Expecting the Great in 2012

Greetings! I pray that you had a blessed 2011 and spent time enjoying your families.

As we get ready for a new year, it's always good to reflect on the journey of the past year. For Bell Investments, our journey was a unique one indeed! We experienced 50% occupancy over the summer of last year, we sold one of our properties and took a loss, and our webpage was hacked and our webmaster has yet to recover our archives. If you're saying 'ouch',  imagine how we felt!

However, even with hardships, we saw great progress. To help fill our vacancies, we ran a move-in special and tightened up our screening process. As a result, we were 100% by October and have had more tenants pay before the 5th since we started renting properties, averaging 80% of rent collected before the 5th!  This allowed us to put more money in reserves and start the rehab on one of our vacant properties we acquired almost two years ago.

The biggest move of our company took place on Sept. 16, 2011. We participated in Project Homeless Connect, an event organized by The Community Alliance for the Homeless and sponsored by local businesses in Memphis. Homeless individuals were brought into the Pipkin Building to receive all types of services. Bell Investments was the only permanent housing vendor there and we were swamped with individuals needing housing. After talking to the other non-profit organizations represented there, they all had the same issue...they needed permanent housing for their clients who were ready to transition into self-sufficiency. God was calling us into something far bigger than ourselves!

After much prayer and consultation with several non-profit leaders, we decided to step up and fill the need- we would offer our properties as permanent housing for non-profit agencies.  There was only one problem....our properties were all occupied. That's when we decided to reach out to other local investors with vacant properties. We discussed fair referral fees and discussed every concern that arose. On October 1, our Landlord Partnership Program was introduced and we've been eagerly serving our community since. Our Operations assistant, Rita Mitchell, has taken our program to another level, helping over 20 individuals since its inception.

What did I learn in 2011? That God is pleased with good intentions! If you want your business to succeed, you must learn to be a servant. This also means helping your tenants in times of hardship. Remember, we are only one incident away from being the receiver...

Make 2012 your best year. Learn to give,live, laugh, and most importantly LOVE.

To Your Success,
Sonja Bell