How to Evaluate an RV Park Management Team Before Investing
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There is no single "good" management structure for an RV park. What matters is whether the specific people running the property, whether they are employees of the sponsor or a third-party contractor, have the systems, incentives, and track record to protect your capital. If you are choosing between a deal run by an owner-operator team and one run by a professional management company, the honest answer is that both can work and both can fail. Your job is to check the same handful of things regardless of which label is on the org chart.
The short version
| In-House / Owner-Operator Team | Third-Party Management Company | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost structure | Often lower fee load, but salaries and benefits sit on the P&L directly | Management fee (commonly 5-10% of gross revenue) plus possible startup or software fees |
| Accountability | Direct line to ownership, harder to fire without disrupting the whole operation | Contractual, easier to replace if performance lags |
| Local knowledge | Usually strong if the team has been on-site for a while | Varies widely by region and by how many parks one regional manager oversees |
| Systems and reporting | Depends entirely on the sponsor building good habits | Often has established software, templates, and benchmarking across a portfolio |
| Scalability | Can strain fast if the sponsor is acquiring multiple parks | Built to run many properties, but attention per property can thin out |
| Turnover risk | High impact if a key person leaves, since knowledge is concentrated | Lower single-point-of-failure risk, but staff at the property level can still turn over often |
Where owner-operator teams win
An owner-operator team that has run the same park for a few years usually knows the property cold. They know which sites flood after heavy rain, which seasonal guests rebook every year, and which local events actually move occupancy. That kind of knowledge does not show up in a pro forma, but it shows up in the P&L.
These teams also tend to have more skin in the game, especially if the general manager has an ownership stake or profit-sharing arrangement. When the person running day-to-day operations benefits directly from higher NOI, they tend to sweat the details that a hired manager might let slide, like collecting on late payments or keeping seasonal labor costs in line.
The downside is fragility. If the general manager or a key maintenance person leaves, a small in-house team can lose institutional knowledge overnight. Ask sponsors directly what the succession plan looks like if the GM quits or gets sick for a month. A vague answer is a real risk, not a hypothetical one.
Where third-party management companies win
A management company that runs multiple parks usually has built systems the first time around: standardized checklists for site turns, a channel manager connected to several OTAs, a maintenance ticketing system, and monthly reporting templates that get compared across the portfolio. That infrastructure is expensive to build from scratch, and a sponsor running their first or second park often has not built it yet.
These companies also benchmark performance across properties. If a park's average daily rate is 15% below comparable sites in the company's portfolio, someone notices and asks why. That kind of internal comparison is hard for a solo owner-operator to replicate.
The tradeoff is attention. A regional manager overseeing eight or ten properties cannot know each one the way an on-site owner-operator does. Ask how many properties one regional or district manager is responsible for, and how often they physically visit each site. If the answer is more than eight to ten properties per manager, or visits less than monthly during peak season, expect some things to slip through.
What this looks like in practice
Regardless of structure, there are a handful of concrete things worth checking before you invest.
- Ask for the site manager's tenure. If the on-site manager has been there less than six months, ask why the last one left. High turnover at the property level, whether it is in-house or third-party, is one of the clearest warning signs in this asset class.
- Ask to see a sample monthly report. A competent team can produce occupancy, ADR, RevPAR, and expense detail broken out by category within a few days of a request. If the sponsor has to "put something together" for you, their internal reporting is probably thin.
- Check review response times. Pull up the park's Google and Campspot or similar reviews and look at how fast and how thoughtfully management responds to negative reviews. A team that ignores complaints for weeks is likely ignoring smaller operational issues too.
- Ask about the maintenance backlog. Every park has a punch list. Ask what is on it and how long items have been sitting there. A long list of unaddressed items, especially anything related to septic, electrical, or water systems, points to a team that is behind rather than ahead.
- Ask how rates are set. A team using dynamic pricing tied to local demand, events, and comp sets is managing revenue actively. A team that sets one rate in January and leaves it alone all year is leaving money on the table.
- Visit or call the park directly, unannounced if possible. How the phone gets answered, how long you are on hold, and whether the person who answers can actually answer basic questions tells you more than a pitch deck ever will.
None of these checks require special access. A passive investor can ask for a sample report and call the front desk before wiring a single dollar. If a sponsor is cagey about any of this, that is information too.
FAQ
Should I avoid deals with third-party management companies?
No. Some of the more disciplined operators in this space use third-party management specifically because they know they cannot build that infrastructure themselves yet. The question is not who manages the property, it is whether that manager, whoever they are, can show you the reporting, systems, and track record to back up the claim of competence.
What management fee range is normal?
Third-party RV park management fees commonly run in the 5% to 10% of gross revenue range, sometimes with a separate fee for onboarding or software. This is a range, not a fixed number, and it varies by region, park size, and scope of services. If a sponsor's fee structure is well outside that range in either direction, ask them to walk you through why.
How much does poor management actually cost an investment?
It is hard to put one number on this because it depends on the property, but the mechanism is consistent: understaffing leads to slower turnover between guests, weak reputation management leads to lower occupancy, and poor rate discipline leaves revenue on the table month after month. Over a full year, these gaps compound into a meaningfully lower NOI than a well-run comparable property would produce, which is exactly the kind of risk Invest With Zac tries to help readers spot before they commit capital.
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