Ancillary income opportunities (wireless, utility management, renters' insurance) are becoming a much larger focus for apartment managers, along with reputation management, says CFLane executive director Dan Haefner. Not taken seriously in the past, sites like ApartmentRatings.com and Yelp are now a priority for renters and managers, he says. (We did our part by writing a vicious assault on a poorly managed lemonade stand seemingly run only by children.)

His firm ended the year with 40,000 multifamily units under management; it took over 50 assets in Q4 alone (75% of its portfolio is fee managed and 25% owned). Its latest: parent company Cocke Finkelstein paid $49.5M for The Park at Vinings, a 484-unit community in Smyrna, Ga (above). Outside of the office, Dan spends time as a professional fan of his daughter's lacrosse team and an innocent bystander to his other daughter's college search. He also loves to play tennis.