Kids Corner

Managing a multifamily community where there are a high volume of children can sometimes be a challenge. Embrace the fact that you are near a school or that you have three bedroom apartment homes at your community. Here are a few things that I do to create a sense of community and involve the children that live there. Make it fun and creative!

1. Have coloring pages in your clubhouse and have a monthly coloring contest with a small prize like coloring book and crayons.
2. Ask the Police Department to come out and sign up each child for an I.D. or give a speech about bike safety. Make an event out of it with cupcakes and juice. Invite parents to come out so they can receive great tips from the police about how to keep their child safe.
3. Purchase sunscreen especially for children and put your logo sticker on them. Hand them out at the pool.
4. Keep ice cream handy in the freezer and hand out at the pool to the kids. Let them know it’s for following the pool rules and being good while swimming.
5. Invite the Girl Scouts to sell cookies in your clubhouse.
6. Purchase T-Shirts with your website or logo on them in child sizes and hand them out to residents at events
7. Send out a Direct mailer with the Back to School theme.
8. Advertise in the school newspapers or in the Football programs
9. Purchase a banner and ask the high school if you can place it on the fence at the football games or softball games.
10. Ask if you can sponsor a popwarner team and your Community can be advertised on their T-Shirts.

11. Create a good grades rewards program. Have the children bring in there report card and give out small treats or gifts for A’s and B’s.
12. During the Christmas holiday I put an old style mailbox in my clubhouse that I painted red and called it Santa Mail! Kids put their letters to Santa in it. I made copies of preprinted letters with the heading Dear Santa so all they had to do was fill in what they wanted and drop the letter in the box. I kept a box of candy canes near the mail box so they could have a treat after they dropped off their letter.

Engage with the kids and create a sense of community!