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Case Study

First Garden City Homes - HomeMaster

After 20 years of its previous housing management system, the organisation chose to modernise its services - and after a competitive procurement process, it chose Aareon HomeMaster.

Taking just 7 months to implement, FGCH quickly saw business improvements, including helping them to take tenant satisfaction from mid-60% to high-70%. 

Incredible Outcomes

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Tenant Satisfaction

Helped increase tenant satisfaction from mid-60% to high-70% within two quarters post-implementation.
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Operational Efficiency

Achieved with reduced reliance on spreadsheets and legacy bolt-ons, and simplified IT management with the SaaS platform 
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Real-Time Visibility

Clear visibility of communications and compliance tasks - which wasn't available in its previous systems
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Excellent Aareon Customer Support

'The best I've ever had' - Mike Parsons, Residence Experience Director noted, with issues resolved in hours or days, instead of weeks 
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"We trusted the process.

The HomeMaster team had done similar migrations over 40 times over the previous few years, and there was no reason it wouldn’t work as well for us.”



Mike Parson

Residence Experience Director

About First Garden City Homes

First Garden Cities Homes (FGCH) was formed on 1st March 2020 following the amalgamation of Howard Cottage Housing Association (HCHA) and Welwyn Garden City Housing Association (WGCHA).  

The two legacy organisations shared a combined 170 year history of providing homes and services to local people, with HCHA being formed in 1911 and WGCHA exactly fifty years later in 1961.  Both also shared a connection with the Garden City movement which continues to influence strategy today to ensure FGCH retains a strong independent outlook that allows FGCH be an organisation that is able to bring uniqueness.

 

Business Challenge


FGCH’s previous housing management solution had fallen behind.

“We were stuck with a legacy system that needed constant upkeep and bespoke work - it was becoming a burden.”

 Mike Parsons, Residence Experience Director 

  • IT time and cost – the on-premise platform required significant attention to keep it updated, and the IT resources could be better used to address other organisation initiatives. 

  • Slow processes – In order to carry out every day processes staff had to use multiple bolt-on modules and interfaces, making tasks time consuming and tedious.

  • Communication – There was limited transparency in communications and data management, and as tenant dissatisfaction was heavily linked to communication, processes needed to improve.

 

"The level of support has been exemplary - certainly the best I’ve ever had.”

– Mike Parsons , Residence Experience Director 

Why Aareon HomeMaster?

FGCH searched the market for a modern SaaS platform that would help it move from its legacy processes – and after a rigorous tender process, it chose HomeMaster. 

“HomeMaster stood out because it’s holistic - no bolt-ons, no interfacing headaches. It’s browser-based, intuitive, and gives staff a dashboard of their working life, that makes things easier for them. 

Important to us, its also CRM at the heart of the system – we wanted that, so we could improve tenant communication, and HomeMaster delivered that.”
- Mike Parsons, Residence Experience Director 

Implementation Experience

It took just 7 months to migrate FGCH from their existing housing management system to HomeMaster, with a smooth migration, go-live and support transition, as Mike explains:

  • Migration -  “We trusted the process. The HomeMaster team had done similar migrations over 40 times over the previous few years, and there was no reason it wouldn’t work as well for us.”
  • Go-live day -  “When it came to the actual switch-over, the go-live was the biggest non-event I’ve ever had! It just worked – no major technical issues, and staff found it very easy to learn and use.”  
  • Customer Support - “The level of support has been exemplary - certainly the best I’ve ever had.”
    – Mike Parsons, Residence Experience Director

Incredible Outcomes

Since going live, FGCH's have seen fantastic outcomes:

  • Tenant satisfaction scores rose from mid-60% to high-70% within two quarters post-implementation – not just from Home Master’s implementation, but from the collective efforts of the organisation to deliver improvements.
  • Real-time visibility into communications and compliance tasks are available, which hadn’t been previously.
  • Operational efficiency has been achieved with reduced reliance on spreadsheets and legacy bolt-ons, and simplified IT management with the SaaS platform.
  • Great Aareon support: “The best I’ve ever had,” noted Mike, with software issues resolved in hours or days instead of weeks.

Book a demo with us today.