How to Plan for 2026 and Beyond

Pete Neubig (0:05) All right, we got everybody coming in. (0:07) All right, welcome everybody for coming in.
(0:11) We got them all following in. (0:13) And we're gonna get started here in another minute or two. (0:17) We'll let a bunch of people jump in.
(0:19) We are super excited to have, do I have to call you Dr. Adeb now?

Deb Newell (0:23) Is that? (0:23) No, not yet, not yet. (0:25) Not yet?

Pete Neubig (0:26) I'm going to.

Deb Newell (0:27) Almost.

Pete Neubig (0:27) You're like, you are.

Deb Newell (0:28) You're gonna go, you're gonna do that anyway?

Pete Neubig (0:30) We're gonna do it anyway.

Deb Newell (0:31) Okay.

Pete Neubig (0:32) So I'm excited to have Deb Newell, who's been a longtime friend of me, Pete. (0:42) And I am going to, so I'm gonna do the intro now. (0:45) We got another minute or two, but I wanna do a little intro and I wanna tell a little story about Deb.
(0:50) So I always call Deb the OG. (0:52) So I call her, Dr. Deb is the new name, but her old name is the OG. (0:56) See, I called the original gangster from the Bronx.
(0:59) So, you know, that's kind of, I grew up in the 80s. (1:01) And so the OG is kind of my vernacular, but Deb was the first person I knew that she owned her own property management firm. (1:09) She then created software to help with maintenance, sold that software to RealPage, and then exited, had a very successful exit in a property management firm, then went out and got an MBA and now a PhD.
(1:22) And so Deb is the unique blend of somebody who's been there, done that, has incredible experience, then became the OG consultant or the OG coach, if you will, learned from other people's experiences, and then went out and got her MBA and PhD. (1:39) So now she has the kind of the tactical book smart and just loves to learn evidently and has been able to take all their experience, her learnings from schooling and from her clients and help so many other people. (1:57) Deb, thank you so much for being here.
(2:00) And I am so looking forward to this presentation.
 
Deb Newell (2:04) You're welcome, Pete. (2:05) If you knew me in high school, you'd be like, she did what with her life? (2:08) Yeah, I went to a public school, so it wasn't like, there's not a lot of accolades behind that.
(2:14) So yeah, didn't do as well as I should have. (2:19) Probably should have paid attention a little bit more.
Pete Neubig (2:22) But thanks, I'm excited. (2:24) Some of us are late starters in life, right?

Deb Newell (2:26) Yeah, actually I am a late, so I am a very much of a late bloomer in life. (2:30) It's okay, I'll take it. (2:32) But I'm excited, I'm excited for this presentation.
(2:35) It's interesting, because I am all about kind of data and just the numbers and trying to dig down into what's working, what's not working. (2:44) And what I kind of discovered is a lot, since I did this last year with you, which was great, a lot in our business hasn't changed from my vantage point, right? (2:56) So I gave the state of the business in 2025, where I focused more on internal goal setting, smart goals and KPIs, which I'm still really big on, and clear expectations, also what I'm still really big on.
(3:11) But I wanted to take a different approach this year and see what the data told me, because I felt that that would kind of help drive this discussion a little bit more. (3:22) So I wanted to know for myself, and I wanted to know what were the top issues that I worked on this past year with clients. (3:28) And I figured that would give me some really good direction into what next year's focus would be, not only for the consulting business, but where I see a lot of companies focusing on and putting their efforts in.
(3:42) And so I was surprised though, to see that the data from 2025, so for this full year, wasn't really any different from what I had saw in 2024, a little bit. (3:56) But, so for context just, and I know I did this little teaser on LinkedIn, but for context, I had well over 600 discovery calls. (4:04) And discovery call for me is where clients are, they probably either were referred or they went to the website or they did something, they filled out a form and they said, this is my pain point.
(4:14) These are the problems I'm having. (4:16) So that's kind of where we start. (4:18) And then we have a discovery call where we kind of just dig a little bit deeper.
(4:22) And I'm listening to all the symptoms of what people are telling me is going on with their business. (4:26) And it could be a myriad of different things. (4:29) And it was so much fun that I actually put it into a mind map to really like directionally see where everything was like top 10 things, like tell me what the top 10 things were.
(4:38) And it was, this is from clients from all over the spectrum in property management. (4:43) This is everybody from affordable housing where they have tens of thousands of units. (4:48) I have multifamily and multiple markets, also thousands of units.
 
(4:52) And then I have single family operators with hundreds of doors, some with very, less than a hundred doors. (4:57) So there's a wide range, but shockingly a lot of similarities when it comes to what's going on in the business. (5:06) And I also worked on 12 mergers and acquisitions and all but one closed.
(5:12) I work with owner operators. (5:14) In fact, I have a couple of those now where they have their own portfolio. (5:17) They're trying to also figure out property management kind of their own portfolio, one in which I'm working with them to actually get a third party property manager because I'm like, you have hundreds of doors and clearly this isn't working well.
(5:33) And so I took all of that information, Love Chat GBT, dumped it all into chat, created that mind map and figured out what were the top issues facing PMs this last year. (5:43) And I figured that would really get us kind of this trajectory into 2026, what people should be looking at. (5:51) So here's strategic.
(5:52) And I told Pete, I was gonna like talk a lot. (5:54) So feel free to interrupt me if you have to Pete, but let's go into.
Pete Neubig (6:01) Let's share the screen.

Deb Newell (6:02) Oh yeah, share your screen, sorry. (6:04) Cause you do have a, Pete's gonna drive for me. (6:07) Yeah, that's perfect.
(6:08) Go into the next slide. (6:12) So I kind of just said this, right? (6:14) What hasn't changed, where the data was coming from, the biggest risks weren't really necessarily external.
(6:22) They were still more internal. (6:25) And that again, hasn't changed. (6:27) Growth is being limited by structure, not necessarily by the demands of what's going on in the market.
(6:34) So I think 2026 is gonna require a very different kind of strategic focus, like less, people still wanna grow. (6:44) They still wanna focus on their company and such. (6:47) But I always said that if you, once you fix what's going on internally, growth just happens.
(6:55) And a couple of my clients even recently have just seen that. (6:58) They're like, it's like exploded. (7:00) And I don't know what it is, something in the universe, something that just says, oh my gosh, these guys haven't figured out.
(7:06) Now I wanna work with them.

Pete Neubig (7:08) So if we- Is that because churn rate goes down or is that just a byproduct?

Deb Newell (7:13) Yeah, you know what it is, 100%. (7:14) It's internal churn rate. (7:16) It's not so much the owner churn rate.
(7:17) I mean, that will go down as a result of my internal churn rate. (7:21) Some of the biggest things are fixing. (7:24) So look to the next slide there.
 
Pete Neubig (7:27) Got it.

Deb Newell (7:31) And so again, problems are the reoccurring operational and leadership breakdowns. (7:39) So that's been a big part of what I've seen. (7:42) Communication, every single time I work with a client and they sign up for consulting, part of my process during the discovery period is meeting with the employees of the business and just trying to get a sense of, hey, what's working, what's not working?
(7:58) Tell me how you do your job. (8:01) And I just, we talk for an hour, sometimes more, and we just kind of deep dive into what's working with what they're doing in their role, how they interact with their team, how they interact with owners and residents and vendors, all of it. (8:16) So that structure plays a lot into what's kind of seen outside of that, which affects growth, right?
(8:26) So it's constrained by what's going on internally, not necessarily what's going on externally. (8:32) All right, head to the next slide. (8:34) So one of the things I saw and I'm trying, is really this fixing this organizational structure and leadership capacity.
(8:49) So ineffective leadership with reactive decision-makings with no role clarity and weak accountability is like the biggest thing. (9:01) So what you have to do is look at your team and if they're feeling overwhelmed, if it feels chaotic, just go back to the basics. (9:10) Do they have clear roles and expectations?
(9:13) Do they know, some people are like, I just know what my job is, I know what to do, but they don't necessarily know the expectations of that job and what they're supposed to be doing. (9:24) So it's, they're misaligned with their team, with the reporting lines, they've got overwhelmed managers, people who probably shouldn't be managing people. (9:35) They should really just be managing their portfolio and they don't know how to develop anybody underneath them.
(9:43) You're forethrowing people in positions of leadership that shouldn't be there yet. (9:49) Maybe we have to get them there, but it takes a little bit longer, yeah. (9:56) And a lot of times I'll see owners just kind of, I call it a lot of things, but like baptism by fire, we just throw people in there and just kind of hope and pray they figure things out.
(10:05) But this lack of internal structure is where a lot of things happen. (10:14) So if you hit to the next slide, you'll, I pulled some data, not just from my stuff, this was more external data, but I felt even though it wasn't property management specific, I felt it was still really relatable to what we're doing. (10:29) 26% of employees feel engaged.
(10:32) So fewer than half are committed to staying long-term. (10:34) So, you know, why are boys leaving? (10:38) What's the root cause of their problems?
(10:40) Is it more money somewhere else? (10:42) Is it less chaos? (10:43) Is it less responsibility?
 
(10:45) Are they the right fit? (10:47) So, you know, looking at what these numbers are telling us, also tell us what's kind of going on a little bit in our business as well. (10:59) So my client's pain points are exactly aligned with kind of this national workforce data, specifically in the burnout and the disengagement and poorly equipped managers.
(11:10) So we wanna focus on how do we kind of turn that and shift that. (11:18) And I will say, it's not necessarily a lack of talent. (11:21) Like that's not what I'm necessarily seeing.
(11:23) It's really a lack of structure. (11:26) The talent might be there, but this is where it's the whole wrong seat, right person. (11:30) Maybe it isn't a good fit anymore.
(11:33) So all of these things kind of come into play and that's kind of critical.

Pete Neubig (11:40) So what I would recommend- When we say 26% of employees are engaged, right? (11:49) That's very low. (11:51) Are you saying that this is a direct correlation to not having the right person in the organization and not having them in the right seat?
(12:00) So is this kind of like a hiring process thing or is this like I hired the right person, I put them in the right seat, but now they're not really thrilled with the vision of the company or something like that?
Deb Newell (12:13) Or is it kind of- Well, I think honestly, it's all of that. (12:16) So a lot of times we hire people and then we just grow super fast. (12:21) But the employees don't grow at the same rate we're growing with added doors.
(12:26) And we're not elevating them. (12:29) And it's like, it's this catch up game, right? (12:32) They're just like swimming and trying to like stay above water.
(12:35) And we're not taking the time, pausing long enough to say, here's what we need to be doing as we kind of pivot now that we've added a hundred more doors than we started the year with. (12:46) And we're keeping people in the same positions with the same responsibilities, but not account and just throwing more doors at them, but not really accounting for their capability and handling more doors in any position. (13:01) It could be maintenance coordinator or property manager, assistant property, it doesn't matter.
(13:04) We're just throwing more doors thinking that they're fine. (13:08) They haven't quit yet and they haven't said anything yet until it just kind of explodes and then it's a little too late. (13:16) So we have to redesign org charts with clear role boundaries.
(13:22) I'm really big on instituting kind of one-on-ones. (13:26) So even if those are monthly, it's taking their temperature, how are they doing? (13:31) Making sure you're available for support, still holding them to be accountable.
(13:36) If you're all of a sudden growing and you're adding more people, who's managing those people and are they, when I say qualified, meaning do they know how and do they have the capacity with the job that you've already given them? (13:50) Now you're saying go manage
 
these people, is that in their wheelhouse? (13:56) And I say build SOPs, like build these standard operating procedures.
(14:01) Like what you have to do as your company grows. (14:03) So your performance isn't dependent on one individual who just like knows everything. (14:09) Tribal knowledge falls with Pete.
(14:11) He knows everything and, but if Pete goes, we're in trouble. (14:16) And that's where I'm seeing a lot of companies are coming to is that they've weighted their employees down too much and they're not utilizing technology or they're not hiring in cadences that make sense.
Pete Neubig (14:30) So I've also seen a big drop in- Do you see a lot of companies hiring, like they probably should have hired, like they hire too late, right? (14:40) They already have all the work that they need. (14:42) They just throw somebody in there because they hire too late.
(14:44) They don't have the time to, because you gotta post a job, you gotta find the right people, then you gotta do the interview, then you gotta- You know, some do hire too late, but I mean, I usually tell people try not to hire too late.
Deb Newell (14:58) Don't get to that point. (14:59) And by the way, hiring a property, let's take the property manager role because for most markets, that's a licensed individual. (15:06) So if I'm gonna be looking for somebody who's licensed to be in a position, that's gonna take some time.
(15:12) Very rarely, if I'm lucky, will I find that person right off the bat. (15:16) It's gonna take, it could take months. (15:19) And you're looking for someone who either just got their license and they've hit the ceiling at their current job.
(15:26) They can't, you know, they got their license, but there's no promotion available. (15:29) That's a good fit, probably, but you know, they're coming with baggage, so that's okay. (15:33) We just gotta redirect.
(15:36) You know, another person might be, did they get fired from their last job? (15:40) I mean, people don't necessarily leave their positions all the time. (15:46) Like if they're a property manager and they're doing well and they like their job, they're going to stay.
(15:51) Unless it's a money thing, there's no room for growth. (15:54) Like they're looking for a career advancement as well. (15:57) So we have to kind of be careful because those looking for jobs may not be in, for that position may not be the right fit because we don't know the backstory of where they're coming from.
(16:10) And you're only gonna get part of it, right? (16:12) You're not gonna, you know, as you listen to these interviews and hopefully you're having more than one, you're listening to how they handle situations, what, you know, how can you try them out for a little bit or just put them in some sort of shadowing positions to see if they're going to fit with your culture and your type of client as well.
 
Pete Neubig (16:35) When I started getting dialed in with my property management firm, I started knowing when we brought on X amount of doors, we would need this role filled. (16:47) And then I would be able to back, I would be able to do the math on that, right? (16:51) We know that we gain X amount of doors a month.
(16:53) We know we lose or we, you know, we gain, we lose. (16:56) This is our net gain of doors a month. (16:58) And I can extrapolate that over this many months.
(17:01) This is when I'm gonna need that person, right? (17:04) But I know I need that person way before then because even though I need that person, let's say I need a person in October. (17:10) That's when the door counts as I need that person.
(17:12) But I know it's gonna be two months to train that person or a month to train that person, a month to find that person. (17:18) So I'm starting the hiring process, you know, three or four months before I need that person when I have the math down. (17:26) That makes the, is that kind of a right approach?
Deb Newell (17:29) Yeah, but again, that comes with looking at, you know, if you flip to that, what slide are you on? (17:35) Yeah, flip to the next slide. (17:37) If you look at it and that, you know, it's talking about clarity, accountability, leadership, time, like all of these things.
(17:47) So that's gonna play a big part. (17:50) You have to just redesign the organizational structure again with how your business is growing. (17:57) So making sure that there's clear boundaries, you're bringing in, again, a team that can manage with other, play well with others, right?
(18:09) So if you go to the next one, I think, again, this kind of, this is just recapturing what I said, but this kind of moves in. (18:18) So your growth in 2026 will rise or fall on the strength of your internal organizational structure, not your lead team velocity, not your marketing, not the housing market. (18:30) It's going to, how your team is structured internally will matter because what, that's like the foundation.
(18:38) You have to build on top of a really good team to get to whatever your other goals are with your company, especially if it's growth.
Pete Neubig (18:50) So this is not, this is not just org chart, but this is like org chart plus like the definition of the role and then making sure you have the people who have some leadership capabilities or managing capabilities. (19:04) That's all part of that structure, okay?
Deb Newell (19:07) Yeah, and here's the thing. (19:09) No, one's going to manage the business as well as you are. (19:13) Like it's your company.
(19:16) It's, you're going to, you can find people who are really good at managing other people, but it's not innately what we're all built to kind of just do. (19:27) So it takes some time. (19:29) Like find somebody, if it's not you, if you're the business owner and you're like, I'm just terrible at
 
managing people, find somebody who is to offset that, to help strengthen that, the foundational growth inside your company so you can grow externally with clients indoors.
(19:50) If you, okay, perfect. (19:52) We're heading over to now like the communication piece, which is also number, kind of the strategic part, number two. (20:01) So the other thing I found was there was a widespread communication dysfunction or cross-departmental like communication, low adoption of systems, whatever it is, whether it's your core management system, if it's another workflow platform, if it's your leasing platform, I can't tell you where it's like just a fraction of the software is being used.
(20:24) There's missing or inconsistent documentation. (20:28) There's an app, it's like the telephone game. (20:30) It's like inaccurate information is flowing from team member to team member.
(20:34) And there's really a lack of standardization across all of the teams, whether you're departmental or even portfolio and you have support, how that's kind of parsed out would just matters. (20:48) But this chaos that's kind of going on creates the company, this is what's creating burnout. (20:59) You might wanna flip to the next one and slower inconsistent like service delivery.
(21:07) This is where tenants and owners get frustrated, right? (21:09) When they said, I've told you this before or it's not documented, nobody took the right notes. (21:15) It's costly to rework things.
(21:17) If you have technicians going back and that's non-billable hours against the company. (21:22) These are blind spots that are just constantly going on. (21:26) One of the things I do highly recommend if you're using something like Slack, Google, Google chat, Teams, whatever your communication channel is internally, don't use email, but use that instead and create different channels, whether it's a move-in channel, a move-out channel, a leasing channel, it can be anything, just a catch-up channel like, just like how's everybody else doing?
(21:54) How was your weekend? (21:55) Like have one channel just kind of like just for a
chit-chat type of thing. (21:59) But structure these channels so that some quick communication can flow back and forth, especially if you have a lot of remote team members, this works really well.
(22:10) Otherwise, it's just so many things get kind of lost in translation. (22:14) And when you're emailing everybody internally and I get the ideas to like document everything, if you've seen some of these threads, they just get so long. (22:25) And so now I'm just having to scroll and look at threads and remember what was the crux of this conversation again and where did it start?
(22:32) And I miss so many things. (22:33) And if you have multiple emails, reply, reply, reply, and I just, I don't know what I'm looking at. (22:40) So really important things like call, get up from your desk, go talk, go walk over.
 
(22:47) If it's a quick, I just need something or this person just dropped off their keys, that could be a quick Slack conversation, but document it in the software, whether you're using an Apply, a Leadsimple, a Monday, a Trello board, an Asana, but like, it doesn't matter. (23:03) Like make sure you're documenting what's going on so that everybody's on the same page. (23:10) Should you be out sick or somebody's gone, that communication can't live in somebody's inbox and nobody else can see it.
(23:18) And I know that there's this big push towards shared inboxes and everything, but emailing each other internally still just gets really complicated. (23:25) Email should be reserved for when an owner has to email me. (23:29) I'm hoping that the tenant is communicating me through the software.
(23:33) A vendor may be emailing invoices or uploading in the software, but keep email at a minimum. (23:39) It's almost so 2024 nowadays. (23:44) Like it's now coming back into like, we're moving into a different direction when it comes to communication.
(23:50) Email's great for documentation, but I would keep that as external documentation. (23:57) So implementing these communication protocols is gonna be key. (24:01) That way you have standardized handoffs between departments and you're eliminating this one person who seems to know everything.
(24:08) And so you're having to slowly build this knowledge base. (24:12) So I say that most PMs don't have a staffing problem, but they have a communication problem masquerading as a staffing problem. (24:22) It comes down to communication.
(24:25) In fact, that is the number one, every time I interview employees, the number one thing they always tell me is communication, which just blows my mind. (24:36) Like you guys all either work in the same office, you're all on the same team. (24:39) How is communication still a problem?
Pete Neubig (24:41) Yeah, usually that's also a lot of small companies. (24:43) Like smaller firms will actually say there's lack of communication. (24:46) I'm like, there's only four of you.
(24:47) How is that possible? (24:48) I will say we lived this. (24:50) We had the email, a black hole, and my property manager left, couldn't find anything in her email.
(24:58) We moved to ticketing system and everything got put into a ticket. (25:02) Once we did that, we were able to search on it, report on it, the ticketing system was way, way more robust.
Deb Newell (25:09) Yeah, I think if you get to a large, and you had a big company, so I think as you get to a larger company, that may work as well. (25:15) But also having different levels of, you know, people who can sign off in certain things, but having a system for that, but again, not by email. (25:26) It's just so hard to like, just go through all of those different threads.
 
(25:31) Okay, so next focus would be repairing operational workflows. (25:35) So focusing on what we're doing in leasing and maintenance, for our residents, owners, accounting, all of that. (25:43) My call, like all of my discovery calls this year revealed constant operational bottlenecks.
(25:50) So we've all felt it, long delays on the market, poor follow-up, lack of lead tracking, and inconsistent showing processes. (26:02) And that's just with leasing. (26:03) So with maintenance, there was like insufficient maintenance workflows, vendors, you know, vendor issues, not a lot of people doing inspections like mid-lease inspections or renewal inspections, and coordinators all the time are overwhelmed.
(26:20) And by the way, when you really think about a coordinator's job, you knew I was going to talk a lot about maintenance, but when you really think about a coordinator's job, it's actually really hard. (26:29) Like on the surface, it sounds so easy saying, hey, you're troubleshooting a phone call or when it comes in through your email, you just look at it, you assign a tech and then you follow up. (26:40) Like on the surface, that sounds so easy.
(26:41) But the part that's so hard is, you know, we're asking them to diagnose a problem with very limited information from a tenant. (26:50) And so then we have to call the tenant back, can you send us a photo or can you tell me a little bit more?
Pete Neubig (26:55) So those are the conversations. (26:55) Don't worry, Deb, we're just going to send a photo and just put it to AI and AI is going to go out there and fix it with his robots.
Deb Newell (27:02) Is that what's going to happen? (27:03) That might be more like 2035, we're not there yet. (27:08) But even with AI, and I know that's a big push, we're still in a very
people-centric business.

(27:14) AI is very, I mean, again, I dumped all of this into AI. (27:18) It's been very useful and it just gives me this information just like that. (27:22) But it doesn't- All right, we got to quit.
Pete Neubig (27:25) Go ahead, Deb, finish your thought and then we have a question from the-Oh, okay.
Deb Newell (27:28) But it doesn't, I was going to say, it's not going to literally solve that emotional intelligence issue that's kind of going on with my resident or my owner. (27:36) So that takes a lot, right? (27:38) I want to talk to a human, it's still there.
(27:40) Okay, what's your question?

Pete Neubig (27:42) All right, for those that are running a lean and mean organization, is there a rough ratio manager to properties, right? (27:49) So we'll get this one a lot.
Deb Newell (27:50) I get this question all the time.

Pete Neubig (27:52) That seems to be an average sweet spot. (27:54) Also, what are the main roles of a good structure?
 
Deb Newell Okay, Bill, great question. (0:03) So I get this question all the time. (0:06) And the loose rule of thumb is, and I say this with caution, is you'll hear a hundred doors to a person.
(0:18) But again, there's a lot that goes into that because you can have 400 properties. (0:23) Does that mean you have four people? (0:25) I've seen people with 400 properties and have 12 people.
(0:30) Partially will depend on your market and your setup and what you're trying to accomplish. (0:35) But that's kind of the very, I don't know, Pete, would you agree with that?
Pete Neubig (0:39) Basic rule of thumb is one to a hundred.

Deb Newell (0:41) Yeah. (0:42) But I don't always agree with it. (0:44) It's what's out there, but it's not necessarily what I agree with.
(0:50) But again, it's a good start and it's a good way to function. (0:54) I think when you're the owner and you're starting your business, you're like, I can do 300 doors by myself, or I could do 200 doors. (1:01) What do you mean?
(1:02) And that is very true, but keep in mind, an employee is not you. (1:08) So that's kind of where the 100 kind of comes into play. (1:11) They may be able to handle a hundred, but I've met employees, no joke, who've done 300 or 400 on their own as property managers with some support.
(1:21) So again, it really depends on the employee, the structure that you have, what you're trying to do. (1:26) Maintenance coordination, it's busier leasing coordination, also very busy with all these calls that come in. (1:33) So we have to make sure that they're not getting overwhelmed.
(1:36) I think the main roles of a good structure are a property manager or a portfolio manager. (1:42) Again, it depends on how many doors and a really strong maintenance coordinator. (1:46) You have to have that position.
(1:49) And I think when you leasing manager, I would say your property manager could probably handle leasing. (1:58) So up to a point. (2:00) That role might become a department and that might be, if you're doing in-person showings or again, how you're structured, that's a really, there's a lot that goes into that.
(2:11) That takes a longer conversation.

Pete Neubig (2:14) Yeah. (2:14) I would say that really is a, it depends kind of question.

Deb Newell (2:17) It does a little bit.

Pete Neubig (2:18) There's a lot of facts that go into it. (2:21) All right. (2:21) So let's wrap it up. (2:23) Let's wrap this up.
 
Deb Newell (2:24) Oh my gosh. (2:24) We have to wrap it up. (2:26) I told you a half an hour wasn't going to be enough.
(2:28) Okay. (2:30) What are we on? (2:31) What slide are we on?

Pete Neubig (2:32) Maintenance issues.

Deb Newell (2:32) I can go on forever for maintenance.

Pete Neubig (2:36) We all know about maintenance issues. (2:38) So let's talk about this.

Deb Newell (2:38) Resident service issues. (2:39) These again, these are just, these are diving in deeper on what I was saying about the communication, but here's what I think, here's the insight you need to hear. (2:47) There's not maintenance issues or leasing issues.
(2:50) There's process architecture issues. (2:53) That's what it is.

Pete Neubig (2:55) Are you finding that using the lead simples, the Mondays, the Appleys, is it, does that help most organizations or is actually, does that?
Deb Newell (3:04) It does.

Pete Neubig (3:04) Okay.

Deb Newell (3:05) Well go into that. (3:06) Okay. (3:07) Great segue into a strategic priority number four.
(3:10) So you can kind of skip over to that. (3:11) So what I did find in, again, in my lovely mind map is that there was too many disconnected tools. (3:18) So a lot of people are like, we kind of got on this bandwagon in 2025, like, oh, I want to sign up for this.
(3:25) I want to sign up for that. (3:27) And it was keep going forward for number four.

Pete Neubig (3:33) I'm trying.

Deb Newell (3:33) Yeah. (3:34) You got to find number four.

Pete Neubig (3:35) I didn't find it.

Deb Newell (3:36) I don't know where it is. (3:37) Oh, well maybe it's just me talking. (3:38) Oh, maybe they cut number four out.
Pete Neubig (3:41) Maybe somebody realized we were going to be up against it and they cut number four out.
Deb Newell (3:45) Okay. (3:45) It's still a good question because there's tech stack consolidation is like, if you don't have any system of record or there's, there's been a very slow
 
adoption of all of these. (3:55) So if you sign up for an Appley, a lead simple, a Monday, you have to make sure your team is on board and adopts it.
(4:03) Otherwise you're wasting your money. (4:04) You might as well just go flush it down the toilet. (4:07) So it's not, there's manual processes are still everywhere.
(4:10) Workarounds are still happening.

Pete Neubig (4:12) But, any, any, any tidbits on how to get the team to, to, to buy in? (4:20) Yeah. (4:20) A lot of these people are kind of stuck in their ways, right?
(4:22) If I'm a property manager and I've been doing it the same way since, you know, for 10 years and now it's like, Hey, I need to do this lead simple. (4:29) How do I, how do I get buy-in? (4:32) Yeah.
Deb Newell (4:32) You know, the old adage of like, you see one, do one or see, see two, do one or something where you see it and you have to show them. (4:39) So you have to show them how it's, so you're going to build these processes out. (4:42) You're going to let them know, Hey, this is what we're doing.
(4:44) We're, we're signing up with this platform and this is going to help us in these ways. (4:50) We're going to have delinquency in there. (4:51) We're going to have moving in there.
(4:53) We're going to have move out in there. (4:55) And it's going to help us stay on track and on task so that I can stop asking you where we're at with everything. (5:02) This will allow me as the owner to oversee everything that's going on.
(5:06) And just to make sure we haven't missed anything. (5:09) So that, you know, it's going to make your life easier, right? (5:12) So you'll make it more efficient, but you have to show them how, if you don't, they won't get it.
(5:18) And the, cause the software is one thing you have to learn that, but you also have to tell them that we're learning a whole new, like the reason why we're doing this is because I actually care about you. (5:29) I want you to be able to be more efficient. (5:32) And this will stop me from micromanaging you so much.
(5:36) Oh, well, I'm on board all day long. (5:38) You're not going to micromanage me. (5:40) So that's the intent behind some of these softwares, right?
(5:44) Is to help, you know, that happen. (5:47) And by the way, that was number four. (5:48) So what you're looking at right now, so in 2026, I think the companies that win, or I wouldn't say the companies that win are the ones with the most tech.
(5:56) They're the ones with the cleanest workflows and the clearest data. (6:01) Those are the ones that are going to win in 2026.
 
Pete Neubig (6:04) And that have the right people in the right seats, right?

Deb Newell (6:08) Owner experience is going to be a big one. (6:11) There was a big push in 25 for owner experience like that. (6:14) I saw a lot too.
(6:15) I want to have, I want my owners to have a good experience. (6:17) I want even my residents to have a good experience that all comes back to communication. (6:21) That all comes back to having the right people, you know, with the right roles and clear understanding and expectations of what they're doing with the right technology in place.
(6:31) Don't over-tech yourself to the point where there's just so many different platforms that your team is just like, I have to open up five different things just to get to one thing. (6:40) You shouldn't have to. (6:42) For the most part, our core platforms can do quite a bit, but these bolt-ons are there for, are really there to help us.
(6:50) And that's what they specialize in. (6:52) And they can help us actually really become a lot more efficient. (6:59) Yeah, see, I kept going.
Pete Neubig (7:01) I know, I think I built this.

Deb Newell (7:02) I don't think, I know. (7:04) I think I thought this was longer than half an hour, but I think the data is clear, right? (7:09) The single biggest opportunity for property management companies in 2026 is operational maturity.
(7:17) That's what I'm going to say. (7:19) And the biggest, the greatest threats are internal, not external. (7:22) The greatest opportunities are structural, not tactical.
Pete Neubig (7:27) Do you think that, I don't want to say this in such a crass way, but we've been able to take advantage of residents and not give a great resident experience because for many years, you had backup applications on properties. (7:44) And it's like, yeah, you're making a little bit less. (7:47) That's not happening anymore.
(7:49) So do you see that in 2026, we're really going to see a push for increasing resident experience and doing those top-notch make-readies and really serving the resident?
Deb Newell (8:01) Well, I think there was still a push in 2025. (8:04) I just think we got away from it when we realized how much was involved in doing it. (8:10) I think the market overtook what was hoping to be a great resident experience.
(8:17) So I think we need to kind of just, I, as weird as it sounds, it's just like, slow down, look at what's going on. (8:25) Don't try to grow so fast when everything is broken internally. (8:29) Fix what's going on internally.
(8:31) And then it will, like, I keep thinking of the field of dreams, right? (8:37) If you build it, they will come. (8:38) So it's the same thing.
 
(8:40) If you truly build a great, strong team internally, your team is happy, the growth will happen. (8:46) And if that's your goal and your focus, that can only happen if you build a strong team. (8:54) There was a couple...
Pete Neubig (8:56) There's so many nuggets that you dropped. (8:58) If anybody has any questions, they want to stay on and ask any questions.
Deb Newell (9:02) Yeah, I'll stay on.

Pete Neubig (9:04) You know, ask any questions you have. (9:07) If you want to join the next webinar is January 20th, and we're talking about the AI tools. (9:13) AI is another hot topic, for sure.
(9:17) But if not, then we're going to let Dr. Deb the OG go. (9:25) Deb, there's... (9:28) Okay, we got one here.
(9:29) Thank you for having the webinar. (9:31) Thanks to you both. (9:32) Appreciate that. (9:34) Really what you're getting at is it's people. (9:37) You got to have...
Deb Newell (9:39) It really comes down to the people. (9:41) You can't do this yourself. (9:42) And if you guys lose your people, can I say you're screwed?
(9:47) I mean, you're kind of screwed, right? (9:48) And that hurts more. (9:51) And so you have to build...
(9:53) And you can't just throw things at people. (9:55) You can't just assume that they know what they're doing and that they're going to do it the way that you expect them to do it. (10:00) As painful as it is, you have to pause and make sure that they're fully understand what their position is and exactly what they have to do and expectations.
(10:12) That's really going to be key in all of this. (10:15) And so, I mean, that's where it comes down to. (10:19) People, the communication, which is people, the tech, which the people have to use, like all of this is building on top of the strong foundation.
Pete Neubig (10:29) Yeah. (10:30) Somebody has just asked if this webinar is going to be on video. (10:36) Yes, we'll have the video.
(10:37) We'll be sending it out. (10:38) We'll also have access to the PowerPoint as well. (10:41) All right, Deb, we have another question here.
Deb Newell (10:45) So Tyler, what would be your sole focus as a solo owner operator doing it all with less than 50 doors? (10:51) I find myself needing to do high-level tasks to grow, but also getting dragged into... (10:55) Okay.
 
(10:56) So this is where I actually think... (10:58) I'm kind of glad I'm partnering with Pete on this because this is what I would tell you to do. (11:03) When it's about 50 to 65 doors, I usually tell owners, you're going to start feeling that strain.
(11:09) This is where I would actually get an assistant, a remote team member to help you with all that back-end office support. (11:16) Just the details of the minutiae stuff that we have to do, the administrative stuff that has to get done, that's kind of what's bogging you down. (11:27) And if you can really get a strong remote team member and just slowly you're giving them tasks off your plate that they don't have to be in person for, that allows you to focus on growing with doors intentionally.
Pete Neubig (11:45) Yeah. (11:45) And I think as you're growing, this is a great way to... (11:48) Deb, kind of correct me if I'm wrong, but even if you just have 50 doors, you should still have an org chart, right?
(11:56) Your name might be in the box in all the boxes, but you should still have an org chart.

Deb Newell (12:01) Well, you should have a goal of where you want to be. (12:03) So some people are like, I want to get to 500 doors or I want to get to a thousand. (12:08) And it's just, how are you going to get there?
(12:11) And so you want to pace yourself out to say, well, I'm looking to sign on 10 doors a month. (12:16) Okay. (12:17) Well then how many years is that going to take you?
(12:20) And looking at that and methodically thinking through what is my next role? (12:24) So when I build out org charts for clients and they don't have a big team, we build it out to your point, Pete, with all of the roles. (12:32) And then I even color code them to say next hire.
(12:35) And it's literally that's what the legend says. (12:39) It will literally say next hire. (12:40) So you know the role that's going to be next.
(12:42) Sometimes we might hire one over another, just depends. (12:45) Sometimes you're hiring two at the same time because you've got a big influx and it's a little bit of the cart before the horse. (12:52) Do I hire the maintenance coordinator first or do I hire the admin first?
(12:55) Sometimes the admin can do both until then you get big enough where you split their role and then you say, okay, now I'm going to hire a maintenance coordinator. (13:03) They're going to take all the maintenance. (13:04) Admin's going to still continue doing administrative stuff.
Pete Neubig (13:07) Yeah. (13:07) When you do that and you do hire somebody for multiple roles, I really, you know, first I think I say both still have two job roles in the org chart, right? (13:17) So they're actually doing two roles.
(13:18) You might have one job posting for that, but you want to have two job roles and then two make sure that the job roles have the same type of personality type. (13:28) Because if you're
 
hiring somebody who's a high I or like one personality and then they have a job role that's completely opposite personality and you're asking them to do both, they can do one really well and one not so well.
Deb Newell (13:39) Yeah. (13:40) And I think as well, when you kind of build out this org chart, keep in mind that as you, and be realistic. (13:49) So if you're saying I want to get to 2000 doors and you're at 50, it's going to take you a while to get to 2000.
(13:55) And you also want to think through, am I going to be a portfolio? (13:58) You're going to be portfolio style for some time. (14:01) And then you're going to kind of maybe hybrid into, you know, a portfolio manager with some support staff who eventually is really just then a property manager and maybe you get to departments.
(14:12) So you just want to think through like, you know, a lot of people will say, well, I'm department and I'm at 400 doors. (14:18) That may or may not make sense depending again, on kind of your market and, and, and who your clients are. (14:26) Cause if you only have like 24 clients, I don't know if I need departments per se.
(14:31) So I think you just have to really think through the type of properties you're managing and where you're located to kind of then think through this internal structure that makes sense.
Pete Neubig (14:41) So are you big on having like the vision kind of set out? (14:45) Like this is, you talked about like if I'm at 50.
Deb Newell (14:47) Yeah, but the vision will change. (14:48) The vision has to be able to shift. (14:50) So you can't be so like, if it's on your dream catcher, you're going to be able to make sure that that's going to have to change.
(14:56) Right. (14:57) So if you say 2000 doors, that may, you may get to a thousand and go, I'm good. (15:03) So, and it's okay.
(15:04) Like more doors is more problems and it's more money. (15:08) It's more people. (15:09) And it's the more, the more you have, the more it takes of your time and you slowly build a really good team.
(15:17) Then it won't feel like a thousand or 2000 is a burden. (15:21) It'll feel so smooth. (15:22) It'll feel like 200 and that's the focus, but you have to invest in the team and really take the time to nurture them.
Pete Neubig (15:31) I think we're going to leave it there. (15:32) Thanks everybody.

Deb Newell (15:33) Okay.

Pete Neubig (15:34) Thank you. (15:35) Dr. OG, Deb.

Deb Newell (15:37) Thanks Pete. (15:38) Appreciate it.
 
Pete Neubig (15:39) See everybody.

Deb Newell (15:40) Bye.