Property management outsourcing to an assistant you hire directly

Property management runs on volume. Every door brings maintenance requests, arrears, routine inspections, lease renewals and a steady flow of tenant emails. Sales teams face the same pattern with listings admin and lead follow-up. When licensed staff carry all of it, they have less time for landlords, vendors and new business, and the rent roll stops growing. Start with the work that piles up fastest, and set clear rules for what the assistant handles and what goes to a licensed agent.

What an offshore property management assistant handles

Leasing. A real estate assistant writes and uploads rental listings to realestate.com.au and Domain, books inspections through Inspect Real Estate, follows up enquiries, processes applications for your property manager’s decision, and prepares lease documents from your templates.

Managing the tenancy. They log and triage maintenance requests, issue work orders to approved tradies, chase quotes and invoices, schedule routine inspections, prepare inspection reports for review, and track lease renewals and rent reviews in PropertyMe, Console Cloud or PropertyTree.

Arrears. They send approved arrears reminders on your timeline and flag accounts that need a property manager’s call.

Sales support. They prepare listing copy and campaign schedules, enter open-home attendees into Rex or your CRM, send follow-ups and keep vendor reports current.

Enquiries. A customer service hire answers routine calls, emails and portal enquiries, and passes urgent repairs and complaints straight to the right person.

Inbox and diary. A virtual assistant manages principals’ and agents’ diaries, inboxes and social posts.

What stays with your licensed agents

The regulated work stays onshore. Appraisals, negotiating, signing agency agreements and leases, trust account receipting and disbursement approvals, bond disputes, tribunal matters and anything your state’s licensing laws reserve for an agent remain with licensed staff. The assistant prepares, books, records and follows up. They don’t decide applications or speak for you in a dispute. Tarino doesn’t give legal or compliance advice.

How we screen real estate assistants

Property admin is high volume, so the practical assessment tests speed and accuracy together. For this role it could include triaging a maintenance request into a work order and writing a reply to a tenant, so you can judge judgement and tone. The search starts with 1,000+ candidates. About 400 pass CV screening, 200 a video screen and 100 that practical task. Around 50 reach the structured interview and 20 the finalist review, and you meet the best 3–4, usually within about 2 weeks. Here is how each screening stage works. More than 95% of Tarino placements are still in the role at 6 months.

Trust accounts, tenant records and your logins

Your hire works in your property management software and CRM under a named account you create. Use your software’s user roles to keep trust accounting and disbursements with licensed staff, require multi-factor authentication and remove access when they leave. Tenant and landlord details stay in your systems, and you remain responsible for them under the Privacy Act. Check your obligations with your state’s real estate institute or adviser. The offshore staff security checklist covers user roles, MFA and offboarding.

Real estate outsourcing without the monthly margin

A managed agency charges for each assistant every month. Staff Domain’s published Scale rate is A$1,099 per person per month, about A$13,188 a year, plus A$1,200 per hire (checked October 2026). Two assistants on that model cost about A$26,376 a year in fees before salaries. With Tarino you pay one recruitment fee per hire and nothing monthly, and your hire keeps their full salary because you pay them directly. Test your own numbers in the offshore staff cost calculator, and read how to hire Filipino staff from Australia for the hiring options.

Count your doors per property manager before the search. That number tells you whether one assistant per portfolio or one shared across the team is the right brief.