New Imperia Showhome

Well, the new showhome is open. It's a large home, but we've designed it with multi generational living in mind. It features a cozy main floor suite that would be perfect for an aging parent, a nanny, or perhaps a grown child in university. We're pretty happy with that, and with the overall execution as we managed to build it in under 6 months.

Paradox of Choice

We've been spending a lot of time studying what makes for an exceptional homebuilding experience vs a mediocre, or even a bad one. One of the key elements that continues to resurface, is that consumers don't fare well with excessive choice. (Please go to Ted.com and take a look at the lecture the Paradox of Choice. You will find yourself nodding in agreement all the way through as the lecturer tells his tale of sifting through 175 choices of blue jeans). The homebuilding industry is one of the worst offendors out there- there are easily 10,000 choices of plumbing faucet alone.

No customer can tolerate looking at all that choice and they shouldn't have to. It should be the builder's job to select the key elements of the home, in a fashion that suit the Builder's vision. If the customer likes the vision, great, they should go ahead and do business. If not, that's fine too. But the way the industry has evolved, unfortnately, is that builders don't develop a vision, and let the customers struggle with doing all the work and selecting the look. The result is intense frustration for the customer because the job is overwhelming, petty and cruel! All too often, the results look pretty poor as well and this compounds the dissapointment.

Classic case happened to us 3 years ago. Picture two nearly identical homes- half a block apart. Home #1, the client was from out of town and let us select the entire home top to bottom. (she told us she wanted "dark" hardwood, that was it). The home turned out super of course- our design team never makes a mistake. The client moved in and got on with life. Home #2- identical floor plan- the customer demanded to select everything in the home from hinges to doorknobs, to mouldings, all surface finishes. The client struggled to make everything match, spent $60,000 more on mouldings, glazed railings, cabinets, and imported tile, the home took 3 months longer to build (the tile had to be shipped via the Panama canal)- and- frustrated everyone in the process. The tragic thing about the whole incident was that home #1 actually looked better! It was put together colorwise, everything matched and fit. Because there were no delays, the tradesmen got into a rhythm and a flow and the fit and finish was better as well.

Second example- from New England. A builder called CP Morgan. They build very quick and with very limited choices for the customers. And they win their local Customer Choice Award consistently. Meanwhile, across town, a competing builder permits its clients to select anything and everything- they brag about their flexibility- and consistently come in lower in their Customer Choice rankings. It is the additional level of choice, that frustrates the clients!!

Metro Class

This week we launch the new Metro specification. Icon spec- as demonstrated in the new Monte Carlo showhome- has been a great success and shows a very solid top end product for housing in Edmonton.

Metro is going to be just a bit different. It allows a little more budget flexibility. Where Icon is luxurious, Metro is cool.

Imagine a home at the base price level that features built in audio, built in wall mount plasmas, a kitchen with a hidden charging station for all those chargeable gadgets we own, motion control lighting and master lighting control- that you can run from your car! That's Metro.

Metro will be available on all the standard plans, and on a special suite of "Metro Only" plans that we are prepping for spring release.

Thought I should update everyone on the ceramic tile replacement referenced in an earlier blog. Our renovation turned out excellent! The clients are moved back in and all is well. Our team did a meticulous job protecting and covering the client's possessions and the whole operation went over without a hitch.

New Showhome

Our new Monte Carlo showhome is now open.  This is the first home open to the public that demonstrates the new specifications and we were all a bit nervous at how clients would receive it.  While the automobile industry has been successful for quite a few years with equipping vehicles properly at the base price level, and not having large amounts of options, housing is a lot more conservative.  Most firms, and certainly most housing consultants, recommend building as cheaply as possible to get the lowest possible price.  Then customers have to go through the agony of upgrading every little thing in order to get the product to an acceptable level.

Perry Built is doing the exact opposite.  We studied what our consumers want to have in the homes based on their actual buying patterns and we put those features in the homes right out of the box.  This means our homes seem just  a little more expensive.  We were nervous about how this would be received.

I think, after just a couple weeks showing the product around, that our theory is proving correct.  Clients are really excited when they learn that the triple glaze windows, Hardi Plank siding, etc., are all standard.  Just like when you go an purchase a Lexus,  the AC and the nice stereo and the ABS are all standard.  I think this is a much more sensible way to market a product and it feels right that we as the experts are defining the logical things that should be in a home, not just building the cheapest box we possibly can and letting the consumer struggle to trim it out correctly.

Looking after Clients, II

Here's another one.  A client with a problem with a tile floor, due to a failure in the adhesive holding the underlay to the subfloor.  A pretty big problem because the entire home is tile in this case.  We are working on this one this week.  Carlos, my assistant Adrienne, and our team, have moved the clients to a cozy hotel for the next few days.  Now we start on the removal, and then the rebuild.

You see this kind of thing on TV all the time of course!  And the erstwhile renovation team works like crazy to get the job done as quickly as possible and as perfectly as possible.  I am going to check on things over the next few days.  We're all hopeful that this renovation turns out as successful as possible for the clients who have been very patient while we get the details organized for them.  I will try and keep you posted!

Looking after clients.

My Service Manager Carlos, together with one of our superintendents, Dan, and myself, spent considerable time on the roof of a five year old home a week or two back.  The client had called me at home one evening to say that water was seeping through the kitchen ceiling.  The official warranty on this sort of thing in our industry lasts for 12 months; that is, "if the home doesn't leak in the first year, the builder is off the hook".

I have never been comfortable with this.  So I broke the official policy and went to see the client anyway.  This is a beautiful home that we built and our customer needed help.

Our rooftop visit was very useful as we quickly found a flashing detail that had been installed wrongly by our people, 5 years ago.  It held up for a few seasons, but as some of the window trim shrunk down to size, it started letting water in.

The next day, Carlos and Dan fixed the problem.

In the process, we decided to augment our building specification, at no cost to customers, by adding an elastomeric seal called Envelope Seal to our typical window installations.  This is a great product that seals the window flange to the surrounding framing.  Apparently the manufacturer has done many thousands of windows without leaks of any kind.  I am hopeful that window leaks will become a thing of the past in our new homes as a result of this change.