In the real estate industry, managing costs effectively is crucial for success. One of the key tools in achieving this is the tour budget, which allows property managers to control the number of tours conducted for each property. This document provides a comprehensive overview of what a tour budget is, its importance, how it functions, and how to set it up for your active properties.

A tour budget is a feature that allows you to set a limit on the number of completed tours for each individual property you manage. This is essential for several reasons, with the primary goal being to control the costs associated with property showings. You can establish your tour budget based on your desired spending for showings or the estimated number of tours needed to successfully rent out the property. It is advisable to set the budget lower initially, as you can always increase the number of showings later, but you cannot decrease the budget once the tours have been completed.

Establishing a limit on the number of completed tours not only helps prevent overspending but also provides an opportunity to review any applications received. Additionally, the tour limit allows for the analysis of tour reports to identify recurring themes that may explain why a property has not been rented. This information can facilitate discussions with property owners and encourage them to make necessary adjustments to enhance the property's appeal and expedite the rental process.

Once a property reaches its designated number of completed and paid tours, meaning those conducted by Showdigs agents, the showings at this property will automatically pause. Tours conducted in-house (taken over), or self-guided tours will not count towards the tour limit.

Showings at this property will remain paused for five days, after which it will automatically be deactivated. If you wish to continue showing the property, you will need to manually resume showings.

Note: When your property reaches its tour budget and you want to continue showing it, you must update the tour budget to reflect the additional number of showings desired. For example, if your original tour budget was set to 5 showings and you wish to add 4 more, you will need to increase the budget by 4, to a total of 9 showings

During the pause period, we will still receive incoming inquiries. Prospects will be able to schedule tours for after the pause period, as we allow scheduling up to ten days in advance. If the property is deactivated, any prospects who had scheduled tours in advance will be notified that the property is no longer available.

It is common for prospects to schedule tours but not attend due to no-shows, cancellations, or tours being canceled by Showdigs due to lack of confirmation. It is important to continue scheduling appointments to ensure that tours are lined up in case you decide to resume showings at the property. For example, if you have a tour limit of 5 tours but 9 people scheduled a tour, once the completed and paid tour limit is reached, we will inform the prospects that their tour has been canceled. We will only exceed the tour budget if there are back-to-back tours, as we don't cancel tour on a short notice (within less than an hour from when showings are paused or deactivated).

When enabling showings with agents, you will be prompted to set a tour limit. By default the limit is set to 10 tour but you can adjust it during the activation process.

If you have already activated your property and want to edit the tour limit, you can easily do it, by following these steps:

1. Select the property from the property page.

2. Click the Edit button.

3. Select the Showings section

4. On the "Set tours limit" part, adjust the number to your needs for this unit.

5. Scroll down and click the Save button.