Executive Summary
Juniper Investment Group faced a common challenge in the multifamily sector: delivering strong portfolio financial performance and exceptional resident experiences while managing staffing shortages and heightened consumer expectations. By implementing EliseAI’s conversational AI products, Juniper Investment Group drove improved leasing and collections performance, streamlined their maintenance operations, and delivered ~$15 per unit per month ROI benefit from AI that convinced their leadership team to fully embrace an automation-driven approach to property management.
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Introducing Juniper Investment Group
Juniper Investment Group, a leading vertically integrated real estate company founded in 2000, has a portfolio of approximately 50 multifamily properties across Texas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma with over $800M in assets under management. With a longtime track record of outperforming the market, Juniper Investment Group has consistently delivered both strong financial performance and leveraged its in-house property management arm—First Choice Management Group—to deliver outstanding resident experiences to its communities across the Sunbelt.
However, like many other vertically integrated real estate companies, Juniper Investment Group wasn’t immune to post-pandemic pressures and changing consumer expectations. While there was initial apprehension about implementing AI at Juniper Investment Group, Zoe Rogers, COO, Molly Bryant, VP, and a small group formed an internal “Innovation Committee” to look into new tech solutions that could improve the quality of life for both their residents and agents.
Dealing with Post-Pandemic Challenges
The challenges Juniper Investment Group faced are ones that many in the multifamily space are familiar with: difficulty hiring and retaining top talent, managing heightened resident expectations, and the shortcomings of conventional property management technology. Its struggle finding high-quality staff spanned from onsite office teams to maintenance techs, particularly in some of its smaller markets. Residents, used to the on-demand nature of apps like Amazon Prime and Uber, expect answers to inquiries around the clock, creating an increased burden on property staff.
Difficult rollout experiences with other technology vendors instilled a deliberate and careful mindset around technology deployment for Juniper Investment Group’s leadership team, which the Innovation Committee had to manage when rolling out new tools. They knew they needed to find an AI partner that would work to understand their pain points and consistently deliver exceptional service. Fortunately, they chose to partner with the EliseAI team.
Enter EliseAI
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EliseAI is the leading provider of AI and automation solutions designed for the needs of modern multifamily operators, with over 415 different organizations utilizing EliseAI’s products in millions of units around the US. EliseAI’s products automate the most tedious parts of the entire resident lifecycle, from tour follow ups to application help to renewals and more, enabling onsite teams to focus on building meaningful connections with residents while delivering improved financial performance and ROI on tech spend.
Juniper Investment Group first learned about EliseAI from the leadership team at a 50,000 unit owner/operator that currently uses EliseAI’s products, who recommended EliseAI both for the quality of their AI solutions and the high-touch nature of their customer service team. The Juniper Investment Group team saw an opportunity to pilot a tool that could be easily scaled across its diverse portfolio of communities throughout the Sunbelt. In contrast to previous vendors that sold a product and then provided minimal follow-up, EliseAI delivered dedicated ongoing support, ensuring each property’s unique needs were met and quickly resolving any bumps that came up during the rollout.
Deploying AI Across Juniper Investment Group’s Portfolio
Juniper Investment Group initially launched its AI pilot across 14 properties, spanning from a brand-new lease-up in suburban Houston to smaller communities in cities like Tulsa and Lubbock. Juniper was very intentional with the selection of communities for its pilot, choosing properties within various locations, asset classes, and housing types to measure the overall efficacy of AI. For Zoe, Molly and the Innovation Committee, working closely with the First Choice team to gather feedback from onsite teams and promptly address any knowledge gaps went a long way to ensuring the pilot was successful. By taking a collaborative approach that emphasized the importance of consistently updating EliseAI’s property information, onsite teams soon realized the platform could handle the bulk of repetitive tasks and quickly bought into using AI, recognizing that it freed them to focus on high-value engagements with residents and prospects.
The impact of implementing AI was felt almost immediately. At one of the pilot properties, a manager was able to handle day-to-day operations on her own after a hybrid leasing assistant departed, as EliseAI stepped in to manage lead follow-ups around the clock. Juniper chose not to fill the vacated role for the time being, recognizing that AI served as a force multiplier that enabled the remaining team member to handle work that originally would’ve taken two agents. Another pilot property, a Class A community in Houston, noted that using AI had become almost a requirement to stay competitive in the high-end of the market, given that other nearby properties were also implementing AI-driven solutions.
With EliseAI automating everything from post-tour follow-ups to work order creation, Juniper’s onsite teams gained time back in their day to focus on customer service and resident experience, ultimately boosting lead-to-lease conversions and improving overall resident satisfaction rates across the pilot properties.
Measuring the Impact of AI for Juniper Investment Group
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Implementing AI across Juniper's multifamily portfolio drove ~$15 per unit per month ROI, based on a combination of conversion improvements, reduced operating expenses through tech stack consolidation, flexible staffing savings, and delinquency reduction.
Implementing EliseAI has allowed Juniper to efficiently capitalize on the 42% of their leads that came in after hours, reducing average prospect response time to under 5 minutes. The value of this responsiveness found reflection in the improved lead-to-tour and lead-to-lease rates, which exceed industry averages. The team estimated that EliseAI has generated ~40 incremental leases per month across the 14 pilot properties, driving $50,000 in incremental value - a topline benefit equivalent to $14 per unit per month. With AI managing their rent collection outreach, Juniper Investment Group also drove their delinquency rates from 2.45% pre-pilot down to 2.06%, collecting more money faster.
Juniper was also able to consolidate various parts of their technology stack, phasing out three spot solutions. Replacing a mass texting service, a first-response chatbot, and a calls answering service generated a reduced spend benefit equal to $1 per unit per month.
Key Learnings from Juniper Investment Group’s Success
Juniper Investment Group discovered that the success of an AI rollout depends on consistent engagement from both corporate and onsite teams, as well as ongoing operational support from the AI provider. While some properties needed extra support in adjusting phone trees or clarifying maintenance workflows, the ability of the team to fine-tune the information EliseAI’s products incorporated in its responses ensured the AI was able to solve over 85% of all prospect and resident inquiries. Molly, Zoe, and the Juniper and First Choice team came to embrace AI not as a replacement for staff, but as a complementary force that empowers their teams to operate more efficiently and outperform other communities in their markets.
Looking to the Future of Juniper Investment Group and EliseAI Partnership
Following the pilot’s success, Juniper elected to expand the deployment of EliseAI’s solutions throughout its entire portfolio. Juniper is excited to continue exploring applications of AI for improved maintenance operations, including triaging emergency after-hours calls, providing better context to maintenance techs for work orders, and providing richer analytics on recurring repairs for improved capital deployment.
By utilizing EliseAI’s solutions, Juniper Investment Group successfully overcame initial skepticism around AI and technology vendors to uncover new operational efficiencies across its portfolio. The partnership drove immediate improvements, including 24/7 leasing support, improved average work order resolution times, and decreased delinquency rates, as well as long-term benefits in data tracking and portfolio-wide analytics. As Juniper continues to modernize and differentiate its approach to property management, the collaboration with EliseAI stands out as a key driver of improved financial performance, tangible ROI, and better prospect and resident experiences at all of its communities.
