For this episode, Paul is joined by Tim Riley, director of the award-winning architectural
practice RCKa. He believes buildings can be catalysts for social change and has experience
of building homes and facilities that genuinely have transformed people´s lives and improved
areas.

You will learn how you can be involved in transforming our society by providing great
homes.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Community groups tend to be focused on delivering their services, so rarely have the
  energy and resources to dedicate to a building project.
• Consulting with the community and stakeholder groups helps you to create an
  appealing scheme.
• Only a small % of an architect´s time is spent drawing. The best architects spend a
  lot of time liaising to get the most out of a site e.g. the structural engineer and testing
  the design Fully housing policy compliant schemes rarely stack up.
• Leverage design review panels. They really are there to help.
• The later living sector is still underserved.
• Developing later living on peri urban areas makes sense.
• Communities near later living villages can also benefit from new infrastructure, shops
  and facilities.
• Later living communities are multi-generational e.g. They have play facilities for
  grandchildren.

BEST MOMENTS

"From the outset we decided that we were going to design an appeal ready scheme.”

“As a developer, the best thing you can do is focus on good design.”
“You´re delivering homes at a third of the cost land wise.”

RESOURCES
https://www.linkedin.com/in/timriley2
https://rcka.co.uk

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
This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/

If you are tired of all the noise and misinformation about land values and development
economics, this episode of the Inside Property Development podcast is for you. Paul cuts
through the confusion and gives you the real deal.

The Property Development Scorecard

https://millbanklandacademy.scoreapp.com

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• The true driver behind development is economics. Starting with being able to
  incentivise the landowner to sell.
• Now that planning takes so long, the initial profit margin has to be relatively high. You
  need a substantial margin of error built into your calculations.
• Prior to 1988 lots of smaller builders built a few houses and sold them. After that,
  planning got too complicated.
• The government still has not understood the underlying problems e.g. Their new
  legislation targets land banking, which is not a thing. Sitting on land which has
  planning permission makes zero sense.
• Over the last few years, building costs have risen by 30%. The fact that this happens.

BEST MOMENTS
“It's not developers being greedy. That's driving this whole process. The thing that's really
driving the whole process is existing use values and meeting and beating landowners’
expectations.”
“Focusing on off-market sites and adding maximum planning value is basically how you de-
risk development as much as you possibly can.”
“The thing that really drives the whole development industry is existing use values and being
able to incentivize landowners to sell.”
“Since 1988 planning got so difficult that they've ended up having to try to buy stuff with
planning because they don't know how to do it themselves.”

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
This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/

In this episode, Paul once again sits down to speak to Lewis Herbert to talk about the really important issues of homelessness and the housing crisis. As well as discussing how we got here, they look at some of the potential solutions, including the use of modular housing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• In the UK, 134,000 people aged 16 to 25 are homeless or at risk.
• There are 150,000 rough sleepers.
• Homeless people need somewhere secure to live, it does not have to be big.
• The fact that these homes are genuinely temporary means they can be compact.
• Compact homes can be built and connected to utilities for £100,000 and projects can be delivered in a year.
• Cardiff already has enough two-storey modular homes to house 300 families.
• Lewis shares several other examples across the UK.
• Travelodge´s are expensive, so modular homes don´t take long to pay for
  themselves.
  

The Property Development Scorecard

https://millbanklandacademy.scoreapp.com

BEST MOMENTS
“I´ve got a passion for affordable housing.”
“I’m a fan of modern methods of construction.”
“If we’re going to get people out of hotel rooms, if we’re going to get people off the streets, compact is the way we’ve got to go.”
“It´s a very happy community on what was a car park.”

EPISODE RESOURCES
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lewis-herbert-84378110

Allia Future Homes - https://futurebusinesscentre.co.uk/our-impact/future-homes
Cardiff – https://businessnewswales.com/residents-welcome-temporary-homes-in-modular-
housing-scheme/
Motels to homes - https://chesshomeless.org
https://www.zedpods.com
https://www.social-bite.co.uk
https://www.fusearchitects.co.uk

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

This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/