Dear Rental Property Owner:
It’s another storm season here in South Florida, and we’d like to take a moment to remind you of the best way to protect your property:
The key to hurricane preparedness is addressing shuttering concerns yourself, well in advance of any storm.
Experienced Storm Response
With all the storms that have hit Florida since we opened in 1985, you can imagine your HPM staff is very adept at hurricane response!
Our backup systems include generators, multiple cellular phone providers to ensure optimal service coverage, fuel stockpiles and standby wireless internet service to enable us to communicate with owners, tenants and vendors when utilities are down after the storm.
Take Action Early
Hurricanes watches and warnings frequently afford Floridians no more than 48 hours to secure their homes. With a limited staff and hundreds of homes under management, HPM is unable to guarantee hurricane preparation assistance to any owner. While some tenants may be able to shutter a home, many may not. Owners are advised to make provisions to secure their own properties, possibly with a local friend, neighbor or relative.
While HPM is unable to guarantee ANY owner that their property will be secured, our preparation routines generally include securing homes in order of the following priority:
1. Vacant homes with automated or accordion type shutters installed
2. One story homes with removable shutters
3. Two story homes with removable shutters
4. Occupied units with tenants who request assistance
Due to obvious time constraints, HPM will not always be able to honor last minute requests to direct vendors to purchase or install plywood at a property.
Neither HPM nor HPM’s vendors assumes any liability for the performance of any shutters or plywood, quality of installations, and/or damages incurred from shutter failure!
Shutters will be taken down when time permits, and generally only AFTER all emergency issues have been resolved at all of our managed properties.
Frequently several of HPM’s vendors will assist in shuttering properties, including carpet cleaning vendors, painters and the like. For this reason, labor rates for shutter installation and removal often vary depending on which vendor performs the work. HPM cannot assure owners which vendors are available to do the work and therefore HPM cannot guarantee pricing for shuttering!
The key to hurricane preparedness is addressing your shuttering concerns yourself, well in advance of any storm. Accordian shutter tracks should be cleaned and lubricated frequently, and the owner is encouraged to attend to this, or request it be performed by HPM during the annual property review (APR).
