A property management heavyweight has warned that as long as PMs describe themselves as administrators, that’s exactly how owners will pay them.
On The Property Management Excellence (PMX) Podcast, director of growth at offshoring service provider Wingman Group, Nick Georges, said he has spent his career watching the property management industry argue with itself about what the property manager (PM) role entails.
The recurring response to this question has been operational: PMs run tenancies, process arrears, coordinate the trades for maintenance work, and file inspection reports. While these functions are vital to ensuring that the property is in good condition, they are almost entirely administrative or backstage.
The problem with that definition, in Georges’ view, is that owners have started to price the work the way it is described. If property management is administration, owners will pay for it accordingly – and eventually, replace it without hesitation.
Forge a partnership with your owners
He said the agencies forging ahead have stopped describing the role that way. They are training their people to act less like task processors and more like investment partners – which means being honest about what the role is actually for and what kind of conversation it should produce.
“Property management and property managers coming to their landlords proactively with opportunities, with information, with energy, and with a general want to actually add value is the future of property management,” Georges told podcast host, REB director, and Managed co-founder, Alex Whitlock.
Georges recounted an anecdote that illustrated the benefits of defining the PM role differently. An investor he is familiar with had found a property and checked in with their PM before signing. Instead of endorsing the purchase, the PM pushed back. When the PM asked what the investor actually wanted from their portfolio, they were able to redirect them to a different property with a stronger yield.
More than one purchase eventually followed, but Georges’ point is not really about the deals. It is about who the PM had become in that conversation. They were not an administrator doing a favour for a client. They were a commercial adviser changing the outcome.
Strategic conversations justify higher fees
Georges pointed out that most agencies do not train their people for that level of contribution and then express surprise when owners fail to grasp the value of the role. PMs are developed for compliance and workflow. Strategic conversation is something they are expected to acquire on their own time, if at all.
As a result, the property management industry has a workforce capable of executing the operational layer of the job competently, but very few people are equipped to hold the conversation that actually justifies the management fee.
“The relationship manager piece of the role, in my opinion, is the most important part of the process,” he declared.
While operations matter, operations control is the baseline. The differentiated value sits in what the PM helps the owner understand, decide, and do next.
Most principals have not completely understood the implications of redefining a PM’s role yet, according to Georges.
PMs need a stronger grasp of how investors think, what different owner profiles want from a property, how maintenance timing affects return, and how to hold a conversation about yield rather than simply pass on costs. Bringing investors and trades into the office to build that literacy – a model Georges has seen work well in Queensland – does more for commercial judgement than another session on workflow management.
Landlords own assets – treat them as such
There is a small piece of language work in his thinking that goes with this. Georges’ view is that the word “asset” does more commercial work than “property” – and that the principle behind the choice matters more than the swap itself. Owners do not need a job-title rebrand. They need a PM who acts like the custodian of an investment. As such, PMs need to be given the language and training to do the job that way.
That is where Georges sees next-gen agencies separating themselves from the rest of the field. They are redefining the role around owner outcomes, investor literacy, and proactive advice.
He affirmed that if the property management industry produces investment partners, the value equation changes faster than most principals expect.
It also changes how the career itself gets framed inside agencies. For years, property management was sold as a stepping stone into sales. In Georges’ opinion, that logic is wearing thin.
Georges concluded that as rent rolls become more strategic, relationship-led, and owner-centric, property management is becoming a commercially sophisticated discipline in its own right.
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