In an abrupt reversal from the past several years, incentive compensation was down for almost all positions. While broad — though modest — base salary increases kept overall total compensation growth in positive territory, the tide of inflationary pressure certainly blunted these gains. As employers seek tools to replace bonuses for keeping employees motivated and engaged, we have been seeing the widespread use of “dry promotions” (advancement that doesn’t come with a pay raise), and we anticipate this will push average salaries for some positions down in 2024. Dry promotions could also factor into succession strategies aimed at countering the continuing wave of senior-level retirements due to ‘Peak 65,’ which by itself should account for some mean compensation erosion.
As expected, the shift in strategic focus from development/acquisitions to operations has resulted is greater than average compensation increases for property management professionals in 2023, and based on what we have seen thus far in 2024 this trend is ongoing. Despite increases for most development roles last year (likely the result of timed project-basedbonus payouts), we expect compensation for that group to flatten in 2024.
