In the multifamily real estate industry, coming up with a unique name for a new apartment, Built-To-Rent (BTR) or for-sale townhome or for-sale master-planned community development is an exciting process – and one of our favorite types of projects at YDM. But before you announce your new name, your due diligence is crucial to protecting your brand.

Inspiration

The name of your apartment or townhome community should reflect what you want tenants to feel when they come home every day. Trendy or classic? Vibrant or subdued? When prospective residents hear the name, is it something that reflects their style? Is it memorable? Do you want us to lean on local history?

Sometimes when clients come to us for naming, the interior design is already established, while at other times, the client wants the name and branding first, so the interiors reflect the unique name. In any case, it’s vitally important that the name fits with the look of the apartment community, inside and out.

Extensions

Depending on the location of your community, you may want to add on an extension with a geographic or neighborhood identifier, such as “South End” that instantly communicates to your audience where the community is located. This can also help with SEO when people are searching for apartments in particular neighborhoods.

While some clients might want single-word apartment community names, others may want to add on an extension such as “Gardens,” “Flats” or “Residences,” which evoke a feel for the apartment community beyond the original name. Renters who are seeking more space would definitely be attracted by “Townhomes” being added to a BTR community name and would serve as a differentiator to apartments.

Competitor Search

You may have found the perfect name for your community, fitting with the vibe and the neighborhood. But before you lock it down, make sure you do a search for competitors. Particularly in large metro areas, there may already be an apartment community in the market or state with a similar name. Also, if there is a prominent hotel, restaurant, real estate company or other business with that name, you may want to avoid it to prevent confusion in the marketplace. Some clients don’t care about non-real estate related business names, but we like to raise awareness of possible conflicts.

Trademark Database

While most apartment communities aren’t trademarked with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, some are, so it’s crucial that you search their trademark database to make sure that your community’s name isn’t a legal issue. We recommend working with a trademark attorney to do a full legal search and secure your community’s name to avoid any issues in the future. Although it may be an extra cost, it will be much more expensive to change the name once you have a website, signage and/or collateral already in place.

Secure Website Domain

When developing name concepts, we always research website domains. This ensures that there’s an easy domain available and occasionally reveals a competitor that didn’t come up during a Google search. Once you decide on a name, we recommend purchasing the domain – and any similar domains – right away to make sure someone else doesn’t first. Particularly in apartment development, it may be a year or more before you announce the project, but you don’t want to be in a situation where someone else purchases your domain. We have seen situations in which a developer didn’t heed our advice, waiting to purchase a domain, announced the project and a domain reseller purchased all similar domains and sold it back to the developer for a hefty fee.

PR Strategy

When you have chosen a name, secured a website domain and created plans for the apartment community, you should announce the project to create interest during construction. We recommend creating a PR strategy that includes the project announcement, ideally which would include renderings, before any signage goes up. If a reporter sees construction or a sign before there’s an official announcement, they may write their own story, with or without your input. Rather than playing defense, you can have complete control of your announcement by developing a PR strategy in advance and planting a flag in the ground with your new name so other developers do not take the name during the lengthy development process.

Need help naming, branding and announcing your new real estate project? Reach out to us!