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The event, held in Sydney at the beginning of November, assessed the big ideas that will shape the property management sector throughout 2024.
A core focus of the Real Estate Institute of Australia’s (REIA) property managers’ roundtable is on people and wellbeing throughout the industry at a time when stress and turbulence are high, with vacancy rates at record lows right across the country.
The key outcome of the roundtable related to wellbeing is a consensus that there needs to be more concerted efforts to remove stress from property managers by “removing pain points from the rental transaction through cohesive community-government partnerships”, the institute’s statement explained.
Moreover, the roundtable deduced there is a need to “provide better on the job support for mental health”.
Summing up the magnitude of the event, Hayden Groves, president of the REIA, said: “To have so many leaders of property management businesses across the nation gathered in one place for the core purpose of identifying and working through our sectors’ major challenges is an Australian first.”
Mr Groves believes “this is the work of the REIA in action before teeing uncovering tangible, industry-led solutions at a time where governments and other stakeholders are prone to making ill-informed decisions based on media commentary and political grandstanding,” he added.
In addition to shining a light of property management wellbeing, the REIA roundtable produced four other key outcomes related to the industry’s function and progression. These include:
- Investment: Stressing the need to promote property investment as a point of difference to emerging investors groups, as well as single investment property owners. This would involve the formulation of concrete policy strategies for the federal government in relation to taxation, lending buffers and foreign investment, amongst others.
- People: Aiming to make property management an attractive profession, utilising every possible avenue, such as education, migration and increased federal support for apprenticeships and training, to do so.
- Innovation: Emphasising education of both business leaders and teams as old technology fades out and new, more sophisticated technological suites become common practice. This includes federal government reforms in the privacy, cyber security and anti-money laundering spaces.
- Commitment to action: All attendees agreed there needs to be industry commitment to action over talk to better service renters, investors and property management teams.
Given the current rental climate of seemingly ever-rising rents and plummeting vacancy rates, Mr Groves insisted: “There is a need to work across Australia and share best practices as a sector.”
“Solving the rental riddle will require the will and collaboration of many to help renters. No one understands the challenge or is best placed to drive change than Australia’s property management leaders.”
REIA director Hannah Gill said the event “brought together an initial group of property management leaders, experts and partners to examine big picture ideas, and is a direct deliverable of the REI endorsed REIA 2025 strategy”.
Mr Groves concluded: “This is just a start.”
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