Bidding solely on the highest price is no longer the deciding factor.

Starting with the announcement of a new property manager search in March, the process spanned four months and five rounds of selection for the mega community of Bo'en Garden in Nanjing's Jiangning District, ultimately leading to the choice of a new service provider.

This massive residential complex, boasting over one million square meters of total floor area and nearly 7,200 households, represents a rare and high-quality project in the property management sector. It initially attracted competition from 17 companies, including industry giants like KWG LIVING, Vanke Service, and Greentown Service, as well as local leaders. These firms pledged investments in the millions and had senior executives personally attend roadshows to answer homeowner questions and promise service commitments.

However, during this selection process, which could be described as a clash of titans, homeowners have moved beyond a fixation on the amount of capital investment. Their focus has shifted toward the specific improvement plans proposed by the companies and the degree of their implementation, demonstrating strong community self-governance. This change is steering the property management industry from a rough phase of "highest bidder wins" toward a more rational stage where "quality service prevails."

From Five to Two: The Defense Session

Following registration, preliminary review, and defense presentations, the five shortlisted property companies entered a crucial roadshow stage.

Facing a selection panel of 55 Bo'en Garden homeowners, each finalist took the stage to present their service plans and respond to live questions from the panel, resembling a large-scale job interview. Since companies presented in separate sessions, they could not observe each other's pitches.

Jie Anguo, General Manager of Country Garden Services' Nanjing branch, admitted that the competition was intense, with finalists including local heavyweights Yincheng Property and Hongyang Property, placing significant pressure on his team.

Jie's confidence stemmed from his team's deep preliminary investigation of Bo'en Garden. Starting in March, he led a cross-functional team from engineering, environment, and customer service, conducting 64 site inspections at different times. These covered weekdays, weekends, holidays, daytime, nighttime, and both rainy and sunny conditions to get a comprehensive view.

"We inspected drainage and leakage issues on rainy days, and checked lighting and security at night," Jie explained. Through this thorough risk assessment, they compiled a list of 647 issues and formulated a corresponding service improvement plan. This preparation allowed him to quickly provide clear corrective measures when homeowners raised the community's persistent problems.

"Minor repairs within our capability will be handled free of charge; for major repairs, we will take the lead in coordinating with the Owners' Committee to initiate the use of public maintenance funds," Jie stated. "The challenge is getting unanimous signatures from owners for these funds. We will rely on consistent, heartfelt service to build trust and facilitate communication and understanding."

Jinbaifeng Property, a local Nanjing firm, sent its Executive Director and President, Li Chunling, to the roadshow. He promised homeowners that all staff would be directly hired by the company, not outsourced, stating, "With outsourcing, quality control and risk management are impossible. We could never be accountable to the owners."

The presence of senior management at the roadshow provided homeowners with a sense of security. "Having someone who can make decisions on the spot makes things much easier. This was a key factor in our evaluation," said Ms. Zhang, Director of the Bo'en Garden Owners' Committee. "In fact, after Jinbaifeng's top leader appeared and answered questions, their votes surged, securing them a spot in the final two."

Ms. Zhang, who has served as director since the committee's formation in December 2021, noted that each property company developed its own plan with unique highlights based on site inspections. "Owners are very familiar with the community's issues; some companies identified them, others didn't. When a company promises a certain investment, the specifics of where the money goes and what actions will be taken reveal their level of commitment."

Following an intense defense session, Country Garden Services and Jinbaifeng emerged from the five finalists, advancing to the "choose one of two" round. After a new round of homeowner voting, the Bo'en Garden Owners' Committee announced the final result: 4,417 homeowners voted for Country Garden Services, representing 79.44% of participating voters, a landslide victory.

A History of Two Property Manager Changes

Looking back over the past five-plus years, Bo'en Garden has been persistently searching for a property company capable of delivering high-quality service.

Initially, in 2015, Wanyuan Property was appointed as the pre-sale service provider through public tender. However, over more than six years of service, performance was subpar, with owners repeatedly complaining about issues with roads, parking spaces, and elevators.

A larger conflict arose over public revenue. Starting in 2022, the Bo'en Garden Owners' Committee repeatedly demanded the return of public revenue from Wanyuan Property, but with no success. It wasn't until November 2025 that a final court ruling ordered Wanyuan to return 7.71 million yuan in public revenue plus interest to all owners. This recovery made Bo'en Garden widely known.

In May 2023, Wanyuan Property officially exited. Simultaneously, the committee initiated a new selection process, with 27 property companies applying. After multiple rounds of screening, Poly Property emerged victorious and was appointed.

Under a "1+2" contract model, Poly achieved a 91% satisfaction rate in its first year, successfully passing the probation period and being directly renewed until the end of May 2026. Unfortunately, after a honeymoon period, disagreements arose regarding service satisfaction, fee collection, and profit distribution. In a general meeting in January of this year, the vote to renew Poly's contract failed, sending Bo'en Garden on another search for a property manager.

In the selection announcement issued in March, the committee set high standards. Requirements for bidding companies included having experience managing villas and high-rise residential properties, managing at least two residential projects in Nanjing, having no administrative penalty records in the past year, and having a registered and paid-in capital of over 10 million yuan. The contract adopted the "1+2" model, with the first year as a probationary period followed by a satisfaction survey to determine renewal.

Notably, the announcement also stipulated uniform standards for property and parking fees, as well as the division of public revenue, effectively determining the property company's financial framework. Despite these strict conditions following two manager changes, the tender still attracted 17 top-tier and local leading firms, all offering investment commitments ranging from hundreds of thousands to millions of yuan.

Why are major property companies willing to make such concessions? Peng Yu, Associate Research Director at the China Index Academy, explained that Bo'en Garden's over one million square meters of floor area means annual fees from property management, energy, and parking can easily cover the initial investment. Furthermore, mega-communities benefit from "diminishing marginal costs" and economies of scale, allowing for highly efficient investment and higher gross margins, as well as potential value-added services.

"A benchmark large-scale project has a strong demonstration effect in the industry. A company that successfully operates this project can use it as a flagship for expanding in the local and even East China market, providing powerful endorsement for future market expansion," Peng Yu believes.

A Shift in Property Selection Strategy

The Bo'en Garden selection process mirrors a change in homeowner standards when choosing property managers in the stock market era.

During the real estate industry's upswing, new management projects were heavily dependent on related developers for pipeline projects, making expansion easy without significant third-party development. This model ended with developer defaults and the peaking of the new home market, pushing the property industry from an incremental to a stock market era.

Around 2022, the supply from new and stock markets fundamentally shifted. Data from the China Index Academy shows that the average proportion of third-party managed area for top 100 property companies rose to 54.72% last year. As the new housing channel shrinks, developing third-party projects becomes increasingly important. According to Kerui, the total floor area of completed real estate projects in 2025 was only 600 million square meters, an 18.2% year-on-year decline, continuously reducing new deliveries from related developers. Stock market mega-communities have become the core for scale growth.

In the ongoing process of expanding external projects, winning the favor of homeowners has become a top priority. "Brought-in capital" has quietly become a key weapon in this stock market battle. A manager from a top-tier firm mentioned that this model is a common phenomenon in the stock market. When a community changes service providers, many legacy issues exist, and initial capital is needed for park upgrades and hazard rectification, creating objective demand.

Peng Yu further pointed out that to maintain growth in managed area and competitiveness, firms must "snatch projects" from third parties like owners' committees, with "brought-in capital" raising the competitive threshold and increasing the probability of winning. It also serves as a credit tool to demonstrate sincerity to owners.

Homeowners naturally welcome this. Free capital for repairs improves the living environment and demonstrates the company's commitment. During this period, the investment amount often became a core factor influencing owner choices.

According to Ma Yanjiao, Research Director at Kerui Property Management, in the early stages of rough competition in the stock market, companies willing to provide large sums of brought-in capital could expand rapidly.

However, this situation has now changed. In the Bo'en Garden selection, eight companies promised brought-in capital. For example, Yajia Life pledged 3.85 million yuan, the highest amount; Hongyang Property and Decheng Quansheng promised 3.6 million and 3.4 million yuan respectively, both higher than the finalists Country Garden Services and Jinbaifeng.

Ma noted that current owner and committee decisions are more rational, no longer simply comparing investment amounts. The weight of comprehensive service plans, implementation guarantees, and regional team stability is now higher. This marks a major shift in homeowner selection logic, moving the industry beyond a simple capital bidding stage.

Peng Yu also believes that as owners and committees gain more selection experience, they realize that sustained service quality, response efficiency, team stability, and public revenue management are the keys to determining community living experience and asset value preservation. This reflects a shift in owner mentality from focusing on short-term benefits to valuing long-term service value.

"We aren't changing property managers for the sake of change," sighed Ms. Zhang, the committee director, noting that organizing a general meeting for a community with over 7,000 households is no easy task. "Having a property manager stay for 10 or 8 years – that is our hope."

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Editor: Liu Wanli SF014