“Help people that are looking for help with help that is helpful.”

That tongue-twister of a mantra framed the central question of our conversation with Brandon Hammond: How do we actually deliver on that promise in a workforce crisis across fragmented markets and under shifting ownership models?

Brandon knows the terrain well. His career spans student housing, multifamily and single-family rentals (SFR), with roles in operations, renovations and field services. That 360-degree view gives him a rare lens into the real estate industry’s deepest contradictions particularly around talent, incentives and the silent cost of shortterm.

I’ve heard variations of this conversation from a dozen angles this year but Brandon brought his ability to zoom out across ownership structures, operational models and regional gaps… and still land on simple, actionable truths.

“These sectors share more similarities than differences..”

Brandon’s career began in off-campus student housing, moved through conventional multifamily, and then into SFR at both institutional players and mom-and-pop shops. Despite the diversity of business models, the core issues felt familiar: service speed, quality gaps and fractured talent pipelines.

He saw firsthand how hiring someone is often the first instinct to solve operational problems yet the pool of talent is drying up. “Maybe I can’t find the people to do the work. Maybe I can’t find the vendors. So now what?” Brandon asked. That “now what” has become the defining question for many operators in today’s market.

From my point of view, the most interesting unlock is when someone like Brandon who’s lived through all three legs of the stool starts asking not just what do we fix but why hasn’t it been fixed already?

“The dollars haven’t caught up to where the conversation actually needs to be.”

The conversation around renewals, retention and experience is loud but investment is still flowing toward acquisition. Brandon explained it this way: Operators understand that long-term residents yield better ROI however nobody gets paid on a renewal.” The systems still reward new leases more than retention.

He challenged a core fallacy in the industry’s incentive model: “Leasing agents are often incentivized individually for new leases but renewals are paid out to the team and worth far less per person.” The message is clear: spend your time chasing the new, not nurturing the loyal.

From my side, it reminds me of the misaligned flywheel. We talk about relationships as flywheels all the time, especially in tech. But when your comp structure is built like a funnel, you’re going to get churn. Not because people want to leave but because your system told them to.

“You don’t need to remove the people, the people are already burned out.”

The workforce conversation is about the experience of doing the job, not just about availability. Brandon said that maintenance techs are asked to handle pest infestations, hoarding, evictions and emotionally heavy fieldwork that goes far beyond a job description.

What’s missing is clarity, consistency and training. Brandon contrasted the chaos of property fieldwork with the nine weeks of onboarding required in hospitality like Ritz-Carlton. “That kind of approach to standardizing the way you interact with residents, it’s what’s missing,” he said.

Our industry is obsessed with efficiency, but we’re slow to apply it to people. We centralize workflows, automate leasing funnels and optimize dispatch. But if we asked a field tech how it feels to show up to a job, nine out of ten would say: “I have no idea what I’m walking into.”

“We didn’t talk about it, we were doing it.”

Brandon shared how his team at Progress Residential cut annual turnover from 22% to under 8% in 12 months without raising base pay. The difference? Consistent investment in people as people. His team built book clubs, virtual TED Talk discussions, flew out to meet employees in person and prioritized psychological safety as much as output.

That wasn’t just for morale. Lower turnover meant faster onboarding, tighter knowledge loops, and a more effective national operations team.

That part hit home for me. I believe culture isn’t just ping-pong tables or pizza parties. It’s about knowing what motivates someone and creating systems that respond to that. It’s about learning before responding, not offering before accepting.

“There’s an outcome that’s inevitable.”

When we asked Brandon what happens if the talent problem goes unsolved, he didn’t hedge. “We already have the movie trailer,” he said. Fifty maintenance openings for every one ops leadership job. Overreliance on vendors. Burned-out staff. More dollars flowing to private equity-backed field service companies.

And if the pressure keeps rising? The worst-case scenario, we discussed organized labor. It reflects the last resort of people who feel they have no voice in the system.

That’s the cost of ignoring the human side of property operations. You lose control of your workforce not just in morale but in structure, economics and outcomes.

What stuck with me most was how Brandon framed that crossroads. You’re going to spend the money either way on better retention or on vendor premiums, union dues and asset-level NOI losses. One is proactive. One is inevitable.

Brandon’s Advice to His Younger Self

“This is a people business. Learn that early, and you’ll soar way higher than you ever will otherwise.”

Brandon said he spent the first 15 years of his career building better mousetraps trying to be the smartest person in the room. However over time, he realized the true value was in people, not processes. You can’t build anything at scale unless people want to build it with you.

He left us with a call for empathy, transparency and investment not just in tech or workflows but in the humans that make the housing industry run.And that’s a Hell Yes! I’ll stand behind.