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In 2023 J Turner Research launched the Rising 1K ORA Power Ranking. This prestigious ranking recognizes properties that have totally turned around their resident satisfaction, improving their ORA Score dramatically since the beginning of the year. Namely, the ranking looks at the 1,000 properties that have seen the most improvement in their ORA Score since January (in 2024, this meant having at least a 13-point increase).
This month, we are diving into what these properties did to see such dramatic improvements in their online reputation. Obviously, we would expect their reviews to score more positively this year than in previous years. The data bore this out, reflecting that the average star rating on reviews for these properties went from a 3.67 average lifetime to 4.64 in 2024. But massive volume was not what moved the needle: these properties have only averaged 4.13 reviews per month on Google in 2024.
These properties made improvements to the resident experience to see the results they did. Today we are going to dive into what caused the biggest impact.
No Stone Left Unturned
To do this analysis, we compared complaint rates of each of the 22 categories J Turner Research’s Thought Analysis tool measures. The “Complaint Rate” reflects the percentage of reviews featuring a complaint about each category. For example, if there is a sample of 10 reviews and 3 of them have a complaint about Communication, the complaint rate is 30%. It is important to note that review samples in this type of analysis reflect all types of reviews, regardless of star rating.
For this particular study, we looked at the Rising 1K’s historic complaint rates (reviews from 2003 – 2023) in comparison to complaint rates on reviews received in 2024 to see where there were noticeable differences. Shockingly, every single category received at least 50% fewer complaints in 2024 than it did historically. For example, at the bottom of the improvement spectrum was Pet Waste, but even this category improved from a 0.9% complaint rate historically to 0.4% in 2024.
This dramatic downshift in every single category reflects that these properties made systematic changes onsite. No amount of pushing review volume in the world can drown out negative commentary to this extent, so it is clear these properties made massive operational changes to improve how their residents perceive them in every aspect of their business.
What Moved the Needle the Most?
Despite a clear improvement in all 22 categories, there were operational areas that showed more dramatic improvement than others. When isolating to categories with substantial volume (complained about in at least 1% of reviews historically), the following five categories show the biggest decrease in complaint rate:
Two clear trends emerge…
First off, as we see in almost every one of these studies, you cannot be successful in resident satisfaction without doing the basics of multifamily well. Unsurprisingly, Customer Service, Communication, and Financial Clarity (clearly communicating about billing/charges) all rank in the top five of most improved complaint rates. These are statistically make or break operational areas, so dramatic improvements in these categories forecast a turnaround for any property’s online reputation.
Secondly, Pests and Condition of the Unit crack the top five. This is consistent with J Turner Research’s findings in previous studies. In J Turner Research’s Internet Adventure Study, survey results revealed that unsafe or ill-performing living conditions will almost certainly create dissatisfaction or turn off residents and prospective renters alike. Notably, properties in the Rising 1K performed worse than the national average in both respects previously to 2024. The lifetime complaint percentage for all properties in the country is 4.3% for Pests and 7.6% for Condition of the Unit. These are markedly better than the Rising 1K’s complaint rates of 5.1% and 7.7%, respectively. It should be therefore assumed that like many other struggling properties in the country, some of the Rising 1K had an Achilles heel with underperformance in these areas.
In contrast, the huge improvements these properties made in both areas, going well below even one-third of the national complaint rate in 2024, reaped immediate results. While neither issue is “easy” to fix, the rewards are clearly great.
What Does it Mean?
RealPage and J Turner Research recently published the 3rd version of their ORA & Revenue study where it revealed that every point of ORA improvement results in adding 9.3BPS premium to market. In fact, RealPage said that “of the many factors that impact property performance, ongoing resident engagement is one of the immediately actionable levers to uncover hidden yield and asset outperformance.” This means that the properties that made the Rising 1K substantially improved the financial health of their property, and thus, we should use the findings as a roadmap for future bottom-line success.
In Conclusion…
Many properties have the opportunity to add dollars to their property’s bottom line by focusing on resident satisfaction. It is not easy, nor does it happen overnight, but there are over 1,000 examples on this year’s Rising 1K list that showed it can be done and is feasible within as short as a year’s time.
Property management companies need to have the humility to look in the mirror and see where they have fallen short by analyzing their residents’ sentiment. But, once they use that data to make changes in how they take care of the units, communicate with residents, and give off a general attitude of good service and helpfulness, the sky is the limit!
ABOUT THIS BLOG:
The insights in this blog came from utilizing J Turner Research’s text categorization tool, Thought Analysis. Thought Analysis is a proprietary AI software that will objectively show you your operational strengths and weaknesses based on anything anyone has ever said about you online in reviews. What is being said is incredibly valuable because it is essentially the "why" behind your scores. Reviews are unprompted descriptions of why a resident is satisfied (left a high star rating) or dissatisfied (left a low star rating). This means that what is being complimented and complained about can be seen by owners and operators as drivers of satisfaction/dissatisfaction.