A Speedy Implementation

At Houston's Villa Serena

By Leah Etling on Feb 2, 2016 in People

When Corri Moura-Smith joined a new property management company in her hometown of Houston, she was tasked with correcting an archaic and outdated accounting and property management system within a very short timeframe.

Villa Serena Communities is a multifamily firm, under the ownership umbrella of Austin Management Group, which focuses on providing safe and constructive environments for families in some of the city’s more challenging neighborhoods.

“They have a true interest in helping people,” said Corri of the three owners of Austin Management Group, Steve Moore, Michael Hoberman, and Howard Einberg. “The main reason they are interested in stretching their dollars is to be able to do more projects to help more people. Their focus is on buying very distressed properties, and renovating them to make a decent place for low income people to live.”

As the newly hired controller at Villa Serena with over 20 years of experience in property management, Corri brought a wealth of expertise in technology and best business practices to her new employer. One of the first projects she set out to implement was improving the company’s accounting practices by finding the right fit in a property management software package.

The turnaround was short. It was Moura-Smith’s goal to have the tech transition complete by January 1, 2015 – just a few months after she was hired. After doing her due diligence and looking at all the available options in the multi-family market space, Corri was ready to make a decision.

She told me, “I was very clear with the owners that because of my past experiences, if we wanted to be converted to a true accounting platform by January 1, we should go with Yardi. I also said I would prove to them that it was the better buy for their dollar. We got all 5,000 units up and running within 3 months.”

When it came to training the on-site staff, Corri found easy buy-in and positive feedback for Yardi Voyager 7S.

“I have a lot of people on my team who I have worked with Yardi software before, and it’s a lot easier to get everybody’s buy in when they like the product,” she said.

“The thing that my staff loves is that it’s one platform, so you do everything in one place. It’s so easy. The owners like it because they are on different types of computers and operating systems. Everyone is happy, whether they are on a Mac or a PC.”

To further streamline workflow efficiency, Villa Serena’s properties then began using Yardi CHECKScan, and are currently in transition to the Yardi Maintenance package, with its convenient mobile functionality, to the maintenance teams.

“They never had check scanners before. So when we implemented CHECKScan, all the time not spent driving to the bank was saved. It was beyond me that they were still driving to the bank,” she said. “And now, with the introduction of the maintenance package, the team will be using smartphones in the field to track and manage work orders. Currently those requests are created in Yardi, but are not pushed out to the field with mobile functionality.”

With so much progress in just a year on the job, imagine what Corri can do for Villa Serena’s operations and systems in the years ahead!

Learn more about Villa Serena at http://www.villaserenacommunities.com/

Learn more about Yardi at http://www.yardi.com