An 18-month national literacy audit of maintenance worker jobs in multifamily apartment complexes sought to find out: (1) the literacy demands for their job success and promotion; (2) the effects of geographical location on their literacy demands; (3) the effects of management policies on their literacy demands; (4) the impact of illiteracy on workers, residents, and the industry in general; and (5) whether the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) taxonomy and scales can be used to analyze actual workplace tasks and materials. Data were collected from mailed questionnaires, telephone interviews, 10 site visits to field locations (6 in Indiana, 2 in New York, and 2 in Texas) of 2 national building management companies, and the analysis of workers' on-the-job reading materials. The following results were cited: (1) maintenance workers need a diverse range of reading, writing, computation, and visualization skills; (2) differences in geographic locations appear to have little effect on the literacy demands on these workers, although geographic areas where hirees are likely to have limited proficiency with English are a special situation; (3) the age of the buildings being maintained has a great effect on literacy demands; (4) policies and procedures used by the building management companies produce different literacy demands; (5) low basic skills tend to reduce job productivity and increase safety risks and resident dissatisfaction; and (6) the NAEP taxonomy appears to be relevant for analyzing workplace literacy tasks but the scales will require a great deal more work. (Appendices provide lists of maintenance worker tasks, the supervisor mail survey, telephone interview protocol, site data, and detailed analyses of job materials.) (CML)