As survey after survey shows the changing demographics of internet access among tenants and the different ways they do so, it is becoming apparent that for many younger tenants, their smartphone is the internet and that they feel no need for any other devices to access the internet. Furthermore, ‘Generation Y’ is much more likely to use tools such as WhatsApp and Kik to communicate, instead of traditional email or SMS.
While most housing providers’ websites can be viewed adequately on the small screen of a typical smartphone, few sites offer any degree of optimisation for smartphones and few housing providers offer iOS or Android apps for areas such as repairs, tenant communications, payments and enquiries.
The time and cost of developing dedicated housing apps is very low compared with other technology implementations, and the cost of setting up accounts on new platforms like WhatsApp and Kik, is almost nothing and they can happily co-exist with housing providers’ other communication channels.
