Construction is risky. For example, last month a tree fell on top of Parkview Mountain House. The tree was located upgradient from the house and, it was so big, that pieces of it actually landed across the street on our neighbor's property.
Thankfully, it didn't cause as much damage as it could have. It punctured the roof in a few places, but magically, the bay window that it landed on was perfectly fine. We also opened up the drywall around the window to inspect all of the structure.
Needless to say, we didn't have a line item in our budget for "trees that might fall on the house during construction." We also didn't have a line item to take down more trees behind the house, which is exactly what we decided to do after this happened. We called an arborist and asked them to fall anything that looked even remotely questionable. That ended up being 4 more trees.
We were not expecting this.
But this is why budgets have something called a construction contingency (although, we still have enough savings from some of our other contracts not to have to use it). In the end, we also learned something. If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, the answer is -- yes -- it can still cost you a lot of money.
This is an aerial photo of the construction site at One Delisle:
Construction is generally considered to be the world's largest industry, and yet, it is well known that its productivity levels suck. Over the last half century, the industry has experienced something in between meager and negative productivity growth.
It is for this reason that, for as long as I can remember, people have been trying to figure out how to turn development and construction into something more repeatable and less custom -- something like a product.
Now, there can be a bit of a stigma associated with this moniker. Architects don't often like to think of their work as being a product and references to modularity can sometimes evoke feelings of cheapness (think manufactured homes).
But I think all of this is quickly changing. And at the end of the day, we are going to need to start building like this if we have any hope of making housing more affordable within our cities.
Here's an example.
Back in 2021, I wrote about a new modular housing company called Juno. They had just broken ground on their first project in Austin (a five-story 24-unit building), and they were in the media talking about how they had more or less reduced the building down to 33 standardized parts.
The multi-family space has since softened in Austin, and I don't have any inside knowledge of how this project went, but the building is now complete and being leased up. And regardless, I think it's an important case study to look to. This is where our industry is heading.
Construction is risky. For example, last month a tree fell on top of Parkview Mountain House. The tree was located upgradient from the house and, it was so big, that pieces of it actually landed across the street on our neighbor's property.
Thankfully, it didn't cause as much damage as it could have. It punctured the roof in a few places, but magically, the bay window that it landed on was perfectly fine. We also opened up the drywall around the window to inspect all of the structure.
Needless to say, we didn't have a line item in our budget for "trees that might fall on the house during construction." We also didn't have a line item to take down more trees behind the house, which is exactly what we decided to do after this happened. We called an arborist and asked them to fall anything that looked even remotely questionable. That ended up being 4 more trees.
We were not expecting this.
But this is why budgets have something called a construction contingency (although, we still have enough savings from some of our other contracts not to have to use it). In the end, we also learned something. If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, the answer is -- yes -- it can still cost you a lot of money.
This is an aerial photo of the construction site at One Delisle:
Construction is generally considered to be the world's largest industry, and yet, it is well known that its productivity levels suck. Over the last half century, the industry has experienced something in between meager and negative productivity growth.
It is for this reason that, for as long as I can remember, people have been trying to figure out how to turn development and construction into something more repeatable and less custom -- something like a product.
Now, there can be a bit of a stigma associated with this moniker. Architects don't often like to think of their work as being a product and references to modularity can sometimes evoke feelings of cheapness (think manufactured homes).
But I think all of this is quickly changing. And at the end of the day, we are going to need to start building like this if we have any hope of making housing more affordable within our cities.
Here's an example.
Back in 2021, I wrote about a new modular housing company called Juno. They had just broken ground on their first project in Austin (a five-story 24-unit building), and they were in the media talking about how they had more or less reduced the building down to 33 standardized parts.
The multi-family space has since softened in Austin, and I don't have any inside knowledge of how this project went, but the building is now complete and being leased up. And regardless, I think it's an important case study to look to. This is where our industry is heading.
Currently, we are on hold and waiting to pour a number of columns on the ground floor because the city has not yet issued our above-grade building permit. And the reason the city has not issued our above-grade building permit is because we have not yet conveyed our parkland dedication land to the city. Frustratingly though, we have been ready to convey this land for over a year! We simply need the city to allow us to give them this free land. To date, we have meticulously documented at least 3-pages of follow-ups and back-and-forth emails as we try our best to do this.
I’ve been doing this long enough that this isn’t surprising or unusual. But it remains deeply maddening. Younger people on the team can’t believe that this is par for the course. On top of this, the city continues to charge interest on the fees that are payable upon issuance of the first above-grade building permit. The result is an insane dynamic where the city can delay things as long as it wants and then charge us, and all other developers, interest on its own delays! I mean, is it any wonder that housing keeps getting more expensive in this city?
During the last mayoral election, some candidates were quick to promise that, if elected, the city itself would start building affordable housing. This, I'm sure, sounded good to most. Toronto needs more affordable homes. But for all of us involved in the building of buildings, it was frankly impossible to imagine. If the city takes this long to accept free land from developers, how could it possibly build anything?
Currently, we are on hold and waiting to pour a number of columns on the ground floor because the city has not yet issued our above-grade building permit. And the reason the city has not issued our above-grade building permit is because we have not yet conveyed our parkland dedication land to the city. Frustratingly though, we have been ready to convey this land for over a year! We simply need the city to allow us to give them this free land. To date, we have meticulously documented at least 3-pages of follow-ups and back-and-forth emails as we try our best to do this.
I’ve been doing this long enough that this isn’t surprising or unusual. But it remains deeply maddening. Younger people on the team can’t believe that this is par for the course. On top of this, the city continues to charge interest on the fees that are payable upon issuance of the first above-grade building permit. The result is an insane dynamic where the city can delay things as long as it wants and then charge us, and all other developers, interest on its own delays! I mean, is it any wonder that housing keeps getting more expensive in this city?
During the last mayoral election, some candidates were quick to promise that, if elected, the city itself would start building affordable housing. This, I'm sure, sounded good to most. Toronto needs more affordable homes. But for all of us involved in the building of buildings, it was frankly impossible to imagine. If the city takes this long to accept free land from developers, how could it possibly build anything?
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