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Concert Snapshot

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Company: Concert Properties

Headquarters: Vancouver, B.C.

Principal: David Podmore, chairman and CEO

Employees: 180

Operations: British Columbia, Alberta, and Ontario

Market segments: First-time buyers, move-ups, move-down empty-nesters, and seniors

Product: Multifamily condos and rental housing in high-rise and mid-rise buildings

2010 Closings: 39 during Georgie Awards judging period

2010 Revenues: $36.95 million during Georgie Awards judging

 

 

Take an HD Video Tour of a Concert Home

 

 

 

Conducting just one walkthrough with new home buyers is not an approach that many single-family home builders feel confident enough to try, but high-rise and mid-rise condo buildings are a different animal. And Concert Properties has learned the wisdom of walking customers through their new condo units only at homeowner orientation, just before they are handed the keys.

Concert is one of the largest residential builders in Canada, specializing in multifamily condo and rental buildings in three provinces. But the firm is the winner of the 2011Customer Choice Georgie Award, Powered by AVID in the category of multifamily builders with fewer than 100 closings. In the survey period for this year’s Georgie Awards, Concert had only 39 closings in British Columbia, although it has already booked more than 300 across Canada so far this year. Multifamily builders often have gaps in closings because they close large numbers of units only when a building is completed.

“Another unique aspect to our company is that it’s owned by 19 pension funds,” notes Concert chairman and CEO David Podmore. “So we are actually owned by 200,000 Canadians with a distinctly long-range investment perspective.  We have to keep them happy. We plan to be in this business for a long, long time. That means our reputation for quality and service is vitally important to us. We really care about what people think of us and say about us. So our approach for handling customers is very carefully thought out.”

Only One Walk-Through

“You only get one opportunity to make a good first impression,” says Rod Wilburn, Concert’s senior vice president of sales and marketing, “so we don’t allow the customers to see their unit during construction.” He compares the approach to that used by new car dealers. “You expect your car to be delivered in perfect condition, and that’s what our customers expect of their unit at move-in,” Wilburn explains.

However, six months before that fateful first showing, Concert’s customer service department begins a series of inspections that must be passed before the homeowner sees the unit. “We have to be 100 percent satisfied that it’s perfect,” Wilburn says. “Customer service has to sign off on the unit before they will even contact the customer to set a date for that first and final walk.”

There’s one critical difference in the way Concert operates, compared with most builders of single-family homes and townhouses, that allows this approach to work: no customizing!

“When people see our model units, they know exactly what to expect,” Wilburn explains. “Our approach from the beginning is to focus on every aspect of design and materials selection, and to deliver a level of quality in details and finishes that exceeds customer expectations. There are no surprises when the customers see their new home and it’s had its final cleaning. It is polished to perfection.”  In part, that happens because Concert removes the possibility of getting something wrong, by standardizing everything in the unit, which allows the firm to buy everything that goes into the unit in larger quantities that help to improve perceived value.

What Buyers Like Best

In AVID’s surveys, Concert got its highest scores in:

1. Overall landscaping quality (17.05 points over the Canadian housing industry average)

2. Clean and ready units at walk-through (+13.69)

3. Sales responding quickly to calls and questions (+13.45)

4. Number of items in the walk-through process (+12.55)

5. Responsiveness to concerns (+11.73)

All this added up to an AVID Index score of 275.893, which ranks in the top quarter of all builders in Canada.

Wilburn is careful to point out that just because there is no customer walk until the unit is done doesn’t mean Concert drops the ball on customer contact all through construction. “Sales is in constant touch with buyers right up until just before closing,” he says. “Customer service does the final walk and homeowner orientation, but the sales team sets the move-in date and gets them their keys. Sales is really the first contact all along, but both sales and customer service are tasked to respond immediately to any customer question or concern.”

Quality control is a focus of the entire company, says David Podmore. “Our goal is that there are no deficiencies,” he says. “All of our people know that timely response to any customer concern is vital. Whoever takes a call or receives an e-mail has a mandate to respond immediately to tell the customer what we’re going to do and when it will happen.”

The closings that made up Concert’s survey sample for this award were in just three projects, all six-story mid-rise buildings, two in Victoria and one in Vancouver. None fall in the category of affordable housing, with suites ranging from below 800 to just under 2000 square feet, and prices running from $435,000 to nearly $1.7 million. But Concert is operating in the affordable niche this year. “We’re working on a 16-story high-rise in downtown Victoria that is designed to fill the need for affordable ownership housing for young buyers,” says Podmore. “We’re doing as much as we can to address the affordability issue that is a critical concern in B.C. right now.”

Bill Lurz has been reporting on every aspect of the home-building industry since 1970. A former editor-in-chief of Canadian Building and senior editor of Professional Builder, Bill is currently editor-in-chief of AvidBuilder.com. He can be reached at bill.lurz@avidbuilder.com.