Hard to Fill AM Role?
My team’s hiring an AM associate for months — multiple final rounds, but no solid hire yet. Given how rough the CRE job market is, but it’s still been tough to close.
The hiring manager is looking for someone who’s hands-on with operations and also solid on the finance/modeling side. Most candidates fall into two buckets:
Strong property-level/project management experience, but weaker on finance.
Strong modeling skills and finance/acquisitions backgrounds, but little hands-on asset management experience — often feels like they’re just parking in AM until an acquisitions seat opens up.
Are we being too picky, or is it just genuinely tough to find someone who wants to stay in AM long-term and has the full skill set?
It seems like your team is facing a common challenge in the multifamily asset management (AM) hiring process. Based on the most helpful WSO content, here are some insights and actionable advice:
Skill Set Mismatch:
Market Realities:
Potential Solutions:
Retention Strategy:
In summary, your team isn’t necessarily being too picky, but the dual skill set you’re seeking is indeed rare. Adjusting expectations slightly, investing in training, and emphasizing the long-term value of the role could help you close the position more effectively.
Sources: Lunch & Learn -Ins and Outs of Multifamily, For those of you in multi-family, Multifamily Developers and Acquirers: What do you look for in property management firms?, What are characteristics of a "good role" in CRE?, Megafunds starting associates 6 months earlier
Unfortunately, if you need to fill the roll quickly, yes you are being too picky. People don't typically want to be in AM longterm. Finance and modelling people even have a ego and it's not shiny and fun. I know on the debt placement side, we beat down on AM and I would only take the roll to make some money while I looked for a new job. For you though if you don't need to fill quickly, aren't stretched and want a long term employee you are doing the right thing.
I’d prefer the operations experience bucket if I was you.
May I ask what market you are trying to hire in?
It sounds like your title is not commensurate with the skills the manager wants.
So I would either adjust the title to better align with the skills required, narrow the skills to match the title.
Yeah your issue is that most people that took the time to learn excel/modeling at the associate level are going to want to do acquisitions. There's an exception at the top tier (the AMs at BX/Carlyle/etc. are going to have excel skills), but you're unless you're in the top bucket you're not going to attract that type of talent.
On the other end you may get some greener analysts looking for a step up that have excel skills, but they won't have hands on asset management experience as they've been learning excel/behind their desk for the last 1-2 years.
Why do you need someone "solid on the finance/modeling side" for Asset Management to begin with? What are they modeling exactly versus plugging in trailing-12 data and projecting CapEx across the portfolio to a presumably already-existing model?
But I guess more importantly, are you offering market-pay? Because with the amount of people looking for jobs right now, that's the only reason I could imagine you being unable to find one. At the very least, you should be able to entice an Asset Manager already working as an Asset Manager at a rival firm with more compensation & opportunity.
Is the general consensus that asset management analysts / associates can't model / have lower Excel skills? Hasn't been the case for the ones I've seen. You have to pay for it sure, but they are out there. a lot of hairy deals need it and there are a lot of hairy deals out there
I don't think that's the consensus at all. I just don't know why that's a hiring skill priority unless you're a start up firm and literally don't have a model or the deals you're working on are so outrageously complicated that the model has to be half rebuilt from scratch every time. I highly doubt most people on this website work on deals that complicated.
You could teach a 12 year old to plug numbers into a portfolio model in less than a week, let alone a single-property model. Personally, I'd much rather pay asset management analysts or associates to use their brains, interpret the information, and recommend a strategy on how to run the assets better. I do not give two shits whether they use Index Match or xlookup to get there or their model is one tab, three tabs, or 100 tabs.
"multiple final rounds, but no solid hire yet."
Post the salary range you are offering.
100% below market salary range with above market expectations. Either reset your salary range or temper your expectations.
Sorry nobody with a dynamic skillset is going to be underpaid, regardless of AM or acq experience.
What asset class? As a multifamily focused person (which is operationally intensive), it is rare to find someone at the associate level with both skill sets. Why? Because if you have both you would have a higher title. An Associate has one and learns the other whilst they are an Associate.
It sounds like your firm is looking to pay someone as an Associate while having full fledged Asset Manager duties. I used to work at a place that hired like that and it was constant churn at the Associate level. Your firm might not be having a “hard time finding people”, they are having a “hard time finding people willing to take lower title & comp than they are worth”.
I am looking for an AM role right now and want to stay in AM for a bit before progressing to portfolio management. I have been working as a senior property manager / asset manager for this family that owns a bunch of buildings in NYC. However, they are robbing me of the actual financial experience of both of those roles. They do not do any budgeting b/c they don’t have boards or investors, they don’t do any deep cashflow analysis b/c for the same reason. Sometimes I feel like I am a glorified coordinator for them. I have great experience on the operational side, have a masters in RE from NYU Shack, have done numerous RE Modeling excel courses, had a finance job before, can talk about the market trends and now learning how to incorporate AI in RE industry. I have been applying for 4 months at this point for an actual AM roles and barely land any interviews. The ones that I do land, I go through an HR screening then 1st round with an AM and then get ghosted by both the recruiter and hiring manager. I haven’t reached out to my network yet, as I am only now being serious about it, but applying online through different platforms feels like I am applying to those resume farm shops that just screening candidates. I ask AI to generate mock technical AM role interview questions everyday and feel like I nail the interviews but just not getting anything. Brutal process... Wish someone would just give me a chance.
Oddly enough, I did that for a year. I had to go to grad school to get the "property manager" stink off me, even though asset management was my primary responsibility. And that was in a much better economy.
I would delete any reference to property management from your resume, even if that's deleting half of your responsibilities.
One of the benefits of working for a less structured real estate family is that you can add a lot of value by bringing institutional level standards to the table and have influence in expanding your job description to things you actually want to be doing. I too also started working for a less structured real estate family. Whenever something wasn’t being done in a manner I thought it should be, I took on the initiative of implementing a better solution, and usually ended up gaining more responsibilities in that area. After doing that many times over the last decade, I am now the most senior real estate guy at the company not related to the Patriarch and basically have complete autonomy to take on whatever responsibilities I choose to do so.
Keep in mind that navigating family politics is critical in situations like this. Even if you are improving a process, you need to do it in a way where you are not making those in a position of power look bad. You also need to go out of your way to make sure key family members know who you are and like you.
I dont even have it on my resume, I have it as an AM role on it. I just briefly speak about how I started as a PM there and was promoted to Senior PM and then to AM to assist the family in bigger CapEx projects, potential acquisition targets (as they have showed interest in expanding their portfolio for the first time in decades). Like i feel so burnt at this family office because they have me do everything for them (maintenance hire/fire process, unit reno, gut renos, facade/roof/boiler repairs/replacement, f****** IT sometimes, inhouse counceling for the bums that we hire, physical inspections of new buildings and DD analsysis with their in-house models) and yet I cant land a true AM role.
sounds like you also need to tweak yours responsibilies and highlight the financial side more (budgetings, forecasting, variance analysis etc)
Listen, if you want more applicants for your Asset Management role, you need to stop calling it Asset Management like it’s a stiff sock under your bed that holds its own shape. Brand the job as REPE and suddenly you’re slicker than cum on a gold tooth.
My grandma went through this a few years ago with her online dating profile. "Single, 77 year old looking for love" wasn't cutting it. "Hot Older Single Woman In Your Area Wants To Fuck" got the job done, even if my new grandpa doesn't have a boat.
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