Mondev

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With both those award-winning projects, Mondev demonstrated their commitment to their company’s founding mission, as set by founder and senior partner David Owen – to enhance, enliven, and invigorate the already stunning island of Montreal.

Both of those projects are also examples of large-scale projects, the kind Mondev has steadily grown into over the years, and the kind they are poised to do a lot more of in the future. Jordan Owen, junior partner, says that the company has been progressing in that direction for decades now. Early in the company’s history, he says Mondev mainly focused on smaller low-rise residential condominium projects for sale, but in the early 2010s they started developing, building, and managing rental apartment buildings. By 2020, he says those projects comprised of the majority of their development efforts.

Jordan, for his part, joined the business in 2017 and has personally been involved in some of the largest-scale projects in the company’s portfolio. He is now part of a team that includes senior partners David Owen and Michael Owen and fellow junior partner Mark Owen.

“Since I’ve been here, we’ve been doing progressively bigger and bigger projects,” Jordan says. “100-unit projects turned into 200-unit projects. Then we did 400-unit projects. Then our biggest project to date was 700 units.”

Levelling up in that manner came with some challenges, he admits. For example, the company had to figure out how to properly scale their management team in order to keep up with the needs of their ever-increasing volume of tenants and residents. They also had to figure out how to price their units effectively, and how to most efficiently design and engineer larger projects with more units than they were used to. Those are all the normal challenges that occur when a company graduates from smaller and simpler projects to larger and more complex ones, but they needed to be worked through – and that’s what Mondev has done over the past few years, according to Jordan.

A key part of working through those challenges has been revamping the company’s systems and processes so they are better equipped to take on larger and more challenging projects, as well as take on more projects at once. Jordan says they have done that, and those systems and processes are now in place. He also says they have built some new relationships with some key industry partners, including some of the premier architects, engineers, and contractors in the city.

These days, backed by those relationships, and armed with their hard-earned knowledge and experience, Mondev is taking on some of their largest building to date. At the same time, they are also taking on some smaller-scale projects, as they have a lot of legacy land stock to work through:

“The smaller projects we’re doing now are older files,” Jordan explains. “A few years ago, we looked at our land inventory and we realized we had enough land to build about 3,000 units combined. For the past two years, our goal has been to clean up our books and get all of those projects built. We’ve worked hard at that goal. We made tremendous progress in 2022 and 2023, but we likely still have another 2,000 units to go. Our plan is to start on all those within the next year or two.”

Those projects, according to Jordan, will range widely in volume from 12 units all the way to 250 units.  Geographically, he says they will all take place on the island of Montreal, all in neighborhoods that are growing and in need of housing:

“We choose our locations very carefully,” Jordan says. “That’s probably one of the things we do best. We choose very carefully where we want to build and we don’t overpay for those locations. That’s number one for us.”

Though they will be diverse in size and scope, Jordan also says that all of Mondev’s upcoming projects will feature the same high standard of care and attention to detail when it comes to their design and architecture:

“All our projects are designed very thoughtfully,” he says. “That’s something they all have in common. We have so much experience in apartment development that we know exactly how they need to be designed. We know what we need to include. We know what it takes to optimize the plans and make sure the tenants are going to be happy.”

As previously mentioned, Mondev is also now working with some of the most experienced and knowledgeable architecture and design firms in Montreal. When selecting those partners, Jordan says they looked for professionals that not only could design a beautiful building, but that could also “think functionally and think financially.”

“We looked for architects and engineers who could wear multiple hats,” Jordan says. “Finding that mix was actually quite difficult and it took years of experimentation, but we’ve been honed in on three of the best firms in the city, and now we work with them on almost every project we do.”

When it comes to achieving quality, Jordan also credits the personal involvement of Mondev’s owners. Between their four senior and junior partners, he says at least one owner is present in “every single coordination meeting” in order to “make sure things are done effectively.”  He also says that at the end of a project, when it comes to signing off on the finishing, all the partners are “very rigorous, myself included.”

“That’s an important role of mine, in fact,” he says. “At the end of a project, I do a walkthrough and I make a list, and then I follow up on those lists with the general contractors to make sure the buildings are finished 100 per cent to our standards.”

In a lot of cases, Mondev also manages their rental apartment buildings after they finish building them. That means their quest to achieve quality continues even after handing over the keys to a property. At that point, achieving quality means providing a high standard of custom service to tenants, which they admit can be a challenge, especially for a company like theirs, that’s growing at such a rapid pace:

“We want to be as present as we possibly can, but that’s easier said than done,” Jordan says. “Being present everywhere all the time is incredibly difficult. But the important thing is we’re trying to get better each and every single day.”

The next phase

As Jordan previously estimated, Mondev currently has at least 2,000 units in the pipeline, all taking place on land the company has owned for several years now. In 2023, he says they started construction of over 1,200 units, and this year they hope to replicate or exceed that number. By next year, they hope to have started the development on all or at least most of the land they had previously purchased.

“Again, these are all old files,” Jordan reiterates. “We’ve owned the land for several years and now we’re trying to get everything off the ground so that we’ll be in a significantly stronger position in the years to come.”

Delivering those units won’t take up all the company’s attention, however. Because they had such a large inventory of land, they recently took a two-year hiatus from buying more land, but in 2024 that hiatus ends and “we’re going to start the acquisition train once again.”

“We’re starting to look again,” Jordan says. “We’re evaluating new sites. We’re trying to find new opportunities to continue growing the business.”

“We’re builders,” he says. “We want to keep building. The questions are simply ‘where?’ and ‘what?’ When it comes to ‘where,’ we’re looking into new geographies. We’re still looking in Montreal, but we’re also looking in Toronto and Ottawa. As for ‘what,’ our next projects are very likely going to be bigger in scale.”

“The vision for Mondev is we want to do fewer projects, but bigger projects,” he concludes. “We’re talking about doing projects with 250 units, with 500 units, with 1,000 units. We’re looking at those kinds of projects moving forward. Once we work through our pipeline, we’re going to be in a really strong position to take on those kinds of projects and grow even more.”

For more on Mondev, their story, their approach with customer service, and the latest news on their current and future developments – and to get in touch with Jordan and his family – visit https://www.mondev.ca/