What I’m thinking about: The price of working with artists, and how the best craftsmen will ignore your explicit instructions when they think they know better.
Quick recap: 32-acre minor subdivide chopped into three child parcels, adding turnkey driveways and home sites. Power and water already at the street. Should be simple, right?
We had crystal clear instructions for our contractor last week. With our broker on vacation and a week’s worth of sunny weather (rare in Louisiana), the plan was bulletproof: finish the two simple parcels first so we could list them immediately when our broker returned for his brief break before another family trip.
Instead, our contractor went completely rogue.
He made an executive decision to blast through work on the flag lot – the most complex parcel requiring the longest driveway. Burned through the entire good weather window working on the wrong property while the two “easy” parcels sat untouched.
We discovered this situation too late in the week. More rainy weather was incoming. Our broker was had a limited window to shoot photos before leaving for his next trip. Zero parcels ready for market.
My initial response was to rapidly course-correct: “Stop everything on the flag lot. Get the simplest parcel done NOW.”
But here’s where this gets interesting:
Our broker pushed back, after conversing with the contractor. He’d seen sellers rush contractors before, and it always ended badly. The quality suffers, listings look amateur, buyers notice. Plus, this contractor’s work quality was genuinely exceptional – even while ignoring our timeline.
The pivot we made:
Rather than force a rushed finish, we got creative. Had our broker strategically photograph the most complete parcel while explaining in the listing that gravel installation was finishing up. Got one listing live two days ago, with photo updates planned once work wrapped.
This gave us something I hadn’t fully appreciated when we started: three distinct products instead of three identical lots, with a staggered listing strategy.
Each parcel has different driveway lengths, home site locations, and clearing patterns. The flag lot (our premium offering, in contrast to most flag lots) winds through trees with what our broker calls a “grand entranceway”. Another has easier access, with a homesite close to the road, but much more woods in the back. The middle parcel is a mix of the other two child parcels.
(Here are four on-the-ground photos to show you the craftsmanship that earned that “grand” description from our broker.)
Now we’re staggering the listings over the next ~2 weeks at different price points per acre. Testing market response with the first parcel while building anticipation for the more “premium” offerings coming soon.
Key lessons from development chaos:
- Artists operate differently. When someone takes deep pride in their craft, they’ll prioritize quality over your timeline every single time. That’s the tradeoff, and usually…it’s worth it.
- Weather delays in Louisiana are real. Know I remarked on this in a previous newsletter, but it bears worth mentioning again, since the wet weather was by far the largest variable that impacted our development timeline.
- The advantages of boots on the ground. Mentioned this before, but one week without our broker on-site led to a complete deviation from our instructions. Fortunately, this was a scenario we could recover from.
- Differentiation beats commodity every time. In a difficult macro, introducing variability with your offerings is only going to help you stand out amongst competing lots.
- Not all rules are hard and fast. Our flag lot is now positioned as the most premium offering, given the work we’ve put into it, compared to traditionally being the weakest offering within a subdivide project.
Total development cost: $130K versus our $125K underwrite. Only $5K over budget even with $19K in additional Phase II costs and $11K in Phase I overruns. Capital buffer saved us from scrambling for cash mid-project.
While it’s impossible to 100% predict how the market will react to any listing, and macro uncertainty remains at the forefront, my instincts are feeling very bullish about the exit potential for this project.
Looking for reliable funding on your next development project? Serious Land Capital is actively seeking minor subdivides and value-add opportunities. Our growing expertise in managing contractors, weather delays, and on-the-fly decision-making means fewer surprises for your projects.
P.S. Want the full breakdown of the contractor communication failure, and our pivot? Episode 153 of Get Serious dissects this in forensic detail. Raw lessons from managing artisan contractors who ignore your instructions. No fluff.
