Apartment Career & Education (ACE) Industry Practitioner of the Year
Rich George
CEO
Blue Door

1. Please provide a brief background on the individual being nominated.

Rich George is known in our industry as the NOI Coach. He is also one of NAAEI’s Senior Faculty Members. He has been in the industry over 30 years and started as a groundskeeper as a college job. Rich has been a pioneer in multifamily education offerings through NAAEI since the institute was created. He now owns his own multifamily portfolio through his investments and his company Blue Door Apartments. Rich has authored three books, one of which he did in partnership with NAAEI as the current text for the Advanced Facilitator and Virtual Facilitator Training programs.

2. What makes this person an outstanding candidate and deserving of the ACE award?

Rich is an outstanding example RPM Career opportunity success. He started in this industry as a grounds keeper and literally worked his way up the ranks to accomplish benchmarks and roles, such as, Vice President, CEO, Partner, Consultant, Facilitator, Faculty, Author, and more. Yet, Rich is one of the most selfless people I know. He truly believes in giving back, and this is demonstrated by the countless hours of volunteer time given to NAAEI. Rich is a natural mentor. He intuitively asks the right questions to solve problems. He shares this gift to to create enhanced learning and development experiences for his students along with designing NAAEI curriculum that aides other facilitators to enhance their facilitation abilities. Rich is humble. He is the last person to brag about himself, and is kind, easily approachable, and welcoming to all who encounter him. I have heard him share parts of his RPM Career "story" countless times over the last 15 years. Without fail, he prefaces it with these words: "I share my story with you not to brag, but to demonstrate the opportunity in our industry is real." Rich truly wants people to grasp the opportunity the multifamily industry offers. His passion for education, along with continuous contribution of time and energy is his way of showing others the opportunity is real. When I talked to Rich recently I was able to ascertain that his current commitments with authoring the VFT program, the AFT continuing education programming, and his significant role in both CAM and CAPS as a subject matter expert tallies to over 400 hours of volunteer time in 2021. I think this alone is the biggest qualifier of Rich being a committed contributor to education in our industry.

3. Please specifically describe their contributions, expertise, activities and any other achievements that pertain to this award.

Rich is considered the leading mind in our industry for the financial and operational aspects of multifamily housing. Rich progressed in our industry to become not only a CEO but also an investor and owner of apartments. Rich completed the very first leadership lyceum class shortly after being one of the founders of the Detroit Metropolitan Association. Rich now is a partner in or owns four different industry related service companies and is also an independent rental owner and investor in his own multifamily portfolio. Rich’s career is filled with successes that he attributes to the education he has not only received through the National Apartment Association but also that he has helped to create and facilitate on a regular basis.

4. Cite examples of how this candidate has demonstrated their commitment to apartment industry education and the promotion of apartment careers.

Rich has been a participative contributor in so many ways to our collective industry. I will list just a sampling below:
1. Rich has been a key member of the Senior Faculty for almost 15 years.
2. Rich has not only taught the AFT/VFT program over these years, he has co-authored the foundational text.
3. Rich has been an essential part of the journey to creating over 400 member of NAA’s faculty members to teach all of the designation courses.
4. Rich is currently serving in the capacity of a lead subject matter expert on the current rewrite of both CAPS and CAM. He is the only person that has committed to do both to help insure continuity and compatibility of these programs.
5. Rich is probably the single person that has taught CAM and CAPS the most over the past 5 - 10 years. Rich teaches on average over 10 complete CAM courses and 5 or more CAPS programs each year.
6. Rich has been actively involved in serving as a volunteer subject matter expert in creating the CAM curriculum for the last 3 rewrites and many refreshes of the curriculum. Rich’s name has been listed as a contributor in these course for 15 years.
7. Rich has been actively involved in serving as a volunteer subject matter expert in creating the CAPS for the last 3 rewrites and many refreshes of the curriculum. Rich’s name has been listed as a contributor in these course for 15 years.
8. Rich was instrumental in helping NAAEI in the development of online curriculum since the institute started with online offerings.
9. Rich has spoken as a volunteer at the Apartmentalize/Education conference 12 of the last 15 years as an industry speaker and influencer.
10. Rich has served as a director at the local and state level and has always been active on some committee or board at the local, state or national level.
11. Rich has inspired thousands of young aspiring industry professionals to change their prospective of having a job to it being a career.
Based upon the expansive list above I don’t think there is a more deserving candidate for this award.

5. What is this candidate's unique approach to career development and apartment industry education?

Rich has always been unique in the multifamily space. He has lived his life in educating multifamily management operators with a mission to elevate the financial understanding of the investment management side of our collective business. Rich has always been differentiated from others in the industry because his passion for promoting how our associates can become our partners.