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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Tag: laneway suite

  • Brampton is building a ton of secondary suites

    Here is an interesting housing chart from Ryerson University’s Centre for Urban Research (CUR) using data from CMHC:

    What it shows is (1) the number of new housing using created through the addition of secondary suites, such as basement apartments and laneway suites; (2) the number of housing units lost to demolition or “deconversions”, such as when a duplex or triplex gets converted (back) to a single-family home; and then (3) the net new units added over the last three years.

    In looking at the chart, you’ll see that the City of Toronto actually lost about 2,000 units from its existing housing stock between 2019 and 2021. Again, these numbers only consider what’s happening in the city’s existing low-rise residential housing stock. They don’t factor any of the housing supply being delivered through new condominiums and multi-family apartments.

    Still, it’s evidence for something that is perhaps already well known: many of Toronto’s low-rise neighborhoods are losing people. They are losing people because the existing structures are housing fewer residents and they are losing people because we make it difficult to build new housing. We want them to be “stable.” But stable built form doesn’t necessarily mean that things aren’t changing on the inside.

    Now compare this to what’s happening in Brampton (a suburb of Toronto). CUR is calling Brampton the land of secondary suites. Over the last three years, it added nearly 11,000 housing units and was on pace (at the time the data was published) to create nearly 6,000 last year alone (most of which are basement apartments). This is all within its existing housing stock.

    With all of this, I think there’s an interesting question about about how much of this is being driven by market demand and how much of this is being driven by land use policies. There’s obviously demand for expensive single-family homes in Toronto, which is why “deconversions” are happening. But to what extent does this change if/when we become more permissive around multi-unit dwellings?

    I think it depends on how we craft the policies.

  • Releasing the shackles on mid-rise development

    I love mid-rise buildings. I think they are an incredibly livable scale of housing, which is why I am looking forward to moving into Junction House when we begin occupancies next year. But as we have talked about many times before on the blog, the mid-rise economics are challenging in this city, which is why we also don’t have any other Avenue-style mid-rise projects in the pipeline right now. We haven’t been able to find land where the math works.

    Here are two excerpts from a recent Globe and Mail article — titled “Toronto’s mix of planning rules limits growth of mid-rise housing” — that speaks to this dynamic:

    For well over two decades, Toronto’s official plan has called for transit-oriented intensification along the “Avenues,” much of it expected in the form of mid-rise apartments that can be approved “as of right” – meaning without zoning or official plan appeals. Such buildings are often seen as more livable and human scale than 50- or 60-storey towers.

    Yet, ironically, the highly prescriptive Mid-Rise Guidelines – combined with skyrocketing land, labour and building costs, as well as timelines that can run to six years for a mid-sized building – have turned these projects into pyramid-shaped unicorns, often filled with deep, dark and narrow units dubbed “bowling alleys.”

    “The economics are so frail,” says architect Dermot Sweeny, founding principal of Sweeny & Co., who describes the angular plane requirements as “a massive cost” because they make the structure more complicated and expensive while reducing the amount of leasable or saleable floor space.

    The critiques extend beyond the industry. Professor of architecture Richard Sommer, former dean of the John H. Daniels Faculty of Landscape, Architecture and Design at the University of Toronto, describes the controls in the guidelines as “very crude.” “They’re built around a mindset of deference to low-rise communities.”

    My opinion is that, at a minimum, we need to revisit the “guidelines” that govern these kinds of projects and we need to make this scale of development “as-of-right.” In the same way that laneway suites work, where you simply apply for a building permit, we need to make it just as easy for mid-rise housing. There just too many barriers and too many opportunities for something to come up that could hold up the entire project for months or years.

    Building at a variety of scales is important for the fabric and vitality of our cities. Unfortunately, I have all but made up my mind that small doesn’t work unless it’s as-of-right. I would love to build another laneway house and I fully expect that to happen at some point in the near future. But I just can’t seem to get my head around another mid-rise building right now. I wish that wasn’t the case. And it’s certainly not because of a lack of effort.

  • Building on top in London — how airspace developers are creating new housing supply in a tight market

    London has a breed of specialist developers that are known as rooftop or airspace developers. What these developers do is build on top of existing and occupied buildings — mostly residential. Firm examples include Upspace and Apex Airspace. According to this recent WSJ article, the city is also making moves to relax regulations so that more of these top-ups can be completed.

    Brokerage Knight Frank estimates that in central London alone there are probably 23,000 buildings that could support a few extra floors, resulting in upwards of 41,000 new homes. I have done early feasibility studies for similar projects here in Toronto and they’re not simple to execute. But building structures are typically constructed with a factor of safety and so, in some/most cases, you can build a little on top without doing any additional reinforcing. (Note: I am not a structural engineer.)

    In any case, the benefits of airspace projects are obvious. You’re creating additional supply in a tight housing market like London. Similar to Toronto’s laneway housing program, it’s not going to completely solve the larger problem of affordable housing. But every bit of new housing helps, regardless of where it lands on the spectrum of affordability.

    One of the drawbacks, which is the headline of the above WSJ article, is that penthouse residents are getting demoted in the process. They’re going from penthouse to sub, or sub-sub, or sub-sub-sub penthouse. They also need to endure a bit of construction right above them. Cry me a river?

    But what is also important to point out is that there are lots of buildings out there which are facing capital expenditure shortfalls. They have maintenance and repair demands that simply aren’t adequately funded. Adding additional floors can be a way for these buildings to generate that cash and, in some cases, residents are even partnering with airspace developers to share in some of the profit upside.

    Not surprisingly, these sorts of arrangements are seemingly being met with a fair bit of support. Because in these instances, your options are basically as follows: Either you cut a repairs and maintenance check right now or you support a bit of development and then hopefully you’ll be the one receiving a check in the future. I suspect we’ll be seeing a lot more of this, not just in London, but in cities all around the world.

    Photo by Sometimes I Snap on Unsplash

  • From back of house to front of house

    Daniel Foch, Daniel Clark, and Adam Darvay recently stopped by Mackay Laneway House to film a last-minute video tour before the new tenants move in. They had quite the rig setup (see above). There was also a drone flying around that is not pictured here. The full house tour should be available in about two weeks and I’ll be sure to share here on the blog.

    One of the things we talked about during the tour was the future of laneway housing in Toronto. Will we see strong adoption going forward and, if yes, what does that mean for Toronto’s laneways? I think we will continue to see a steady increase in the number of laneway suites that get built in Toronto each year. And so eventually this form of living will become a ubiquitous part of the urban landscape. It’s happening fast.

    Now consider what this could mean for Toronto’s laneways. As garages and parking spaces get slowly replaced by new housing, it will mean that our laneways could at some point flip from being vehicle first to pedestrian first. Mackay Laneway House does not have any vehicular parking. The front door is off the laneway. You enter on foot. That’s how you experience the lane. And Gabriel and I thought it should be celebrated.

    If or when this tipping point occurs, it will trigger a perception change. Slowly but surely we will start to think of our lanes not as back of house, but as front of house. And when that happens, it’ll almost certainly force us to rethink how we design them. Forget utilitarian. Our laneways have the potential to become some of the most pedestrian-friendly streets in the city, especially with a few streetscape and landscape improvements.

    Pushing this idea even further, could you imagine a world where our laneways not only become more front of house, but where the laneway side becomes the more desirable side of the property? If we gave people the option, how many would prefer to build their main house on what is today considered to be the backside? (Remember how things once flipped in Paris?)

    But for the fact that we have an entrenched built form that could make this “inversion” challenging, I think there are people who would prefer to have their front door on the quieter and more pedestrian-friendly side of their property. Either way, I continue to believe that we are in the early stages of an ADU/laneway housing revolution. And things are just getting started.

  • Los Angeles adopts “standard plan program” to encourage ADU construction

    The city of Los Angeles has taken an interesting approach to accessory dwelling units (what we generally call laneway or garden suites here in Toronto). In an effort to streamline the approvals process and bolster the supply of housing in the city, they’ve gone out and pre-approved a series of “standard plans” that you can quickly implement on your property. The idea here is that all of their approved plans have already been checked for compliance with the various building codes. So those reviews don’t need to happen before a permit can be issued (though the building department would still need to review any site-specific conditions).

    What that means is that if you’re in the market for, say, a one-storey, one-bedroom ADU at around 450 sf, you can simply scroll through their list and find the one you like the most. Here is one that fits this criteria by Design, Bitches (I just wanted to mention this firm name). The potential downside of this approach is that it could encourage less architectural experimentation. On the flipside, many of their approved designs are really nice and so maybe it’s a boon for those who are lacking in good taste. Either way, if you want to encourage more of something, the way to do that is to reduce friction.

    To start to give you a sense of how meaningful this could become, the city of Los Angeles received 1,980 applications for ADU construction back in 2017. This is the year in which the state changed its regulations so that ADUs were no longer prohibited in some municipalities (I don’t know all of the specifics truthfully). Last year, LA saw 5,374 applications and I suspect the number will be even higher this year. Should other cities look at pre-approving certain designs? And could this be an approach used for even larger building typologies? Speed is good.

  • Mackay Laneway House is now complete and available for rent

    Eleven years and a few setbacks later and we now have a completed laneway house.

    As Bill Gates once said, “most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.”

    Construction is all finished up and Mackay Laneway House is available for rent starting immediately.

    For photos and more information, click here.

  • Double height space at Mackay Laneway House

    The drywall started this week at Mackay Laneway House. This is a fun part of the construction process because it is that moment in time where, very quickly, the space transforms from a full on construction site to something that starts to resemble a livable space.

    What you are seeing above is a double height space (and 8 foot long skylight) that was incorporated into a sloping roof on the side of the house that faces the existing backyard. This is a design move that I felt pretty strongly about from the outset. Gabriel Fain, who is the project’s architect, likes to joke that it was really the only design directive.

    The move does a few things.

    1) It is a way to get light down and into the house without having a window facing the existing backyard. So it mitigates privacy concerns. 2) It frees up the north wall of the house, creating a place for a TV, art, photo backdrop, or whatever. You only have so many empty walls in a house of this size. And 3) it looks really cool and frames a large tree that overhangs the house.

    Stay tuned for more progress photos. The best way to do that is to follow @globizen.

  • 3 ways to get into real estate development

    The most popular post on this blog is this one here called, “What real estate developers do and why I became one.” This post alone has been responsible for a good chunk of the organic traffic that this site receives since I wrote it back in 2014. If you search for “real estate developer” in Google it usually comes up on the first page.

    Probably because of this post, the number one question I receive in my inbox is about how to become a developer or how to transition into development from some other discipline. Usually this comes from someone who is early on in their career and/or is in architecture (which is not surprising given my background as a fake architect).

    I have tried to respond to this question publicly and at scale with a number of different posts. But many of you probably haven’t seen them before, and so I figured it would be a good idea to summarize some of them here (they’re usually tagged with “developer dirt“):

    If you’re looking for a more succinct summary of what to do, here is what I would suggest to you. You basically have three options.

    1) You can convince someone to take a chance and hire you, even though you likely don’t have any development experience. Maybe you have a background in something relevant such as real estate law, architecture, or politics (good). Or maybe you don’t (less good). Either way, the best way to position yourself is to understand what it is that developers do and figure out a way to create value for them from day one. You want to be in a position to say, “Yeah, I know I don’t have any direct development experience, but I can do X, Y, and Z for you starting today and I think that would be helpful to you for the following reasons.”

    2) Get a relevant degree. I’m thinking an MBA in real estate or some sort of master’s in real estate development. The reality is that the development business has, in many ways, become more institutionalized. It has gone, though obviously not entirely, from rich private families developing with their own balance sheets to more institutional capital sources, such as pension funds. Because of this, there are going to be hiring managers out there who need to check off certain boxes. For example, does this person have a real estate degree? This may make it harder for someone to take a chance on you if you don’t have the right experience and/or credentials.

    3) Just go out and do it. Despite becoming more institutional, the development business remains, in my view, a deeply entrepreneurial endeavor. You have to be able to problem solve and you have to be creative. The best developers I know don’t focus on can’t, they focus on how. Because there are too many obstacles in this business. A can’t mentality wouldn’t get you very far. So consider renovating a triplex, building a laneway suite, or doing something else that allows you to take a piece of real estate and create some additional value. Because that’s all that development really is at the end of the day.

    If you found this post useful, please consider sharing it with someone that you think would benefit from it. And if there are other topics that you would like me to cover (or cover in more detail), please feel free to leave a comment below or to at me on Twitter. I prefer Twitter over email because it forces brevity. Happy Canadian Thanksgiving, all.

    Photo by Bernard Hermant on Unsplash

  • Preferred method of communication

    I was “on site” this morning for the installation of the helical piers for my laneway suite (that will be the topic of a separate post). More often than not, I’m in the office. But I like going on site because, well, building things is fun. One of the things that I find interesting about being on site, though, is that my preferred method of communication always seems to change. When I’m in the office, I have a bias toward emails. That is the case for two reasons: 1) I’m usually focusing on something and I find that calls can be disruptive, and 2) emails can be a highly efficient way to communicate. Tell me what you need (in the shortest email possible) and I’ll try and respond as succinctly as I can. However, when I’m on site, all of a sudden I don’t want to do emails. I would rather talk on the phone. That becomes the most direct way to deal with things. I am mentioning this because communication is paramount. And many of us have different preferences for how we like to do it. Knowing those preferences can be helpful when you’re trying to get things done.

  • Mackay Laneway House is now under construction

    Well, it only took 11 years.

    I still remember the first time I walked into Etobicoke Civic Centre and showed the lady at the counter my design for a laneway house. She didn’t know what a laneway house was and she couldn’t figure out where it fronted. “Wait, it’s behind the main house? It has no frontage. Where’s the street? Huh?” A lot has changed over the past decade, as I knew it would. All of the building permits are now in and Mackay Laneway House is under construction in Toronto’s Corso Italia neighborhood.

    Kilbarry Hill is overseeing the construction process. (Construction was supposed to start earlier this summer, but COVID-19 had something to say about that.) Regular updates will be posted on the Globizen blog and on the socials, with the goal of creating a kind of “how-to guide” for laneway suites. Expect detailed construction updates, a list of the individual trades that are being used, post-completion costing information, and probably a bunch more.

    The first order of business is the site servicing work, all of which has to be done via the existing house. No connections off the mains because, remember, these are intended to be secondary suites, similar to basement apartments. This raises the question of how best to submeter the utilities. Thankfully, the good folks over at Lanescape were kind enough to share how they have done it.

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