Sat 3 Mar 2007
Builder's Breakfast with Ray Peacock and Emma Freeman
In this month's Builder's Breakfast Rupert Bates talks to Ray Peacock and Emma Freeman of George Wimpey City.George Wimpey has come a long way since the years of the cat, a familiar advertising logo throughout the 1980s, as the company expanded its business as one of Britain’s biggest housebuilders.
In those days the developer was known as Wimpey Homes, with its corporate history referring to its “quality compact housing”. A clever euphemism for a rash of new estates, which were not exactly queuing up to win design awards, but did their job in housing Thatcher’s children, as the former Prime Minister espoused home ownership for all.
How times have changed. A major re-branding a few years ago saw the company go back to its birth name. In 1880 George Wimpey started a contractor business in Hammersmith, soon working on major building and road projects in London.
Now, with various acquisitions along the way, its UK homes are sold under the George Wimpey and Laing Homes brands, with 26 regional businesses and three satellite companies, while its US housing arm Morrison Homes builds in California and Florida.
You wonder if Wimpey would have re-branded if the founder had been called Kevin rather than George, for while still delivering across the price range, Wimpey in some quarters has gone distinctly upmarket, distancing itself from the joke that it was merely an extension of the hamburger chain, churning out fast food homes.
This explains the choice of the Wolseley restaurant next to the Ritz in Piccadilly for breakfast rather than Wimpy without the 'e' for a meeting with George Wimpey City, the division dedicated to bespoke apartments on high-rise schemes in the UK’s major cities and feeding the hungry international investor market.
Ray Peacock, managing director of George Wimpey City (GWC) having previously been finance director, describes himself as a typical accountant, which is probably why he turned down the high priced Eggs Benedict in favour of a glass of water. Hardly what you would call a Builder’s Breakfast.
His accountancy background ensures Peacock, who prior to joining George Wimpey spent 11 years with Redland, is wedded to process and detail, but he also has an eye for design, using leading architects such as Assael Architecture, and with a commitment to customer care – attributes not always attributed to bean counters. Fail to look after the customers and George Wimpey City staff get hit in the pocket.
Peacock probably declined breakfast in the hope it would give him a chance to get a word in edgeways, because alongside him was George Wimpey City’s lively and loquacious sales and marketing director Emma Freeman, a former estate agent with a passion for the product that goes far beyond mere sales tactics.
Risk mitigation on sites ranging in gross development value from £70 million to £150 million, means GWC puts projects into joint ventures, be they with banks, other developers, or equity investors.
“We choose up-and-coming areas in the cities. As a developer we tend not to be first in the door, but choose locations that have started to improve and where we can justify the selling prices, rather than relying on hope value,” says Peacock.
GWC usually targets schemes with at least 150 units and a minimum six storeys in height, appointing main contractors to deliver the projects and external agents to sell the apartments.
Falcon Wharf in Battersea – a glass, steel and timber building stretching to 17 floors – recently won a What House? Award in the Best Apartment category. Other London schemes include The Water Gardens by Canada Water tube in London Docklands and VizioN7 in North London, a joint venture with Taylor Woodrow.
But GWC also builds high-rise schemes in Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and Cardiff, all set for local landmark status, with prices ranging from £150,000 one-bedroom apartments in Cardiff to a £2.2 million penthouse in Battersea.
Although it seems every five minutes a new tower, dubbed iconic even when just a computer generated image with no ground broken, is soaring towards the skyline, there remains a lack of top quality stock to sate demand from investors, who range in profile and nationality.
“A good location and high specification remain hugely important. We want investors to come back time and again to our portfolio of product, seeing potential for good growth and rental yields,” says Freeman.
Middle-East and South African investors have been drawn to GWC’s London schemes, while Irish investors, whether in the form of syndicates looking to flip the off-plan properties before completion, or individuals who have got rich on the back of the Celtic Tiger, are still key drivers.
While the arrival of bonuses in City bank accounts should fuel demand, Freeman points out such wealth is not all ploughed into property, as many City workers have lifestyles they might not have paid for yet, or instead may simply use their bonuses to play the stock markets they know well.
“The number of owner-occupiers we have is relatively small, but as well as out-and-out investors we see people buying for City crash pads, or parents buying flats for children starting University, or, given the pension fund shortfalls, property as your pension,” says Peacock.
There was “no comment” when asked to speculate on further consolidation in the housebuilding sector, with Wilson Bowden the latest big acquisition target. Not surprising as, alongside Scottish entrepreneur Sir Tom Hunter, fast becoming a hunter-gatherer of housebuilding stock, and Barratt, George Wimpey, as Show House went to press, was also in the Wilson Bowden mix.
George Wimpey buying Wilson Bowden and resurrecting the cat logo would provide fodder for City cartoonists, with Wilson Bowden boss David Wilson’s golden retriever a familiar figure in his advertising. ‘Cat eats dog’ would make a good headline. You suspect the feeding frenzy is not over yet.
First published in Show House Magazine March 2007.
The greatest care has been taken to ensure accuracy but some information contained within this article may have changed since it was first published.
Posted by Rupert Bates
in Builder's Breakfast, Emma Freeman, George Wimpey, Ray Peacock on Sat 3 Mar 2007
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