Developing investment and property management software since 1984, Yardi, world leader in the real estate technology sector, has entered the French market with the opening of a Paris office. Richard Gerritsen, regional director for Europe, explains what the company intends to bring to the French real estate sector in this interview, which was first published in Business Immo Europe. Business Immo: What is Yardi proposing to the French real estate sector? Richard Gerritsen: We don’t consider ourselves a software company anymore, but a technology partner that provides solutions and services to support the activities of investment and asset managers. We provide the dashboards, the reports and the data that our clients need to make their decisions, which means we provide more than just software. Where we traditionally focused on the back-office activities, we are now completely focused on providing insight on the performance and the health of the portfolio, whether it is more on the day-to-day asset management functions such as lease or vacancy levels, or at a higher strategic level, on the performance of the assets. BI: Yardi has opened an office in Paris. What is your plan for France? RG: Our clients have properties in 29 countries across Europe, where we have seen an increased interest in high-quality modern technology helping asset managers. Over the last two years, we have spent a lot of time in France, which is now the fastest-growing country on the continent for the adoption of Yardi technology. Because we have high expectations for the continued growth of Yardi in France, we feel the time is right to open an office in Paris. BI: How does Yardi differentiate itself from its competitors in France? RG: Traditionally, the French real estate market has been served with software firms that...

Real estate asset management firms are facing extraordinary challenges in the aftermath of the COVID-19 outbreak. Some may emerge from the crisis relatively unscathed. Others might not be so fortunate. Social distancing requirements and work-from-home strategies, prompted by COVID-19, have rapidly amplified the importance of operational and financial data, its accessibility and team connectivity. What matters almost more than the data itself, however, is the means of obtaining it efficiently and using it effectively to benefit clients, investors and other stakeholders. That’s not easily done without the right technology. In the world of real estate asset management, data comprises information that reveals a portfolio’s health, such as revenues, debt, risk, occupancy and sales, along with property-level operations such as energy consumption and accounts receivable. Two distinct groups need this data: operations groups tasked with effective management of the portfolio, property and tenants; and those who focus primarily on investors along with the organisation’s tactical and strategic issues. Some systems compile data from multiple disparate systems, making usable data a moving target. This approach – which prevailed in most property management industry vertical markets until the last couple of decades — is complicated, cumbersome and prone to error. For asset and operations managers to remain nimble, act proactively, anticipate and react decisively, they need a way to stabilise and gain instant access to it. That’s why connectivity is the key value proposition in asset management and the reason that sophisticated yet user-friendly asset management software applications that collect, process and apply such data across the asset management lifecycle are increasingly relevant. All user groups benefit when the data their business depends on is readily available. Fortunately for them, today’s asset management technology platforms assimilate all asset management information at the property and portfolio levels and...

Our previous article explored key portfolio risk mitigation challenges faced by real estate firms amid today’s uncertain market conditions and the likelihood that future income streams will fundamentally change. This time we’ll examine ways to help businesses that are currently forced to operate in a very different manner and environment for the foreseeable future. The ability of those now working from home to maintain productivity, collaboration, informed decision-making and productive action will be tested to the limit – not the least by kids running riot in many households! Mitigating risks associated with working from home requires: Adopting technology infrastructure that enables collaboration and process continuity. Addressing capital transactions and investor queries satisfactorily. Understanding the impact on reporting when data is drawn from multiple sources and collections systems and processed by multiple people. Successfully transitioning fund raising, normally handled in person by general partners, into a remote undertaking. Reliable and immediate access to key performance indicators from all business operations, from tenant transactions to the investor level. You might also want to consider how working from home now might reshape how you conduct business in the future (e.g., more videoconferencing, less travel, more remote viewing of properties, the potential to reduce carbon emissions). We don’t know how long the pandemic will run and thus delay the return to normal working patterns. Could demand for office space tail off permanently, for example? Real estate investment managers can gain the necessary data transparency, control and understanding of their investment data in a remote work environment just as they do in the office – with a single connected platform that allows collaboration between teams, while centralising all their key financial and operational real estate metrics, even if outsourced, for analysis, reporting and decision-making. Automating the real estate fund...

The largest Yardi Advanced Solutions Conference (YASC) to date for Yardi’s European clients, with more than 490 guests in attendance, featured learning, networking and fun in London on November 20 and 21. YASC is a global Yardi event where clients can expand their knowledge of Yardi’s solutions. Clients gain detailed insight into the Yardi product solutions they use, the Yardi development roadmap and newly launched solutions. They also have the chance to speak with other Yardi users and obtain one-on-one advice from Yardi product specialists at Knowledge Central. With more than 100 classes to choose from, in nine role-based tracks, clients can dive deep into technology that supports the needs of a variety of real estate asset types. New to YASC Europe this year, attendees enjoyed a mainstage panel session which featured coworking entrepreneurs Charlie Green of The Office Group; Giles Fuchs of Office Space in Town; and Chris Armstrong of mixed-use operator Get Living. The panel discussed alternatives to traditional commercial real estate. Chaired by Justin Harley, director of coworking and residential at Yardi, the panel dissected two components for running flexible workspaces: putting the member first and integrating a solid technology management platform.     Vox Pop! Several clients took part in our Vox Pop station to share what they were loving most about YASC. Here’s what some of them had to say: “I absolutely love this conference – we send people every year. You can learn about how to automate operations and how to expand your services.” -Adam McGrath, Northern Trust “It’s great to meet lots of different people from Europe who use Yardi and it’s great to be here learning from all the technical experts.” -Georgia-Rose Rochester, Grosvenor Estate Management Limited “I’m particularly interested in learning about Yardi Elevate and...

Editor’s note: reprinted with permission from Firestarters – Provada Edition. How to handle and collect available data is becoming a key competitive advantage in real estate, says Richard Gerritsen, regional director for Yardi in Europe. The quality of said data is essential.  The real estate industry currently faces a watershed moment. “We are in the middle of an explosion of the volume of available data. Tenant apps and all other proptech solutions are worth nothing without the data. The upside is that it is easy to get the data, but at the same time collecting it is also the most difficult – and boring – part,” Gerritsen recently told me. As the real estate industry becomes increasingly digitalised, the quality of data will become ever more important, says Gerritsen. “You could argue that data is the most crucial part of the business. We are living in the data era and it is such a big part of the real estate industry. Any proptech solution tries to add value based on the data already available. Without good-quality data, the value of a proptech solution is limited in a best-case scenario. If you can’t guarantee that the data is good, you can lay dozens of apps over it, but it won’t be a sustainable solution. Those who say it is too much of an effort to bring it together will not succeed.” Gerritsen provides the following example to illustrate the importance of getting the details right. “If I log into a tenant app and discover that the lease information is not correct, that I have logged into unit 24 instead of 23, or that the app doesn’t know me at all, that is really bad. In the past 20 years, those types of errors were commonplace,...