Watch the Full Episode here.

This solo episode of the Inside Property Development Podcast is all about the biggest mistake developers make, which is being over-reliant on their consultants. This is a problem because it is not the job of your consultants to know and do everything that needs to be done to deliver your project on budget and on time. Paul explains why so many developers fall into that trap and how to avoid doing the same.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• When developers become overly reliant on their consultants, particularly architects and planning consultants, things can go very, very wrong.

• When it comes to property development, consultants don´t know enough to be able to take care of everything. 

• Consultants have multiple clients, so it is unrealistic to expect them to prioritise you and chase things up to make sure they get done on time e.g. expecting your architect to oversee getting planning permission.

• Developers need to see the big picture, and how everything fits together. They need to conduct the orchestra, which includes their consultants to make sure everything gets done properly and on time.

• Be 100% clear about what each consultant will be doing for you. 

• You can hire a development consultant, but they are just going to do the things you can and should be doing yourself. Plus, they may not do it well.

• You are always going to be more motivated than anyone else will be. After all, it´s your money that is on the line, not theirs.

BEST MOMENTS

“Property development is complex, there´s a lot of moving parts. I often liken it to 10-dimensional chess.”

“There are a lot of things that influence the success or not of a deal, and it is not any of the consultant's job to know about those things.”

“It's not the planning consultant's job to sort of negotiate the whole deal.”

“It's very rare to find a good development consultant, who knows and does everything … if they did, they would be doing it for themselves as a developer.”

“It is our job to understand and instruct and put together a really detailed document for our professional team.”

ABOUT THE HOST 

Paul Higgs is a Chartered Planning and Development Surveyor with 40+ years' experience in land, planning and development and a 100% success track record in winning planning consents.

Paul undertook his first refurb project when he was just 17 and then worked his way up from labouring on building sites to becoming Head of Land for renowned plc housebuilder, Barratt Developments. He managed to escape the corporate world in 2002 to set up what is now a multimillion-pound award-winning property development company, Millbank Group. 

In 2013 Paul founded the Millbank Land Academy, the UK’s first training company dedicated to property development; to teach established and aspiring developers the insider secrets the big housebuilders don’t want you to know! 

Paul is also a founding investor and former board director of the industry-leading PropTech Co, LandTech, and has lectured on Advanced Development Valuations on the MSc Property Development at London South Bank University.

CONTACT METHOD

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-higgs

Millbank Land Academy: https://www.millbanklandacademy.co.uk

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/paulhiggsofficial

YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@InsidePropertyDevelopment