Costas Kivelos:
Welcome everyone. Costas Kivelos here, First Access condos and to day on condo investing with Costas, we have a fantastic project. A project that checks all the investment box criteria. It is called Prime by CentreCourt Developments, the big boys on the block here in the GTA. Now, this tower is going to be situated on Jarvis, just south of Gerrard in the center of the real estate universe in Toronto. It’s going to be steps from Ryerson University, steps to multiple different transit routes, steps to the financial district, steps to Yorkville, steps to the new Ontario relief line, then the list goes on and on. This is going to be one of the best investment opportunities of the year and we have first access for you. A little take on the building: we are 45 stories, 595 exceptionally designed investor suites with no wasted space, the list goes on and on and that’s why we are excited today. We are onsite at the head office of CentreCourt. We are going to be meeting a person who needs no introduction, Jason Lam, V.P. CentreCourt Sales and Marketing. He is the surgeon of the pre-construction industry. That’s the nickname I gave him and for those of you who watched previous webinars with him and myself, you will see why. He is a fountain of information, a wealth of knowledge and him and I are going to tell you why Prime will be one of the best launches of the year and a place that you should put your money.
Welcome back everyone. Costas Kivelos, First Access Condos and today is going to be one of
my favorite episodes all year. I’m here with a good friend of mine and one of my favorite people
in the industry to work with, Jason Lam, V.P. Sales and Marketing, CentreCourt developments.
The big boys on the block here in the GTA. Jason always a pleasure. How are you doing today?
Jasom Lam:
I’m doing well. I'm excited to be one of your favorite episodes of the year even though we don’t
know if that’s going to be true but I’ll ask at the end of the year and we’ll talk about it then.
Costas Kivelos:
I guarantee it because every time we work together, magic happens. Not just on the First Access
Condos and but on CentreCourt’s end. They just completed the first major launch of the year and
they sold 597 out of 599. The fact checkers will say you didn’t sell out but for all intents and
purposes, in seven days.
Jasom Lam:
Yeah.
Costas Kivelos:
So, when that happens, magic happens.
Jasom Lam:
Absolutely.
Costas Kivelos:
And that’s what I love about CentreCourt. They put the foot on the gas and they sell buildings out. So, what we’re here to talk about today is not what happened a few weeks ago but what’s going to happen a few weeks in the future.
Jasom Lam:
Right.
Costas Kivelos:
We’re here to talk about Prime condos located at Jarvis and Gerrard, steps from Ryerson, in the center of the Canadian real estate universe, Toronto. Now, before we get into the project, let’s give some background. Jason, tell us what you think sets CentreCourt apart from other developers.
Jasom Lam:
I think it’s our ability to execute. I think for the last 11 years, we’ve been bringing triple A locations to site and we’ve been selling them quickly because we understand the nature of the business but we’re getting the construction even faster. So, one of the elements is fully zoned sites, no cancelled sites, 0 days of interim occupancy and record timing in terms of construction timelines. We're building a 50-story building in 26 to 30 months which is pretty unprecedented in the market and none of this is luck. This is all about leadership from top-down execution and commitment and passion to what we do. So, it’s consistency and for us, we take this business very seriously, we make sure that our purchasers and our broker strategic partners are all aligned and we’re able to execute and give the best product possible in the marketplace and we’ve done it over and over and over again and we continue to raise the bar in the marketplace both from a
sales and marketing perspective but also from location and completed product.
Costas Kivelos:
Now, you mentioned that CentreCourt. I think they’ve been around for 11 years if I’m not mistaken.
Jasom Lam:
That’s right. Yeah.
Costas Kivelos:
And you guys have sold 18 different projects.
Jasom Lam:
That’s right.
Costas Kivelos:
Now, a little known fact is that in the past two years, you’re the number one developer for units
sold in Canada. So, how many units did you sell last year?
Jasom Lam:
That’s a great question. We had two majors launches last year which is around 11 to 1200 units. The year before that we were in the 1500-unit category. This year, I think, we’ll be 1500, 1600 units in total. So, for us it’s the pipeline, right? We’re not… a lot of developers, in 10 years, will put out 2, 3, 4 buildings. We’ve done 18 sites in 10 years. So, again, none of this is luck, all this is just excellent in terms of ability to execute, to acquire, to partner and bring these product on line and finish it in a timely manner. I think we’re one of the few developers that finish on time and one of the only developers that have 0 days of interim occupancy and one of the elements about CentreCourt that’s important for you to understand is that we’re a fully vertically integrated company meaning that all the facets of the development process are all carried in-house. So, the decisions, strategy, execution, collaboration, it’s all under one roof and we’re not depending on other people in terms of timelines, in terms of opinions. It’s all in-house, the decisions are made by us and executed by us and it allows us to have full control in terms of timelines and the
quality of what we do. So, there is a lot of layers and when you’re looking at the industry itself, there’s a lot of developers to choose from. So, it’s important that you align your hard-earned money or your investment dollars to align with the [0:06:46] that not only brings product to the market but finishes in a timely manner, builds quality product and is able to execute to the highest standards that the industry can possibly have.
Costas Kivelos:
I couldn’t have said it better myself and the reason I wanted you guys to hear it from the actual VP of the company is because no one can explain it better than Jason. He’s an investor in CenterCourt, First Access Condos, we’ve invested in CentreCourt and the most common question, there’s a few questions that we get and one of the most common ones is, tell me about the developer. This developer is top shelf, triple A. You cannot get a better developer with a better reputation in the GTA and that’s why I’m very excited to be here today because they choose triple A locations and their criteria for choosing a location follows First Access Condos’ criteria in choosing winners for you, the investor. So, now, we’re going to talk a little bit about
Prime. Now, if you study the history of CentreCourt and see what they like to choose for locations, one of the number one factors, kind of that it’s something that it’s centered around is proximity and access to transit.
Jasom Lam:
Yeah.
Costas Kivelos:
Tell us about Prime and then tell me how it basically is in the center of transit.
Jasom Lam:
It’s in the center of a lot of things and I think, when you’re acquiring a real estate asset at any given point, you want diversification, you want to be able to cater to a mass group of people that are going to identify this as their future home, a great space that’s close to work, to school, to lifestyle, to public transportation. So, we prioritize public transportation as you just mentioned. We’re very close to two subway lines on Yonge Street at college and at Dundas. We’re close to the future Ontario line at Queen but it’s not just that. Transportation is the lifeblood of our city and as we continue to grow, there’s going to be a lot more people fighting to get that proximity but it’s about employment, it’s about institutions and infrastructure that create that diversification, that broader net when it comes to resale, when it comes to rental. Again, like you said, when you talk about the list of sites that we’ve brought online, we prioritize all of those elements and I think every single purchaser that's bought with us, that's one of the biggest reasons; is location, location, location. That hasn’t changed in the real estate market. Those are still the top priorities for not only you, as a buyer but from us as a developer.
Costas Kivelos:
And location location location, that’s at the top of the Ten Commandments of real estate investing.
Jasom Lam:
Right.
Costas Kivelos:
And what CentreCourt does is they dig deeper and they don’t take it at face value. They look to see what makes a location a triple A location and those are the factors that Jason just mentioned and those are the factors that we at First Access Condos follow and use that checklist to find you top investments. Now, last year, we invested one of the CenterCourt developments that is very similar and down the street, a short walk from Prime and the reason was that it was proximity to transit, a very large potential renter pool with Ryerson University.
Jasom Lam:
Yeah.
Costas Kivelos:
And it being strictly in the center of downtown. These are the reasons why you need to make an investment in a project like this. Now, tell us about the actual building Prime.
Jasom Lam:
Well, look, we’re at 319 Jarvis Street. It’s a 45-story building that houses 595 incredibly unique opportunities, as you mentioned, steps to Ryerson, steps to Yonge street in the subway lines, to the financial district, to a lot of the local amenities. We’ve got a great amenity program, 20,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor amenities that really fit the narrative of the people that are going to be living in this building, the residents of the building. So, we’ve got a tremendous fitness space that’s over 65,000 square feet which is a massive space dedicated to just fitness. We’ve got a very unique shared coworking space and lounge area and a beautiful lobby furnished with Versace furniture and I think those are the elements of the building that I think really stand out. The architecture itself is very unique. It is a very unique sort of honeycomb-shaped building with that dark facade and the gold trim. This is the type of building that will stand out like Grid really does stand out with zigzag designs and 411 Church with the honeycomb. I think we always try and bring a building that’s unique to the area that will stand out as the landmark to the
community.
Costas Kivelos:
Now, what I’ve noticed about CentreCourt is that their projects have some of the best amenities in the business and they always hire some of the greatest designers in the world to furnish their lobbies. You had mentioned Versace, okay?
Jasom Lam:
Yeah.
Costas Kivelos:
In another project it was Fendi. When you buy a CentreCourt product, this is the level of opulence that you will receive but it’s not ridiculous pricing. It's still investor based and the numbers make sense. Now, when we talk about buildings that have as many and amenities and the opulence that you provide, they’re usually an upper tier pricing where the numbers don’t necessarily make sense for you, the average everyday investor but how does CentreCourt make everything fit? What’s their goal when it comes to providing the most for an entry level price?
Jasom Lam:
I think the goal is, instead of doing these smaller amenity spaces and cut up into several different ones that people may or may not use, we prioritize what makes the most sense from a day-to-day lifestyle that’s functional, that’s practical, that fit the demographic of the neighborhood. So, in extreme copious amounts of gym space in tier 6,500 square feet is huge. I think that shared coworking space, getting ready for our new normal where we’re working from home, we’ve got a huge student population that’s sort of begging to live in this space. I think it really fits the demographic and again, the confines of your condominiums, it’s not stuck to your suites. You’ve got a huge amenity programming and to speak to the Versace furniture that we’re putting in the lobby, it just ties to the design and it’s the quality that you can expect the minute you step inside the lobby, it’s what you can expect throughout the rest of the building.
Costas Kivelos:
We’ve had a fantastic first half of the show talking to Jason Lam, V.P. Sales and Marketing,
CentreCourt. Costas Kivelos, First Access Condos. We’re going be right back. Talk to you guys
soon.
Costas Kivelos:
Welcome back everyone. Costas Kivelos, First Access Condos. Jason Lam, V.P. Sales and Marketing, CentreCourt Developments and we have had a fantastic time today talking about Prime, talking about CentreCourt, the developer behind this fantastic project, talking about what they do, their mantra, their business model and how it can help you make a lot of money. Now, the focal point about these projects is that they’re focused on transit and we had mentioned earlier that there’s reasons triple A locations become triple A locations. So, one of the reasons in, Prime is its proximity and access to transit and Toronto is going to be receiving close to 200000 thousand new immigrants every year, following the years of COVID. These are my predictions and I think I’m going to be accurate and a lot of us in the industry share that belief. So, when all these people come to the center of Toronto’s real estate universe, think about the traffic
congestion. So, transit is paramount and being able to access that is going to be the only way of life. So, we’ve talked about that and we briefly touched on Ryerson but one of the destinations, the draws for Prime is it’s walking distance to Ryerson.
Jasom Lam:
Yepah.
Costas Kivelos:
The second largest university in the city of Toronto. So, talk to me about Ryerson and how its
proximity to Ryerson has been a fundamental deciding factor on how you design Prime.
Jasom Lam:
Right. Well, it’s no secret that Prime is a huge proponent of the downtown core and what makes Prime such a unique opportunity, right? You’ve got 47,000 students. They’ve grown 5000 in the last five years. So, that in itself is several Prime buildings just to accommodate, right? So, the beauty about students is that they go to school and in good economic conditions and they go to school in bad economic conditions and they rent and the people that are paying their rents and their tuition are their parents. So, the beauty about that is that you’ve got this regenerating rental pool from day one, it’s this security blanket that you’ve got. Let’s forget about transit, let’s just forget about the downtown employment hub, the tech scene and all of that. This institution that’s continuously growing is literally at your doorstep. So, I think having that as your insurance policy is a huge story that will give you comfort when it comes to the demographics of who’s going to be renting.
Costas Kivelos:
And let’s recap those numbers. 47,000 potential renters within walking distance, growing by 5000 year over year. That’s a regenerating rental pool that’s guaranteed, that’s not going anywhere and as Jason said, remember this: students will go to school during good economic times and bad economic times and the rent is usually paid by their parents.
Jasom Lam:
Absolutely.
Costas Kivelos:
Continue Jason.
Jasom Lam:
And you’ve got the international students and they have a huge number. I mean one of the things about Ryerson that’s so unique is that we talked about 47,000 but they can house less than 2000 of them. So, you have people that live at home but you’ve had a huge demographic of individuals that are not from Toronto, not from Ontario, not from the country that now migrate to go to school and they’ve got… their solely dependent on the private sector, you, the condo investor to find their home which is why we design the product the way we did. It’s perfect for that demographic but it’s also perfect for that young professional, the person that’s sort of working constantly in the University Health Network or the financial district. So, we made sure our plans are efficient which in turn make costs a lot lower, prices a lot lower and I think this is the perfect product for this quarter, for this market and for investors.
Costas Kivelos:
And see, what people don’t understand is we always talk about price per square foot in the industry but to the person that doesn’t buy or is not engulfed in this on a daily basis, they talk about end price. So, let me put into perspective if you don’t have an efficient floor plan and say you have a 700 square foot 1+den but 50 or 100 square feet is really wasted space at the [0:18:53] going rate right now, 13 to $1400 a square foot, that might be 130 to $140,000 of money you paid for space you can’t use and one of the and one of the reasons CentreCourt does so well and is so efficient, is that your floor plans have no wasted space.
Jasom Lam:
Right.
Costas Kivelos:
So, when you see that it might be smaller than what you expect but if you take the time to actually dissect or review that floor plan, you’ll see no wasted space and how efficient it is.
Jasom Lam:
Absolutely.
Costas Kivelos:
So, what happens for the end user and the investor alike, they are spending less of a final purchase price and getting a more efficient unit and when it comes to investing, it’s all about what is spent compared to what you can generate.
Jasom Lam:
Absolutely, you couldn’t have said it better and when you look at the key plate at Prime, again, a lot of people will speak to the floor plans being the best they’ve ever seen or their favorite but I genuinely believe that when you look at Prime, no one has developed the better key plate of investor friendly product that is ideal for really attractive price points and I think efficiency, maximization, functionality, it doesn’t get better than this and you’re seeing that time over time. There’s a lot of old product that was much bigger than it needed to be and you’re getting the exact same function but you’re just minimizing the wasted space as you mentioned earlier and ultimately, what that means is you’re saving money both from a maintenance fee perspective but more importantly at the actual price point.
Costas Kivelos:
And that is fantastic and I noticed that over the course of the last few years, Toronto floor plans have become exceptionally better and more efficient than we had previous to that, okay? And CentreCourt, when you’re building in triple A locations and the cost of acquisition of that land is so expensive, it’s a very fine tightrope walk to be able to give a quality product at a price that is still affordable to most.
Jasom Lam:
That’s right.
Costas Kivelos:
And what I’ve noticed, a lot of these investors that we have in your projects, they are all across, it’s a diaspora of all different kinds of people, a true cross section of the demographic. There’s people that work construction, there’s people that are doctors, there’s people in the financial industry. It’s really a mosaic of everybody we have in the city. Now, we’ve talked about transit, we’ve talked about Ryerson. Now let’s talk a little bit more specifically about the actual building. So how many stories are we going to have just south of Gerrard and Jarvis?
Jasom Lam:
We’ve got 45 stories, a total of 595 suites and we vary from studios to junior one bedroom, one bedroom product 1+dens and two bedrooms, again, ultra efficient, very, very functional floor plans and I think you’re going to see it’s going to be the most attractive price point and the downtown core. There’s no one else that’s going to be able to come close to the product that we’re going to be bringing online when it comes to value in the triple A location.
Costas Kivelos:
And what Jason can’t say but I can say, is that this is going to be launching very soon in the next few weeks. Remember, once you see a project on our show, it means that game time is coming up pretty soon, we’re getting you ready. Now, one last thing that I wanted to touch on, I want to recap, okay? CentreCourt’s accomplishment in sales and efficiency but the reason I’m doing this is so that everyone at home is prepared for how quickly Prime’s going to sell. Now, Transit City, 1000 units in one month.
Jasom Lam:
It was less than a month. It was probably two weeks tops.
Costas Kivelos:
55 Mercer, 500 units in eight days.
Jasom Lam:
Yeah, 5 to 8 days, we sold over a half a billion dollars in real estate. Yeah, yeah.
Costas Kivelos:
8 Wellesley, not sold out. 597 of 599.
Jasom Lam:
I’m happy to say that we’re fully sold out at this point in time. Within less than 10 days, we’re easily 90, 95% sold. Again, representing over half a billion dollars. I think the moral of the story is not only do we select triple A locations that are identifiable and relatable to a lot of our purchasers, they can picture themselves living it, they can picture their kids living it, they can picture a tenant wanting to live there but more than anything is we price these buildings effectively to the market and we understand that we’re leaving meat on the bone, then that’s the most important thing is that it’s a partnership and our purchases are just as important as our strategic broker partners, just as important to the finished product when we get into the ground and everyone needs to win and I think we have a huge substantial track record that really comes unrivaled and I think a lot of you that are looking at purchase in real estate today are going to be really excited with what Prime has to offer, what it’s going to look like four years from now and what you can expect in terms of how the market’s going to perform.
Costas Kivelos:
Now you’ve heard it here today. We’ve gone over the history, the location, the why, the how and
we’ve also told you the what’s going to happen. This project is going to be near sold out within a week’s time based on CentreCourt’s track record and our current market conditions. Jason, thank
you. I look forward to knocking another one out of the park.
Costas Kivelos:
Thank you, Costas and thank you for everyone tuning in.
Costas Kivelos:
Welcome back everyone, this is Costas Kivelos, First Access Condos and we’re going to end our episode on Prime with some real-world numbers and predictions based on the returns we have seen. I am going to tell you what to expect when you invest here. Now, no one has a crystal ball but what we do have here is experience in investing a lot of money but not only investing it but making people a lot of money. So, let’s talk prime. What kind of returns would you, the investor, expect when you buy something here? Let’s use a one-bedroom unit. Now, even at the fantastic pricing that comes from CentreCourt for their projects, you’re looking at about $600,000 give or take for a one bedroom. Let’s use a round number, because I’m doing some math on the fly here too. Now, if we have a $600,000 one bedroom and we think that it’ll be ready in four years, I’m not going to get in and talk about price per square foot because that’ll complicate things and here at First Access Condos, condo investing will Costas, we simplify things. What you’ll be seeing, is that that unit will increase year over year for the course of the four years at about 10% of purchase price. That is, each year, your $600,000 condo in year 1 will be worth 660 in year two and remember, I can break this down over a phone call or a zoom or whatever you like but we’re going to say 10% per year. Over the course of four years, that’s 40%. 40% of 600 is 240. Now, $240,000 will be your profit. $120,000 was your initial investment. What does that mean? A 200% return on the conservative side and that’s why you are going to buy at Prime. Thank you everybody, this project won't last. We told you how fast these things sell out, make sure you get in contact with me, email me, call me, number and email is on the screen. Hope to hear from you soon and don’t call me in eight days, these sell out in seven. Thank you.