Livabl is proud to introduce the Livabl Launch Podcast with Matthew Slutsky – your newest go-to podcast for a behind-the-scenes look at the Canadian real estate market.
In Livabl Launch’s first episode, Matt sits down for a candid conversation with Toronto-based builder and ‘Condo King’ Brad Lamb.
Known as Toronto’s top condominium broker, Brad has an impressive 30 years of experience in the Toronto real estate market. From being a real estate reality TV star to being the mastermind behind the sales and marketing for over 130 condominium projects across Canada, Brad Lamb has pretty much done it all.
Here are some highlights from the episode, where Matt and Brad cover everything from today’s market conditions to how Brad got his start in real estate:
On designing floor plans
Matt: Do you agonize over floor plans to the extent you agonize over the exterior?
Brad: Yeah, first comes the floor plans. So, we’re looking for a shape that will work for good marketable sellable floorplans, and floor plans that can command higher price per square foot, because it’s a tough business to make money.
On the first home Brad ever purchased
Brad: “The first property I bought was myself and my two brothers. I had I had, like $2,000 or $2,500 saved after three years of working as an engineer. My older brother had same and my younger brother got loaned by my dad and we bought a townhouse in London, Ontario. And we rented it. That was my first property and we made money on that. And when we sold it, we bought three more.”
Matt: “I remember hearing that story. That was the end of engineering for you.”
Brad: “Yeah, it was. I went on a tear. But what I did is I learned buying one property was difficult. But I understood how to skin it at that point. I knew what I could borrow. I knew where I could get money together. And I never borrowed any money in my real estate career, never more money from family members. That $2,500 was my grubstake to get to where I am today.”
On Toronto’s condo market
Brad: “I always said that the condo market in Toronto would really take off when the house market was significantly more expensive than a two-bedroom or three-bedroom condo. And that really happened for us in the kind of early to mid 2000s, where houses became out of reach at a million or three million. And condos at $8,000-$900,000 were a good alternative, you know, back when prices were, say $700-600 per foot. And that’s the same thing going on now in Hamilton and Cambridge and other cities that have not historically had good high-rise markets but are getting them now because house prices are higher, the only way to get multifamily in a city is to have house prices, single family home prices out of reach of most people.”
On Brad’s upcoming master-planned community in Creemore
Brad: “We bought 100 acres outside Creemore, and it’s about 800 houses. It won’t be a modern community, which is really what I’d like to do. But you can’t, so we’re going to do a Victorian village with true Victorian architecture. […] I feel like in about three years, we’ll be ready to start selling it. And it’s very exciting.”
“We’ve never, I’ve never done anything like it. I don’t know that I want to do more of it. But I want to try it, I want to do it. And I want I really want to do like, you know, I’m driving on the 401, and I look north and south. And I see Milton and I see Mississauga, like every house looks the same. You go to Markham, and you’re driving around like this could be Oakville. It all looks the same. We want to do a development that looks nothing like anyone else has ever done, and try to make it you know, façade-wise, beautiful. And I mean, finishes in those houses are fine. We’re not going to break any records here. But we want to try to spend a little bit more time and attention on architecture, kind of like what we do with our condos. Our condos don’t cost a whole lot more than other condos to build. We just spend more time on the detail.”
To learn more about Livabl Launch with Matthew Slutsky, visit the full podcast webpage.
