Video Interview – TalkCondo Discuss Axis Condos ahead of Launch with Shamez Virani
- Roy Bhandari from TalkCondo interviews Shamez Virani, the President of CentreCourt Developments to introduce Axis Condominiums
- Shamez explains the four areas that distinguish CentreCourt Developments from other builders in Toronto
- The process on how CentreCourt reverse engineer their condominiums to meet the needs of the people that will eventually live in the suites
- Why Yonge & College is becoming one of the most sought after areas in Toronto
- What sets Axis Condominiums Apart
- How you can get front of line access to Axis Condominiums
Get Front of Line Access to Axis Condominiums!
Transcript:
Roy: Today we are joined by Shamez Virani, the president of CentreCourt Developments and today we are going to talk about Axis Condominiums, in our investor pool, probably one of the most anticipated new condo launches of this fall. So, thank you for joining us Shamez.
Shamez: Thank you for having me.
Roy: So, first of all, anytime we talk about new condominiums with our investors, we will say the most important thing is buying from a good developer, a reliable development. So tell us a little bit about CentreCourt from your angle.
Shamez: Sure. There is certainly a lot of choices out there for today’s condo buyer, and I think there is a few things and you have noticed now for six years from our very first project, I think over the course of our six development project in downtown Toronto, we have done a couple of things differently from which kind of set of set us sort from some of our competition.
The first is focus, our focus has been in entirely at the downtown core of Toronto, when we started the company six years ago, the thesis behind creating a new organization was we wanted to focus on developing core downtown locations in close proximity, to transit, to all major amenities, to the universities, to the major work centres, to all the things that are sort of making Toronto and continuing to make Toronto one of the worlds greatest cities. So, if you look at our various locations, we have been very focused on doing high rise in core locations, so, I think when you think of CentreCourt, you can think synonymously downtown locations, and had a focus on that approach. That’s the first thing I stated that distinguishes us.
The second thing is we try to know our buyer, we try to know what’s important to our buyer and as we have learnt in this market that’s driven by a lot of very astute investors who know a lot of elements of what makes their investment in condos successful, we realize that the most important thing is floor plans and efficiency of design. So for us what that means is we start designing our buildings from the inside-out, we start with the floor plate, the suite mix and the suite designs, from there we create a design of a building, of a typical floor plate as we call it, and then we design the exterior that complements that, that goes with the vision of the project.
Tied to that is the third thing that distinguishes us. We really try to focus on who is going to live in the building. All to often in condos developments in Toronto you see developers or development that try to be all things to our people. In a marketing piece you can read the whole brochure but you wouldn’t know if it’s really designed for empty nesters or for first time college student. Whereas with each of our projects, given the location, given the timing and the market, given the price-point and the design, we really focus on particular segment and particular demographic that sort of distinguishes the building.
And then lastly I think that we pride our self the most on and what is for proving itself out of the three projects that we have completed at this point, the fourth that we are about to complete and the next two including Axis, we are really try to deliver on all out commitments including timelines, and one thing that we have noticed over and over again in the market with some of our competition, some other developments is, they will sell on day zero call it..and say delivery is coming in three years. And very rarely if they ever commit and deliver on that, delays after delays after delays, and I understand the reasons because it’s not an easy thing to develop such large scale properties but we take a lot of pride in actually delivering on the time lines and delivering the quality finishes, amenities, everything that we promised and commit to do. I think if you look at our three projects which we have delivered in the last two years, you would see that time and time again we have delivered on a timely completion which is important to your clients, obviously to be able to start to see a return on their investment, and more importantly we deliver what we have promised and what we committed to and we take a great deal of pride in doing so.
Roy: That’s great. I think there is a couple of things that you sort of touched on there, I think what’s interesting about CentreCourt is this is the sixth condominium that you are building. There’s almost a CentreCourt brand in terms of at the condominium, without knowing anything about the project, we know it’s gonna be in the downtown location like you said, we know the floor plans are gonna be agonized over like every square millimetre, now you guys spend a lot of time on that. Another things that you guys do probably better than any developer that I can think of is reverse engineering the project, so, you think about who the end user is first and then designing the suites as well as the amenities and then designing every part of that building to match the end user, you did mention that and I think, from my angle, a couple of..we look at The Grid for example which I think is the gold standard of reverse engineering a condominium to the end user.
It was all based around the Ryerson students, so you have that area for the students to study and the suites where designed with that in mind as well, so, I think that’s awesome. Now I am taking a little more now about Axis condominiums, it’s located right behind Yonge/College, we have seen huge growth for. The rental rates are going through the roof, we have seen studios now rented, sixteen, seventeen hundred dollars a month, what is it about this neighbourhood in particular that you think is bringing people in and why we’re are seeing these numbers go up.
Shamez: I think the Yonge and College is truly the centre of downtown Toronto, so, if you sort of put those elements of what makes downtown Toronto tick, I think it’s a combination of the business centre of Canada, the educational centre of Canada between the University of Toronto and Ryerson, all of the major hospitals that are on university which is only, you know, call it two blocks away. The of Provincial Government which is very close. Yonge and college is a walk, truly a walk from all of those things, so who ever lives in that area, in this node, they can work essentially wherever they want to and they have got all the amenities of Yonge street, I guess the high shopping street of Bloor Street is also very close, so I think truly if you were to drop a pin in the centre of Toronto and say ‘where is the true centre of Toronto’, even transportation I mean the Yonge and College corridor, the college subway station on the Yonge line right there and the college streetcar, you have got proximity transportation that’s better than I think anything.
So, if you look at walk scores, you know, the typical standard, the livability of a neighbourhood, it’s proximity to major amenities, the walk score’s in Yonge and College are extremely healthy. So I think that’s really that’s what’s really driving it.
I think when we thought about Axis and thought about to your point, the reverse engineering and what can work really well in this building to be designed for ultimately, who do we see living in this area. A couple of factors that we have become sort of very interested in and very aware of. First is that today’s graduating students, students that are graduating from the top institutions in Canada and the world, whether it be Waterloo, University of Toronto, Ryerson. There is an increase in the number of those students, the increase in portion of those students who are wanting to explore careers in technology, in computer science, in engineering, you know, where when I graduated, the top student wanted to go into investment banking, or consulting or accounting, today’s top student are really trying to go into these industries and work for companies like Google, or Facebook, or Snapchat or Amazon, any of these technology company’s that are truly changing the world in real-time, Uber, you know all these companies that are redefining the way that we live today.
So, we noticed that that’s where top students are, and there is no dislocation and then the design of this building is very much designed for young professionals in mind, that’s a new emergence of a new category, of young professionals who have a very different outlook on how they like to live and what they want in their building and in their suite than some other demographics. So, that was the sort of first thing we noticed .
The second thing we have noticed is that Toronto as it’s evolved and as it continues to sort of enter the equation with great global cities, one thing that’s really starting to emerge in Toronto is the technology and the computer science industry. So we are not very far from MaRS which some people may be familiar with right on universities, and MaRS is this incredible incubator of technology and life sciences and innovation and it’s right down the street. So, we have realized rather these two things are coming together. So, who do we see living in Axis? I see it would be late twenties to late thirties demographic, largely focused around people who have careers in computer science and engineering and technology, and people who are doing extremely well and want to be in buildings, in a location that’s sort of designed with them in mind.
Roy: Awesome, that’s great. So let’s talk a little bit about Axis itself. Tell us a little bit about how tall is it, how many suites, give us the rundown of the basics.
Shamez: It’s a thirty eight storey condominium project located at the south east corner of Church and Wood street, Wood is one street north of Carlton, so right across the old Maple Leaf Gardens, today it’s a surface parking lot. On one side you have the new Loblaws which is arguably the nicest grocery store in Toronto.
Roy: A great selection of cheese.
Shamez: A great selection of cheese, a great selection of wines. Just a really great space, I think a originally when people saw that they were turning Maple Leaf Gardens into Loblaws, a lot of people scoffed, but when you go there it’s actually quite something. Across the other side on the north side of us, we have got a Church Street Junior Public School, a school of very close proximity and again we are a five minute walk or less from Yonge/College, so, proximity wise, we are right there.
As far as the building, it’s 38-storeys, we are going to have just under six hundred suites. As far as sort of what we did to tie the design of the building to the demographics that I was describing earlier, we’ve done a couple of thing’s that are really unique: Amenities – a lot of developers to the point I made earlier try to be all things for all people, a lot of developers have kind of created this amenity formula that has the same sort of approach project to project, that doesn’t really change based on who they think will live in it, so, you often will see the party room or the theatre room or the kitchen servery room and if you actually study these spaces once the project are built, they’re never used. So, as we studied what does gets used in the amenities we are building and particularly with this demographic, with this sort of late twenties to mid thirties, young professional who is high flying and growing their career, they are wanting to have all things in their life at a high quality, high pace, the number one amenity they use is a gym but a lot of condo gyms leave a lot to be offered, so a lot of these people who are living in these buildings pays their amenities fees, to somewhat cover the cost of the gym, don’t actually use the condo gym.
So, we said first thing we want to do is to create truly state-of-the-art world class gym. So we have dedicated nearly seven thousand square feet which is to tell you sort of that it’s approximately three or four times the size of a typical condo gym. Then we are going to design with some of the top fitness gurus of the city to create a space which everybody in the condo building will through in their gym membership, a hundred and fifty dollars a month and use the facilities that are in the building. So, we are gonna spend a large amount of space and dollars in creating a truly world class gym, that’s the first thing and this is very much on point for the demographic that we are designing the building for.
The second thing and it’s the first of it’s kind in Toronto and as far as I know, globally, we are creating a shared work space within our building and what that means is, this demographic that I am describing to you that works at the Google’s, the Facebook’s, Instagram’s, the Amazon’s, the technology, computer science, engineering companies, they are very mobile workforce. So, one thing you will read over and over again in sort of literature about office spaces is how today’s workforce, today’s new professional generation have a laptop, an iPad and a cell phone and they work remotely, often time it’s not a requirement to come into the office and check-in at 8 and be out at by 5.
As long as you got WiFi, as long as you know your responsibilities are, and this is happening in real-time, at a lot of industries we see in Toronto. So, knowing that because of the space constraints in downtown Toronto and the pricing issues, I wanted to make affordable units efficiently designed, we decided we are going to create within the building a great space that is created just for shared working type. So, if you live in the building, instead to go out and find a Starbucks or a coffee shop or even rent an office space in the shared workspace, we are creating an environment in which you will essentially be able to bring your laptops downstairs, four thousand square feet fitted out with the best technology, great design, coffee bar, very comfortable seating, offices, if you wish to have a private office, meeting rooms if you want to give a presentation or a long distance conference call. Essentially we wanted to create an environment that was really going to speak to this generation and put in a space that will work for them.
Roy: That’s awesome, so, talk to us a little bit about floor plans, talk to us a little bit about the smallest size to the largest size – just talk to us a little bit about that.
Shamez: So, one thing we have realized sort of how the Toronto condo market has evolved in the last number of years is that there is a desire now for like great spaces that could be shared in multi tenant situation, because of the affordability issues and pressure and because of the ongoing increases in rent. Like most major cities New York, Shanghai, Tokyo, London, we are starting to see an environment where the norm is to have roommates. It is to have two or maybe three people working and living within this suite.
And from the investors stand point, from a client standpoint, a lot of the time when you have a very efficiently designed two bedroom or one bedroom plus den – that acts as a two bedroom, you end-up getting double the rent on a per square foot basis you end up actually getting greater per square per foot rent in some of the studios suites.
Roy: We’re seeing huge demand for those convertible one-bedroom and den’s.
Shamez: And we notice that and at the same there has been a sort of moving away from the small studio, they use to be the affordable sort of product that you can have for… Some of you who is looking for a low rent. So now instead of having a studio that you would rent for thirteen fourteen hundred, you are now seeing two bedrooms that are less than double the size of that studio that are getting probably double if not more than double the rent because they are a more livable efficient suite with two full bedrooms.
So, knowing that in mind we gave designed a floor plate to have at least one, one bedroom suite that faces the east and west that’s in a mid-four hundred square foot mark, we have got a five one bedroom plus den’s that are north facing that are on a five hundred and eighty square feet that are incredibly and efficiently designed – the den will in practical terms act as a second bedroom for a lot of people who are living in this space but really efficiently designed like, again like as I mentioned we start on the inside-out so there is no waste in square footages and we take great pride in the fact that efficiency of the floor plan is critical to functionalities.
Then four corners are larger two bedroom suites and when I say larger, it is still very efficiently designed, on the north corners we’re just under seven hundred square feet, two bedroom corners, split bedroom’s with one bathroom, and on the south where about mid seven hundred square feet two bedroom, two full baths, we put them in the south because typically the larger units, the larger corners, that’s where people will spend more money because of the views of downtown Toronto. Then you have got two suites that are, if I could say, my particular favourites that I’m really impressed by, two, two bedroom south facing suites that are around five hundred and ninety square feet, two full bedrooms, one full bath, very efficient layout but we get to think about getting a fully functional, true legal two bedroom under six hundred square feet, it’s a pretty tremendous suite.
On a floor plate of, ultimately in sixteen units we have on a typical floor plate, we only have five suite designs which is very efficient also in terms of understanding the building, when we create a great suite, we want to repeat it because we believe there is going to be ample demand for that unit type rather than having way too many options in the building when we create a great suite, we want to replicate that and offer as many of that because had you seen the plans and you and I are both have an opinion, they are all going to be highly desired and they are all going to be well absorbed and ultimately provide great housing for the ultimate tenant who will be in the suites.
Roy: There is a couple more things that I want to touch on in this building, in that we have seen is that you tied in with a couple of..Fendi is involved with this project, and also Tesla. Can you talk us a little bit about how are those tying to the project?
Shamez: Absolutely. So, one thing we have thought about in our project starting with a Fendi furnished lobby which we are going to be designing the lobby in a tremendous way which’ll include Fendi furnishing within the lobby. One we have thought about sort of strategically is the business, is the lobby itself and in this day and age in downtown Toronto, this demographic, the number one place that people come in and out of the building is the lobby, not the underground parking lot which is maybe some people’s perception of typical condo life, here typically people are coming to and from work, to and from whatever activities they’re doing through the front door.
So, when you think about that in a building like Axis which has nearly six hundred units, we are going to have, call it eight hundred to nine hundred residents who are almost using that lobby every single day.
So, we want to create a fully world class lobby experience, what that means is taking a lot of space and spending a lot of money in creating a state of the art, highly designed. Something that you are really proud of bring people in day in day out, we think that adds tremendous amount of value to the building, to everybody that lives in the building and to everybody that’s renting or owning in the building. So, that means if you look at the rendering of our lobby you will see we have got white marble throughout the lobby, all the way up to the top of the 2-storey high lobby, we are doing a beautiful gold feature wall that you will see as a unique one-of-a-kind art piece that we are going to be bringing into the lobby, we are going to be plating the elevator doors in gold with really nice touches, so, you have got this white and gold aspect, it’s very tied – actually the inspiration of it was Apple iPhone that they do in the special white face with a gold trim, it was the one of the most expensive, most luxurious iPhone models. When I saw that, when I saw the technology aspect of that and tied to the demographic, I thought there is some really nice ways that we can create that.
Then on top of that in terms of the physical space we have built out so beautifully large expanse of space with the marble. We’re also furnishing it with the nicest furniture we could find and Fendi actually, which is a well-known brand of some if the nicest furnishing, so, we found some pieces in the Fendi furnishings catalogue that we really like and our interior designers like so we will be bringing those in. So we will have a really high-end luxurious feel while still maintaining that modern sort of technology aesthetic. So, that’s the lobby.
The second mentioned which is again first time that it has been done in the condo development is two Tesla’s for the building. So we are going to purchase two Tesla vehicles which we, the big believers and the movement towards a carbon free vehicles, vehicles that are charge driven, we are, we are going to be buying two Tesla’s, putting them in the building, they are going to be there for the use of the residents of the building.
So, in this sort of location this day and age, majority of people that live in the building won’t own a vehicle because they walk to work, they walk to all their amenities, they walk to school…whatever they do, they tend to walk or take transportation, public transportation, or Uber or what have you but there are those times when you want to go visit a family member that’s sort of outside the city, you want to go golfing or go grocery shopping, there is those times maybe once a month or couple of months that you so wish to have a vehicle, so, in the sharing economy back in the shared workspace and the nature of sort of sharing live spaces, we thought that the next evolution of that is to actually put vehicles in the condominium, owned by the condominium that are there for the use of the residents
So, if you imagine, what does this do for investors ultimately? When the tenants come in, they walk through this lobby and see this dramatic sort of ‘five star hotel lobby experience’, Fendi furnishing, then you tell them, you know what? You have got this state of the art gym, this world class gym, you are going to throw in your gym membership. Then you have got a shared workspace, you have got an office space in the building that you can use for your exclusive use. And oh! You have two Tesla’s.
You have differentiated this building from a sea of other projects that are out there and you have really spoken to a particular demographic, that’s going to drive values, drive rents. I genuinely believe we are going to get ten, fifteen percent premium to the other projects on the market on rents in the building because of sort of the different touches and thoughtfulness that we have taken in designing this building.
Roy: One of the other things about the CentreCourt projects is that they tend to sell out very quickly, we think the same is going a happen to Axis, so if our investors are interested in purchasing, what do they need to do?
Shamez: Well they need to talk to you. The reality is that we have, you know, for the last twenty-five hundred units that we have sold, we have developed close relationship with the small handful of the top performing agents that are out there in the market, yourself and your brother, Amit, have been with us from day one, you sold in every single one of our projects, I think all of your clients who have purchased, today we would say that they are very glad that they purchased and we are believers in relationship and so we are believers in working through a few individuals that only are able to promote our project and answer the right questions and inform their clients in the right way, you guys being one of that small select group.
So, if your clients wanted, I agree, I think the response, I am getting it from my text messages and emails and voicemails are early indications that this is going move as quickly as any of other past projects that we sold out within a matter of days, in fact. Is that you are the clients if they’re seriously interested to work closely with you, figure out the suite that is right for them and we will do our very best to find for them a place in the building.
Roy: Thank you very much for joining us.
Shamez: Thank you very much for having me.
Roy: Now we are looking forward to working on Axis condominiums.
Shamez: Thank you.
