Latest Events

Halloween is just around the corner, and it is a great time to create a fun experience for the kids of the community! Communities can section off a parking area where residents can pull up and participate in a Trunk or Treat contest where they are encouraged to use their creativity to decorate their trunks/tailgates and win a prize for the best trunk. Usually the participants will bring candy and goodies to hand out to “visitors” same as they would for trick or treating. The trunk or treat should last about an hour to an hour and a half depending on participation. Some ideas: The costume parade would occur immediately after the winner of the best trunk is announced—kids AND PETS should be strongly encouraged to participate. Property employees should round...

It’s that time of year! Cook-offs everywhere are starting their initial planning stages. In this industry, cook-offs are a great way to engage your residents and to get your whole community involved in something yummy. ‘Tis the season for chili. If you do a quick Google search, millions of results appear for award winning chili recipes. Since they are not in short supply, this is the perfect fall cook-off theme. Whether your community has participated in chili cook-offs in the past or you are a first-timer, here are five tips that will spice up your community’s cooking event. 1. Request Sign-Ups You don’t want to launch a chili cook-off without having an idea of how many cooks and how many tasters will be in showing. Have a sign-up sheet in your main office. To receive higher visibility, start promoting your...

We have often said that the one differentiator that your competitors can never replicate are your residents themselves. And an extension of that is their apartments! So if we can highlight your residents pads, then we have showcased the community in an entirely unique way. That is the inspiration behind an Apartment Decorating Contest, where we not only want to engage our residents and shine a spotlight on the creative and beautiful apartment decorations, but also use the results as a way to inspire prospects to live at our communities. The Contest Overall, the plan is fairly simple: Encourage residents to showcase their apartments, whether it is just one room, or every room, for a chance to win the Apartment Decorating Contest. Tell them they can submit several pictures, including: · ...

My kids just got their first Hungry Hungry Hippos game (which was sadly pretty flimsy compared to when I was growing up!), and they are obsessed. But today, we found a live action version of Hungry Hungry Hippos, which would make a wonderful game at an apartment community party! So take a look and tell us what you think below!

One of the most popular event on ResidentEvents.com is our Cardboard Drive in Movie for kids. Kids, just like cats, just seem to love to get into boxes, which is why whenever an appliance is ever purchased, the kids get a brand new "present" in the form of giant box they can play in. So it's time to take that idea and expand it to a community-wide fort building event! Start planning today and save all the big boxes that come to the community when you order new appliances, and when residents move in, tell them that if they have any large boxes after the move, they can donate them to the future community fort. After that, all you have to do is let your creativity run wild - enlist the residents in the build job and create mazes, secret...

You are locked in a room with time ticking down. There are clues all around you, but can you piece together the puzzle to escape in time? "Escape Rooms" are becoming incredibly popular throughout the country, and would make for an excellent team building event for your office staff or residents! We tested out the Houston Escape Room, and had a great time working out the clues to beat the room. (Here is a list of Escape Rooms throughout the country) Our group had only 4 people, so they teamed us up with another group of 5 people, which actually helped to prove one of the great benefits of this event - team building! We went from not knowing any of them to feeling pretty close to them after just one hour. We were forced to work together to share...

We always talk about creating wonderful curb appeal at our apartment communities, and this idea takes on an area that we normally can't make as much of an impact: apartment balconies! Many times, when residents move in they think about what furniture they will have within the apartment itself, but often the balcony gets somewhat forgotten in the process, so this is an opportunity to give a facelift to one of the most visible aspects of your property. The idea is simple - Create a contest throughout one property, or throughout your entire portfolio where residents are encouraged to give their own balcony a makeover, hopefully beautifying the property in the process. To help with the process, you can make a deal with local plant nurseries or outdoor furniture locations to advertise their store in exchange for a discount specifically for your...

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the pool...   Set up a movie projector next to the pool and screen the classic, JAWS!  Provide inner tubes, so that residents can lounge in the pool as the Great White terrorizes Amity Island.  If you are feeling adventurous, have one person troll the pool depths, nipping at toes during the most tense movie moments. Before the movie starts, add in some games of Sharks and Minnows to get the theme going!   We also found this awesome watermelon shark you can try out! (Idea inspired from:  http://texasskiranch.com/events/jaws-on-the-water-by-alamo-draft-house)

I recently stumbled upon a system called the 21 Day Fix, which is essentially a group fitness program that attempts to get everybody on the right track with exercise and nutrition over a 3 week period. Before I begin, however, I want to stress that this is not meant to be a sales pitch for the system, as I haven't seen the entire 21 days in action, but the initial concept was so compelling to be implemented in an apartment community, I couldn't help but share. This program takes a community approach to self-controlled workouts and nutrition. At least in the situation I saw, it was sold by an independent rep, similar to how people sell Tupperware, Mary Kaye, etc. But rather than selling strictly a product, this is both a set of products as well as a community approach to fitness. Each person gets...

Take a look at graphs on pet ownership over time, and you will see massive increases over the past 25 years. And not only is pet ownership rising, but people's connections with their pets has gotten even stronger. Pets are no longer just animals, they are their "kids", whose "parents" dote on them just as much as they do on those less furry, human kids. This also gives opportunities to apartment communities to take "pet friendly" well beyond simply accepting pets, creating an entire suite of services and activities that actively welcome pets. A pet costume party is one of those quirky events that seem so incredibly awkward to some, but still drive a ton of interest from those who love their pets! The idea is simple: Set up a day for residents to bring in their pets to the community...