When the management of an apartment community changes, it can be jarring. Whether it’s preparing for a lease-up or management change on a stabilized property, the process comes with a lot of question marks for owners, investors, residents and the on-site team, if one is already in place.

Bell Partners, which manages over 60,000 units nationwide, understood that point and decided to do something about it. A few years ago, they created a new position — Transition Manager — and Lindsay Zaleski, Regional Transition Manager, was one of the first to fill it.

“The ‘transition’ in my title is the key,” she said. “When Bell is hired to manage a stabilized property, my role is to help get the property running to Bell’s standards with no disruption of service. If we are working on a property that won't open for a year, you're not going to hire a community manager yet. I fulfill any role and responsibility between those of the on-site team and regional manager.”

Another big part of Lindsay’s job is helping pitch business opportunities and respond to requests for proposals (RFPs). During the presentation, she defines key aspects of her unique role.

“A lot of clients find my role pretty interesting, because most other companies don’t offer a similar role,” she said.

In addition, Lindsay is responsible for making on-site staffing decisions, completing market surveys, reviewing vendor agreements — “and everything in between.” However, one of her most important responsibilities is ensuring a smooth transition for residents if the property is already stabilized.

She and her team take the time to notify every resident, through email and flyers, about the management change, and let them know who Bell is, what the company is all about, and assure the people who live in the community that Bell and its employees are there to help. To ensure there is no lapse in service, they generally overstaff a property during the early days of a management transition.

“We find out what’s important to the residents so they get a good feeling about us and know that we are here to make their living experience as hassle-free as possible,” she said.

In a recent management transition in Raleigh, she and her team threw a huge pool party for residents on the second weekend Bell was on-site to show how much Bell appreciates them as residents.

“We recently completed a transition in Nashville,” she added. “In the first week, residents came to us and said, ‘We can already see a change and we are so excited.’ We took care of issues that they had been having for several months. That's what's Bell is all about. We give it our all.”

Lindsay began her career in the multifamily industry as a leasing agent while she was in college. Her original plan was to go to law school. By the time she was finished with her undergraduate degree, however, she had already built a successful career.

“I was doing so well that I decided not to go to law school,” she said. “I was already loving it. I'm a huge people person, and anytime I get to be on-site and around residents, prospects or the staff, I'm all for it. I have a really big heart, so when I get to see people excited about where they are going to live and excited about their futures, I get excited too. It's rewarding to me. I haven't looked back.”

Now, after quickly proving herself within the last five years with Bell and working her way up through the ranks, Lindsay is about to wrap up work on a two-property transition in Cincinnati, Ohio. The deal consists of one stabilized property right in the heart of downtown, and a lease-up that is so close to the stabilized property “you could throw a baseball at it.”

The first residents moved in to the lease-up in mid-March, and Lindsay was there to assist. She helped coordinate the entire effort for both communities, working with different departments on updates to the websites, contracts and more. She helped train the staff and was in contact with the residents to make sure they were happy during the transition.

“People don't like change,” Lindsay said. “Anytime there is a change in management, you usually have some resident concerns. We want residents to be happy. We come in strong from the beginning, and let our residents know what level of customer service they can expect from us right from the start.”