Brandon Donnelly

Daily insights for city builders, delivered every morning at 6 AM ET. I’m Brandon Donnelly — a Toronto-based real estate developer and founder of Globizen. I’ve been writing here since 2013.

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  • Crazy girl down in Virginia Beach

    Last night I received an email from a 27 year old woman in Virginia Beach that really made my day. With her permission, I am sharing that email in full here on the blog, but redacting her identity. Here it is:

    Brandon,

    You don’t know me, but I just wanted to take a moment and say, thank you. I am a 27 year-old woman living and working in Virginia Beach, VA, with a Civil Engineering degree from Virginia Tech. Up until recently, I have been trying to “find myself” in my career with little success. I always had a feeling that I was “meant to do something” with my career. The problem was that I didn’t know what the hell I wanted to do. 

    Anyway, fast-forward to November 2016, and I decided to start applying to real estate development companies in the area. After all, it seemed like a pretty cool job. I began sending random emails to a few companies to see if they would hire me…. There wasn’t a real position open – I sort of just begged. Through all my random internet searches, I happened to find your blog one day… And to be honest, you have become a great inspiration to me.

    I began to love real estate development. Not just normal development, I want to make a difference. I began to feel excited and passionate about a science, a line of work, and an end vision and goal that several people share. I want to build these wonderful, competitive, beautiful, sustainable cities. I want to make our world better and more beautiful one place at a time. I was finally able to find myself through your work, so I thank you. You have helped me to commit to a career switch, be patient with my job hunt, and apply for an MBA program.

    Thank you for doing what inspires you because by doing it, you are also inspiring this crazy girl down in Virginia Beach! Keep it up.

    I wanted to share this email for two reasons.

    One, if you’re a firm in the Virginia Beach area, you should consider meeting her for a coffee. Send me an email and I’ll forward it along to her. It’s always challenging breaking into a new industry.

    And two, her email does a great job illustrating how important it is for people to feel fulfilled with their work. People want to make a difference. And some would argue that this desire is even more pronounced in the next generation coming up and entering the workforce.

    I feel lucky that I love what I do. And I know that many of my colleagues feel the same way. 

    Sometimes my friends in the development business will say to me that it’s hard not to become cynical and jaded over time. You start out wanting to change cities for the better and you think you’re doing the right thing, but then it feels like you’re getting punched in the gut every step of the way trying to do exactly that.

    That’s what life will do to you every now and then: It will punch you in the gut. If you want to accomplish great things, you have to take those. But it’s a hell of a lot easier to take them when you’re fulfilled by the work you do. 

    Trying to build better cities is pretty damn fulfilling. I am sure that many of you would agree, regardless of what side of the industry you happen to be on.

    Photo by Ravali Yan on Unsplash

  • Hive by Studio Gang

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    As part of the National Building Museum’s Summer Block Party, Studio Gang created an installation in the Great Hall called Hive. See above picture. Note the human for scale. 

    Hive is an interactive series of spaces built exclusively out of lightweight and recyclable paper tubes – apparently 2,700 of them. The tubes have a polished silver exterior and bright magenta interior (love that part), and vary in size from several inches to over 10 feet. They are notched together to create a self-supporting structure.

    The installation is beautiful in its own right – especially against the museum’s 19th century interior – but the idea is that each “sound chamber” within the Hive has different acoustic properties. The small chambers create a more intimate setting. And the main chamber is more grand and public. Think group yoga class or concert.

    For more photos of Hive, click here. Below is also a time-lapse of the Hive’s construction. If you can’t see it, click here. (Don’t worry about turning on your sound.)

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvJV7m0JOF0?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

    Image: Tim Schenck

  • Reblog: The rationality paradox

    A few days ago, Seth Godin published a terrific blog post called the rationality paradox. It’s not very long (like most of his posts) and I like it a lot (particularly the bold part), and so I’m reblogging it in full here:

    If you see yourself as an engineer, a scientist, or even a person of logic, then it’s entirely possible that you work to make rational decisions, decisions that lead to the outcomes you seek.

    The paradox is that you might also believe that you do this all the time, and that others do it too.

    But a rational analysis shows that this is far from true. Almost every choice we make is subconscious. We’re glitch-ridden, superstitious creatures of habit. We are swayed by social forces that are almost always greater than our attraction to symbolic logic would indicate. We prioritize the urgent and most of the decisions we make don’t even feel like decisions. They’re mostly habits combined with a deep desire to go along with the people we identify with.

    Every time you assume that others will be swayed by your logical argument, you’ve most likely made a significant, irrational mistake.

    Your actions and your symbols and your tribe dwarf the words you use to make your argument.

  • Crypto Valley is emerging in this small Swiss canton

    There are 26 cantons in Switzerland. One of the smaller cantons is Zug. It has a population of around 122,000 people and an area of 239 square kilometers. The capital of the canton is the town of Zug, which itself has a population of about 29,256 (as of December 2015) and an area of 21.61 square kilometers. 

    To help put that into perspective, a single municipal ward in downtown Toronto (Ward 28 – Toronto Centre-Rosedale) had a population of over 66,000 people back in 2011.

    But as small as Zug may be, it is known as one of the most business friendly jurisdictions in the world. It has some of the lowest corporate taxes and the local revenue service prides itself on calling each taxpayer a “client” as opposed to a “debtor.” 

    As of 2010, the canton’s registry listed more than 29,000 companies, with more than 1,000 arriving and being started each year. There are about as many companies in the canton as there are people in the town of Zug.

    It’s a classic example of jurisdictional arbitrage and it’s one that Zug seems determined to keep. In July 2016, the town of Zug began accepting digital currencies, such as Bitcoin, as payment for city fees. 

    The impetus for doing so was to help advance Zug’s position as a global center for cryptocurrency innovation. There’s a very real government supported push to make Zug into “Crypto Valley.” And startups from around the world who are working in this space are starting to take notice. To me this feels like a natural extension given the canton’s existing strengths and reputation. (More reading here and here.)

    I’ve been to Zug maybe twice and, at first blush, it could easily pass for your average sleepy-yet-affluent Swiss town. But then you think about all of the money that flows through this place and you quickly understand why that modest, but very tasty, breakfast sandwich just cost you all of the CHF’s in your wallet. 

    Of course, if the entrepreneurs in Zug get their way, we won’t be carrying around wallets anymore. We’ll be paying with some sort of crypto varietal. And that would only strengthen this canton’s story: You don’t necessarily need to be big to be globally impactful – just put the right policies in the place. 

    Oh, and have a very high quality of life and an immensely beautiful natural setting. Those things help as well.

    Photo by Martin Sattler on Unsplash. The above photo is actually of Morschach in Switzerland, not of Zug. I couldn’t find a royalty free image of the latter. Please forgive me for the false advertising.

  • German investment fund buys 1111 Lincoln in Miami Beach for $283M

    The German investment fund Bayerische Versorgungskammer (BVK) has just closed on the Herzog & de Meuron-designed mixed-use parking garage / event space at 1111 Lincoln in Miami Beach. 

    They paid USD$283 million or $1,932 per square foot. It’s one of the biggest deals ever on Lincoln Road.

    The complex includes 94,488 square feet of office, 51,839 square feet of retail, and a 300 stall parking garage / event space (people get married in this garage). The sale also includes retail space at 1664-1664 Lenox Avenue, but excludes two new residential units according to The Real Deal. I’m assuming it is these two.

    The seller was developer Robert Wennett, who bought the site – existing office building + surface parking lot – in 2005 for $23.5 million. He then spent $65 million on the widely celebrated HdM garage and built himself a penthouse residence on top if it.

    I am very curious to know the cap rate. But it would also be interesting to try and figure out what sort of premium could attributed to the fact that this is a pretty famous complex designed by HdM.

    The Wall Street Journal once wrote that several hundred people walk into this parking garage every single day just to look around. I have been one of those humans on many many occasions. See above photo.

    For more photos of 1111 Lincoln, click here.

  • The authoritative architectural guide to Toronto

    It’s late. I just got home from the office. And I’m exhausted.

    But I did just receive my copy of Toronto Architecture: A City Guide. The “handbook” was originally written by Patricia McHugh (1934-2008), but it was recently updated by Globe and Mail architecture critic Alex Bozikovic. (Also, shout out to Vik Pahwa for the terrific photos he took for this guide.)

    When I opened the book, one of the first things that stood out for me were these two lines:

    Toronto has in fact rebuilt itself over and over again.

    This book is, in part, a tool to understand that story.

    In my view, this is one of the biggest compliments that you can pay to a city. Cities should not be static entities. Because if they are, then they will inevitably fail. Change must be a constant.

    As I read through the guide, that wonderful spirit of reinvention is abundantly clear. But I think the real way to experience this handbook is on the streets of Toronto – and probably with a good camera. That’s why it’s called a handbook. 

    The book is primarily structured around 26 distinct walking tours, each of which could be covered off in an afternoon. Along each tour, Patricia and Alex point out which buildings you should be focused on and provide pithy, yet insightful, comments for each.

    I believe that the more you know, the more you can appreciate. So if you’re interested in architecture and/or Toronto, I would you encourage you to think about getting a copy. And if you’re interested in going on a walking tour, tweet at me.

  • E-commerce jobs are clustering in larger cities

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    The New York Times just ran an interesting piece on “how the growth of e-commerce is shifting retail jobs.”

    Here are some of the key takeaways (all US data).

    Online shopping accounts for about 8.4% of all retail sales.

    But e-commerce related jobs are growing way faster than all other forms of retail employment. See above graph.

    That said, e-commerce jobs are still a small portion of overall retail employment. And the rise in e-commerce employment has not been enough to offset the losses in other areas, such as in departments stores.

    Over the last 15 years, e-commerce added 178,000 jobs and department stores lost 448,000 jobs. In this same time period, warehouse clubs added 841,000 jobs! I found it interesting to see department stores on the bottom and warehouse clubs on the top of the graph.

    image

    Finally, e-commerce jobs appear to be concentrating in larger metros. See above map. Each mustard dot represents 40 e-commerce jobs. You’re selling more products with less human capital, and those people are clustering. This is a broader trend.

    According to the New York Times, counties and smaller cities (under 250,000 people) account for almost ¼ of overall retail employment. But when it comes to e-commerce firms the number drops to around 13%.

    Once again it would seem that technology and what we do online have an impact on our cities and towns. And that’s fascinating.

    All images from the New York Times

  • How did we miss this?

    I promise that this post won’t be all about laneways.

    This afternoon Erin Davis of Torontoist published a post called: Are Laneway Suites a Solution to Toronto’s Housing Crisis?

    There’s a quote in it from yours truly:

    Brandon Donnelly, a 34-year-old real estate developer, has submitted plans to the City to build a laneway home behind the house he owns in the St. Clair Avenue and Dufferin Street area. “Look, nobody is claiming that laneway housing is going to solve all of our affordable housing woes. But it will do two important things. One, it will unlock new ground-related housing, which is precisely the kind of housing that we’re no longer able to build at scale. And two, it will create additional rental housing,” says Donnelly.

    But I particularly like this one from Christopher Hume – urban affairs columnist at the Toronto Star:

    “But the City has all kinds of rules against it—‘You can’t do it for this reason, you can’t do it for that reason; oh no, we can’t have that!’ Why? Says who and for what reason?

    This morning my friend Alex Bozikovic also published a piece on Toronto’s new 1.75km of public space under the Gardiner Expressway called The Bentway. It’s currently under construction and will open this winter.

    The timing of his article is actually quite serendipitous because I was in the area last night and as I walked past the construction site I couldn’t help but think to myself: “This is going to be absolutely brilliant once it’s done. Complete game changer for the area.”

    My point with these two examples is that in both cases we are rethinking – or at least trying to rethink – neglected urban spaces. It’s about finding value where no additional value was thought to be found. And I love that.

    Conventional wisdom has told us that our laneways and the spaces under our elevated Gardiner Expressway are not spaces to be celebrated. They are utilitarian at best and they are to be completely ignored at worst.

    But when The Bentway opens this winter I have no doubt in my mind that it will prove conventional wisdom entirely wrong. Who wants to hang out under an elevated highway? Watch the entire city. 

    One day I believe that we will also look back on our laneways just as we look back at the The Bentway before it became The Bentway. We will ask ourselves: How did we overlook this for so long?

    Image: PUBLIC WORK via the Globe and Mail

  • Am I being too subtle?

    Billionaire Sam Zell has a (relatively) new book out called, Am I Being Too Subtle?: Straight Talk From a Business Rebel.

    I haven’t read it yet, but I’ve added it to my queue. I can, however, tell you that I always enjoyed listening to Zell speak candidly about business and real estate when I was in graduate school and he would come in. He was never one to mince his words.

    He’s making the rounds right now to promote this new book and he recently sat down with William D. Cohan of the New Yorker. Not surprisingly, the Chicago Tribute debacle formed a large part of the conversation – up until Zell got tired of talking about it.

    “That is the L.B.O. that drove this company into bankruptcy.” Zell said, of the Tribune experience, “I made a bet. I thought the bet was reasonable. I underwrote it appropriately. I was wrong.” He lost his entire investment.

    But this misstep did nothing to phase Zell’s contrarian approach to business and life:

    Zell attributes his wealth to a prescription articulated by any number of successful business people: zigging when everyone else is zagging. It’s a replicable formula, he says, and he has little patience for people who complain that it was somehow easier in the good old days, or that the moment for such opportunities has passed. (His earliest successes came from investing in real-estate assets that others shunned.)

    He refuses to listen when he’s told he can’t do something. “I spent my whole life listening to people explain to me that I don’t get it,” he says. “I look at the Forbes 400 list, and if I eliminate the people who inherited the money, everybody else went left when conventional wisdom said to go right. How did I do what I did? By not listening to anybody else.”

    It’s the Sam Zell way.

  • Laneway housing — right now feels different

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    The CBC published a piece this morning on my laneway house proposal. The subheadline: Real estate developer believes time is right to build a laneway house he planned five years ago. 

    It’s true. As many of you already know, this proposal has been in the works for a number of years. But right now feels different. I continue to be encouraged by all of the interest and support surrounding laneway housing in this city. 

    Thank you Michelle Cheung for covering this.