BILD High-Rise Forum: Why Developers are Losing Sleep

On April 4, 2013, some of the best and brightest in the new homebuilding industry gathered at the Westin Prince for BILD’s High-Rise Forum. The topic: “What’s Keeping Toronto Developers Awake at Night?”

The panel of professionals consisted of Sam Crignano of Cityzen Development, Jim Ritchie of Tridel, Gary Switzer of MOD Developments, and Alan Vihant of Great Gulf. So, let’s talk about what’s happening in the new home industry that’s making these guys toss and turn in the early hours of the morning (below are just a few of the main points discussed at the forum).

Sam Crignano of Cityzen 

Affordability and infrastructure. Crignano said that Cityzen has had a lot of issues with transit in Toronto, and specifically pointed out the many hurdles that they’re encountering with The L Tower. The ineffectiveness of the government is being blamed for the deficit in infrastructure, and that’s something that we’ve been saying for a long time. There’s no doubt that transit and residential growth need to be integrated more effectively in Toronto.

As far as affordability goes, the issues are countless, but Crignano focused in on the rise of development charges. He believes that development charges are possibly at a tipping point, and he is concerned about what will happen to the state of the industry if the charges are pushed too high.

Alan Vihant of Great Gulf

Vihant said he sleeps pretty well at night, but one thing that does bother him is the media’s portrayal of the state of the housing market in Canada. But, he doesn’t put all the blame on the media sources - he just thinks that the real information isn’t readily available. Vihant believes that the industry as a whole needs to start doing a better job at educating and informing the general public about the state of the market. We shouldn’t be battling negative headlines, we should be preventing them.

Gary Switzer of MOD

Switzer also believes that it is the industry’s responsibility to provide better information to the public about the condition of the housing market in the GTA. He continued, saying that a good way to do that is to ensure that sales staff are armed with all the facts so that they have ammo to battle negative headlines if they have to - because no matter what the industry makes available to the general public and media outlets, someone out there is going to print or post something negative, even if it’s not true.

Another issue that Switzer discussed was actually a non-issue. Some people believe that the amount of smaller units is causing would-be buyers to look elsewhere. Switzer thinks that it all comes down to design at the end of the day. As an example: A well laid out 400 square foot unit will sell before a poorly laid out 700 square foot unit.

Jim Ritchie of Tridel

Ritchie agreed with Switzer’s point on the size of units not mattering as much anymore. He used Tridel’s Ten York as an example. They sold about 40 suites that were 1,350 square feet or larger - spacious or intimate, Ten York has been hugely successful. Location, location, location - that’s what people care about when they are looking for a place to live downtown Toronto. Ritchie also voiced concerns about development charges affecting affordability and the media’s negativity swaying people from purchasing.

Conclusion

So, the main points were: Affordability, Toronto’s lack of infrastructure, negativity in the media, and the question of unit sizes. The four panelists discussed a number of other topics as well, and you can read all about them by searching #bildforum on Twitter. Along with us, @Urbanation, @Slaner14, @UrbanToronto, @BILDgta, @monarch_group, and many more contributed to the great discussion!

Thanks again BILD and panellists for a very informative morning.