who is building apartments in Minnesota

[Daniel Anshus]

Hey everybody, who do you know that is building smaller apartment buildings (50 or less units), in Minnesota? Close to the Twin Cities or Saint Cloud would be ideal. Would love to meet with people doing this as I have been interested in learning more about this. Thank you

[James Hamling]

Originally posted by @Daniel Anshus:

Hey everybody, who do you know that is building smaller apartment buildings (50 or less units), in Minnesota? Close to the Twin Cities or Saint Cloud would be ideal. Would love to meet with people doing this as I have been interested in learning more about this. Thank you

 Saint Cloud huh.... lol, well, ironically that would be myself and 2 others both of which are operating their own non-syndicated fund and will not allow any other in on their deals, they cover every aspect of it. 

Twin Cities, there is a long list of builders who are happy to take the business, about 20% could actually complete the build and about 20% of those will be a fair price point and not ridiculous over the top billing. 

Pulling off a multi-unit build is nothing like just doing a bigger single family, nothing at all. I started in building multi-unit in the 90's and the tricks and tips from back then that helped give better efficiency and cost's are now absolute must do's to not loose ones shirt, that's the first key aspect of a good building partner, a master of logistics, MASTER. Good example, I had a slight pricing and supply chain issue on some needed materials, I could have thrown $ at the problem but instead I made some calls and I bought a partial rail car of the material, lined up my own motor carrier, was able to cut 2 middle-men out of logistical chain, 1 1/2hr drive to rail yard to personally supervise and we got out materials, faster than anyone could deliver, for 30% discounting AFTER all associated costs. Standard builders today will not put in that effort or are clueless how to hit up Georgia Pacific to get something done. 

Another key detail is architect. A person can find some prints to use for at best 8-12 unit complex but up to 50 units, an architect is essential and one who knows multi-unit housing and not some quazi-art piece of a building. Then facilitating design edits and renditions between HVAC, engineering, plumbing, back to HVAC, electrical, back to plumbing, engineering again, now hvac, engineering yet again..... yeah you get the picture. My last design for multi-plex was about 240 hrs from template through too complete final rendition checked off by all, that started from a template I had handy AND was in a style I have built for over 20yrs, I could draw it out with my eyes closed. Codes change, updates are required, impactors mitigated, it's a heck of a process. 

All in all, there is a long list of boxs to check off to get a decent builder who can actually complete a multi-unit build. It's a lot more than just a structure physical build, that's just 1 of about 45 pieces.