Are you ignoring 30% of the rate changes in your market?

Keeping up with competitor rate changes is oftentimes a time-consuming task for managers and operators, who put together competitor reports to help measure their position in the market and adjust rates accordingly. However, as more competitors rely on new technology and become more data-driven, ad-hoc reports will not suffice for operators who want to stay competitive. Ad-hoc or infrequent competitor reports can leave most with an incomplete view of rate trends in the market, making it difficult to react faster to changes and significantly impacting a store’s bottom line.

In highly competitive markets, and in markets where operators are implementing dynamic pricing, many operators are forced to evaluate competitor rate activity several times per week. But even then, these operators are only checking rates on weekdays, missing out on potential rate changes happening on the weekends. After all, weekends are the most popular time for moving and future tenants are looking for storage!

StorTrack examined daily rate activity for the U.S., Canada and the UK. The analysis showed that for the month of May, 32% of rate changes occurred during the weekend in the U.S. and UK. In Canada, 28% of rate changes happened on the weekends. Shown below is a breakdown of the findings, including number of stores currently tracked in each country, Average Daily Live Rates (the average number of rates available online each day), and Average Daily Rate Changes weekdays vs. weekends (the average number of rate changes made daily across all stores and unit types).

Average

Country

Stores

Daily Live Rates

Weekday Daily Rate Changes

Weekend Daily Rate Changes

Weekend Rate Changes

United States

53,234

362,551

52,151

48,965

32%

Canada

2,839

19,977

1,663

1,344

29%

United Kingdom

3,991

19,362

2,722

2,517

32%

So what does this mean? There are seven days in a week, so you should be looking at the rate changes and activity not only during the week but on the weekends too. In one week alone, you missed out on approximately 30% of the price changes that happened in your market.

Luckily there are tools and data available, like StorTrack’s Optimize platform to help you track this activity. Simply log in to the platform or schedule reports to be sent to managers and operators who should be actively tracking changes that can impact them directly and getting you one step closer to maximizing your optimal rental rates.

Curious about what you might be missing out on in your market? Find out now with an Optimize account!