Property Management Operations & Accounting Manager

Residential Portfolio | 100+ Units | Washington, DC

Type: Full Time
Hours: 40 hours/week
Schedule: Full overlap with U.S. Eastern Time required
Compensation: Based on experience and demonstrated skill

Job Overview

We are a U.S. based real estate investment and property management company managing a portfolio of 100+ residential rental units in Washington, DC.

We are looking for an experienced Property Management Operations & Accounting Manager who can take ownership of the daily operational details of our portfolio.

This is not an entry level administrative position.

You must have at least 3 years of relevant professional experience, preferably in property management, real estate operations, accounting/bookkeeping, or a closely related operations role.

We need someone who is exceptionally organized, fast, accurate, and proactive. You should be comfortable managing a large number of open tasks, d ---------- what needs attention first, following up persistently, and making sure issues actually reach completion.

A major part of your job will be helping us manage the work itself, not simply completing individual assignments.

The right person will become a central point of coordination across tenants, vendors, leasing, maintenance, accounting, and management.

Our goal is simple:

Nothing important gets forgotten, nothing sits unnecessarily, and management always knows what requires attention.

What This Role Owns

You will help manage the day to day operating system for our residential portfolio.

That includes:

- Property management operations
- Task and workflow management
- Tenant communications and follow up
- Maintenance coordination
- Rent tracking and delinquency
- Basic accounting and reconciliations
- Leasing administration
- Vendor coordination
- Documentation and recordkeeping
- Management reporting
- Process improvement and SOPs

You will frequently have many items moving at once. Success requires knowing how to prioritize, delegate or coordinate, follow up, escalate, and close the loop.

We are specifically looking for someone who does not need to be reminded repeatedly about open items.

1. Task & Operations Management

This is one of the most important responsibilities of the position.

You will:

- Review open tasks every day
- Create and assign tasks from emails, texts, tenant requests, and management conversations
- Determine priorities and deadlines
- Keep task statuses, notes, owners, and due dates accurate
- Follow up with team members, vendors, tenants, and applicants
- Identify tasks that are stalled or overdue
- Escalate urgent or high risk issues
- Make sure completed work is actually documented and closed
- Provide management with concise updates on outstanding issues
- Identify situations where someone is waiting for information and proactively obtain it
- Help coordinate work across multiple team members
- Maintain recurring operational checklists
- Reduce the number of items management needs to personally track

You should naturally ask:

What is still open? Who owns it? What is the next action? When should it be completed? What could prevent it from getting done?

2. Tenant & Property Operations

You will help coordinate daily communication and operational issues across 100+ residential units.

Responsibilities include:

- Monitor tenant communications
- Respond to routine tenant questions
- Identify urgent or sensitive issues requiring escalation
- Track tenant requests through resolution
- Maintain accurate property and unit notes
- Follow up when tenants owe documents, information, or payments
- Coordinate communication between tenants, management, vendors, and other team members
- Make sure important conversations result in documented next steps

The goal is not simply to respond quickly. It is to resolve issues efficiently and completely.

3. Maintenance Coordination

You will help manage maintenance from initial request through completion.

Responsibilities include:

- Review incoming maintenance requests
- Gather necessary information from tenants
- Create and update work orders
- Coordinate tenants, technicians, and vendors
- Schedule appointments
- Follow up on outstanding work
- Identify work orders that have been open too long
- Confirm that work was actually completed
- Obtain photos, invoices, receipts, and technician notes
- Keep maintenance records current
- Escalate emergencies and recurring property issues
- Help identify vendors who are slow, expensive, or unreliable

We want someone who notices when a work order has been sitting for three days without progress before management has to ask about it.

4. Rent Tracking & Delinquency

You will help maintain accurate visibility into tenant balances and collections.

Responsibilities include:

- Review rent payment activity
- Review tenant ledgers
- Track unpaid balances and partial payments
- Track payment arrangements
- Identify discrepancies between payments and tenant accounts
- Maintain delinquency tracking
- Follow up on outstanding balances according to company procedures
- Prepare concise delinquency summaries
- Escalate unusual or significant balances
- Make sure management has accurate information before decisions are made

Strong attention to numbers is essential.

5. Accounting & Reconciliation Support

You do not need to be a CPA, but you must be comfortable working with financial information and identifying inconsistencies.

Responsibilities may include:

- Review income and expense information
- Compare tenant ledgers, bank activity, invoices, and payment records
- Identify missing, duplicate, or incorrect transactions
- Organize invoices and receipts
- Track reimbursements
- Assist with account reconciliations
- Research discrepancies
- Maintain supporting documentation
- Prepare organized summaries for management review
- Coordinate with bookkeeping/accounting resources
- Help ensure transactions are properly documented

If two reports do not agree, your instinct should be to investigate why, not simply copy one number into another spreadsheet.

6. Leasing Operations

You will help keep vacancies and applicants moving through the leasing pipeline.

Responsibilities include:

- Respond to prospective tenant inquiries
- Track leads and follow ups
- Coordinate showings
- Conduct initial applicant pre screening
- Track applications and missing documentation
- Follow up promptly with prospective tenants
- Maintain current leasing status for each available unit
- Coordinate lease documentation and move in requirements
- Identify leads or applications that are stalled
- Keep management informed of vacancy and leasing activity

7. Management Reporting

We do not want management spending hours digging through systems to figure out what is happening.

You will help provide clear visibility into:

- Urgent issues
- Overdue tasks
- Delinquent accounts
- Open maintenance items
- Vacancies and leasing activity
- Outstanding vendor issues
- Accounting discrepancies
- Decisions requiring management attention

Your updates should be concise and decision useful, rather than long summaries of everything you did that day.

8. Process Improvement & SOPs

We want someone who improves the operating system over time.

You will:

- Maintain checklists and SOPs
- Document recurring processes
- Identify repetitive work that can be simplified
- Suggest workflow improvements
- Help standardize recurring tasks
- Identify opportunities for automation
- Improve how information moves between systems and team members
- Help eliminate unnecessary administrative work

We value people who respectfully say:

“I noticed we keep doing this manually. I think there is a better way.”

Minimum Qualifications

Applicants must have at least 3 years of relevant professional experience.

Strong candidates will have experience in one or more of the following:

- Property management
- Residential real estate operations
- Operations management
- Bookkeeping or accounting support
- Accounts receivable
- Maintenance coordination
- Leasing administration

Direct property management experience is strongly preferred.

This position is not designed for someone learning basic professional organization or task management for the first time.

The Person We Are Looking For

You are likely a strong fit if you are:

Extremely organized. You can manage dozens of open items without losing track of them.

Efficient. You look for the shortest reliable path to completing work rather than creating unnecessary steps.

Fast but accurate. You understand that speed without accuracy creates more work.

Proactive. You follow up without waiting to be reminded.

Good at prioritizing. You can distinguish between something that can wait and something that needs attention today.

Comfortable with numbers. Ledgers, invoices, payments, spreadsheets, and reconciliations do not intimidate you.

Persistent. If a vendor does not respond, you follow up. If information is missing, you obtain it.

Calm under pressure. Property management inevitably involves urgent and occasionally difficult situations.

A strong communicator. Your messages are professional, concise, and clear.

Independent. You can make reasonable operational decisions within established procedures.

Accountable. When you own something, you make sure it reaches completion.

Most importantly, you should be someone who reduces the amount of management attention required to operate the portfolio.

Tools We Use

Experience with several of these is highly desirable:

- AppFolio
- ClickUp
- Asana
- Quo, formerly OpenPhone
- Gmail / Google Workspace
- Google Sheets
- Excel
- Notion
- Slack or Google Chat
- Make

You do not need experience with every system, but you should be comfortable learning software quickly.

Experience with AppFolio and task management software such as ClickUp or Asana is particularly valuable.

Schedule & Availability

This is a full time, long term position.

Requirements:

- 40+ hours per week
- Full overlap with U.S. Eastern Time
- Consistent daily attendance
- Prompt communication during working hours
- Daily review and management of open tasks
- Reliable internet connection
- Backup internet/power plan
- Long term availability

We are looking for someone who has the capacity to make this position their primary professional commitment.

What Success Looks Like

After you are fully trained, we should see:

- Fewer tasks requiring management follow up
- Open items moving toward completion every day
- Maintenance requests being resolved faster
- Accurate rent and delinquency tracking
- Clean and reliable task management
- Better coordination between tenants, vendors, and team members
- Accounting discrepancies identified early
- Leasing leads receiving timely follow up
- Fewer dropped balls
- Clear visibility into anything requiring management attention
- Better documented processes
- Less operational work sitting with ownership

The ultimate measure of success is that you create leverage for management rather than additional management work.

Compensation

Compensation will depend on experience, demonstrated ability, and performance during our selection process.

Candidates with significant property management experience, strong accounting skills, AppFolio experience, and demonstrated operations management ability may qualify for higher compensation.

Shortlisted candidates will complete a paid practical skills assessment before final selection.

How to Apply

Please put “Details Matter” at the top of your application.

Then answer each of the following:

- How many years of property management, real estate operations, accounting, or related experience do you have?
- Approximately how many rental units or properties have you previously supported?
- What responsibilities did you personally own in your most recent role?
- Have you managed a task management system for a team? If yes, describe how you made sure tasks were completed on time.
- Which of the following have you used: AppFolio, ClickUp, Asana, Quo/OpenPhone, Google Sheets, Notion, Slack, or Make?
- Describe a situation where you discovered that an important task had been missed or was falling behind. What did you do?
- Describe a financial or accounting discrepancy you identified. How did you find it and how did you resolve it?
- Imagine you begin work and discover 35 open tasks, 8 unread tenant messages, 4 overdue maintenance requests, and a - tenant claiming their $2,000 payment is missing from their ledger. What would you handle first, and why?
- What is your current work schedule? Do you currently have other clients or jobs?
- What is your desired hourly or monthly compensation?
- Describe your internet connection and backup plan.
- Confirm that you can work 40 hours per week with full U.S. Eastern Time overlap and are looking for a long term position.

Please answer the questions individually. Generic applications that do not answer them will not be considered.