Condo Guru Blog

Archive for the ‘Don’t Do It’ Category

Property management companies lose customers/contracts.  That’s a given in any business.  I’ve been lucky and have never had one of my properties that I’ve managed leave due to dissatisfaction; though I’ve “fired” one or two properties which probably caused them to be not so happy.

In the property management business, changing from one management company to another is commonly referred to as “transition”.  It is a generally orderly process where the old management company hands over documents and information a month or so prior to the actual changeover date so that the new management company can hit the ground running on that changeover date.

Despite that there are more than 100,000 condos in the City of Chicago, the main players in the property management business are a relatively small group – one of those 10% have 90% of the business kind of things.  It’s a small world and eventually companies have to deal with each other on a regular basis to transition properties. 

Nobody likes losing business and it takes a large amount of professionalism, courtesy and cooperation to handle it gracefully.

It continually astounds me when a company losing their business throws a childlike temper-tantrum and refuses to cooperate.  It makes everyone involved in the transition look bad and stains the industry as a whole.  The old management company looks petty and everyone around says; “See, this is one of the reasons we’re firing them.”  The new company is left scrambling around trying to piece together what they can.  Scrambling around causes balls to be dropped and owners of the property say; “Why did we hire these guys? They look like idiots.”

So, my grump for the day………This weekend I am taking over management of a new property and, for the second time this year, the management company is being unprofessional and uncooperative. 

Unfortunately, the owners of the property are the ones most likely to suffer while I try to get a handle on everything as fast as I can.  Nobody wins – we all lose.  Like I said, it stains the industry and irritates me to no end. 

It is very short sighted and someday, if the prior management company survives giving this kind of customer service to its clients, they may ask something of me.  Of course I’m too much of a professional to not cooperate and I also obsess about my company’s reputation in the industry.  Other management companies might not be so professional.

It is good though that property management is a small industry and people get together and talk……….