Optimizing Revenue Through Smarter Renewals

If the past few years taught our industry anything, it’s this: renewals are the quiet powerhouse in the revenue stack. In a recent Summit session, Amy Roos brought together operators and product leaders, Robert Jones and Mattie Langford from Entrata, plus Chris Amrich (B.Hom Student Living) and Joni Warfield (IDM), to talk about how renewals moved from “back-office task” to reliable growth lever.

The headline? Renewal trade-outs often outperform new-lease trade-outs in normal markets, and that’s before you count vacancy loss and turn costs. Keep one more resident each month and the impact to NOI and asset value adds up fast.

What separates the best operators isn’t a single tactic; it’s an operating posture. Chris started with student housing, where renewal success begins on day one: a slick lease signing, a clean move-in, clear communication, and on-site moments that feel human. Joni echoed the same principle in conventional multifamily, with one twist: the Phoenix reality. In supply-heavy submarkets where prospects see weeks of free rent, renewal offers must be hyper-localized. Blanket “+3%” increases are out; a unit-by-unit strategy that weighs expiration timing, trade-out to today’s asking rents, historical retention, and the hard costs of downtime is in.

Timing has shifted, too. In student housing, renewals can launch within weeks of move-in to get ahead of the market and capture intent early. That early signal matters just as much in conventional: knowing 60–90 days out whether someone plans to stay changes your exposure plan, pricing posture, and staffing priorities.

This is where Entrata is leaning in. Revenue Intelligence surfaces a Likelihood to Renew score so teams can act before exposure creeps up. And a small but mighty enhancement (capturing renewal intent directly from emails sent) puts a simple “I’m in / I’m out / Not sure” signal into both the Renewals view and dashboards. It’s not a survey every quarter; it’s live sentiment from real interactions.

On compliance, Robert walked through Entrata’s Rent Control capabilities. You can configure what’s regulated, e.g., base rent alone or rent plus parking, internet, and other fees, etc.and those guardrails apply automatically when offers are generated. Upcoming controls around “how often” rent can change sit on top of a new rent history view, so teams get protection without calculators and workarounds. The renewal offer itself has been redesigned to be shorter and smarter, with specials and concessions pulled in automatically. (And yes, expired offers are easier to find, extend, or regenerate.)

The conversation naturally turned to AI. Mattie sketched where we’re headed: using Entrata’s Eli and our sentiment layer across everyday communications, including service request notes, messages, and interactions, to spot degrading sentiment in time to fix it. From there, centralized workflows can recommend the next best action: a welcome nudge for new move-ins, a check-in after a rocky work order, or, at renewal time, a recommended package with the right incentive, the right channel (text, email, call), and even the right time of day. The goal isn’t to replace humans; it’s to give site teams back the hours they need for the conversations that actually change decisions.

If there’s a throughline to all of this, it’s that renewals are no longer the endcap of a lease—they’re the outcome of a year-long relationship. Start strong, watch the signals, localize the offer, automate the guardrails, and let AI handle the heavy lift so your teams can do what they do best. With Entrata’s Revenue Intelligence, Rent Control, and evolving AI workflows, operators can improve trade-outs, reduce exposure, and protect NOI without burying teams in manual effort.

Want a walkthrough or to turn on intent capture in your renewal emails? Your Entrata rep can help.