If you’re an architect, developer, or someone else in the business of building buildings, chances are you have an extensive mental list of things that you would think about before buying a piece of real estate. I know I certainly do. These are things you learn over time – sometimes by making mistakes.

Depending on the type of real estate, this list would vary. So this is not going to be a comprehensive list of things to consider, by any means. But today I thought I would mention 3 things that a lot of people might not think about when buying a new condo, particularly when buying pre-construction off drawings.

Noisy Adjacencies: 

What’s around the suite? Elevator shafts, mechanical rooms, and gyms all create noise. There are measures to protect against all of these noises, but that doesn’t stop me from worrying about these sorts of things. For instance, in my experience, some (many?) condo gyms don’t have the right kind of floor to deal with dropping weights. In these cases, something is usually done after turnover to address the noise complaints.

Exposed Overhangs: 

Does the suite overhang the floor below or sit on top of a space that is exposed to the elements, such as a loading bay or walkway? If so, you might get a cold zone if it hasn’t been properly insulated or heat traced. Of course, most projecting condo balconies also create a thermal bridge that can create a cold zone around it. But the first example could be worse. If you live in a place that doesn’t have subarctic winters (Toronto) this may be a moot point.

Transfer Floors: 

The most efficient way to build a multi-family building is to repeat the same floor plan as you go up the building. This ensures that everything runs in a straight line. The minute you create stepbacks and offsets, you then need to start “transferring.” This means that structure and services will need to be brought from one location of the building to another. This can lead to deeper structural beams and additional bulkheads which could then impact ceiling heights in the suites. This won’t always be the case, but something to think about when you see dramatic changes in the building’s form next to your suite.

Again, this is not a comprehensive list, but these are some of the small – perhaps anal – details that I would think about if I were buying a condo. Feel free to add other items in the comment section below. They don’t have to be anal-retentive in nature.

If you’re on the building side, you work to get ahead of these issues by, for example, anticipating where you could need additional height for transfers and sound attenuation (such as around mechanical spaces). But buildings are complicated and sometimes things happen. It’s a long way from initial sketch to finished occupied building.

One of the things I try to be aware of is the language that I use to describe things. Because the words and conventions we use can impact how we perceive things and they can also reinforce certain inherent biases. (I have a good friend who is an expert on this topic, so he has heightened my awareness.)

For instance, I find that we tend to equate home and house. In other words, we’ll use the descriptors detached house and detached home interchangeably. And when we say that someone is a homeowner, it can sometimes, or often, mean that they have purchased a house.

The same does not seem to be true for apartments and condominiums. Rarely do I hear people say that they live in an apartment home or a condominium home. It’s just an apartment or condo.

This is meaningful because the emotionally charged word is home. It signifies a subjective (and usually comforting) experience, whereas the word house, I would argue, represents a building typology. And so by conflating the two, I often feel that we’re promoting a cultural bias that privileges houses as the ideal building typology. A true home is a house.

The other word that I often think about in my business is unit. When we talk about multi-family buildings we often – and I’m definitely guilty of this – refer to each suite as a unit. We’ll say things like: “This is a 200 unit building and the unit mix is as follows…”

Again, I am absolutely guilty of this. But at the same time, I often think about how this word, unit, is probably the furthest thing away from a home. Who wants to live in a unit? That doesn’t sound very pleasant. In fact, it sounds clinical. People want to live in a home. Now that’s a word with positive psychological associations.

And so by reducing each home to a unit, I think it could be making us lose sight of the fact that each suite will eventually be lived in by someone who will then make it their home. Yes they can be considered a customer who are paying for a product (a great place to live), but I don’t think that should take anything away from its homeyness. 

I live in a condominium and it is my home. What about you?

Image: Flickr

I am very interested in the social side of buildings. What I mean by that is that we usually focus on the quantitative side. We look at sale prices. We look at average prices per square foot. We look at reserve fund balances. And as I recently argued, this is all very important stuff. I think we should do much more to make this data publicly available.

But there’s also a side to buildings that’s harder to measure: the human side. Sale prices and staged MLS listings don’t tell you what the people who live in the building are like. What the vibe will be like at the pool during the summer. If you can expect to find dog poo in your elevators. But when you live in a multi-family building, I think most people will tell you that the qualitative side also matters.

So this morning, I thought I would run a little experiment and pull the top Instagram photos for a random sampling of relatively new condo buildings in Toronto. These are public photos that have been uploaded and tagged with that building’s location ID. 

Obviously there’s an inherent bias since I figure Instagram users probably lean towards Millennials. Also, the top posts could be easily skewed by a small number of heavy influencers. But I still thought it would be interesting to see if any particular identities started to emerge. And I do see some differences that reflect what I would have expected. I wonder how these might relate to the original marketing for the buildings.

What do you think of the photos below?

Feel free to do the same for your building and post the photo in the comments below. That could make for a really interesting discussion. My building is the first photo.