Peter Lohmann built a property management business to 600-700 units through systems alone, then hit a wall. He switched to assigning each owner a dedicated property manager in a pod structure, which cut owner churn and is already driving referrals.
So I thought everything could be solved with a great system and a great process. Now, most property managers underweight on systems and process. So I had a lot of success by doing more systems and process than the average property manager, and it took me pretty far. But when we hit around the 600, 700 door mark, I ran into the limits of my philosophy and we plateaued in growth. And I've had to dial back that perspective and increase my belief in people and relationships. And in fact, we recently made a change from departmental to like a pod hybrid where now every owner gets assigned to a specific property manager. We created a new position called property manager and we have 3 of 'em now. And that was a result of a lot of, I love that by the way, a lot of thinking and reflection on my part. And we're early days, but I think the change has been notably positive for our owners and I think is going to take us to the next level of growth as owners churn is going to drop and I believe referrals are going to go up as as well. So I'm really excited about that, and I think it's been a fun journey for me to calibrate on how much of this business is systems and process, how much of it is those people and relationships.
