The best time to set up a parking program is before the first resident moves in. There are no current residents to win over, every lease can carry the parking terms from day one, and every resident registers their vehicle as they move in. Wait until the community is full, and you’re introducing a new rule to people who signed without it.
That’s true whether you’re opening one community or running several lease-ups across a region. In this guide, you’ll find what to decide about parking before you open, how to keep registration accurate when you have 40-50 new move-ins a month, and how to handle the things a stabilized property never deals with: contractors on the lot, tour traffic, and residents who moved in before the program existed.
Key Takeaways
- A lease-up is the easiest time to start a parking program, because no current resident’s terms change.
- Decide permit types, per-unit limits, guest rules and reserved spaces before the first lease is signed, so the lease and the move-in packet can carry them.
- Make vehicle registration a move-in step. Residents register their plate from their phone, so your team isn’t keying in 40+ vehicles by hand.
- If early residents moved in before the program started, ParkM recommends enrolling them forfree until their lease ends. Ultimately, your property management team gets to make that call.
- Give parking concessions as a free permit for a named unit, not as “free parking”, so every car on the lot is still registered.
Why is a lease-up the easiest time to start a parking program?
Because nobody’s deal changes. At a stabilized property, the toughest conversation about a new parking program is with the resident who’s parked for free for three years and now hears there’s a permit.
At a lease-up, that resident doesn’t exist yet. New residents read the parking terms in the same lease as the rent and the pet policy. Parking is part of the deal from the start, not a change to it.
That’s why stabilized properties usually enroll current residents for free: only new move-ins pay until the current resident’s lease renews. It works, but the paid program only reaches the whole community as leases turn over. Our guide to how grandfathering works covers that rollout step by step. A lease-up skips most of this process.
The timing matters for your numbers too. At a stabilized property, parking revenue lags behind occupancy while grandfathered residents work through their leases. At a lease-up, it grows with occupancy from the first move-in. For an owner watching NOI on a new asset, that’s ancillary revenue starting in year one instead of year two.
What should you decide about parking before the first move-in?
Settle everything a lease or a move-in packet needs to mention. Each of these gets harder to change once 50 residents have signed.
| Decision | What to settle | Why it’s easier before opening |
|---|---|---|
| Permit types | Resident, second vehicle, guest, reserved | Every lease can name them from the start |
| Limits per unit | A cap by unit or by leaseholder, such as two vehicles for a two-bedroom with two names on the lease | Nobody moves in with three cars expecting three permits |
| Guest rules | A nightly cap per unit, a cap across the property, and a limit on consecutive nights | Guest spaces don’t quietly become overflow resident parking |
| Reserved, covered or garage spaces | Which spaces are premium, and how residents get one | Your leasing team can offer them during pre-leasing instead of reassigning spaces later |
| What each permit costs | Your call. A second or third vehicle can cost more than the first | Residents see the price before they sign |
| Your enforcement partner | Which tow or boot company, when they patrol, and warnings before tows | Your partner is trained before the first car needs checking |
| Who never gets towed | Staff, vendors and contractors | Construction crews are still onsite for months |
Guest rules deserve extra attention in a new community. Without a consecutive-night limit, a resident’s “guest” can park in visitor spaces every night indefinitely. Our guide on how to stop guest parking abuse covers the usual patterns, and our visitor parking permits page shows how guest caps work in ParkM.
If you’re still choosing an enforcement partner, settle it before opening. Our guide to choosing a tow company for apartments lists what to check.
Pro Tip: Put the parking terms in the lease and on the move-in checklist, not only on a sign in the lot. A resident who read the parking rules when they signed can’t say nobody told them.
To see how this works across a portfolio, read what ParkM does for property managers.
How do you register vehicles when move-ins arrive 40-50 a month?
Make registration the resident’s job, done at move-in, from their own phone. In a busy lease-up month, your team is handing out keys, walking units and answering questions. Writing down plates, handing out hang tags and updating a spreadsheet is where details get missed.
One missed plate means one resident with a warning on their windshield they didn’t deserve. It also means one more tense conversation at the leasing desk.
With virtual parking permits, the license plate is the permit. There’s no sticker to hand over and no app to download. The resident enters their vehicle details online, and the permit is active the moment it’s issued. Your team sees every registration in the property manager portal as it comes in.
Three habits keep the list accurate through a lease-up:
- Add registration to the move-in checklist. Ask residents to register their vehicle before they get their keys, the same way they set up utilities.
- Compare registrations with move-ins every week. During peak months, check who’s registered against who’s moved in. ParkM can also audit registered vehicles against your rent roll on request.
- Warn before you enforce. Give new residents time to register, have your partner warn unregistered vehicles first, and only then start towing.
“We are very excited that so many of our residents have registered and we are still getting stragglers. But it has been an amazing rollout.”
Danielle Sankonis, Assistant Property Manager, Deertree Apartments and Town Homes, MD
Pro Tip: Print the QR code from your parking signs on the move-in checklist. Residents can then register at the leasing desk before they leave with their keys.
How do you handle contractors, vendors and tour traffic while the community is still being built?
Plan for them before anyone gets a warning. A lease-up lot is rarely just residents. Crews are finishing later buildings, vendors are in and out, and prospects are parking for tours.
- Put contractors and vendors on a no-tow list. ParkM lets you name staff, vendors and anyone else who should never be towed, so a crew’s truck isn’t treated like an unauthorized car.
- Keep tour parking out of the permit zone. Mark spaces near the leasing office for prospects, so a tour doesn’t end with a warning notice.
- Enforce where residents live. Start enforcement in finished, occupied areas and extend it as buildings deliver. Your partner can’t tow from a public road that runs through the community, so confirm where the private lot actually starts.
- Check your state’s signage rules. Some states require tow-away signs to be posted before any tow. Confirm the rules with your enforcement partner before the first warning.
Each of these is a phone call your leasing office won’t get from a general contractor or a prospect who just found a notice on their car.
What if some residents moved in before the program started?
Phased lease-ups often open the first building months before the last. If residents are already living there when the parking program starts, they signed without it. The same fairness question a stabilized property faces applies, just to fewer people.
ParkM recommends enrolling those residents for free until their lease ends. They register like everyone else, so their vehicles are on the permit list from day one. The permit charge applies once they renew. Some skip the free period and start charging right away to earn revenue sooner.
The earlier the program starts, the fewer residents you’ll need to grandfather. The grandfathering guide covers how to announce it to residents who are already there.
Should parking be part of your lease-up concessions?
It can be, as long as every car still gets registered. Free parking for the first few months is a common lease-up concession. The risk is in how it’s handled. If “free parking” means nobody registers, you’ve got unregistered cars on the lot from day one and no list for your enforcement partner to check.
A better way to offer it is a free permit for a named unit, for a set period. The resident gets the same deal, but their plate is on the permit list like everyone else’s. ParkM can issue a free permit to a specific unit as a concession. You can use the same tool later to close a renewal, and our guide to using parking revenue for amenities covers renewal concessions in more detail.
Pricing doesn’t have to be final on opening day, either. Once your program has run for 60 days, you can change permit prices and types at any time. Set a lease-up price, see how residents use the lot, and adjust.
Pro Tip: Write the end date of a parking concession into the concession terms. The resident knows when the free permit becomes a paid one, and your team doesn’t have to explain it later.
What does a parking program cost the property, and who runs it during lease-up?
ParkM is free to the property. There’s no setup cost and no monthly bill. Residents and guests pay for their own permits, and ParkM shares that revenue with the property. There’s no long-term contract, and 30 days’ notice ends it.
In a lease-up, support matters as much as cost. ParkM takes resident and guest support directly, seven days a week. So when a new resident asks “how do I register?”, the question goes to ParkM instead of to a leasing desk that’s already busy with move-ins.
To get started, ParkM needs a unit directory and a launch date. A launch coordinator, the resident communications, training for your onsite team and your enforcement partner, and 10 standard parking signs are included. How ParkM works lays out the launch from first announcement to enforcement.
ParkM isn’t a tow company. Your enforcement partner uses license plate recognition (LPR) on a phone to see which vehicles have a valid permit, and you set the terms with them directly. ParkM covers the cost of a wrongful tow, plus storage fees up to 24 hours, under its no-bad-tow guarantee.
If you’re running several lease-ups at once, one login covers every community in your portfolio, and each property manager sees only their own. You can set up the same program at each opening instead of starting from scratch.
“I’ve continued to recommend them as new properties have come into our portfolio because what they provide goes far beyond parking permits and revenue share.”
Tina Pike, Property Manager, Sofi Belmar, CO
Set it up once, before the first keys go out
A lease-up is the one time your parking program has no history to work around. Use it.
Residents who move in under clear rules don’t need convincing later. Your team gets a lot that works from day one, and your owners get parking revenue that grows with occupancy.
If you’ve got a community opening in the next few months, now’s the time to set this up. Book a demo and walk through the parking setup for your next lease-up.
Last reviewed October 2026.
