Who’s interested in SocialLY ResponsiBle Investing?

​Do Well by Doing Good

Impact investing is an investment strategy that seeks to generate financial returns while also creating a positive social or environmental impact. Investors who follow impact investing consider a company's commitment to corporate social responsibility or the duty to positively serve society as a whole.
- Investopedia

   Build a Primary Care Medical Centre & Rental Housing
that is Specially Designed  for the Needs of
Senior Citizens & Dementia Sufferers ​

Concept drawings are currently being created for Redgum’s Summerland-Magic Apartment Homes investment opportunity, a 1-acre land assembly that will see up to 140 rental apartments built in a part of British Columbia that is desperately in need of rental housing. A primary care medical facility will be added, as well as specially-designed, assisted-living apartments for dementia patients.
 
Summerland is a small town in British Columbia’s sun-soaked Okanagan that does not attract the development dollars it needs. Kelowna, 45km to the north, and Penticton 25km down the highway to the south, absorb most of the development capital.

The rental vacancy rate in Summerland is pretty much zero because there is little rental housing stock available. When empty nesters want to downsize, they are forced to stay put or leave their community. When seniors stay forever in their full-sized homes, young families have nowhere to move to, and the town’s population becomes top-heavy with older citizens. If this trend continues, you are left with hollowed-out Tombstone Towns.

Making changes on the fly during a meeting with District of Summerland planning staff

                         Planning rules almost always put cars first.

      Multi-family housing projects are really just underground concrete    
​            boxes on top of which you're allowed to build apartments.
     
      Developers only get to build condos and apartments in medium- 
            and high-rise buildings once the mandated number of
​       parking spaces for motor vehicles has been accounted for.

Every new development brings unique design challenges.  The main one on a multi-family build is parking. Recently changed zoning rules in Summerland boosted density in my location from four to six storeys. But the number of car spaces required by each living unit (one per door) and the large mandatory setbacks to the neighbouring properties pose a problem. We can't actually build six storeys and still fit one car space per dwelling.

Either we build fewer homes, or we apply for a variance, which we know will not be well-received by council because they just rewrote Summerland’s Official Community Plan and it already included a big reduction in parking requirements.

As we age, we need more medical care. Medical facilities in Summerland are stretched The doctors and nurses who serve Summerland’s residents are ageing too. They want to retire, but there are no new doctors to hand their patients on to.
 
The city has tried to get financing from the BC government to build a healthcare facility for years. Approvals and partial funding are in place, but a $3M shortfall has stopped this project in its tracks. $3M is a massive amount of infrastructure money for a small town to raise.
 
I’m a socially conscious entrepreneur. When I hear about issues like this, I see a challenge worth accepting. It is a chance to do well by doing good.
 
I have four lots under contract beside Summerland’s downtown core. Every service a person could need is within a short walking distance. The initial plan when putting the land assembly together was to build up to 120 rental apartments in four six storey buildings. 
 
Most units would be designed with the special needs of the elderly in mind. Think wider doorways for wheelchairs, no carpet so that wheelchairs don’t get stuck, larger turning radiuses in hallways, especially when entering and exiting the elevator, and solid backing in walls and ceilings for when bed lifts and grab bars need to be installed.

                                         Figuring out the Medical/Residential Mix

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Finding a Win-Win Solution

Successful negotiation is all about finding common ground with your counter-party and making trade-offs. You get something you want, I get something I want. 
 
I want fewer parking spaces so I can build more homes. The town wants a medical facility. It needs young, entrepreneurial medical professionals to set up shop in town. But most new doctors today don’t want the drudgery of managing their practices. They want to practice medicine, not run a small business.
 
These are problems I can solve. I’m a real estate entrepreneur. I'm also a professor who teaches business management to executives, MBA students, and undergraduates at UBC in Vancouver. I know how to create and build companies. I know how to invest venture capital. I also know how to recruit medical professionals and run the business side of their practices.
 
This is doable.
 
By helping solve the problem of missing healthcare in Summerland, my development team and I can request compromise from the city on parking and setback requirements. Building fewer parking places will translate into more homes. 
 
A further option is to expand the medical facility to one entire building. Several floors could be designated as a full multi-use residential/medical centre. Level 1 and 2 ambulatory care could be offered on the first three floors floors, and rental apartments on the three floors above. 
 
We are even investigating whether one of the floors could be specially designed as a residence for dementia patients.

Figuring out how much floorspace to devote to medical care.

Offering Accommodation for Those with Dementia

Dementia rarely affects both people in a marriage simultaneously.  One partner usually remains able-bodied and the other afflicted. 
 
Summerland-Magic Apartment Homes could offer the dementia-affected person a chance to live in their own private rental apartment on a specially-designed home-care floor of our medical building.
 
The unaffected wife or husband could live upstairs in their own, separate rental unit, close enough to spend quality time with their loved one, while having a separate living space they can call their own for physical and emotional down time.

One More Big Win

As if this weren’t enough, there is one more big win to report on this medical.residential mixed-use concept.
 
Employees at the dementia care residence and the building’s medical staff can live in one of the other three Summerland Magic buildings.
 
With four buildings side by side, linked by connecting garden space, outside sitting areas, and walkways, doctors and their support staff will be far enough away from work that they can mentally separate, but close enough that they can stroll from home to the office in just a few minutes.

This is an incredibly exciting project. Please reach out for more information & to inquire if you are eligible to invest in it.