Don’t generalize by accusing all developers.We need the serious ones of them

Necessary clarification
Please allow me to clarify something: I strongly believe that a big part (maybe half) of the residential developers being active in Romania today are people who either were tricked while chasing easy money or they developed on purpose bad constructions, in order for them to cash in more money in shorter time. But for every developer who behaved like this, I also meet one more, someone serious, professional, with strategy and plans. A person or company who tried to develop something good, with respectable quality, civilized, aiming to build a strong brand name and to achieve his clients to be happy for buying his property.

People are upset on residential developers for various reasons
Today I notice that the majority of the Romanian society is very upset on developers. They are accused for absolutely everything. People say that developers:
Built with very low quality, in order to earn more money.

Bought the cheapest possible materials, delivering a new building which is worse than the old communistic ones.
Tricked their clients in all possible ways.

Had bad plans and strategy and when they did not succeed to sell, they simply declared bankrupsy and left their clients without their property and having lost their advance payments.

Did not pay attention to the finishings of each apartment and to the area around the block.

Designed very bad projects, in wrong locations, far away from civilization and transportation, with wrong interior architecture and design.

(last but not least) Try to sell at very high prices, refusing to accept that their clients don’t have the income to sustain such an investment.

All these and many more are the arguments of people against the developers. They don’t bother checking which of the developers is serious or not. They say “developers” and they include almost everyone inside. Unfair, but it happens…

Sick environment for serious developers
About 40 days ago, I had written an article for the “battle” between the developers, the clients and the banks. You can read the article here.

This post created a wave of comments and (especially) emails to me, with people complaining and talking usually like Marian did, on 27.05.2010:

“Isn’t it better for the developers to die starving or to be executed?
It is better for the first category (developers) to starve or to be foreclosed and to make room/space for a new generation of developers who learn from the mistakes of 2005-2010. Why is it worth and why should they be saved?”

The major mistake with ANL apartments
Some months ago I had warned you for what will happen with that project, to sell the apartments of ANL at very low prices. It was 25.02 and you can find the text here.

ANL announced that they will sell the apartments with 407 Euro / sq.m., while I am 100% sure that they will pay more money for the new constructions they will develop! (Actually I have heard about discussions and prices, but I don’t have any official information which I can use).But this “407″ was enough in order to present the normal developers as “thieves who are selling with 1.000 Euro”. Even big media were wondering “why they don’t sell with 400, like ANL does?”

Only people who don’t know the construction reality think that one can develop a civilized new development with less than 500 Euro / sq.m. cost
I am sorry, but I have to be very straight forward on this issue. I am not a construction expert myself, but I know some basics, plus I have checked the budgets of hundreds of projects. There is noone who can develop a serious project of apartments with less than 500 Euro / sq.m. Whoever tells you that he can, simply lies or doesn’t know himself too. And then we start all these “conspiracy theories”, ending by talking like this reader of mine and thousands more.

You know… I am tired to read people saying all kinds of easy words, without knowing the reality, without caring for the damage they create. A serious company has serious approach to work, procedures, quality controls etc. What do you want? Amateurs who think that building is placing one brick on the other? Or professionals who will deliver to us product at a level of quality which will improve the life of people and will secure them in the future?

We want the best but without to pay for it
“We want the best, but to pay the minimum possible” one might reply. Fair enough. But if this person is working in the private sector, does he also offer his best services at a minimal price? Is he so generous as well? Or he remembers the word “generous” only when it is about the others?

Developers have made too many mistakes, but still we need them
Unless we want communism to return, we have to accept that the economy will move ahead through private people and companies who will invest and expect a profit out of this activity. This profit should be adjusted to their work, the risks they undertake and the business environment they work in.

Developers have made hundreds, thousands of mistakes. But not all of them are the same. Not all of them are so bad. Let us not generalize on this, because it is dangerous. As society, we need them, we need the serious ones of them. The ones who will deliver to us better homes, higher standards, a better life in the end of the day.

Coming up:

• The real costs of a development
• The result of the project “selling ANL apartments for nothing”