Knowledge Base
Maverick Spend
Maverick spend is purchasing that happens outside a company's approved suppliers, negotiated contracts, or standard buying procedures, typically at higher prices than the organization has already negotiated.
How maverick spend shows up at apartment properties
The classic case: the company negotiated pricing with a national supplier, but the technician buys from the supply house five minutes away because the unit has no heat and the resident is waiting. Multiply that across every property, every tech, and every urgent repair, and a meaningful share of spend never touches the negotiated contract. Maverick spend in multifamily is rarely defiance — it is speed. The contracted supplier is a day away; the counter is not. Any fix that ignores that reality will be ignored by the people doing the repairs.
Why it costs more than it looks
Off-contract purchases usually happen at counter prices — the walk-in rate, with no negotiated discount applied. The direct cost is paying more per item. The indirect cost is worse: every dollar that leaks outside the contract weakens the volume commitment behind it, which weakens the operator's position at the next negotiation. Maverick spend also scatters purchases across suppliers, which makes portfolio-level visibility into operating expenses per unit harder — nobody can total what the portfolio pays for a part when it comes from many vendors under many names.
How to reduce it without slowing repairs
Mandates fail when they compete with an urgent repair, so start with measurement instead. Read the paid invoices, line by line, and quantify what off-contract purchasing actually cost — which items, which suppliers, what price gap. A quarterly line-level review such as The Benchmark turns maverick spend from an abstraction into a specific list of items and better sources, which a site team can act on without slowing down. Pair it with stocking the highest-frequency parts so the fast option and the cheap option become the same option. See also reducing multifamily operating expenses.
Related terms
Start with one property and one quarter
Send us a quarter of invoices and we will show you what it should have cost. If there is nothing there, we will tell you that too.
