Architect Looking to Transition to Development - Any ADVISE?

[Aaron Vanderpool]

Greeting BP Network,

Long time listener first time (writer), but I have a life-transition question that I thought I would throw out to the community for advise. I am a licensed architect who's spent the last 10-years doing the traditional architecture thing. But in the last 4 years or so, I've been bitten by the real estate bug. Now, I've spent those four years consuming hundreds of hours of podcasts, youtube videos, I've read BRRRR/Multi-Family Millionaire etc, but I want to build on my knowledge by leveraging my skills as an architect to get a foot in the door at a developer.

What I don't know is how to sell that skillset "swap". How to sell the value I can bring to a developer in pre-construction, deal analysis (zoning, building codes, etc) and construction management on company projects in order to learn more about the $$ side of the equation for a commercial developer. 

Currently I live in Portland OR but I am planning to move back to my hometown of Kansas City in the next six-months, and aside from cold-emailing top developers in KC, any advise on this proposition? I appreciate the wealth of knowledge, and if you've read this far THANK YOU!

[Scott Krone]

@Aaron Vanderpool  - Welcome to the dark side : )

When I was purusing my masters in architecture, I was the TA for a professor who was a developer, architect and GC so I got to experience all three roles while learning the craft.  Having also taught college architecture, I recognize the tension between being an architect or a developer.  Having worked in all three spaces for the past 30 + years, we have also worked with a variety of architects in the GC role so I hope my comments are helpful.

In essence there exists a tension between the three roles:  architect, developer and GC.  Simplistically, a developer's primary goal is to maximize revenue/value while controlling costs.  An architect's primary goal is to make the coolist building ever (I know I am being simplistic), and a GC's is to build the design while trying to manage the developer's budget.

In my opinion, the best architects are the ones that understand construction (not just design, but structure, MEP, and alternative buildings techinques) and can design within a budget.  For us, when I assess a property, I am looking at it from all three perspectives:  how to maximize revenue, how the design will impact the costs and what do we need to accomplish, and how will be actually build it.  Believe it or not, we have worked with many architects who have no understanding of how the structure impacts the MEP's, and provide no solutions as to how we can phyiscally build the building, or no understanding of details and how to address expansion and contraction of 4 different building materials when they intersect in one location (these examples are from very expensive architects).  The worst architects come up with elaborate plans which will never meet the clients goals, and have no understanding of how to build (IMO).

How to best add value to a developer, knowing the relationship between all three roles.  The better you understand the budgets, focus your designs to fulfill that, and come up with cost effective construction solutions, you will become incredibly valuable to a developer.  In essence the truist meaning of the word architect:  master builder.