# How one portfolio lifted occupancy 11 points without touching rent URL: https://www.leasesurance.co/blog/portfolio-occupancy-11-points-without-touching-rent Title: How one portfolio lifted occupancy 11 points Summary: A 5,000-unit residential book swapped the cash deposit for a waiver. Occupancy went from 87% to 98%, concessions dried up and bad debt halved. --- [← Back to Blog](https://www.leasesurance.co/blog) Case study A ~5,000-unit residential book replaced the cash deposit with a waiver. Occupancy went from 87% to 98%, concessions collapsed, and bad debt halved. LeaseSurance · Insights Most residential landlords treat occupancy, concessions and bad debt as separate problems. They aren't. On affordability-sensitive books all three trace back to the cash deposit, and they trade off against each other. Discount the rent to fill a unit and you dent income. Lower the deposit to reduce the barrier and you raise your exposure. The deposit forces the choice. One inner-city residential portfolio of roughly **5,000 units** stopped making that trade. In mid-2024 it moved to [deposit-free residential leasing](https://www.leasesurance.co/zero-deposit). Tenants choose a small monthly waiver fee in place of an upfront cash deposit, and the landlord holds [underwritten cover against move-out losses](https://www.leasesurance.co/risk-governance). No rent cuts, and no loosening of credit standards. ## Occupancy followed adoption {#occupancy-followed-adoption} Over the next two years, as tenants took up the waiver, occupancy climbed in step, from **86.6% to 97.7%**. That is roughly eleven percentage points on a book that had been stuck in the mid-80s. Deposit-alternative adoption over the same window went from zero to **23% of leases**. The mechanism is unglamorous. The upfront lump of deposit, first month and moving costs was filtering out applicants who could comfortably afford the rent. Remove it and they sign. CASE STUDY · RESIDENTIAL PORTFOLIO ## One portfolio. Two years. {#one-portfolio-two-years} +11 points of occupancy, without touching rent. A ~5,000-unit inner-city residential book replaced the cash deposit with a waiver. LeaseSurance Smart Leasing · Zero Deposits · 1/5 02 · WHAT HAPPENED ### Occupancy rose with adoption. {#occupancy-rose-with-adoption} LeaseSurance Smart Leasing · Zero Deposits · 2/5 03 · THE NUMBERS ### Three moves on the same book. {#three-moves-on-the-same-book} - **+11pts** — Occupancy, 87% → 98% - **2.8%→0.6%** — Rent given as concessions - **−51%** — Bad debt No rent cut. No looser credit. The same applicant pool, with a lower barrier to entry. LeaseSurance Smart Leasing · Zero Deposits · 3/5 04 · WHY IT WORKED ### Three mechanics did the work. {#three-mechanics-did-the-work} 01 Lower move-in barrier Removing the upfront deposit lump let tenants who could afford the rent actually sign. 02 Deeper cover 3-5x a one-month deposit absorbs vacate balances a deposit never could. 03 Priced on real risk Underwritten on the portfolio's own ledger data. No shelf price, no cross-subsidy. LeaseSurance Smart Leasing · Zero Deposits · 4/5 05 · THE TAKEAWAY ## A deposit problem, solved as economics. {#a-deposit-problem-solved-as-economics} Fill more units, discount less, write off less. Same tenants. Better book. Built on data. Powered by AI. Underwritten by Guardrisk. LeaseSurance Smart Leasing · Zero Deposits · 5/5 ## Fewer concessions, less bad debt {#fewer-concessions-less-bad-debt} The knock-on effects showed up where you'd expect. With the affordability barrier handled by the waiver, the discounting used to clear inventory fell away. Concessions dropped from **2.8% to 0.6%** of rent. The cover also runs three to five times deeper than a single-month deposit, so it absorbs vacate balances a deposit can't reach. Measured against [a conventional one-month cash deposit](https://www.leasesurance.co/blog/lease-insurance-vs-cash-deposits-cost-benefit-analysis), **bad debt fell by 51%**. Same applicant pool. A lower barrier to entry. Fuller building, less discounting, cleaner write-offs. None of this required a rent cut or a change in who the portfolio would accept. It required removing a barrier that was quietly costing occupancy, income and recoveries at the same time. Figures: occupancy and adoption are drawn directly from the portfolio's lease data (24 months to mid-2026). Concession, bad-debt and cover figures are from LeaseSurance's rent-normalised outcomes analysis on a comparable book. The client is anonymised at their request. ### About LeaseSurance {#about-leasesurance} LeaseSurance provides deposit-free lease insurance for residential and commercial portfolios across South Africa. [Speak to Us](https://www.leasesurance.co/contact)