As my Grade 10 year comes to a close, I have to finish a couple of things before I can move on to Grade 11. One of these things is Planning 10. School District 44 says Planning 10 is a requirement in order to graduate. One of the big projects that is involved in Planning 10 is the job shadow project. Wait didn’t I do that already in grade 9? (Bring your kid to work day). Think again. A Job Shadow and Bring Your Kid To Work Day are different. Let me explain. Bring Your Kid To Work Day is when you go to work with one of your parental guardians. A Job Shadow is when you take control and you go to work with someone who works in the same field that we are interested in. To be able to go on your job shadow we had to finish three steps first. Step one, read over the project brief. We did this so we could understand what we were getting into. Step two, create a brainstorm list of the jobs that we were interested in and find some businesses associated with this line of work and call them to ask if we could job shadow with them. Lastly step three, create a list of questions that we could ask them while you are participating in your job shadow.
Finding the job
When it came time for me to create a list of jobs that I wanted to do, I did so and after doing some research, I came to a conclusion. I was very interested in Real estate Development. I thought about if I knew anyone who participated in this field of work and my uncle popped into my head. My uncle Norman Laube is the owner and co founder of Peakside Homes and Pure Living. These two companies are in the Real estate Development business. I called my uncle and asked if he would let him job shadow me and he said yes. Next it was time to make a list of questions that I would ask about his job. A lot of my questions were based around the financial aspect of the job which is what he deals a lot with. These questions would help me understand the job better as well as write this blog post. Here are some of my questions.
When it came time to ask Noman about some of the questions that I have about his job. Question 1, How did you get the knowledge and skill to become a property developer? Answer : I went to UBC and studied business and real estate. I worked with Omnicron for many years and I learned a lot about the job there. Question 2, Is it easier to work with a company or with your own company when making a project? Answer : “ I believe that it is easier to work with your own company because you are the boss and you get to make the decisions. Questions 3, What kinds of challenges do you have to prepare for and have dealt with before? Answer: When doing property development there are goverment regulations that you need to know (for example how many inches a railing has to be from the edge of the deck.) When you gain experience you learn how to deal with these problems.
Peakside Homes
The day came and it was to time to do my job shadow. My uncle and I drove around to a bunch of his different houses around the North Shore. First he took me to his two houses on Panorama. These two have been listed at around 2.5 million dollars each. The project started off by Norman getting an offer from his realtor about a house on Panorama with a lot of land. They purchased the house and went to an architect firm for them to design two homes to sit on this lot that they had just bought. These two house would be modern and have high quality appliances. Peakside Homes always puts elevators in their homes because it makes them stand out when they sell the house. Here are some picture of the two homes that are almost done and have both been sold.
After Norman gave me a tour of the two Panorama houses and all of the special features and challenges that he ran into while they were building, we moved on to the first house that started the business. This house is in lower Lynn Valley. The house is a 5 bedroom 5 bath with 4,335 square feet. The house sits on a 8,850 ft square lot. The house has an elevator that visits all three fours and has a suite so you can have some extra money coming in. The Appin house was listed at 2.1 million and sold even before they were done in 2016. Here is a picture of the house in 2018
The last home we toured was one of the two homes below that sit on Doran road in Lynn Valley and offers a city view with an open floor plan and a huge patio. Each home has over 4600 square feet of living space and sits on a 7500 square foot property on the top of a beautiful hill. The house offers 6 bedrooms, 7 baths and it is within .46 km of Argyle High school. The houses are listed at just under 3.1 million dollars each.
Pure livivng
Also my uncle Norman Laube is also the co- owner and co-founder of another company called Pure Living. Pure living is also a real estate development company that so far builds more mid-rise devolpment projects. He and his partner are working on a project proposal for Keith Road and Mountain highway. Here is the sketch that a designer did.
Requirements for the Job
This job requires someone to have knowledge of things like property analysis, building construction and local government regulations. You have to have the ability to problem-solve, analyze and work well with lots of different people because you work with architects, realtors, bankers, contractors and government officials. I think I am good at analyzing and problem solving and building things and I work well with lots of people. I would have to go to school like UBC or BCIT to take courses in property development and then work with someone who is already an expert in this field like Norman.
Conclusion
Overall I had a great experience following my uncle Norman Laube around during a regular day at the office. I enjoyed see what is takes to source, buy, demolish, design, build and sell a house. There are a lot of stressful situations that come along with this job like getting permits or surprise delays or unexpected expenses but at the end of the day it is all worth it. I think that it is really cool how you can drive around every day and look at the difference that you are making in the community. The real question is would I consider doing this job once I graduate from university and look for employment? The answer is yes, I would be very interested in working for Peakside Homes or Pure living in the future. This is because I really like the aspect of putting new homes the neighbourhoods. I enjoy the different challenges like designing a house that fits in all of the laws and regulations. I would have to gain the right knowledge skills and experience but I think I have the interest and right skills to start studying and learning this field. I would like to thank Norman Laube for letting me shadow his job and spending time with me.
Here is a video of some of the photos that I took during my job shadow
