Episode 36

How would you define resilience? How can this quality help with your career in property management? Join us as we talk with industry expert Ed Buckley from Avenue 5, whose career has spanned over 25 years, and see how his resilient attitude helped him on his path to success.

Host(s): Jonathan Saar from Market Me Social and Mark Howell from Howl Creative Concepts

Our Special Guest: Ed Buckley from Avenue5 Residential

Ed Buckley is currently working as the Vice President of Operations at Avenue5 Residential. Ed began his multifamily industry career in 1998 and has overseen performance for lease-up, stabilized, mixed-use, and LIHTC properties. Prior to joining Avenue5, Ed served in portfolio leadership roles for Equity Residential, Concord Management, Integral Property Management, US Residential Group, and Greystar. He holds certified apartment portfolio supervisor (CAPS) and housing credit certified professional (HCCP) designations.

Show Highlights

How do you build a lifelong successful property management career? One key element is resilience. What do you think of when you hear that word? This episode takes a deep dive into resilience and why it’s so important.

Key Questions/Topics Covered

What has kept you resilient throughout your property management career?

There will always be another issue, another mountain to climb as far as managing properties goes. We need to remember that we are managing people’s homes. There is a quote that I love that I saw hung up somewhere: “Residents don’t live where we work; we work where they live.” You have to be resilient and meet any challenge because people rely on us for where they live!

Tips for maintaining a positive attitude

It sounds a bit cliché – but I always try to treat people the way I would want to be treated. No matter what, understand that everyone is always going through something. When something goes wrong, I can cuss with the best of them, but I try not to make it personal and remember that we need to work through the situation and solve it.

Covid and resilience

I am amazed by both the resilience and creativity that I saw and experienced during the pandemic. For example, I took part in a weekly phone call attended by property managers and vendors from all over the U.S.. Competitors right there on the same call, all brainstorming together on how to meet the unprecedented challenges we were all facing. Vendors there not to sell but to show how they could support the industry. Truly amazing to see us all come together during this time.

That was on a national level. Back at home, it was hard to transition to a new office way of life: plexiglass everywhere and masks. For me, it was a challenge to switch to virtual leasing. Regardless, changes needed to be made, and we did.

Overcoming challenging situations

I am known as the cleanup guy. As many of you know, in third-party management, you always have 30 days to lose a property. So coming into a property that has low occupancy and is hemorrhaging money is always a challenge. There is no magic wand that is going to get you immediate results. However, it starts with making the right decisions from day one.