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Property manager Angie Villapudua (center), a fifth-year economics student, helps another student

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They work seven days a week, 24 hours a day and go to school fulltime.

That may not seem humanly possible, but with a part-time property managing job it’s practically true.

For the past year, fifth-year economics students Angie Villapudua and Chris Haro have managed 88 units in Westwood Village for Xenon Investment Corporation. The apartments are spread among six buildings, all within two miles of campus.

Since they work out of their small, but tidy, fourth-floor apartment in one of the buildings, they are basically at work whenever they aren’t in class. Even at school in between classes, they are on their cell phones coordinating maintenance requests.

And there is no excuse for turning off the emergency pager they have with them – every day after 6 p.m. and all day on weekends – to watch a movie.

“There is never really an ending time (to the day),” Villapudua said.

“Even when you’re watching TV, you’re at work, because there is always something to be done or on your mind,” she added.

The two met about four years ago when they were both students at UC Riverside. After a summer accounting internship where most of the people they worked with were UCLA graduates, they decided to transfer.

Though they didn’t plan to manage apartment buildings, when they heard their manager was leaving, they figured it was the perfect job to help pay the rent.

Xenon wasn’t excited to hire students for the position, but after a few weeks of persistent inquiries, they said they got an interview. And by the end of the interview, they had the job.

Despite the responsibility, they love property managing, saying it’s been great preparation for their future.

Both students plan to graduate from UCLA in June and move on to careers in accounting. But with their Xenon experience this year, they also see themselves buying and managing their own buildings after they marry and settle down.

“You can never go wrong with real estate,” Haro said.

In the meantime, the duo gain more experience every day collecting rent, handling maintenance requests, and leasing upcoming vacancies.

This is the busiest time of year for property managers, because a majority of their tenants move out in June when they graduate or go home for the summer, Haro said.

The two hold open house two hours a day Monday through Friday and four hours each Saturday and Sunday to rent the 70 available apartments.

Though prices run a little on the high side for the market – one-bedrooms top out around $1,450 while two-bedrooms at $2,300 – renting the available apartments isn’t hard, Haro said.

“All the buildings have a character all their own,” Villapudua added. “Since it’s Westwood, we don’t have to sell it, it’s just a matter of showing (the apartment) to as many people as we can and eventually someone likes it.”

Aside from open house, the rest of their daily work can be done anytime because the job is relatively flexible, Villapudua said.

About 90 percent of their tenants are students, so most of them are gone all day anyway, she added. But some tenants say the job’s flexibility within one day isn’t very much flexibility at all; if something goes wrong, it has to be taken care of right away.

Julia Reichert, a third-year art history and American literature & culture student, said she’s had all sorts of problems with her apartment since she moved in eight months ago. The student manager’s number is always the first she calls.

First there were cockroaches in her apartment that “Chris and Angie” sent exterminators to eradicate. Then at different times in the year her toilet, dishwasher and garbage disposal broke and had to be fixed or replaced. And then with the recent downpours, her balcony flooded and had to be drained.

“I always tell them I wouldn’t want to have their job. Just based on the number of calls that we elicit, I can’t imagine how many they get from the rest of the apartments, and go to school full-time,” she said.

Villapudua and Haro say they meet a lot of people like Reichert who question their ability to manage six buildings and finish school, especially parents helping their students look – and pay – for a place to live.

“They always ask how we do it. Or they will say right in front of their children, ‘I wish my kid worked,’ and their kid’s right there,” Haro said.

But Villapudua said they tell them they have no other option.

Both students get little help from their parents. In fact, Villapudua said she works an extra job on campus six hours a week so she can help her family. She is the first in her family to attend to college.

Even with the hectic schedule, they do get a day off from time to time, such as Easter holiday which they spent studying. They rarely take off more than a day though because they are the only ones who know what’s going on in their buildings, Villapudua said.

Despite the students’ work ethic, Xenon President Rohit Mehta acknowledgd the job is too much for people with “other commitments.” When they leave, he said will hire someone who can be on-site all day.

“Management’s intent is to take care of the buildings. I don’t think it’s fair to students to have to (work every day), but they need the extra income. It’s a Catch-22,” Mehta said.

Regardless of their boss’ concern for both the buildings and students’ welfare, Villapudua said the arrangement has worked pretty well.

Reichert agreed, saying they’ve always been timely in resolving problems and that she is going to miss them next year.

“They’re students, so they can relate to students,” she added.