Today, I am joined by Richard Parker, Daniel Riley and Sergio Grande as we discuss managing projects.
Here’s a quick summary of what we cover…
What is a project? Common or consistent elements to a project, budgets, timing & contingency plans, how projects can go wrong, project and site management, project roles, ream members and related parties, external dependencies, why we manage projects at all and the panel’s top tips for managing a successful project.
Between us, we have a range of experience, project sizes and time in the game as far as managing a project is concerned. So, makes for an interesting discussion I would say…how about you?
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Transcription of the show
Today, I am joined by Richard Parker, Daniel Riley and Sergio Grande as we discuss managing projects.
Here’s a quick summary of what we cover…
What is a project? Common or consistent elements to a project, budgets, timing & contingency plans, how projects can go wrong, project and site management, project roles, ream members and related parties, external dependencies, why we manage projects at all and the panel’s top tips for managing a successful project.
Between us, we have a range of experience, project sizes and time in the game as far as managing a project is concerned. So, makes for an interesting discussion I would say…how about you?
Property Chatter
Welcome to the property voice podcast helping you to navigate safely through the world of property investing, get the lowdown and updates, insights and outcomes on all matters property with a splash of entertainment along the way to a property, voice, or voice to trust among the crowd. Now, let's get started with your host, Richard Brown.
Hello, and welcome to another episode of the property voice podcast. My name is Richard Brown. And as always, it's a pleasure to have you join me again on the show today. Well, we've got quite a long conversation and I was looking to potentially split it into two and make it a two-parter again. But in fact, I listened to it back and I think there wasn't really a convenient place to break it. So we're going to let it roll the entire just about an hour. So you can listen to it in chunks if you want. You can listen to it at a faster playback speed. But the contents really good, the conversations really good. So I had Richard Parker is an experienced portfolio landlord, developer, and author, Sergio Grande, who is a rich chartered surveyor. And Daniel Riley has been full-time in property for five years joining me who's you know, worked on smaller projects through to small conversions like HMOs, up to now, commercial conversions, and part you build as well. So we've got a range of experience on the panel. I hope you enjoy the conversation. I'll come back and wrap up shortly. Here we are, again, another panel discussion for the series of property core skills on the property voice podcast. I'm very pleased to welcome the panelists with me today. And one, one of the panelists is trying to join. So we'll see how that works out. Like I said, we can see vas his name, however, we can't hear him or see him right now. So let's see if as he joins us, and you were under who is vice but he may join us, he may not. But the people who we can see and can hear around the table right now are rich, Richard Parker or rich Parker just to differentiate from myself, Sergio Grande , and Daniel Riley. So hopefully you guys can join at some point. And we'll welcome vas when that happens if it happens. But probably let's get started. What I normally do on this sort of panel discussion is just go around the panel if you like and just ask us to do a quick sort of one-minute intro just so the listeners have got a bit of context, a little background about who you are, what you kind of involved in and what your you know, interest or experience in the area of managing projects is. So if you wouldn't mind, I know going to sort of force anyone to go first. So just chip in who wants to introduce themselves and get and kick us off.
So if I go first, Richard, so of course, name's Richard Parker. And I've been involved in property in terms of buyer toilets and things like that for about 16 years. And they initially an accidental landlord, while I was full-time employed as an engineer in the automotive industry, which I enjoyed very much. But I've been continuing with property all through this time and went full time in property about three years ago. And I'm now really enjoying it and developing into all kinds of projects. I've got commercial property, I've got blocks of apartments HMOs with students in so I've got a broad portfolio of properties now, which I'm looking to continue to expand.
Thank you rich and you didn't mention you know, any so I try not to push the book too much. I think I've mentioned it once before so SAS pension legacy for those of you interested because I have got a SAS pension and, and I was so interested in the subject, I decided to write a book on it, which is available on Amazon.
Well, you know, I'm sorry for torturing you and making you say so. But you know, it's a really good book. It's very nice, very specialized, but every bit every property investor should read that honestly, because it can open the door to quite a significant additional funding stream, or an alternative way for you to invest. Money is under your own control. So it's a very good read. Cool, thanks. Thanks, rich, we'll call you rich if that's okay, just to differentiate with me. That's okay. Cool, cool. So, Daniel or Sergio, who would like to go next,
go on organized. Daniel Riley. I've been full-time in property now for about five years. I started off on quite a big new build development, which was very, like a luxury type of development for large houses 5000 square feet. And it went, it went there were some troubles on site. So instead of going for the Make a new builds, I've gone for more control. So buying something smaller, I have bought a shop and converted into apartments, and then moved on to some other apartments. And I'm in the middle of renovating my house as you can see.
While the listeners might not be able to see, but yeah, we can see a bit of drying plaster there behind us so so we're looking good centrist in your journey and we might come back to it because I know that you started, you know, effectively working on a building site a new build development, as you say sort of large, luxurious, but now you've gone back to smaller ways people tend to go the opposite way. So it'd be interesting to maybe get some of your insights and experiences about how you followed that path. And and why you did Maybe, yeah. Thanks to have Daniel. Appreciate that. says yeah, there's no hiding place now. I'm afraid you, you're on the floor.
Yeah. So my name is Sergio Grande. I'm a part-time property investor. I have a HMO student, HMO student property, Liverpool. And I'm in the middle of getting another property which I'm going to be living in and also doing some reefer work to it. And my full time job, it's chartered project surveyor, in which I will be running 126 residential units project, which is about 25 million pounds. So I'll be managing the commercial side of it, which it might come helpful during the conversation. Maybe that's pretty much me.
Thank you, and what about uh, do you have any letters, you know, that are relevant to your business card and CV these days? Sergio? Yeah, I recently got chartered by the ICS and the CIO B. So that's something I'm happy about. And hopefully, it always, it will help me in the future.
Excellent. All right. So, unfortunately, it doesn't sound like we can hear from vassal of us. Maybe he'll join us later. So we can't do the introduction for him right now. But I guess if we just think about the panel, you know, including myself, we've got a range of experience and project sizes and levels and etc. And it's and time in the game. So hopefully, we'll have a nice interesting mix, you know, from the DIY, developer, investor, project manager, if you want to call it that, right through to professional large scale new build. So, yeah, quite a good thing. So I guess, you know, just to kick us off, so managing projects, what, what's the project? Yeah, so what is a project? And we had a little chat before, but, you know, what, what would be a typical project from the panelist's point of view that you might get involved in? Let's start off that way, ritually come back to you?
Yeah, I mean, for me, it could be something as simple as, as a very light refurb, for example, simply replacing some cabinets or units within a kitchen. You know, it could be as light as just replacing doors, and some flooring and, you know, touching up the walls with some paint, it could be a very simple life project like that. And equally, I would say, another project could be a complete new build, you know, that they're at completely different ends of the spectrum. And both of which I've done to lesser or greater success, depending on obviously, who's involved in that project. But for me, any task like that, I would class as a project.
Absolutely. So you know, I think Daniel, you kind of gave us a bit of a hint in your intro that you you worked on sort of this for unit new build development that I think was ground up development, right. Yeah. Purely new building what you've been working on recently.
The most recent is I'm in the middle of a renovation on two apartments, two basement apartments, which have needed underpinning they'll need a tanking system for the building regs suspended in underground in EDA. Basically, an insurance back guarantee that no water ingress over time. So they're the most recent. And just before that, I
think you're involved in another project seems remember.
Yeah, that was a commercial to residential a shop or in Manchester and to a couple of flats, so two bed flat downstairs, two but upstairs.
Okay, cool. Cool. And Sergio, what about you, from your perspective? You probably can answer professionally and personally, maybe, I don't know.
Yeah. So I think from a purely investor's point of view, they How's the flat I'm going to be buying in the next couple of months, it could, it could apply as a bit of a light touch refurbishment project where I've got a flat that's perfectly livable in it, but I just want to change a few things make it a bit more attractive to the tenants. So you can do that just by changing the bathroom and redoing the walls, changing carpets, and so on. So that could also be a project.
Absolutely, we're going to add to that, sorry. And on the professional side, and if I'm actually curious, so when you're in your professional role, your professional capacity, is just give us a bit of an insight into maybe some of the projects you might get involved in, and then what were your role will be, and maybe if there's anybody else involved in that?
Well, it gets quite lengthy. Because obviously, the process is very long. But from my current point of view, from main contracting perspective, we generally tend to get involved when we get a contract from our client, generally stage four rebar, our iba, which means we can get to a point where we can develop the design with the subcontractors and get it to construction stage. And commercially, really, my role is to negotiate well get the budget from the, from the, from the client, and just split that into the different packages, find all the companies that could do the different trades, negotiate the bill of quantities with them, employ them, negotiate the contracts. And then during the construction stage, doing all the monthly evaluations to them, negotiate any changes any extras. And also, from a main contracting point of view, negotiate the valuation of the line with the client, making sure I get enough money from the client. And I don't pay too much to the subcontractors. And then just doing the monthly reporting to my board of directors. And at the end, just doing final accounts, making sure the contractors finish the work on time on with the right quality and agreed, agreed final accounts with them on to the next project.
I guess then you just stick with your second Sergio, I guess in your sort of day job these projects, they substantial value contracts with multiple man days and over an extended period of time. Would that be right?
Yes. So currently the 126,000,826 units project, it's, it has a value of 25 point 7 million, and it's gonna go over 103 weeks. So just just over two years, under two years.
It's done it without some sort of budget, you've got your basement, you know, conversions quite enough to go down quite a few floors. I think the bulk of the budget times about the 80 grand.
So why difference by 80 grand and then the one before you said the commercial conversion. Yeah. How much was the budget on that one?
I remember actually, I think it was 70 ish, if I remember save at 78 quite hands-on on the project or keeping it down
a decent chunk. But more than you know, just putting a bit of carpet down and look at paint on the wall though. Yeah.
Yeah. Because, you know, there's this community start with the shop from got to get the services in so all the three-phase electric, just little things that are just a level up from your normal house renovations? Yeah,
I'm gonna come back to that, actually, because I'm gonna try and get you know, what's different about managing a project and what's involved there, it's just to give us a, you know, an insight into some of the budgets that you're kind of have been working with give us a sort of a flavor of some of the things you've been working on.
So I mentioned like a very light refurb and I'll exclude labor costs in the first one. So for example, just a light refurb one bedroom flats, that would I would target for around three, three and a half 1000 pounds plus labor costs. But in terms of a new build, so I you know, a few years back I had a bungalow that I was building and that came in at about 180,000 pounds with a value of about 330. So you know, that's kind of the The the change of the budgets that I might be dealing with in terms of my properties generally
interested in and you know, from my own part, I think I've had been an evolution or growth in my project values over time. So I've probably gone from looks of pain, you know, three 510, Grand refurbed sort of thing, particularly in the early years, you know, progressively increasing in complexity and budget size, things like HMO conversions probably spending about similar to Daniel, the ADK, you know, to about 120k, on those sorts of projects, typically, in sort of middle phase of my experience, and more recently, some of the projects have been working on the Vejer of varying size, but some of the last ones have had a sort of budget value of about somewhere between three and 600,000. In terms of works, you know, build cost. So that kind of positions us doesn't it really in terms of you know, the audience so that hopefully, that's useful, but I think what I wanted to get on to so we got differences in budgets and timelines, and maybe the kinds of projects but what are the similarities? You know, what are the things common elements that we need to look out for, or consider when we're taking on a project, know, anything that would be consistent throughout any type of project, let's, let's just get your thoughts on that. Who'd like to go?
I think one thing that's consistent if you've got tenants above and below, is just the difference is the difference in a normal house project where you just pass through a ceiling, if you've got tenants above, it's just the ability regulations are starting to fire and soundboards little things you might not think about.
So you might have to engage with building control, basically, right? That's typically with a project, I mean, if you're just doing a single-family home and ripping the kitchen out, you know, you might not need to involve them too much. Obviously, if you put a new boiler and you need to notify them of that. But in terms of, you know, you might have neighbors, and you might have building control. So you might have a party role. For example, if you got to do work to, you know, to semi-detached house or a link to terrorists or to house and then you might get building control involved to make sure your work is to a certain standard, I guess, is what you're saying. Right? Yeah. And it's funny, actually, because so what you say they're about, maybe you have to put some fireball or soundproofing in as the cost, isn't it? Yeah. So what else is what else do we need? What is common? What else is common when we're looking at projects?
You want to have, ideally, a contract, if you're going to be working with third parties, especially contractors or subcontractors. And in that contract, obviously, you can you can do a standard one, like JCT or something like that. Or a more. Not so standard one. And in there would include things like scope of works and, and Bill of quantities, if, if you could, because that helps a lot with avoiding discrepancies during the construction period.
Yeah, JCT joint contracts tribunal, right, just to spell it out. So that would be Excuse me. That's a formal contractual structure that you'd find in typically, you know, you know, even minor words contracts as they call, I've got a fairly decent ticket size of works, maybe 50k or something like that, you know, or more, you might use something like a JCT contract. I don't know what the other guys think. But if you talk to your local builder about we're gonna stick this on a JCT contract, what sort of reaction might you get? shock? shock. Yeah, so a lot of builders I speak to at the sort of lower end of project value, let's just say that they're not really wanting to get involved in that they see things like, you know, liquidated damages clauses or retentions, or extended warranties or you know, things like that, that are built into your, you know, the more formal contracts that Sergio probably is really familiar with. But your average, you know, one man in a van type of builder might be a little bit reluctant. So from a contracting point of view, absolutely. I think it is a common element, but it might be the nature of the contract, and could vary. So, you know, it doesn't have to be a formal JCT contracts. There's other versions out there, like from the Federation of Master Builders, they also have a standard contractual structure as well, you could use but then, you know, perhaps coming down, I mean, what, maybe rich and Danny were some of the projects you worked on. How have you engaged You know, some of the people that you've got working with you?
Well, I'll tell you a funny story about the very first project that I did, which was actually a new build of two nice nets on an end of terrorists. And this was literally my first project going back 16 years ago. And I've got several quotes from builders. And it was interesting, you talking about contracts, because the quotes came in. And quite naturally, I went for not the lowest, but I went for one of the lowest and I've had quite a good conversation with the builder. And, you know, I've heard you know, I've done some research and thought, it's a good thing to have a contract. So just as we was wrapping up the discussion, I said, What about a contract then? And he literally spat in his hand and put his hand out and said, that's it. I'll give you my word. And I'll be honest, I went with it. And I am still using the same builder. I was very fortunate, very lucky. The first time. I'm not saying I'm not advocating that I'm just saying it worked for me. But certainly there are times I think you just have to go with a little bit of gut instinct. But where it's possible, particularly these days, in terms of insurance and litigation and things like that, I would definitely recommend a contract wherever you can.
Yeah. And about you, Daniel, have you engaged people with similar relayer,
I've got a bricklayer by trade. So what Claire, I know quite a lot of builders on a personal level. So like I say, I'm lucky, lucky enough, if you get a decent builder who's just realistic and check first time, it could be, you know, a bit real thinking, is he going to complete the project, but if you have sort of scopes, or works and timeframes and is sticking to him, if you're if he sort of on his case, they've been, you know, like a teacher, you can you know, what's going to happen, you just need to be really on the on the ball with them.
Fair enough. It's funny, I was talking to a stockbroker today, for a random reason. And I've got a business where I needed to get his authority to do some work on his house. And he needed to replace some v locks windows. So it's about 3k 4k jobs, something like that. And just, you know, just said I was okay, you know, sorry about the bad news. But you know, can we proceed? I said, Yeah, absolutely. I said, It's okay, if it's okay with you, I'll probably just send you a quick email just to make sure we've got it authorized and clearly in writing, because that would be a contract, right? And exchange of emails would classify as a contractual arrangement. If that was saying, so is a contract, but it's very hard to prove. So he said, I want to stop broke. My Word is my bond, carry on. Okay, I'm still gonna send you an email anyway. Which I then did. So yeah, you I'm not sure that the spittin handshake is for everyone. And if you do happen to know, people in the trade, then fantastic. But yeah, I would suggest always having some kind of documentation of what's been agreed. And that should, you know, have the basic information who's doing what, what sort of price has been agreed, or what sort of payment arrangement you have for the job, what's included in it. And you know, those types of things have had some simple like an exchange of emails, or simple exchange of letters to protect yourself. And here's a tip, by the way, I, unfortunately, have been on the receiving end of one or two contractors not doing such a great job. And I had the unfortunate experience of having to talk to a litigation solicitor about, you know, well, this has kind of gone a bit wrong. What what are my options? He said, words could probably cost you 50k, you know, to go after this particular builder, I think the contract value was 120k. But then they haven't spent 120k. They spent about 70, is it but it'll cost you about 50k. If you wanted to pursue them. Is it Can I ask you a question? He said, Who did you contract with? I said, Oh, the building company. It was a limited company. I said, Yes. And he said, Did you have the personal guarantee of the director of the company? No. As the as the company got any assets to speak of? No. He said in that case, I wouldn't bother. So he said you could take them to court. It'll take about 18 months, it'll cost you about 50k you may or may not be awarded your costs. But even if you did, and you went to that extreme and you won and you were awarded significant amount of your costs, in all likelihood the bill though concerned with just fold the company and you wouldn't see the money. So he said, what I always recommend people to do to avoid people like you speaking to people like me is to either get contracts in the name of the builder Personally, I will take a personal or directors loan, sorry guarantee. Alternatively, you can actually get construction insurance specific to the project. And it's well worth paying the premium on that, in case things were to go a little bit wrong. And at least you have some recourse that way without having to go through that process and be as disappointed and probably as stressed out as maybe that picture point, pain. So that was the litigation, construction litigation solicitor who speaks to people in this business all day. So that was, that was pretty sobering, I've got to be honest. But now that is mine very next contract, guy did exactly what he said. And I, I basically made sure that the owner of the building company was had was, you know, signed on the dotted line himself personally. So that's what I did in that case, and then another contract, we insisted that there was an insurance that you can get construction insurance, and we specifically made sure that they got that it wasn't a very expensive premium actually well worth doing. And even if we have to pay for it yourself, I'd recommend doing it. Anyway, that's a bit of a digression. But we frightened everybody away from doing projects now, by mentioning that, so we got contracts, we've got, you know, people like building control. Maybe if we can add to that we got sometimes we've got planning involved, haven't we?
Generally around projects, one of the reasons why things go wrong, particularly in property is the responsible team members, it could be a subcontractor, or it could be building could be, you know, planning, or it could be some other authority when they're not under your control. And that I think, is always a big problem, why people either miss their timing, you know, they've got a target day, everyone thinks they can deliver on certain timing. And one of the big things obviously, is they miss their timing. Equally, those kinds of things where those people aren't under your control is a result of why your budget is exceeded. I mean, generally, very simplistically, projects, usually problematic, because you miss your timing or the budget is exceeded. And I think one of the biggest problems for people within the property industry, particularly if you're starting out, and you know, you could just be doing a small project. But if you are not completely in control of those people, I that they work for you and by contracts in a job ad to someone does not mean there, you've got control over them. Unfortunately, as you've just alluded to, with the project that you were talking about, Richard, I think this is one of the biggest reasons why people in property have problems with their projects. And it's very difficult, particularly, again, as you mentioned, Richard planning can be a law unto themselves, they don't see you as the customer, you're just another person that they've got to deal with, and they've got their job and their remit. And it's as simple as that. And they'll they'll deal with you how they deal with everyone else, which is often it does vary council by Council, if you know, you're dealing with the individual councils, building control, sometimes you've got a bit more control over those because I personally always go private building controllers, because then they, they work for me, and I've always found them personally, to deliver better than local councils. Because particularly if you're doing property in different areas, because every time you're new learning, new building control, the team members and things like that, and they don't all operate as the same. So for me that that's just highlighting one of the key things in terms of why projects can be problematic.
Yeah,
totally agree. I think you mentioned you know, I planning stock has a consistent point, so maybe shouldn't have actually flagged it, because you don't have planning with every project. But then you've gone into what is consistent, which is budgeting your budget for the project, and obviously, the timing. And you're quite right in saying that, you know, if either of those overruns and you've got a problem. So that you know, so that's for me suggests having a project plan. You know, so if you have a project plan, which you know includes things like your financial budget, your timescales, the people who are involved, you know, the scope of works that's involved, you know, as a minimum, then you can coordinate that project would that be fair, is that fair, even if you do any sort of a fairly simple like refurb you don't necessarily need it to be a fancy pants sort of Gantt chart, using Microsoft Project, but you would still have some way of measuring the project, would you?
I would absolutely recommend that and I'm so sure Sergio will come in with the kind of projects that he's talking about. I'm sure he's got a very detailed project plan. But yeah, people who are doing again, starting out may have no project plan, or more likely, they'll have some unrealistic project plan. And I think, you know, we're all, we all think we can do far more than we actually can, which Germany makes project plans, you know, over ambitious, and sometimes I'm realistic. And one of my recommendations would be to people that haven't got that kind of experience in dealing with, it could be a very small project or something a bit more ambitious, is if you can speak to someone who has done, what you're trying to do, see if you can get hold of their project plan, because don't try and reinvent the wheel. If you can speak to someone to say, look, can you just give me the project plan, perhaps that you use for your project, because I'm doing something similar, I guarantee there will be things in there that you have not even considered. And it's a great basis to start to tailor your own specific project plan to
Sergio was giving various head gestures when you're referring to him there. So I'm trying to figure out what that meant to you. So come on, why don't you tell us what's on your mind about project plans.
So rich touched on very, very, very good points. And I just want to make clear that it doesn't matter the size, and it does matter. You know, whether you have a massive Gantt chart with 3000, with a program of 3000 activities, we still get the projects late and over budget at 26 million pounds. So for me, it's too you know, a lot of that, at the end of the day, a construction project has a lot of variability. And you need to figure out a way to reduce that variability the to the minimum. And you can do that by talking to people that know, as Richard mentioned, you can talk to somebody that's done something similar. If you don't have that person, you can talk to three or four builders, and each of them will give you their view so that you can create your own view from the inputs. And then once you are at the stage where you are doing the project, you just need to realize that there's gonna be issues. So you have to have a contingency, both in budget and in time. And you need to be on top of things to be able to react quickly. And that helps if you have a good team. But if not, unfortunately, it's just on you because it's your project. So you need to figure out a way of dealing with the issues that you have. A lot of the times, you know, projects finished late because we change things ourselves or the client. So it's not strictly fair in just putting the blame on, you know, the utilities company or the subcontractor not turning up on site, because we sanitize piece of those people by not doing things on time, or by not giving them what they wanted or changing things last minute. So there's a lot of things that change in a project. But the point I'm trying to make is, first have a good plan and then be able to react quickly. Yeah,
very good point. I think you've the variability point is really important because we projects has a degree of complexity, right? You've got lots of moving parts. It's interesting, you talk about 3000 line project plan. But you know, even if you've got a kind of reefer project, if you think about it, you might have plumbing, you might have electrics, you might have carpentry, you might have plastering, you might have flooring, you know, already I've also five and you know, different trades. And within that you've got you know, your first fix your second fix, you know, different components, you know, you schedule a finishes, you know, what standard you want, what look you want, what's your end market. So, there's the point about control and decision-making is really valid. I think equally, you touched on team and people I'll come back to that. But before I move off, I want to bring down your back end because Daniel what's been your approach to you know, managing the projects that you've been working on over the last two or three years, you've kind of worked on to invent very hands on and that that daily, really just being on the builders all the time and also I like to learn because on the first project, it was completely out of my hands, you know, like, like Sergios projects. They go wrong. Sergio Jones, I'm sorry, to alpo he's not gonna do anything. There's no difference. So once it starts losing control or big, on a big scale, it loses control fast. So I've tried to keep tight reins on the project so that it doesn't lose control fast
to how do you how do you keep tight reins on? What does that mean to you, Daniel?
Yeah, get there earlier than everybody else, make sure everybody knows what they're doing as soon as they get there, go and get some materials after. So the tradesmen as soon as they're going to know what we're doing, we've got a list to do. Is there need any materials that can be nipped off and guard? So they're just constantly working on the job? And just keep? Well, just keep on them constantly? You know, make sure, just make sure that what we've agreed is being done it in a timely fashion? Yeah,
I think what we, you know, also, there's a slight distinction, isn't it? Because you've got project management, let's say that on the one end, that's planning a budget, you know, who you're going to who's going to do? What's the various stages, the, format and the rollout of the program? But to some extent, what you're saying, Daniel is more like site management, right. So on site, who does what job? Are the roles clear? Have they got what they need? You know, in terms of the materials, for example, that's like, you're on their cases, you kind of say, so that there's some distinct roles there. And of course, if it's a small project, it might be we our project manager and site manager and you know, everything else, but as the scale perhaps, and the complexity increases, you might then start to separate out those roles into distinct roles. Yeah. Is that fair?
Yeah, I think, yeah, I think if you're going above a couple of 100 grand on the works, he may be good. If you couldn't do the work yourself, you'd then employ a manager. But for me, personally, I like to be the manager just to be to be involved. So I can see every aspect of it unfolding.
And just to be clear, you you're on site a lot, right. So you're pretty much full-time in this business, right?
Yeah, I'm serious. Three, between, yeah, three quarters of the day or two-thirds, I'll be there on-site. And the rest of it will be project managing offside.
Okay, and what about you rich? What's How do you approach projects or site management.
And it really depends, again, on the scale, and, and who I'm dealing with. So as I said, my main contractor builder, I've never had a relationship with him for 16 years. So I know how he operates. He knows how I like to operate. Literally, today, he's doing a work on a commercial building for me that he started a few months back for me. And there was some aspect he wasn't sure about. And he just phoned me up. And he said this is the problem. I can either do this, or I can do that. How would you like me to proceed? I gave my direction. And off he goes, and does it. There, I can do that. Because I you know, he's part of my power team. And, you know, I know how he operates. And if that was someone that I was very unfamiliar with, I might have said, Don't do anything I need to come to site, I need to look at it, etc, etc. So it really depends on actually who I'm dealing with and in how I would respond to that.
Yeah, I think that's fair point, especially when, you know, I think the implication there being that you weren't on site, right when he called you. Yeah. And I presume you're not on site, constantly badgering him, like maybe Daniel was with his project, right? So it'd be different.
Now that's true that that's, that's maybe I'm, I'm a little bit different to Daniel, because I know, I know him. Daniel is very, very much he's really on top of what's going on. Again, a little bit of what I tend to do is when I establish a timing, a timeline with my builder, and I don't tell him this, so I hope he's not gonna listen to this by always build in a little bit of buffer. So if he says he's going to take 10 weeks to do this, I'll allow 11 weeks or 12 weeks because there's going to be something come up, but I don't expect him to be perfect. I know there's going to be a problem arise that he can't resolve on the timeline that we've agreed for whatever reason there is. So I always personally build in a little bit of buffer into all my projects. It makes for good sleeping, is what I would say. Because otherwise, if you just set yourself too tight of project plan, you can really lose sleep and stress over that you're not hitting your timeline. So for me, I've learned This from being completely in control of my projects, that that just works for me. And, you know, that's how I approach it.
And in my own case, one of the lessons I guess I've learned is, I use a phrase have my own eyes and ears. So even if, you know, I've appointed someone as a contractor, whether that's one tradesperson, a main contractor, or whatever arrangement I've got, I will have somebody who represents me and my interests, who will go to site, and we'll, you know, check on things. And, you know, the level of D, you know, frequency and detail of those checks would vary depending on the nature of the project. But that's something I've learned over years is to make sure I have my own eyes and ears. And in my case, you know, to be honest, it's no point me going to look at our project and, and checking the quality of the build, because I'm not a builder. So I would have a suitably experienced and qualified person perform that role for me. That's the way I would do that. But I guess some of you guys, you know, Daniel, you're a bricklayer by trade, you say, so, I'm sure you can inspect the construction works and see if there's anything wrong yourself.
Yeah, I just think I just think, worst case scenario, right. During the last recession, there was nobody available, not the recession, sorry, just during this pandemic, there was nobody available and materials wasn't that so instead of the job being on staff, you know, I was that hurt on the job for the family member. So, you know, it's, it's just an extra string to bar. Yeah.
And I think I remember, by the way, you telling me during the pandemic, that you were like you were getting materials ahead of in advance, and kind of, you could foresee that the beer shortage, seems to remember you're doing that. And so being resourceful and resilient, and having a bit of foresight, you know, can actually pay off. We've touched on a little bit of like, the team and stuff, and I'm going to come back to the team and roles. But I think the other thing about a project is dislike certain dependencies, potentially, with other parties. So Ritu, talking about when things are outside of your control, building controls an example of an outside party. But as you get into more complex projects, particularly if you're creating new units and things like that, we've got other parties to negotiate and deal with, haven't we? So who could we get in? Who could get who could interfere? I guess, who do we need to negotiate with? and coordinate on our projects? Just to find out what have you experienced?
on the project? And one of the many it is this, this tenant of both. So don't appreciate it. You know, heavy machinery blasting first thing in the morning if they're working nights, you know, so you've just got to, you've got to, you've got to let people know, before people are in the vicinity, what's happening? If if, you know, if there's just a stone wall or a floor between now otherwise it can become very difficult. Yeah.
And what about other parties that you might need to engage in your project? I'm thinking maybe three utilities and people like that, maybe?
Yeah, without doubt, for me, the water, you know, I'm not gonna name any specific, but the water companies are just, again, another foil to themselves. And I think partly because, you know, they, they've got almost a close shop, you know, they've been assigned a certain area, there's no competition there. So I don't think there's any real pressure on them to improve customer service. And again, the bungalow that I had built, I was dealing directly with the, the, for the sewage, I was dealing with the water company in relation to that, and things just took forever. Or Remember, you know, when it was first being put through, and I was waiting for effectively, the case officer to be assigned or the, the, you know, the person that we're going to deal with my particular job of works. And I found out after about two weeks, I said, I haven't heard anything, they said, Oh, no, we haven't assigned anyone yet it should happen next week. And, you know, I just couldn't believe that that kind of thing can happen. But again, if you haven't had that experience before, you might not build that into your project plan. And this is how things can very quickly go awry.
You know, if you're doing a project really need to think about utilities, just you know, to get a price for an electric connection. For instance, it can be You know, 10 to 12 weeks just to get a price. And then you could be waiting again, for the works. So just before you're doing the project, like, why the plumbing that we've just been talking about just factor in those speak to someone who's done their job previously, if you've not, and put that on a to do list, surnames, Sergio, want to bring you back in here? So I bet you've got a number of external parties that you engage with on some of these projects, what's your what's been your experience? And what would you recommend people take into consideration?
It's exactly what Richard Daniel was saying, if you're going onto any new connections, you will have to engage these utility companies. So you just need to build in the time into your program. All the things I can think of other than, obviously, water, electricity, and gas, and internet out things like, you know, when you're doing works, say, on a public footpath, you're putting a scaffold there, you're gonna have to need licenses from the, from the council. So I've just had a project. Before the one I'm going to start now where we we've just had to extend the license, obviously, origin, you need to get it, if you need to excavate on the public footpath you need to get another license, we've also had to this, we were building an office in between two walls, like in between two properties. So we had to party wall agreement. And we had to get an agreement to put the scaffold over the existing building to the left-hand side of our property. So for that, you also need to factor in time to get the agreements, right, get the permission from your neighbors, get both party wall surveyors involved, which takes time on, you know, sometimes they might not want to do it, or you might have to liaise with the people to ensure that you can get it so it's, you know, sometimes not about time, or money is also about relationships and how you treat people. Because if you're going to be doing a demolition, as we were doing, and you're gonna be disturbing your tenants and, and they might leave, so the owner is not going to be happy. So you might have to give in and restrict your demolition hours, just so you can get the license to put your scaffold on top of their building. And all of those conversations take time. And you need to factor that in. And you can't just go on say, well, you need to give me permission, because I'm gonna be building this, it just doesn't work like that. So, you know, that's another couple of examples of external power parties. Yeah,
good ones, you know, I remember we just wanted to do a demo, you know, demolition, within a building and outside was a public highway. And to put a skip, you just want to put a skip down, just so we could put all that rubbish in it, it took about four days to because we needed to get a permit before we can put the skip down. So it just delayed the demolition. By that four days, we couldn't deliver the skip. And so we got the permit, you know, and Okay, maybe it was four days, and that was too bad. But, you know, these are the little things that eat into your project timelines. And so trying to be planning ahead, you know, for these things is very, very wise. And the other things maybe to think about other things that you need to do in terms of preparing a property or a site, there's an obvious one that which is, you know, always comes up whenever I'm looking at projects these days aren't just for me, it's asbestos. But other things like that, in terms of surveys or requirements before you get involved in a site that people, you know, could mention and got some tips on.
I mean, asbestos was the most recent one for me, Richard, so I bought, quite recently or completed on a block of apartments. And the I was gonna, I was gonna refinance on the block, and they insisted on having an asbestos survey, luckily, only in the community awareness, because I think that's actually the requirement. Right? It wasn't a HMO, they were all self contained individual apartments. So that was something I had to, you know, pull together for the finance company rather than actually of interest for me because I'd looked at the building, and I thought it you know, it looked acceptable to what I'm used to. But, again, building that timing in it took about two weeks for someone to be free to be able to go and do that. survey. And then further two weeks before I got the report, well, that slowed down the finance being improved by four weeks. So again, something that maybe you've not thought about. And I again, I come back to the idea of if someone's done something that you want to do, try and get hold of their project plan or their budget plan, whatever it is, it will make you aware of things like this that maybe you don't consider. But all of these things very quickly have a knock on effect to either delay in your timing or your budget being exceeded.
salutely. So if you're doing things like new build developments, or things like that, you often have a bunch of surveys, even if you're not doing a new build development. So I've had to do soil surveys, for example, ground surveys, you sometimes have transport surveys or noise surveys, and things like that you need to do for planning purposes. You know, and access if you're if it's not necessarily a new build, you might have other types of survey, particularly, you know, if you see that a damp was quite a common problem. And obviously, in all the properties you need to get done, particularly with financing. So you talk about third parties having input finance companies, or finance providers, one of the most significant ones, and then often have this kind of requirement. And I think the other thing to remember is at the other end of it, you might say I need a new build warranty, or you need to start the beginning to get the new build warranty at the end or professional certificate, something like that. And equally, you might need an EPC for new build property, you might need to get a new address. But you know, these are brought you can't get broadband unless you've got the address here, which I discovered things like this. And then you got silly little things like if your property is empty for a period of time, you might get stung for penal council tax rates. So there's a couple of things like that just wanted to say I'm kind of just throwing those out there because actually wanting to move on to do we all work alone on our projects? Or do we work with other people leading question don't try and do it all on your own? So we want the sorts of people that you work with Daniel and the professionals the utility companies that you need to instruct sport readjust the tradespeople really other than the professionals who need it's just the tradespeople I work with.
But that's that you've highlighted that really for me and you know, the professionals and the tradespeople so you know, there are two key people that you might need around that professionals might include what sorts of types of people is your electricians, your plasters, your plumbers, kitchen fitters painters,
that's more on the trade side on the, the actual professionals, we've got one here amongst our mates, we've got a you know, a RICS chartered surveyor with Sergio. So you might have a surveyor, and what about other types of professionals like that.
So surveyors, if you want to change any walls, and they need a structural engineer, to see if the wall supporting your building, you build an instructor,
architect, architect, architect, sometimes a planning consultant. So you might need to, depending on the level of project, you might need. So I talked about planning, consulting, there was something else in my mind there, oh, yeah, some sort of Project Manager, or site management. So and, of course, you've got your, I call them service providers. What I mean by that is, you know, maybe your insurance broker, maybe a finance broker, maybe a solicitor, you know, things like, I've got it on a site of mine now. And, you know, effectively, I want to split the site, you know, and I section off or hive off a part of the of the site. So that means amending the title, which I need to do before I refinance, because if I don't, I do ask refinancing, I probably won't get permission from the lender to do that. So these things you need to what I'm getting at is, there's quite a number of people that we need to coordinate. Right. So we've got the complexity of the construction that we've been talking about, and the project plan and the budget and the different trades and the sequence of work, then we've got the complexity of the different people that are involved, the trades, the professions, the service providers. So why on earth are we doing this? Why are we you know, got all this complexity into somebody telling me what why are we doing it?
The satisfactory feeling at the end of the project.
I'm genuinely curious, you get a satisfactory feeling at the end of the project. Sergio and rich Come on. Why do we do this?
That's a very good question. And sometimes I do, I do find myself looking at what I'm doing and think one Earth, and we're doing this, but you do get a lot of being an ex engineer myself, you know, my whole career has been about problem solving. And I think being in property, you do quickly learn that you have to become a problem solver, because there are all kinds of things that are always thrown at you. And you just have to, you know, deal with them one at a time, fix a problem, move on to the next thing, fix a problem, move on. If you know, as Matt Damon said, In the film, Martian, you know, if you solve enough problems, you know, you complete what you've been, you know, tasked to achieve, or what you want to try and achieve. So, it, there is a great deal of satisfaction, I think that once you've completed something, and ultimately, you know, you're looking to create a home for someone, whether you've you rent it out, or whether you actually choose to sell it. That's ultimately why we're doing this, and I take a lot of pride in the properties that I have, I maintain them to a good high standard. And, and, and having very happy tenants that have been with me for many, many years, on the ones that I rent out, and I get a great deal of satisfaction from that.
Cool stuff. Come on Sergio. Why do you do it?
It's at the end of the day, we're always gonna face challenges, it doesn't matter if it's property, or if it's anywhere, to be honest. And, and I think so the projects where I've, I think suffered the most when I got the most involved, those are the ones that actually, you know, you feel a bit more proud when you finish them. You know, obviously, you need to look back, and, and actually have that feeling afterward. During the time, it's tough. as Richard says, he feels like you're having a problem after another. And but there's little wins as well, you know, when when you place a contract with somebody for less money than what you had allowed for, that's a good result. So you know, you take that money and put it in your pot, and you watch it like a hawk, and you don't want to lose it. But there'll be other times where you have to spend more money, and you won't feel as good. So you will have your wins and losses. But at the end of the day, I think if you know, if you put your effort in what you do, generally you would feel proud of what you do, even if it has to be afterward. You know, sense of satisfaction,
or pride, you've got, you know, building a home for somebody to live in. We've got you to know, problem-solving itself, you know, that can be there. I think for me to maybe add to that, I think it would be you know, let's say let's, what is the purpose we're here for I mean, value-added, you're creating value, as well. So I think a project enables us to create value or add value to a property, and then that's got a financial return, you know, as well. So, you know, that's, that's one of the incentives, why we put ourselves through this, you know, and the ability to create, you know, it's, it is a form of creativity, and we're not maybe artists, but you know, we're creating something from, you know, we're transforming something from what was to something new. So for me, they're, you know, really important things. And I think, you know, I do a bit of what you might call build to rent. So I quite I take a lot of satisfaction things are well built, that that's going to be my legacy that's going to be in my portfolio, that's going to be however many tenants for a home for many, many years to come. And, you know, maybe I've got a bit more gray hair than, you know, I, I started with, but I have a great deal of satisfaction from knowing that. So to pick up the, you know, the points that you do, you mentioned there, so I was gonna say why do we do this? And hopefully, they'll get some positive responses. Maybe I didn't frame the question in a way that might elicit all those positive responses, and thanks for bringing them out. So I think is there anything that you know, I'm going to move on to perhaps closing up and ask in a minute about things like your top tips or things to you know, any no knows things to avoid in terms of projects? I'm going to come to that so you can start thinking about that. But is there anything we haven't covered? You know, we should in this conversation, just think about who's listening and hang on? Hang on, Richard, you can't possibly end the conversation about managing projects without talking about that. Anything we haven't really covered?
I don't think so. I think it's more More or less, if you if you've got a plan in place, and speak to people who've already walked those steps. You know that's, that's, that's a that's the main star.
I think he's about having the right mindset as well, you know, if you go in to, you know, can be a small project, but certainly, anything as it starts to get larger, thinking it's all gonna run perfectly well. It's just not like that, but you know, you will get through it, like anything. And it's just about staying positive, understanding that you're going to have setbacks, you know, he undoubtedly, I can't think of anything I've had dealt with as a project through my entire life. That has gone completely smoothly, you know, there are always going to be setbacks, large or small, depending on what they are. But I think if you have a positive mindset, you know, that's really important to have with anything that you're dealing, again, with within project within projects. And with property projects in particular.
I think we're missing Sergio.
Yeah, just one-word resilience, you just have to be resilient, and, you know, take on every problem you get, it's not all problems. You know, I don't think that's the idea that we should be given away here. Projects don't always go wrong all the time. And if you have a good team, whether big or small, whether it's full of consultants, or just your builders, or your trusted builder, as rich said, they don't really need anymore, and then just try to plan for a just build a little bit of a contingency. And, and, you know, go out of your comfort zone, but don't try to stretch too much.
Dr. Rosa. What is that, Daniel?
I'm gonna try and enjoy the process. Sorry, for interrupting that serve you. Absolutely. Yeah,
I agree. I enjoy the process. So okay, may be drawing to a close, bam, any final closing comments, thoughts, tips, you know, don't do this type of stuff. You might have just wrapped that up there. But you know, just to go round, you know, what would you want people to hold in their minds, you know, from your experience of managing projects, what the what the key, you know, one, one or two tips are one or two things not to do.
My top tip would be don't change the specification. A simple example, you know, you see this all the time, and things like grand designs and other property programs, the budget says an acrylic bath, and then next thing, they've gone out and bought a copper bath, you know, it's not going to achieve your budget, if you're, instead of sticking with the specification, or whatever that is, you decide to put your real own stamp on a property, particularly if you're going to rent it out, you're not going to hit your budget, it's as simple as that. So for me would be once you've set up if you want, if you're serious about hitting your budget, do not change the specification, stick with it, and you should be on target.
Tip, a tip that I could give there is this is if you're going to instruct someone or work with someone, as asked to have a look at previous works, they've done or ask that people who have worked with how that person operates. Because I fell foul of both?
Well, that's how we learn. You know, that's gospel, it's experience, isn't it, we learn from our own mistakes. And that wisdom is learning from other people's mistakes. So you're wise, if you listen to Daniel, and you learn from one of the lessons he's learned, so thanks for that one. We got one, Sergio.
I'd say whatever you do, just compare it. If you get quotes from a contractor get quotes from three or four. If you talk to architects talk to two or three. And that will give you a good idea of where you should be with your costs. And also during the construction just, you know, because to it, and if you can't assume to Richard just have somebody that will be close to the process. Because as Daniel said, if the project gets out of control, then it's the more out of control it gets, the more difficult is to bring it back. So stay on top of things. And one for me,
I think, you know, I look a bit like Daniel, I've learned this, you know myself proved through pain actually. But there's no substitute for experience. But if you don't have the experience yourself You can bring it in. So I think that for me is probably my top tip. So I think I'm awful. And I've grown, you know, I've did, you know, small projects, medium projects, and you know, people might call what I call large projects, small projects, especially compared to what Sergio is doing, but, you know, kind of progressively moved up. But they're not all the same, they don't operate the same way. And so when you move to the next level, there's a different level of experience and it you need different people around you, you know, perhaps, to be able to, to manage those sort of projects. I think, for me, it's like, you know, get out of your comfort zone, but don't get out so far. That your snap. That's number one. And number two pride, try and surround yourself with people with the experience and with the knowledge and with the capability to deliver what you wish to deliver. So that will probably be my single tip. But there's so much we could talk about in this topic. But it's, we've just reached about the hour mark. So I think, unless anyone's unless there's anything people want to come back with an ad. Then I think I just like to say thanks so much to the panelists. You know, rich Parker, Daniel Riley says your grungy poroelastic managed to make it is he I can see his name. He didn't make it. So you don't know who on earth he is. Why am I talking about a guy is not on the podcast. But he did try. I think he's been listening to us on and off. I've got the odd text message from him. So we'll try and get you in another one for us. But thanks for making the effort. So then, thanks, everybody. This will be out shortly. But I really appreciate you joining me today and sharing guys. It's been very, very valuable, valuable. Well, I hope you enjoyed that conversation. It's really good when you have that kind of chat with people who they've got varied interests and experience in terms of working on projects of different size. And their approach is also different to so you might have listened to Daniel who's really hands on and how he goes about things and contrasted that with say me or rich Parker, who's a little bit more hands off, in how we go about things all the way through to Sergio who's got 3000 lines on his project plan in the office as well and breaking down your 25 was it 25 26 million pound construction projects into multiple work packages over several years. So you're going to get some interesting and different insights there. There's so much to take away, I'm not going to do a summary. Hopefully you've taken notes as you've been along. Been been listening along. But hopefully you found that of interest. So that's managing projects, which is the third part really as managing properties, managing portfolios and managing projects the last few weeks we've been covering. Hopefully you've got some merit out of that. I'm going to come back next week with another property core skill. In the meantime, you can find the show notes the transcription over at the website, thepropertyvoice.net you can drop me an email podcast at thepropertyvoice.net if you'd like to talk to me, or in the light to be introduced to any one of our panelists, I'm happy to do that when they're happy to share the details which they usually are. But I guess all that remains to say right now is thanks very much for listening once again this week. And until next time on the property boys podcast.
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Transcribed by https://otter.ai