Happy Clients Don't Change Agencies. Are You Happy With Your Property Manager?

We've written before about the findings of the 2018 Voice of Australian Property Management Report, which found that most property managers are inexperienced, many are not happy in their role and want to leave their job, and that staff retention is often a low priority for real estate agency owners. Yikes!

We know from experience that investors can feel it's a case of "better the devil you know", staying with a less than satisfactory real estate agency simply because that has become the expected level of service. 

Not happy with that, we've taken a look at our own data to determine how we "stack up" in terms of client satisfaction. We're pleased with the results!

We have significantly higher client retention than the industry average

According to research from Real Estate Dynamics, the real estate industry has an average property management attrition rate of 17.3% per year. This means that on average, an agency will lose 17.3% of the properties they manage within a year, often due to poor service. 

In addition, when property management departments lose the management of a rental property, they often don't record why. Instead, the focus turns to churning in new properties to replace the lost ones. 

When people choose to no longer have their property managed by our agency, we do record why. We've found that over the past year, 93% of the properties we manage were retained under our management. i.e. we had an attrition rate of 7%, significantly less than the industry average of 17.3%.

Looking into why, we've found that 6 of our 7% total attrition is due to owners selling or moving back in to the property (in fact, 3% each). 

In summary, happy clients don't change agencies. They stay where they are. 

The industry average annual client retention rate is 82.7%. Ours is 93%.

​Investors move from "big name" agencies for better service

We've run an analysis of all the property investors we work with, and found that 30% of our investors have moved to us from another agency. 

That is, the investor had chosen another agency to manage their property (usually a big name, corporate franchise agency), had a bad experience, and chose to leave. 
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Almost one in three of the investors we work with have followed this path. Big brand name and big budget doesn't guarantee better service.⠀

30% of our investors have moved to us from another agency. 

​People who have experienced our service are our biggest advocates

Again taking a look at our data, we've found that 58% of the clients we work with have been referred to our business by experienced investors. 

It can be tempting to feel there is value and security in a large agency brand name with a large marketing budget. We're grateful to know people are choosing to join us through positive word of mouth, not because of big advertising spend. 

58% of the clients we work with have been referred to our business by experienced investors. 

Are you happy with your property manager?

Are you happy with your property manager? If not, contact us to see how we can make a difference for your investment experience.