Riverstone’s Victor Paguinto takes pride in his work and in sharing his knowledge and experience with the people he supervises. The HAA Maintenance Supervisor of the Year for 500+ Units, Paguinto is an easygoing guy who relishes the challenge of mastering something he didn’t know how to do before. During his 15 years in apartment maintenance, he has figured out a number of projects through trial and error, research and collaboration with his coworkers. A strong believer in teamwork, he prizes a positive, can-do attitude in the people he supervises and is quick to share information with his crew to help them succeed.

“I like the challenge,” he said. “Things that I don’t know, the owner or the manager gives me an opportunity to try to fix it, and most of the time I come through. … I try, and if I succeed, they let me do it again.”

Like many of his peers, Paguinto, maintenance supervisor for Riverstone’s Old Farm Apartments, got his start as a porter and worked his way up. A friend recommended he try apartment maintenance and suggested applying at a smaller property. Paguinto, who already had some experience repairing window-unit air conditioners, worked as an all-around helper on the property and began assisting the property’s lead maintenance technician with A/C jobs.
“I learned little by little, and then the lead maintenance found a job somewhere else,” he said. “I had a little bit of knowledge on A/C, so the property manager asked me if I could fix it. I just said, ‘OK,’ so they gave me the lead maintenance position after about a year or so.”

A couple of years later, he moved on to a larger property, where he led the maintenance team for about six years. The manager of that 200-unit property moved on to a property with more than 700 units and took Paguinto with her as the property’s new maintenance supervisor. There, he led a team of nine people handling work orders, make readies, routine maintenance and more, including pitching in when things got hectic.

“I’d do some work orders during the summertime when it was really busy with my guys, fixing A/C or any kind of problem,” he said. He also got his first taste of carpentry work there, which he hopes to learn more about.
“On that property, we had a lot of siding repair because the siding was wood siding, so me and my guys started tearing up outside walls and replacing some siding in house, just me and my guys, because we didn’t have money for contractors to do it,” he said with a chuckle.

Paguinto enjoyed the challenge and the camaraderie of working with his whole team to get a job done, and he takes great pride in seeing the fruits of his labors.
“It was challenging, but it was fun to do it because I had a lot of guys helping me,” he said. “… You feel good when you see the job done. It looks good. It made me proud of myself.”

Learn more about Paguinto and the other “Leaders in Maintenance” in the September issue of ABODE, available immediately for download here and landing in members’ mailboxes this week.