I said, it it the speakers each had different amazing stories that you could just take pieces of and relate to. So I look forward. If we're gonna do that again this year, I really look forward to that and see who's gonna get up and the stories to tell.

Speaker 1 7:19

Yes, but this is staying. This session is staying forever.

Speaker 7:21

Yeah, it was it was amazing.

Speaker 1 7:23

Yeah. And now you've been in the industry a long time. 35 years. I just celebrated 35 years. Congratulations. You've helped pave the way. Why do you think it's so important to continue giving back in the way that you do and helping women leaders rise?

Reviewer Not Doer: Real Case Study

Speaker 7:41

There are some brilliant, amazing women. And right now we are at a um another there's all these new things that can't come out technology-wise, that you stay up with. And I know a lot of people tend to the the bottom line is definitely renting apartments because that's how all of us get paid. Right. Right. We we know that. Um, but we have to rethink how we do business. Are we doing it efficiently with what we have today? Some of us made decisions five years ago, 10 years ago. We put those policies and procedures in place, we put that technology in place, and that's what we've kept doing. But now you might not need to do 10 spreadsheets to get that Monday morning report out. Right. Maybe you can use uh different tools. And when I started, so when I first started, we were going from manual to computer. And um it was, you know, the choice I gave you was do you want the orange screen or the green screen? There wasn't, and then when we went to modems, it was the dial-up, and all I remember is lightning struck and all the modems went out, you know. So, and and now we rely on, you know, the cloud and all the different services and and the technology that's emerging from the next generation of these applications or uh things that they're doing that they need to connect with the core systems, right? And you know, is there a way instead of doing 10 spreadsheets, that there's a way to pull that data and and have other tools work for you and you become the reviewer and not the doer. So with the with women, it's it's definitely important to stay on top of technology and always be re-evaluating are we doing this efficiently, are we doing this effectively? Because most of the clients that I work with today come to me and say, I want to position myself for growth because they feel growth is on the horizon. But when you bring all of that growth, you're now either gonna have to get more human capital, or you're gonna have to reevaluate and make your teams efficient. Right. Because that's gonna flow through all of your support systems, your accounting, you know, everything, all the way up to the executives that are looking at their business intelligence tools and what their dashboard so they can dial in and see markets and and things like that. So, you know, staying abreast of I love it because I always like to stay up with, you know, when I go to the conferences, I just take time to just wander up and down all the spots. Well, I don't go to like the plumbing and appliances, okay. I'll be honest with you. Um, but I do go to all the emerging technology to see what's coming.

Speaker 1 10:41

Yeah. Well, I love that you said you become become the reviewer, not the doer, because AI can do so much for us now. We still have to have that human hand in reviewing it and you know, making sure it's doing what we need it to do.

Speaker 10:52

But I'm I'm reviewing like this year, we're doing KC Reimagine. And March 1st, we celebrate 14 years.

Speaker 1 11:01

Oh, congratulations.

Speaker 11:02

Yes, and we have um, you know, we've taken high school kids, college kids, um, and they've started at an entry level or just to get some money while they're going through college. And then we have the the tenured, senior people like myself.

Speaker 2 11:22

Right.

Speaker 11:23

And I've asked everybody, I was like, you know, look at what you're doing, and we're redoing our software. Yeah. And it's simple as um when we do data conversions, or even we do imports into accounting for some of our teams, and they're they're doing something simple as changing GL accounts. So we've built tools that you can upload a spreadsheet in in seconds. It's changed it for you, so it makes our import and everything way more efficient. Right. And we spile audits and just you know, um a case study. We had a client we were onboarding, and um the challenge was they didn't, they were had 40, like 50 commercial properties, and they had a variety of commercial leases, um, lease briefs. The data in their current system wasn't completely accurate. And so they were either gonna have to hire a plethora of tents where you have human error that are gonna go through 400 leases and type this information in, but we were also trying to fast track, and and so to think outside the box, we worked with Nectarflow and uh helped create this tool where you just take the lease abstract and put it in a Google Drive and worked through the data points we were looking for and then the five output spreadsheets we needed.

Speaker 1 13:06

Wow.

Speaker 13:06

And then having that 80-20 rule of hey, all of this, and then we put in uh you know the source data we had so it could look and see, well, the lease says this, but the computer data says this, so somebody could go, this is accurate, or this is missing. Yeah, and then so we could fix it before we imported it. And man, we were just flying through it. Yeah. So you take something as simple as that, so we didn't add any additional staff, we used the same staff they had who knew the data, but we just got it to them much quicker.

Speaker 1 13:46

Yeah, absolutely reviewer, not the doer. Right, right, because it would take forever.

What Leaders Should Audit Now

Speaker 13:51

I mean, when we calculated the demand hours and the cost, it was way more effective. And then they have a tool now when they do an acquisition of a commercial property. It's a tool that they can reuse or grow or change, right, you know, and modify. So that that's just another case study of just going there, listening to the problem or the challenge, trying to think through what's available, right and and then building it and then and and then seeing how it works.

Speaker 1 14:25

Yeah. And on that, what should on that same note kind of what should COOs, CIOs, what should they be auditing right now in their tech stack? Like what should they be looking at in order to know how to become more efficient and do all these processes better faster?

Speaker 14:42

I tell you what was really eye-opening, what they should do is have a collective meeting and listen to their team. Because a lot of times what they don't understand is, and and this was the eye-opener, what I what I am truly passionate about now is I go, I go to a company and I'm doing a business assessment because they're like, we want to look at our tech stack. Like I said, going back to positioning for growth. Right. I say, all right, opening day, I want everybody in the room. I want the maintenance leaders in the room, I want operations, you know, marketing, anybody, and I want the executives. And what we discovered is the accountants were doing so much in Excel, and when somebody found that there was a discrepancy in numbers, the man amount amount of man hours that it took to redo it, and the COO was sitting there and had no idea that they were doing it because they're removed from this process. Right. And when they heard it, they can't, when they all heard everything that everybody was doing. I had a they they told me this one maintenance guy, he goes, Oh, he's pretty, he's gonna be pretty quiet. He ended up being the most vocal person out there, right? You know, like I'm on my phone and I want I'm going to this building and I can't see um all the tickets, or I can't do this, I can't do that. And being out out of all the ones they expected to be quiet about it, he he was the most vocal.

Speaker 2 16:16

Yeah.

Speaker 16:17

You know, and and so I say, listen to your teams, have a big meeting, ask the questions, and find out what everybody is doing, because then what you can do is build a strategy around what are the quick, easy fixes, or maybe we need to change the policy, or hey, in our when we send RFPs out, these are the things that are our problem or pain points that we need to change.

Speaker 1 16:43

Yeah. Is there are there any certain behaviors that an operator should stop doing when they're when it comes to technology decisions or implementation? That's kind of a loaded question.

Speaker 16:56

No, no, I don't I always get the start doings, not the stop doing.

Speaker 1 17:01

So I just kind of went blank on that. Ways of thinking because it's it I think change management comes into it as well. Um it comes down to the people, like you just mentioned. Yeah.

Goldilocks Theory Of Tech Stacks

Speaker 17:16

Um I don't I don't know about the stop doing, except for, you know, look at every Excel spreadsheet, every Word document, all these other things that you're doing outside of your system and put those on the list of things to stop doing.

Speaker 1 17:31

Yeah.

Speaker 17:32

Because those things can be done through various, I mean, we're utilizing and testing out all the various AI platforms. And in what we have to come up with is the one that does the most of everything. Right. Right. And can it integrate with with our other tools? I mean, all the software providers are creating amazing AI platforms for you know, marketing and leasing and being able to help you be a 24-7 shop and all of that, right? Um, but what I'm dealing with is the other stuff. You know, it's like once I have the data, if I'm not using a BI tool or if you have an acquisitions team, you know, how can they help in their research and what's the bless best platform? And a lot of people, um, we're we're dealing with what we're called AI champions. You need to start looking at your AI strategy, cybersecurity. You need to have that in place. Um, you need to have your policies, but your AI champions are the ones that if somebody in a company comes to them with a problem, they're not gonna know how to write, or maybe they don't even know how to prompt to get the answers they want. Right. And they just start typing in questions like they're doing a Google search.

Speaker 2 19:00

Yeah.

Speaker 19:01

And it's not the same.

Speaker 2 19:02

Yeah.

Speaker 19:03

And you can keep answering questions. And so um, you know, giving people a cheat sheet of like, hey, here's some prompts, but also there's a difference between a personal AI account or a company. The company is more one the the AI programs they people don't realize can be public and other people can see your questions. Whereas if you have a company, it's private. And you could build standard um prompts and things like that for the the difference. I want to research a company, I want to research a property, I want to research a market. Um, you know, and you could build those standards and then they could start there, and then as they're asking, yeah, you know, and it can search going through LinkedIn or websites or any information and do it much quicker.

Speaker 1 19:57

Yeah.

Speaker 19:58

And you'd be surprised.

Speaker 1 19:59

Yeah. It is surprising how quickly everything is evolving and changing. And you mentioned, you know, at any conference you go to, you're walking through the trade show floor, like checking out all these new technologies. What advice do you have for operators who are just overwhelmed by the pace of change?

Fear Management In Implementations

Speaker 20:18

If you know me, you've heard me tell everybody the Goldilocks theory. Let's hear it. Right. And it is you can do too little or you can do too much. Okay. So if you have too much technology, you've overwhelmed your team. And if your technology isn't connected very well, you're overwhelming your team. Case in point, my youngest went to go. I've been around this industry so long that I can walk in with all of all of their adults now. But at some point in time, they have rented apartments. Right, of course. And I can look online or I can go into the office and I can tell them immediately what software they're using. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Right. And um, and I have to walk them through, and now they're going through the process of like identity verification, cut screening, and all these other. So I'm seeing live and in action them go through this. And they're sitting right by me, like, well, now they're sending me a link for this. And why but I gave it over here and I was like, honey, that's because they're using this and it's not all connected. Right. Right. Different systems and and why they can't get through their gate systems or you know, all this kind of stuff. And uh, so it it's interesting. You want everything to be as tightly integrated as possible. So it's a smooth experience for you know, the person who's going through it, who's going through, hey, I found my apartment and they're so excited and they toured and all of a sudden, but now you've given everybody the pain point of just qualifying and signing their lease and getting their keys and everything else, right? And navigating around your site. And that's just your new resident. That doesn't even talk about what goes on behind the scenes to your support teams or your leasing teams and and all of that. So the Goldilocks theory is uh basically pick a tech stack, you talk about change management, right? Pick a solid tech stack, you can always add on more. But start with core, what you need. Figure out, especially chart a map as to what's phase one, what's phase two, what are we doing this year, what are we doing next year? You know, and and always keeping an eye on, you know, what's available and asking yourself, do I really need this? Because you can get really wowed by the new shiny objects. Right. But what value does it give you? Right. You know?

Speaker 1 22:42

Yeah, that's great insight. And in fact, it kind of leads into my next question was which was because you worked on both sides of the table, operator and um uh software provider. What do operators consistently underestimate when they implement these new systems? Fear management. Okay, there you go.

Speaker 22:59

Because I walk in and I'm very honest with people. When I go in, I said, you're about to throw this whole company into a tizzy because they know what they're doing today. Right. They've done it for so long they can practically do it in their sleep. Right. And now you are changing things that nobody knows. You're upsetting your accounting department, your executives now get income statements and balance sheets, all their data in a different format. Your site teams are, you know, doing something new. If you're staging a rollout, your support teams are supporting two different systems, the old and the new, but the new they don't know. And they need that go-to super user. So because they need that transitional knowledge, right? Because they want to be self-sufficient, but they're still having to support the old.

Speaker 2 23:52

Yeah.

Building Teams And Champions

Speaker 23:53

And and and I've had companies come and and they're saying, Well, you know, we want to do this and we want to do that. And I said, No, let's let's wait on this one, let's do that next year. And um, and then toward the end, they say, Thank you for for telling us to wait.

Speaker 1 24:10

So you're able to go in and kind of analyze you see the big picture. I see the big picture. What they want, the the brightness.

Speaker 24:16

And I will take them there if it takes years. We we partner with these companies, we don't go anywhere. And and what we can do is because we're software agnostic, meaning that we're partnerships with all like the players, the major players plus ancillary companies and and things like that. We we are here to serve our industry, and whatever you pick, we want it to be the smoothest, most pleasant experience. And if you have a problem, you can come to us. Right. Right. Because my team is different. We're a boutique shop, and we've all worked for management companies. We've worked on site, right? We've um we've uh managed the teams. So we know exactly what they're going through. Right. It's different than some of the larger shops, but we're not the best fit for everybody. But the funny thing is, being in this 35 years, I know all the other people. And if I'm not a fit, I'm gonna recommend you to some people, and I'm gonna make that introduction. Yeah. Because I I believe in abundance. We're we're gonna get the clients we're supposed to get, and it's all about what's best for that person that needs help. Right. And and um, but anyway, it's like you see the big picture and you've lived it long enough to know what they're embarking upon, and they don't. And you're like, okay, I'm gonna get you there safely.

Speaker 1 25:38

But we're gonna we're gonna do this. But it's gonna be a really wild ride.

Speaker 25:42

And and I have sat there, I have to laugh. I I uh recently worked with a client and they're in Louisiana, and uh, if anybody knows Louisiana, you know it's a heavy drinking culture. Party, Mardi Girl, Mardi Girl's going on right now.

Speaker 1 25:54

I was gonna say, I think that's a Mardi Girl's gone.

Speaker 25:56

I think Fat Tuesday was like a week or two ago. Um, but uh the accountant there was like, I need a drink, I'm gonna be a morning drinker because we were completely changing, like, and and they were giving her more responsibilities, uh-huh, right? But she didn't understand that now the data was gonna be there. So her bankrupt and and everything else, and we were taking things off of her that it didn't look like it when she was sitting there, but at the end of it, it was it was gonna be yeah easier.

Speaker 1 26:28

And is it nice to see that kind of light bulb or the light switch that goes off?

Speaker 26:32

I love it when they come back to you and go, All right, you're right. Uh-huh. This is so much better. Yeah. I was scared, but right. And and I also tell people it's a 90-day process. Like, let's say we go live, the first 30 days is heavy support, heavy hand holding.

Speaker 2 26:50

Yeah.

Speaker 26:51

Because they heard you in training or they heard it, but now they're doing it and you're with them. And but in our world, it's a 30-day restart. So then the next 30 days are like, okay, I did it the first month, and now they get more comfortable by the third month. Smooth sailing. Smooth sailing. Because it's repetitive. Right, right. We bill the rent, we collect the rent, we do our light notices, we do our leases, we do this, we do that, we close our books, it goes on to accounting and we move on.

Speaker 1 27:22

Yeah. That's great.

Speaker 27:24

That's great.

Speaker 1 27:25

Um so when you work with a portfolio, are you and you see what they want, that you see their brig, big, bright future. What are you evaluating before you even touch anything? I'm evaluating a team that they have. Okay. And are you looking for that? You mentioned like a champion. Like, are you looking for the the champion?

Generations, Habits, And Adapting

Speaker 27:50

We need cheerleaders, okay. Those need to be the executives. Okay. Um I I will tell you there's always uh going to be a negative person in the group. And it's difficult enough. We need the cheerleader to come in. And that usually has to be an executive that's involved and going around. And and I've seen some amazing uh champions in that way. Yeah. And then there has to be their person that gets it. And I've always found that one. And sometimes it's the one that's already in place in their company, but then as you bring on the technology, they start to see the talent that they have. Right. And they start to kind of tweak and evaluate and and and say, oh, wait, they didn't they didn't see that in the job that you've had. Right. But now look how amazing you are.

Speaker 1 28:45

Well, I would imagine through these technologies, you're opening up kind of new skills and new pathways for the on-site teams and and even that too.

Speaker 28:55

So the corporate teams, like they're not just assistants anymore.

Speaker 1 29:01

Right.

Speaker 29:01

Right. And and the other thing that you have going on right now is you have so many generations and how they've come up through their lives with technology. You know, I mean, my 10-year-old grandson knows how to get around all the little whatever, you know, locks we put on his iPad or anything else. Oh, I know. I know. I mean, it's like he just has Siri things and then whatever, and we're like, Yeah, stop that. Like there's an honor code system here. Right, right. Yep. So, yeah, and then so you've got that, and then you've got the the person who um, you know, is around technology, but basically can just, hey, teach me, and and I can do it, but they're not gonna be the leading edge. And then you've got um some of them that are in in the corporate offices now um that are kind of the middle and they adapt to technology. They don't need, you know, they've got three or four monitors, and they don't need it like me. I still have to print paper and take things off, but you know, other people just throw it up on screens and and can do all that. So you have to be adaptive for, you know, what is their, I guess, technology threshold or um yeah, you know, and be able to accommodate.

Speaker 1 30:26

Yeah. Yeah, it's funny the the generational differences as well. Um, even my my 16-year-old daughter who you know she comes to all the women's summits, Nora, um, she will much prefer a written planner, a day book, you know, like we used to have. Whereas I'm on my phone and I've got my Google Calendar synced to my all the different things. I've got everything.

Speaker 30:44

So I've got my planner, yeah, and uh and I've got uh my phone when I'm at the doctor or wherever. And then the but the other thing that I got as a Christmas gift is that digital wall calendar. Oh, fun.

Speaker 1 30:56

I love it.

Speaker 30:57

So uh when my husband says, Are we doing something this weekend so he knows what to plan? He can just go into the laundry room and he looks at the planner or whatever and says, Oh, what's a free weekend? Yeah, you know, yeah. So yeah, that's right, because it took, I had a whiteboard and uh it was like the whole year. Yeah, and I would have to erase it and I'd have to handwrite all this stuff in there and it took up the whole wall. Yeah. So now it only takes up this much space, and it's easy because I can be on my uh computer in the office and type in what events we have and birthdays and all that kind of stuff. So yeah, that was a that was a for me being a tech geek, that was a perfect gift.

Speaker 1 31:34

Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it it's just so funny to think the differences between people's preferences and things and trying to get them to shift their mindset a little bit. Yeah.

Speaker 31:43

Well, and I always go to people and say, you know, what how do you stay organized? You know, some of them are a paper planner, some of them aren't digital, but it's also what system do you use? Right. You know, and it's funny that even just talking to my team, all the way that they plug their hours or block their time, or I'm still trying to figure out mine. I don't know.

Speaker 1 32:06

I I'm a recovering post-it note girl. Like I would have all the post-it notes around my mind. Yeah, no, I I have I love all the notes.

Speaker 32:15

I love all the different colors and even get me started on office supplies.

How Tech Impacts NOI And Reporting

Speaker 1 32:19

Oh, yes. Okay. Back, sorry, I think we got off on a tangent thing. I'll take you down any round level. Yeah. So okay, so looking at the whole system, how does proper implementation affect NOI, the reporting accuracy, you know, when you're having a system of, you know, an AI do it rather than human hands mixing up numbers, maybe something like that, um, or operational efficiency, how does this all affect the the NOI at the end of the day?

Speaker 32:46

It it's huge. So when you first go into okay, you've evaluated the company or or what your strategy is in your moving toward a tech stack cost, you know, when you're dealing with the sales rep, recently um we get a lot of repeat clients where they work for one company and now they've switched, and their roles might be slightly different. Maybe they went to a smaller one because there was more growth potential. And it's the first time that they've gone into a software selection and they're looking at contracts and they don't understand how the contracts are structured. This is bundled, and so they can't seem to break it out because this one's split out. Right. Right. And what all does it include? And looking at it, and I'm like looking at it and making sure that it includes you know, um electronic signature, you have to have that these days. There's there's a lot of things that you just have to have, and then I'll also introduce the other, but um the technology can expose your accounting practices, or you know, when you're changing a platform, you might have only been cash, but now you have the ability to have multi-books, right? And when you're looking at something accrual versus cash, it's it's a little different. Um, and also there's a lot of people who the owner loves their QuickBooks, right? So not all the data is being created or stored in the core system. They might only be using it for the residential piece, but not the accounting piece, and until you bring everything together, you know, and so a lot of times you're exposing, oh, I didn't know that, you know.

Speaker 2 34:30

Right.

Speaker 34:31

And it it makes the decision making so much better, but it's also real time because they're able to look at the data and see occupancy and see market conditions and see income statements and and things like that, and trending and trailing and comparing or how they're doing bad debt or how they're doing write-offs. Because I work with brokers too, because people are refinancing or they're selling, and um, their brokers want accrual T 12s. And I go in and I look at it because you know, GPR should be certain, and how and we talk about how are you doing your bad debt and how are you doing your um your write-offs or your collections or you know, exploring all that because it you know, I may need to make a bunch of journal entries. Right. You know, so I don't know if that completely answered your question.

Speaker 1 35:28

Well, yeah. I mean, I think at the end of the day, anything you can do to increase efficiency, lower costs, you know, lower the mistakes, you know, that have been made, or the you know, the data's here, but it's not over here. It's gonna it's all gonna increase the value of that.

Speaker 35:42

Yeah, I mean, because you can put reports and data up into AI and have it do an analysis. Now, AI is not gonna always be 100% accurate. Right. Be, you know, and and so you do have to validate. You know, recently I was watching a a sports show and and they were teasing because uh uh one of the broadcasters had gone on AI to prepare, but he didn't really fact chat. Oh, oh no, yeah. And so when he got on air and he said, Oh, such and such has only won so many Super Bowls or so many, whatever. And and one of the other guys, you know, basically called him out on it and said, That's wrong. Oh funny. They had one more there. Yeah, so it's like, yes, you're gonna get data, but you do need to validate it. You cannot, you have to have oversight, you can't take the human moment out of it. Uh huh. You know, you can help it minimize your data entry or having to look at it you know with your eyes, but you you still have to validate. Yeah, that's funny.

Speaker 1 36:43

Now, I know that you love to give back. Obviously, you give back to the multifamily women uh every year attending and sponsoring. What else is going on that's exciting for you right now?

Giving Back Through Entryway Talent

Speaker 36:53

Oh, I sometimes I tear up about this. Um, Melanie French called me. I I it had been placed on my heart when I entered this business when I was 25, the the power of our industry, right? We have homes. Right. And there's an affordable side and there's a conventional side and everything in between. And now there's workforce housing. Right. Right. Which we have some workforce housing. I I even have done things with um what they call co-living, which is basically student housing for adults that live in these big cities where the rents are super high.

Speaker 1 37:28

Yeah, we have that here in Phoenix.

Speaker 37:29

Yeah, and but you think about um we have people that um maybe their uh jobs have been they they go away, right? I I have always been a big um worked with homeless and um uh foster kids and prison ministry, things like that. And um, we have this industry where uh a GED high school diploma is all you need because we give you tools, we give you certifications, we you know do all that. So um right here in Phoenix is the headquarters, but I am part, I am on the city advisory board of entryway and entryway talent.org if you're interested in looking up what they do. But uh we my responsibility is ambassador brand awareness, but also raising money because what we do is we take at-risk situation in homeless, we put them through our training program, right? So we teach them maintenance skills, we teach them leasing skills, we prep them for interviews, and there's a lot of large um multifamily companies that are also giving, and they go in a job interview and they're up against all the candidates that came in from all the other areas. But if they get placed, then um they're given an apartment. Wow, they're given a career and an apartment at a discounted rate. And um, we've had some amazing success stories. We vet these candidates out because we want them to be the best candidates. We want them, and there's a commitment that they have to do. We're giving them a second chance or hand up. We're not just saying, hey, here's a program. Right. They have to um learn, they have to show up for classes, but the money that we raise could be giving them an Uber ride to class. Right. Um, but there's a story of a lady who was living out of her car, uh-huh, and she was an older lady, and she came through the program and she ended up on with a company that was a lease hub. Okay. And she just traveled, she was one of their top leasing people, and she traveled. So she actually told us that there was only six was I mean, they were paying for her home and her food and everything else when she was on the road. Right. So there were only six weeks out of the year that she wasn't, you know, traveling like that. And you know, she could pay her own way.

Speaker 1 39:58

Yeah.

Speaker 39:59

But we gave her a path.

Speaker 1 40:01

Right.

Speaker 40:01

And there was another gentleman who he and his four-year-old son were in a a shelter, uh-huh, and he went through and became a maintenance man. Uh-huh. And he and his four-year-old son now live in a great neighborhood and in a safe neighborhood in an apartment. His son goes to school now, and I mean, that's where the heart of multifamily is. And I think of where I came from, oh, 25, um, you know, not didn't really have a career and came into this industry, fell in love with it, fell in love with the people, um, never left. Yeah. You know, and so that's my give back is I want to mentor people. Yeah. I want to tell people how wonderful this industry is because when when somebody's going through an illness, I I see all these posts, such and such is going through an illness. You know, here's a go find me page. And I see so many people go on to that. Yeah, it's beautiful. Or when I deal with the homeless, I'll I'll put uh say, Hey, I'm I need some glasses and stuff, and I can buy them in bulk at Amazon and you can do 20 bucks and then buy a box and take it to a shelter.

Speaker 2 41:08

Yeah.

Speaker 41:09

You know, so it's exciting. But no, entryway. Um, and of course, you know, I want to raise money, so I've got a selfish as you can go to entryway North Texas if you want to donate and just make sure and put my name on it to get credit for it.

Speaker 1 41:21

We'll put that info in the show notes there. Yeah.

Speaker 41:23

But it's great because, like I said, their headquarters are here. Yeah.

How To Connect And Closing CTA

Speaker 1 41:27

That's beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. It's lovely. Um, so for everyone listening, watching, how what's the best way for them to get in touch with you or your team if they want to learn more?

Speaker 41:37

Go to our website and go to uh connect or contact us, fill out a form, and that goes to my team and you just tell them what you need. And that's kscgroup.com. The k sc group.com.com. The yeah, everybody gets uh it's t-a-p. Yeah. Um, I always have to like do the alpha bravo thomas or whatever. Uh, but it's the kscg group.com and there's a connect, and they've if it's something different than a service, right, and and they just want to have a conversation, or you can come be my friend on LinkedIn. Okay, you can find me on LinkedIn and uh and reach out. And um now if you try and sell me something and it spam is like I I don't I but if somebody says, Hey, you had a minute, Talk, I want to ask you some questions, or you can always sell the real messages on LinkedIn. Yeah, yeah, no, yeah. Okay, anyway, and and I get a lot of people who go, we can solve all your properties problems. So, like, yeah, you didn't really look at my profile then because I don't have any properties. I do that, thank you though. If you've got properties, we can talk right turn it around and tell them.

Speaker 1 42:45

I love that. That's great. Well, thank you so much for being on the show today. Thank you for just being in our lives for so long. It's wonderful.

Speaker 42:52

Well, I get teary-eyed because I love you and Patrick so much. And I, you know, I've always thought uh y'all are amazing people and what you're doing for our industry. I support, you know, the Innovation Council, which I think is now AI, innovation, and something else. It's technology, it's been like super long now. The name has been it's three days and we're gonna learn a lot of stuff. It's gonna be amazing, and it's always on my birthday, so it's always like, hey, happy birthday. Yeah, and um, but it's uh it's amazing, you know what how y'all are you know um being advocates for the industry, yeah, doing podcasts, having these conferences that are different. Yeah, it's very different. We're all together, we all experience everything together.

Speaker 1 43:35

The beauty, yeah, the magic.

Speaker 43:36

Yeah, I will tell you, I'm really glad we're not doing the hiking up Camelback Mountain anymore. Because I never did that. You and me both, but so yeah, uh, because somebody say, Oh yeah, you you gotta be really I was like, I don't hike. And I was like, Yeah, no, I'm just gonna have room service and all that. But when you did the the yoga thing, the lady who like we're all stretching, and yeah, the breath work and all I was like, oh yeah, I was like, Oh, I could take it now.

Speaker 1 43:58

Yeah, that's nice.

Speaker 44:00

Yeah, I was like, count man on that one. I like it. Ease into the day, yeah, ease into the day.

Speaker 1 44:04

I like doing that hiking.

Speaker 44:06

I was like, yeah, no.

Speaker 1 44:07

There's always a group that will do that camelback hike and I hike, and I I uh applaud them. I applaud them too. Hand them a mimosa at the bottom. Yeah, gonna go up to the top.

Speaker 44:16

I'll meet them at lunch and see see if they have any sketch. I'd be like, I was in Salt Lake City. I volunteered for something. I volunteered for a walk, and I did not realize that the person I was working with was like, Yeah, we're gonna meet at 6 a.m. I was like, Oh, okay. I should have I should ask more questions. So in the in the middle of salt, I don't like high altitudes. And I was like, okay, I'll go ahead. I'll just I'll meet you. Yeah, I'm just gonna take some pictures. I get like one of those lime bikes of the past. No. Right.

Speaker 1 44:49

As long as you don't end up in the helicopter. No, just sell.

Speaker 44:51

Yeah, I didn't do the helicopter the first time you did that. Oh, yeah. No, uh uh. I was like, I don't do the helicopters either.

Speaker 1 44:57

Well, thank you so much again for being here. It's always a pleasure. Um, all right, so that wraps another episode of the Multifamily Women Podcast. Thank you for tuning in. Um, be sure to register for the summit. It's September 10th and 11th. You can do that on multifamilywomen.com. You'll meet Kim there and all of our lovely attendees and sponsors. And uh, we'll see you in the next next episode.