Property Profits Real Estate Podcast · Dave Dubeau

Jay Biggins: The Operational Advantage in Multifamily Investing

April 9, 2026·15 min·1 clip

Jay Biggins reveals why hiring a third-party manager means they'll 'eat your lunch' and how he self-manages across the country.

The episode opens with host Dave DeBow introducing Jay Biggins, a Florida-based multifamily operator whose portfolio spans Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Ohio, and Indiana. Jay states he is agnostic about market geography and will go wherever he can achieve the right return, with most recent acquisitions concentrated in Texas due to cap rate compression in South Florida. His preferred buy box is a fully occupied, mismanaged or under-managed property where intervention can involve fixing rental rates, controlling expenses, or light cosmetic work rather than heavy physical renovation. He explicitly contrasts this with heavy-lift rehabs, saying the yield per headache is worse for construction-intensive deals. A central theme is Jay's rejection of third-party property management. He argues the conventional wisdom that distant properties require outside managers is mistaken and that the moment owners stop managing their managers, performance deteriorates. He frames third-party management as 'death by a thousand cuts' where no single failure is catastrophic but cumulative underperformance erodes returns. His company self-manages all assets across the country except a small number of HUD properties. Jay also does not syndicate capital or use co-general partners, instead relying on two long-term partners and recycled equity from asset sales to fund new acquisitions. He has purchased properties as small as 40 units in markets where he has no other holdings, dismissing the idea that operational scale efficiencies are required before entering a new geography. On deal sourcing, Jay reframes the question: he argues the edge is not in finding deals others cannot access, but in seeing opportunity differently — being willing to take on assets that appear risky but represent manageable, exploitable problems. He notes that so-called off-market deals are often not truly proprietary and that broker relationships are valuable for both acquisitions and dispositions. On market conditions, Jay draws a comparison to 2011-2015, describing the current environment as a window where buyers can acquire value-add or cash-flowing assets at reasonable prices before a recovery tightens the market again. He reports that his firm had record revenue years in 2022, 2023, and 2024, and that 2025 saw slightly lower transaction volume but higher revenue. He is aiming to add approximately 3,000 units in 2026 if discipline on pricing allows. The episode closes with Jay directing listeners to multihousing.com for contact information.

As heard by us

A steady take on multifamily market selection, self-funding, and disciplined exits.

This conversation keeps its focus on multifamily investing from the operator side: where Jay Biggins buys, how he funds deals, and how he thinks about holding and exiting assets. The strongest point is his market discipline.

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Why you'd press play

A practical operator conversation about scaling multifamily by chasing the right return, not the hometown map.

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