John Combs Launches Property Management Firm

RiverRock has hit the ground running, with more than 2.2 million sf of office and medical space under management in Los Angeles and Orange counties. Besides Combs, the founder and principal of the company, management at RiverRock includes managing directors Lyle Randles and Mickey McClune, both former senior managing directors for Newmark & Company Real Estate, and both with more than 20 years in the commercial real estate industry.

Combs, a veteran of more than 20 years in commercial real estate management positions, tells GlobeSt.com that RiverRock plans to focus on Southern California properties for its first two years and then to branch out throughout the Western US in years three through five. The company starts with a staff of nine, and Combs anticipates it will grow to 15 by the end of the year.

Combs directed a national management operation responsible for approximately 300 million sf of space in his position at Insignia. Before Insignia, he was CEO of O'Donnell Property Services Inc., which Insignia later purchased, and before that he was vice president in charge of property management for Vantage's North Dallas Division. The RiverRock founder says the new company will offer property owners "client-centric service model" and "hassle-free fee structure."

According to Combs, management firms have been forced to cut back on the very thing they have been hired to provide: well-trained people who have the leadership to maximize property value, so training and education of management personnel will be top priorities for the new firm. He explains that managers will be tested and rated on entry-level skills, and again following all training programs, and other staff members will be evaluated regularly as part of the new firm's focus on maintaining performance levels.

Combs says competitive pricing has reduced property management to a commodity, forcing many service firms to cut back on employee training and education. This, in turn, has created an industry of high turnover, unskilled and overworked staff where both owners and employees are frustrated, he says.

Combs' business model at RiverRock is to buck that trend by outsourcing non-core functions of a property management firm--such as human resources, legal, corporate and property accounting, information technology and training--so that property managers can concentrate on managing the properties. RiverRock has already established a relationship with Deloitte & Touche Outsourcing, a business unit of Deloitte & Touche, to provide traditional accounting and information technology consulting services.

Besides its Irvine headquarters, RiverRock maintains an office in Long Beach and will open other offices as the need dictates, Combs tells GlobeSt.com. He explains that he named the company RiverRock because a rock in a river holds fast while all else swirls around it, just as a quality property manager serves as the solid foundation for an owner, a building and its tenants despite market conditions, business cycles and day-to-day issues that swirl around a property.