Most of you reading this blog would not have the faintest idea who Alix Earle is. Good. You have better things to do than watch 25‑year‑olds lip‑sync on TikTok. You probably have a low‑level disdain for the influencer economy and the dopamine casino of social media. I get it. I too cringe my way through what I see online. But precisely because that world feels ridiculous compared with debt‑to‑income ratios, OCR and chattel valuation, it is a great place to steal ideas, shake up your assumptions, and stress‑test how you choose a property manager.
Alix Earle is a 25 year old young lady who charges high six figures in USD for a single post. She started raving about a prebiotic soda called Poppi at uni simply because she liked it. The founders noticed and, instead of paying her in cash, they gave her equity in the company. So when PepsiCo later bought Poppi for close to 2 billion US dollars, she walked away with tens of millions.
That’s right. 25-year old; talked about a fizzy drink.
These days, she doesn’t need anyone’s money, which means she can be ruthlessly selective with brands and it is precisely this level of selectivity that makes her so valuable.
What does all of this has to do with your Mt Roskill 3 beddy that is on the market for a property manager?
1. Equity‑like incentives: make your manager think like an owner
When Alix talked about Poppi, she wasn’t “doing an ad”; she was defending an investment that could change her life. Her incentives and the brand’s incentives were perfectly aligned. That is exactly the psychology you want from a property manager: not “Did I lodge the bond?”, “Have I done this quarter’s inspection?”, “Did I tick the boxes?” but “Have I grown and protected this asset so my future income and reputation rise with it?”
I’m not saying you should pay your property manager in equity unless they happen to be your child, in which case that’s called estate planning and you should talk to your accountant. You can however create equity-like alignments so that when you grow, they grow. I’m talking about structuring the relationship so that the more properties you buy, the more the manager managers; the better their arrears, vacancy and dispute figures, the more you reward them with referrals, longevity, and, where it makes sense, performance-linked bonuses. For example, you might agree to review their fee structure or send them a warm intro to another APIA landlord after two years of consistently low arrears and vacancy. The symbiosis has to go both ways so that when things go sideways, you’re both feel the pain and are motivated to fix, not patch.
2. Selectivity as your quickest quality filter
Alix can afford to say no, which is precisely why her yes is meaningful. The property manager who is “available for anything” and negotiable on all terms (especially price) is just window dressing. This is not someone well positioned to advance your interests.
The agency that proudly announces it will take any owner, any property, any tenant is optimising for volume, not for your return. And guess what? Once their books hit a certain number, they will likely flick it off for a handsome profit. All of a sudden, you are not a customer, you are inventory.
If your first instinct is to ask, “How low can you go on fees and how quickly can you take this off my hands?”, you are exactly the kind of owner that volume shops are built for. That doesn’t make you a bad owner, but it does mean you need to be more deliberate about who is really in charge of your asset.
Your fastest due‑diligence hack is one question: “Who is not a good fit for you, and why?” If they can describe the owners they refuse (non‑compliant, abusive, “never spend on maintenance”), the stock they avoid, the tenants they decline, you are talking to someone who protects their own brand and therefore yours.
3. Stop buying “posts”; start buying conversions
The influencer economy gets it. The old, out-dated model concerns itself with big cheques, big posts, big dopamine hits, then nada, nothing. 20K likes is no good if you’ve only sold one truckload of fizzy drinks. The newer model: smaller cash, equity that only pays if the company actually grows or exits; creators get rewarded for conversions, not just content.
Most landlords are stuck in the old model with managers. You negotiate down the fee, buy a slogan like “hassle‑free,” and then measure success by how little you hear from them. You are basically buying posts. Instead, buy conversions. Ask: “Over three to five years, what usually happens to arrears, vacancy and net cash flow on properties like mine and how would you show me that?”
Stop paying for admin. Start paying for performance.
4. Structure the management authority like a performance contract
Ever wonder why full-service contracts seldom bother to define what full means? I see owners fall for this over and over. Even if the contracts map out standard routine tasks, they almost never commit to a measurement of success, in an unregulated market no less!
You only need one grown‑up conversation. Nail down a handful of moments that matter: inspection frequency and reporting standard, arrears escalation timeline, maintenance approval thresholds, rent review cadence. Put it in writing. You are delegating, not abdicating; the clearer the rules, the more safely you can get out of the way.
5. Use a one‑page health dashboard so incentives stay alive
Brands don’t keep creators around because their feeds are busy; they keep them because sales, search and loyalty go up. The feedback loop disciplines everyone. Most investors run on the “no news is good news” operating system until it isn’t. What about “good news is good news”?
Ask your manager for a one-page quarterly “Portfolio Health” dashboard with:
- a simple traffic light: green/amber/red
- net cash flow this quarter vs last quarter
- arrear days and vacancy days
- a tick-box for ‘bond lodged’ and ‘inspections up to date’
If you can’t understand it in under 30 seconds, its the wrong dashboard.
If it’s green, fantastic; keep rewarding that manager. If it flips to amber or red, what’s your bat-signal to lean in, talk like adults about what’s going wrong, change the incentives or change the manager.
The influencer world may look like the opposite of serious investing, but under the ring light is a brutal, data‑driven question: are the people fronting your asset behaving like owners, or like actors paid by the hour? If this has you rethinking how you evaluate and reward your property manager, good, that discomfort is the point.
Now, over to you: what’s the next uncomfortable, real‑world topic you want unpacked for APIA members? Write in with your suggestions, and the next column will tackle the one you most want answered.
Sarina Gibbon
Sarina Gibbon is the general manager of the APIA.
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