Gain insights and education on what is needed for Land Development and what to consider. With Carina Guzman
Francois: We have Carina Guzman. Hi, Carina, thank you so much for joining us. Very excited to have you.
Carina: Thank you for having me. So, I'm going to try to share my screen with all of you. Good evening everyone, Francois. That's the most? I'm going to speak French. Okay.
Francois: Español.
Carina: Español, buenas noches. Thanks for having me here. My name is Carina. Thanks to the REITE club for inviting me to be one of your presenters this evening. This is really fun for me. So, I'll tell you a little bit about who I am and how I began. Immigrated to Canada from Latin America, born and raised. And I followed what every immigrant's parents decide, which is go to school, get a good job, get a pension, and you live happily ever after.
That's what I did. And my parents were so happy with me. But after a while I started to really develop myself in the real estate world. And Personal development. And I really started growing out of the corporate world and I actually felt tired of being in a cubicle. I decided to take control of my life and really become accountable for myself, for my retirement, how I wanted to live my life. I wanted to live my life on my own terms and not ask an employer. I take my time off. And then throughout the way, I've been able to motivate people and be part of many groups like these.
Hopefully, I can do the same with this group. My aha moment actually really came in 2015. So, at the time when I was developing myself, I started to really learn about zoning and urban planning. And that became my outlet for really liking my passion. I loved it. And at the time there was a lot of news about the LRT. The Light Rail System, that's brand new to Ottawa. And I had read it many times before that, but like all things, when you begin to expand your mind and begin to learn maybe something that you've read before and you read it again, all of a sudden it has a new context, like a new meaning to it.
That's literally, it was like, I realized, there it is. It's right here. It's literally maps. And for those of you who see these maps these are mostly, in every single city they're everywhere and you see them all the time, but you don't really think much of them until you realize there's something to this as a real estate investor. I realize the city allows you to change the density in these areas in the Light Rail or any transit.
Francois: Yeah, they've rezoned and tired areas and neighborhoods.
Carina: Exactly and I thought this is like a treasure map, so I'm just going to follow up. And that's essentially what we did. So, we began really small and then just grew from there. This is one of our first a hundred meter transit projects. Then I began taking on much larger projects. I began to do it for other clients. We did some more of our own projects and then just expanded from there and became more challenging, more out of the box and all of that.
I want to teach you guys a little bit about the Land Development Principles But before I do that, I have to give you the foundation, and the foundation really is zoning bylaw. And for those of you who may have not heard of zoning before. Zoning is essentially the definition that the city gives to every piece of land. So, it really defines what you can and cannot do with every single piece of land, including how high can you go? What is your total buildable area? How much can you intensify that area? How much parking do you have to offer among a lot of other things.
Francois: That's a big one, the Parking requirements. I know in some cities that can make or break through deals.
Carina: And I don't know if you knew this Francois, but in transit stations, there's very minimal parking requirement.
Francois: Yeah, almost zero in some areas.
Carina: Yes. For those Ottawans that are here and the meeting today, this is geo Ottawa. It's an interactive online map that it's publicly available to everyone. Most cities have a map like this. You should be able to find a zoning map for your city. If you don't have one you can always go speak to the city. Go talk to the development office there, and they can give you all the information regarding the zoning of your specific property or land. So, this is the foundation.
You must always know this. And from here on. I'm going to give you guys some of these land development principles, but each one tag on top of each other. So, when you begin to look at it all as a whole, it gives you a whole new perspective on how you can look at real estate as a whole.
Francois: The building blocks.
Carina: Yes. So, this is,
Principle #1: Missing Middle. This is not a new concept. It's essentially not low density, meaning like a bungalow or a single house, but it's also not a high rise condo building. It's in the middle. It's a low rise, three, four stories. That is a very gentle form of intensification. It comes in many forms. It doesn't only have to be in a block. It can be designed in many varieties and the city really expects most of the intensification and infill to happen. Within these types of builts.
Francois: I don't know if you heard Robert earlier, but he said, this is what's lacking in Gatineau, I know we're across the river, but same idea. So, I'm sure that's happening across the bridge as well.
Carina: Totally, and this is where I'll show you the city is really pushing to have more of this urban IC until happening in urbanized areas, as opposed to extending outward.
Principle #2: The 15-minute Neighborhoods. This concept is actually fairly new in North America, but it's not really new. If you're an immigrant, I grew up in a 15 minute neighborhood. It's essentially the premise. It's to live within 15 minute proximity to all kinds of amenities. It's like being able to mobilize, you're able to walk and bike and take a transit and go get a coffee and maybe stop by the grocery store, that sort of thing.
The cities are really now, and this is a nationally pushing tool or it's creating more of these communities. And the intent is not only to reduce our dependence on cars, but of course also include more of a rental in one specific property, because like we realize now with COVID and I think Bindu mentioned this is that a lot of Ottawa is still a buying kind of people. Want to buy their house, but we're now moving into more of a rental society and this is going to become more and more of a thing.
Francois: And it's a challenge because there's nothing for rent or available. So, we need this infill to happen quickly.
Carina: Yeah. And you know what, that's a good point that you just made because if you guys have heard there's a huge deficiency in housing by now nationwide. And the government has pushed a lot into the new programs, like the rapid housing units. The affordable housing initiative and CMHC has also released their own construction, rental, construction financing. So, all of these things, when you put them together, it's really to promote this type of infill. And the city is really going to look at these infills to be in areas that are walkable and bikeable and it creates healthier communities.
Francois: If you have kids and you don't have this heavy traffic, because people have to drive everywhere.
Carina: Exactly. Absolutely.
Principle #3: 613 Flats. This is very Ottawa terminology, but it's actually not. So, the idea is that it supports the vision of the 613. So, they're going to allow for this type of development in the 15 minute neighborhood. But the intent is to build something that is in smaller pieces of land. And now it's maybe in the exterior, it looks very much like a house or like a semi's or something cute like that. But when you go inside, it's like 12 units.
Francois: My streetscapes, it's not like a skyscraper.
Carina: Exactly. So, it doesn't pop out. The intent of that is to blend. And if some of you are wondering what the 613 flats for Ottawa mean? It means that it's a building that has a minimum of six rooms, still kitchen, living room and bedroom. Three of those bedrooms have to be bedrooms. As three of those rooms have to be bedrooms. So, that's where the three come in and they can be separate. This is really cool for investors because initially if you had a duplex, let's say it's one unit. We are going to sell the duplex.
Francois: It's Like flex space. Wow. This is really cool. Yeah, I've heard it in office design, like where they move around systems, furniture, cubicles. Like you, you came out of it now for residential. This is really neat.
Carina: Really neat and for investors, you will be able to sell each one separately, if you want. And this is mind blowing because back then as far as it is right now, this is not something that has been allowed. This is the first time.
Francois: It is the kind of condoization that didn't have anything to do with saying from Montreal, which is not happening here. You can't convert rentals into condos as well. You can, but it's very difficult.
Carina: Really exciting. Prime locations are corner lots. And actually in fact, the corner lots just as a side note if it's on the main street corner lot the city will, is looking into changing the zoning so that it allows for a component of that to be commercial plus residential as well.
Francois: Too faster in this 15 minute neighborhood and community.
Carina: Exactly. So, now in 2021, when you go in and analyze properties, you can take a look at it and say, does it fit? Or does this area look like a 15 minute neighborhood? Is there all these amenities available? And you can get a perspective of. Would a 613 flat be allowed in this type of area?
Francois: That's excellent.
Carina:
Principle #4: TODs. So, that stands for Transit Oriented Development. That has been my niche since 2015. And these are areas that are within 600 to 800 meters of the transit stations. Here, you see those Circles. Those are our already defined areas that are 600 meters from those transit stations. Investors always ask me, Carina, where do I buy my next investment? I always say, go look at these zoning maps, the bubbles, because these are the areas that are going to number one, have the possibility to intensify at some point, or you could, like you said, Francois is zoning.
They're more likely to land well with zoning amendments. And also these are the areas that are going to appreciate at a faster rate because of their location. Like I said, zoning amendment. This one here is actually one that I'm doing. It's a transit oriented development. It's a little triplex and we are changing the stoning and converting it to a 44 unit building.
Francois: Nearest service station, I assume just looking at the house style. Yeah. So, that area was industrial and residential. So, this will be a big improvement.
Carina: And that's the other thing, because I was able to know that these TODs are out there. The Transit Oriented Developments, the city allows it and this property actually sat on the market for a year. It was so crappy. And then I realized, when I finally saw it? I thought this is crazy because the potential is huge. So, people might not see it because it's a changing area. And it's ugly but there's opportunities there.
Francois: And that's thinking outside of the box. So, that's new thinking, new ways of investing. So, we just have about one minute, if we can wrap up, I'm sorry, time flies.
Carina:
Principle #5: Secondary Plans. There are secondary plans out there. These are again, not another treasure map. It's basically like a future view of what the city plans to do in specified areas. So, again, investors, if you're looking for investment property. If you find these secondary plans in the areas that you're looking for, you can essentially look in the future. For example, in this map here, the red is areas that are meant for mid low rise to mid rise. And the orange might be something like triplexes. So, you know that maybe it's not allowed now, but in the future it might be.
Francois: That's amazing.
Carina: My little advice to you is that learn a little bit about these principles and maybe in 2021, it'll help you look at your real estate investments in a new light and give you a new perspective into what you could do with a piece of land that maybe you never thought was possible before.
Francois: Thank you so much.
Carina: Start small guys.
Francois: Start small. Yes, because that could be big. Daniel was saying, that's a lot of grunt work and knowing all those people.
Carina: Please take the advice of professionals, learn what you can, but surround yourself with very intelligent people and start small.
Francois: Excellent. Yes. So, your contact information will be in the chat as well. So, we have one very smart woman, Carina from Ottawa. And I've had the privilege of walking with you on a real estate walk this summer and learning about your expertise. So, this is really exciting.
Daniel: 1I'm assuming then that you will agree with me that this was a really nice 15 minute, but that was a tease. We do a full Saturday workshop that people pay for. I think this just could qualify for something like that. Of course, whoa, that was amazing what you shared in 15 minutes. Thank you. Carina.
Carina: Thank you.
Francois: Imagine three hours. Thank you so much.
Carina: Thank you so much, guys. This was fun.
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