Earlier this month, the National Multifamily Housing Council (NMHC) released its Top 50 Managers list based on how many units managed–a purely quantitative measurement of units. So for this month’s ORA© installment, we wanted to highlight the top 10 managers of the NMHC 50 from a different point of view, with a different yard stick: just how happy are the residents in all those units?
Apparently size doesn’t mean much when it comes to online reputation. Companies at the very top and toward the very bottom of the NMHC 50 boasted high ORA© scores. In fact, of all the public companies in our industry, only two REITs ranked in the top 10.
At the very top, The Bozzuto Group (the 21st largest manager) and MAA (the sixth largest) tied it up with an ORA© score of 68. They were closely followed by Cottonwood Residential at an ORA© score of 67—though it’s No. 49 on the NMHC list.
There was also a three-way tie for the fourth spot at an ORA© score of 65 between Morgan Properties, Drucker & Falk, and Camden Property Trust. Those firms were followed by Milestone Management, RAM Partners and Village Green.
Compared to the national average of 52, the top 10 managers from the NMHC 50 list were well above. But while Greystar Real Estate Partners, LLC became far and away the biggest manager last year via its acquisition of Riverstone, the firm came in on this ranking at No. 10 with an ORA© score of 56.
To arrive at the aggregated score, J Turner Research tracked and analyzed the online reputation of more than 53,000 apartment properties across multiple ratings websites on a monthly basis. To overcome the challenge of multiple ratings scales, J Turner devised a statistical model that establishes a single score for each property representative of the aggregates of ratings websites. This score serves as a benchmark to compare various properties nationally. To arrive at a top managers list, J Turner averaged the scores of the properties in each company’s portfolio.
| Rank | Company | ORA Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Bozzuto Group | 68 |
| 1 | MAA | 68 |
| 3 | Cottonwood Residential | 67 |
| 4 | Morgan Properties | 65 |
| 4 | Drucker & Falk | 65 |
| 4 | Camden Property Trust | 65 |
| 7 | Milestone Management, LLC | 63 |
| 8 | RAM Partners, LLC | 61 |
| 9 | Village Green | 58 |
| 10 | Greystar Real Estate Partners, LLC | 56 |
