Multi-Family Solution Services
We have on-going relationships with private investors (local and reginal), REITs, institutions and public property companies through work undertaken by our Property Tax and Valuation Divisions. Whether you are a first time purchaser or experienced investor, our Brokerage Team is here to help. We track all apartment sales, in every market in Atlantic Canada. We know the players: many are clients.
Purchaser Representation
If you wish to purchase an apartment property, Purchaser Representation is the best strategy to adopt since many multi-family properties are not listed for sale on the Multiple Listing Service® or even with commercial brokers. A comprehensive knowledge of the properties, their physical characteristics, ownership and state of the market is key. We act on your behalf to locate properties that meet your purchase criteria, advise you on their market value and rental potential, review their income and expense proformas, and where appropriate, negotiate the acquisition on the most advantageous terms for you. Since we are the purchaser’s agent we are legally and morally obligated to act in your best interest: however our broker’s fee is usually recovered from the vendor.
Vendor Representation
Vendor representation occurs when the vendor retains us to sell their property. In order to get the most advantageous terms for the vendor we (1) reduce the risk of the transaction to the purchaser to the greatest degree possible by detailing the fiscal, physical and legal attributes of the property in a Master Sales Prospectus, (2) price the property appropriately by using our proprietary information technology platform, CompuVal®, (3) expose the property to the largest number of qualified, potential purchasers using CompuVal's® Prospect Sales Database and a co-broker network. We have carefully structured our sales commission so that it is “broker neutral”; we get the same fee whether we sell the property with the aid of another broker or directly ourselves. Since we have no incentive to “double end” the commission our objective is directly aligned with that of the vendor … to get the property sold! Our Brokerage staff are the product of our own seven year real estate training program which includes negotiation as a defined skill set.
Research
CompuVal®, our leading edge information technology platform, acquires and combines apartment sales, revenue and expense data from multiple sources, and then processes and analyses it to give us insight into the region’s marketplaces. It has acquired rental data on approximately 50,000 apartments and expense data on about 1,000 buildings, together with critical acquisition metrics such as the Overall Capitalisation Rate, Equity Dividend Rate, Internal Rate of Return, Terminal Capitalisation Rate and Risk Premium.
Valuation
Our Valuation Division provides seven types of reports each tailored to the requirements of vendors, purchasers and mortgagees who need to establish the property’s market value for disposal, acquisition or financing purposes. The reports span the spectrum from a preliminary opinion of value to be utilised in broad decision making to a formal “court ready" document suitable for legal proceedings.
Property Tax Amelioration
Property taxes typically comprise a substantial portion of the property’s total operating costs. This tax burden falls right down to the bottom line and thus adversely impacts the property’s market value. Our Property Tax Division first reduces the tax load by negotiating a reduction in the assessment or by successfully appealing to the relevant court. The property is then enrolled in our PAMS® Property Tax Manager program to ensure that the tax savings so achieved are not lost in subsequent years.
Counselling
Our Counselling Division provides Feasibility Studies to developers to (1) test whether a proposed development is financially feasible; (2) determine which one of several mutually exclusive developments is the optimal project; (3) identify the type and size of development that will maximise the return on investment.