Real Estate Investor Magazine South Africa Real Estate Investor Magazine - April 2017 | Seite 29

M
ike Deacon is an architect with 40
years’ experience in the commercial and
residential property market. He has a good
understanding of the balancing act involved in being
the developer while managing the professional team.
He shares his experiences and insights below.
Different team members, different agendas
In my experience, the developer and the professional
team are driven by different interests. Consultants
are focused on their own discipline, all the detail
around it, and doing it well ‒ this in a world getting
increasingly complicated. The result is a widening
range of consultants with the focus of each one
getting increasingly narrow. It’s been suggested they
eventually know everything about nothing!
Managing the programme
is never a static process, as
every step of the way throws
up new design issues that
need to be examined.
The developer, specifically, is driven by two factors:
to make money and to create. The skilful balance
between these two is key as to what eventually results.
The profit side is easy to define: to make money. There
are plenty of examples where this is almost the sole
concern and bad buildings may result. Defining what
it is to ‘create’ and the ability to do it successfully,
on the other hand, is challenging. It’s essential that
there’s a desire, emotional need, the wish, ability, and
the intellect to create inherent quality, to leave behind
something greater and more important than self and
that adds to the environment.
Designing for market needs
There’s therefore an interesting area, a sort of ‘no man
land’ between the developer and the wide array of
professionals he works with, particularly the architect.
The key to success is a shared vision and the developer’s
ability to give the development a commercially viable
form and to see it through. Being an ex-architect as
well as the developer in a project helps me get a grasp
of what is required on the design side when working
with an architectural firm. I can give help on the
vision, the scope, size and other spaces needed in a
development.
During the design stage, consultations include an
overarching understanding of what the end result
www.reimag.co.za
should be. What market we are targeting? A recent
residential development I have just completed in
Tokai, Cape Town, required some innovative designs
to create a different type of living space. The concept
that I had was to provide something entirely unique in
the upper end residential security estate market. My
primary role, however, is to manage the development
from start to finish.
Managing the development process
There is very much an order in managing the
development process. To start with, there must be a
need in the market and then one must fully understand
the norms of that market. Next is the identification of
a site suited to a building that fulfils that need. It may
be necessary to amend the property rights. This may
require dealing with objectors who may be right but
often are purely obstructive, NIMBY driven, because
they understand little of Urban Planning.
The next step is to convey the vision to the architect,
including the nature of what is needed. The team then
work together to chisel out sketches of the appropriate
building, involving the remaining professionals as
and when their input is needed. Of fundamental
importance are regular costings and viabilities. Two
of our most recent developments required years of
sourcing the right land. Then many more years getting
planning permission, EIAs and other permissions.
The role of the Quantity Surveyor and the input
he requires from the other professionals is now key.
Discuss, change, mould, tweek, and amend until you
have a product for which there is a need and can be
sold for more than it costs to develop.
Once the product has been defined, the execution
follows. Managing the programme is never a static
process, as every step of the way throws up new design
issues that need to be examined. Vital decisions have
to be made in terms of the big picture. A detailed
marketing programme needs to be formulated, with
all the various elements in the mix addressed. A
proper strategy must be implemented with critical
timelines worked out.
Lastly, the enlistment of estate or property agents
in the marketing of a development, be it commercial
or residential, can be most helpful. However, if you
come from a professional background, you tend to
assume that they are steeped in the professional ethic
of clients needs before own needs. Don’t be ‒ my
experience is that they are often driven by their own
need to, first and foremost, earn a commission. So,
select your agents carefully!
RESOURCES
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