2018 was an interesting year, very favourable (with the usual caveats, more on that later), and we still look at 2019 with some optimism. Here are the highlights.
1. Volume of building was up, seven homes were either finished or started during the year. That is my most productive year to date.
2. Completion of the Live33st.com purpose built rental. This six suite rental project was a tremendous effort and could feature its own website (and it does www.live33st.com) to tell the complete tale. Nothing more to say here other than it was a humbling experience to get it built and financed, and many lessons were learned. Will it ever get repeated? Hard to know.
3. The market really changed in the latter third of the year. Ouch. I feel for the business owners who are experiencing terrible personal losses and hope they can recover.
4. Oversupply is a real problem, costs went up a lot to build, and land prices actually started to adjust faster than in prior downturns.
5. I rediscovered how much leverage can kill a home builder and fortunately steps taken in 2017 allowed me to survive that part of the business cycle in 2018. Leverage utilized was applied very carefully at the right time, in the proper amount, and invested cautiously.
6. Once again my network of supporters, suppliers and contractors came through. Like they say, your network is your net-worth.
2018 leaves me with a lot to be grateful for and plenty of opportunities to improve. 2019 is a real puzzle. Let's get to that in a future post.
The year ends and the finsihing begins. A fitting conclusion for 2018.