What makes one community association management company more profitable than another? The answer isn’t just about pricing or portfolio size. It comes down to how well leadership understands and acts on their key performance indicators (KPIs).
In the Summer 2025 issue of Vision Magazine, published by the California Association of Community Managers (CACM), Adam Balkcom, CEO of CAM Leadership Institute, authored a feature titled “The Most Important Management Company Metric to Track.” In the article, Adam highlights one KPI that consistently appears across high-performing management companies: the ratio of a manager’s portfolio revenue to their total compensation.
This simple but powerful metric is often overlooked. In the top-performing firms CAM Leadership Institute has interviewed, this metric serves as a clear indicator of portfolio profitability and overall company health. Companies that maintain a 30 to 40 percent manager pay-to-portfolio revenue ratio create room for sustainable growth, cover operating costs, and maintain profit margins.
“There’s one metric that consistently shows up among the most successful companies: the ratio between a manager’s portfolio revenue (gross base management fees) and that manager’s total compensation. This ratio is a critical indicator of whether a portfolio is profitable.”
-Adam Balkcom, CEO of CAM Leadership Institute
Without visibility into this metric, portfolios can easily become unbalanced. One company discovered a high-earning manager was assigned several low-revenue, high-maintenance communities. That manager’s compensation was nearly 90 percent of the revenue being brought in. After tracking the ratio, the company restructured by letting go of low-paying accounts, raising fees, and redistributing portfolios, and saw its most profitable year in two decades.
Profitability does not happen by accident. It is driven by data, reviewed regularly, and used to inform decisions about staffing, pricing, and account assignments.
“That’s the power of tracking. When you shine a light on your data, you quickly identify where things are off. Then, when you start applying time and resources to improve those problem areas, you can immediately measure what’s working—and what’s not. It saves time, energy, and money when you know exactly where to focus your efforts.”
CAM Leadership Institute is helping companies deepen this insight by building a standardized KPI dashboard for community management companies. More firms are also adopting tools like Power BI to automate updates and visualize metrics in real time.
Adam’s message to the industry is clear. Companies that thrive in the years ahead will be the ones that approach profitability with precision, clarity, and discipline.
Read the full article in the Summer 2025 issue of CACM Vision Magazine HERE.