We recently attended two conferences in consecutive weeks: The National Rental Home Council (NRHC) Industry Leaders Conference in Houston, TX, and the National Association of Residential Property Managers (NARPM) Broker / Owners Conference in Jacksonville, FL. 

The NRHC group consists of large institutional owner-operators that are focused on macroeconomic trends – interest rates, supply and labor costs, demographics, and demand  – anything that would impact the yield back to their investors while running an operation at scale. While some of this also impacts the NARPM group, most of the property management business owners in NARPM are interested in learning how to grow their business from 10 to 50 to 150 to 500. 

There were not many people who attended both conferences, so we wanted to take advantage of our unique perspective and share our learnings from both…

The Industry View (NRHC)

We wrote about what we learned at the NRHC conference in detail, and here are the top three takeaways to highlight:

AI is the Next Revolution

• AI is seen as the “next revolution”, following the Industrial Revolution and the Internet. 
• One key to AI will be framing questions the right way.
• People will be able to move away from execution tasks and move to the judgment layer and focus on exceptions.

Opportunistic is Gone, Normal is Here

• The demand for single-family rental homes is very persistent, and the supply still has a long way to go.
• The time for “opportunistic acquisitions” has passed for single-family homes, and now the industry will be a core investment that has to be built on sound operations.
•  It should be hard to raise capital and acquire homes which is exactly the environment we are in today, and this is much closer to what should be considered “normal”.

Regulation in SFR

• There is an opportunity for the industry to highlight the extensive renovations conducted by single-family rental operators that would otherwise likely not happen, as well as the access to great neighborhoods and schools that many single-family rentals afford.
• Positive recent legislation for the housing industry includes a revamped squatters bill in the state of Georgia and more favorable laws for increased density via ADUs in California.

The Business Improvement View (NARPM)

Use Word of Mouth

• Low-hanging fruit for many property managers is utilizing the power of word-of-mouth – give your happy clients an opportunity to talk about you with others, and build an actual word-of-mouth strategy.
• “60% of business comes from word of mouth. But only 20% of companies have a word-of-mouth strategy.”
• The strategy must consist of 1) the right words, 2) the right mouth, and 3) watering holes (the right place)

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Professionalize Everything

• Create radical transparency at every point in the resident experience or client experience. Ask, “How are we doing? Is there anything else we can do?” – don’t be afraid to ask the question and don’t be afraid of the answer.
• Instill professionalism in all four buckets of property management: Investors, Vendors, Teams, Residents. This is done through strong leadership, thorough training, and the right metrics.

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Be Intentional with Culture

• Culture often shows up differently depending on the size and experience of the company:
  • 0-500 units: Culture is simply a reflection of the owner of the company. It is who you are.
  • 500-1000 units: Culture has an awareness and is identified and refined.
  • 1000+ units: Culture is talked about, followed, and understood.
• As you grow, if you don’t create a company culture, the culture will create itself.
• Don’t forget to ask team members “What do you need/want?”

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