Introducing a high-rise building that enhances working from home
Exploring new housing alternatives that bring a better work-life balance for a new economy model
If something has changed more than anything during this pandemic, it’s the way we work. Since the beginning of the Covid-19 crisis more than 5 million Canadians have been working from home, and recent polls show that this new trend could become permanent to some extend.
Based on a poll from the Vancouver based firm Research Co, 65% of those surveyed expressed interest to continue working from home to some extent after the pandemic.
This new reality has forced architects and developers to ask themselves very important questions:
- How can we ensure that people who work from home feel it is an enjoyable experience?
- How to avoid the potential negative impact of working from home in their family life?
- How will working from home affect new units layout and buyers preferences?
With the pressure on real estate prices driving the market to produce smaller units, it seems unlikely that after the pandemic bigger units will be financially viable and buyers will be able to afford them.
New design solutions for residential high-rise buildings could answer the previous questions with a positive outcome. The answer lies in combining designs, a series of city policies, and financial decision.
1. Defining the needs
Working from home has disrupted the way we interact with our home. It has forced to us to re-think and our family space in order to accommodate space for work. Some of us thought that would be a short term thing. We started working on the sofa, the dining table, or on a small desk in the bedroom. But the days have gone by and we we have been already 5 months working from home.
Personally I have been upgrading the desk and the chair, but what if this situation extends for one year, two years, or even becomes permanent to some extent? Things would have to change to incorporate a more long term solution. That launched me into a research mode to narrow down the requirements for the ideal home office and how to incorporate it in residential buildings.
For a home office to be successful, the space will need to comply with the following parameters:
a) People can work without distractions
b) Allows people to separate physically work from personal life
c) Doesn’t compromise the health of their family if people from outside come to visit for a business matter.
d) It has adequate dimensions, sunlight, and ventilation
Given the previous parameters, the most immediate idea that comes to mind would be to move to an apartment with two bedrooms. A second bedroom used as an office in an apartment has the potential to satisfy conditions a, d and b, depending on the family size and routines. But certainly can’t satisfy condition c. In addition, to rent or to purchase a bigger unit is a big investment and a long commitment in time, which might not be an option for many people due to financial constrains.
2. The hypothesis
So in order to satisfy all the previous conditions, ideally the home office should:
- be a space in the same building.
- Physically detached from your main apartment
With all that in mind, we imagined a hypothetical residential high rise building of 34 floors.
Typically a building has a mix of units of 1, 2, and 3 bedrooms to satisfy different needs, and in our model we assumed:
- 60% of studios and 1 bedrooms
- 40% of a combination of 2 and 3 bedrooms,
These numbers are pretty standard these days.
3. An alternative solution
So given the fact that we have a total of 294 units, and not of them will need an office space, how could we provide some office spaces in the building separate from the apartments?
The answer to this is in a combination of getting creative with the amenity areas and monetizing them to make them financially viable.
This proposal suggest the introduction of amenity floors at different levels that will be divided into small flex spaces that can be rented by the building residents. From now and on we will call these floors flex floors.
4. How many flex floors do we need?
To define the number of satellite flex floors we need. First we needed to calculate the number of spaces spaces we need. We assumed that first of all only 60% of people will be willing to work from home in the future, attending to the previous polls.
290 units x 60% of people willing to work from home = 174 residents
In addition, the people who has a 2 or a 3 bedroom apartment are more likely to transform one of their bedrooms into a office. For that reason we will assume only the people who live in a 1 bedroom or a studio will find this option appealing.
174 residents x 60% units being 1 Bedrooms = 105 units
105 units will be the number of apartments that are likely to need a flex space to use as an office in the building.
5.How does the satellite space look like?
Each flex space should have enough room to allow different programs related to the daily life. The program will evolve through time, from a single office, private party room, exercise room,etc. depending on the day and the hour.
With that in mind an area of 220 sq.ft with a dimension of 22' x 10' would give us that desired flexibility.
6.How many flex spaces could we fit in one flex floor?
With that in mind we took a typical floor plan and divided into spaces of 22' deep x 10' wide, leaving a 5' balcony in front to have some outdoor space. With that configuration we could accommodate a total of 18 flex spaces in a whole floor, that would mean with 5 floors we would have 90 flex spaces, which is close enough to our target.
7.How are the flex floors positioned in the building?
We positioned one flex floor every 5 floors. The reason behind is to minimize the use of the elevators.That would limit peoples interaction and make it feasible to take the stairs to go to their flex space from your apartment. This model would allow to create neighborhoods of residents every 5 floors.
However since the value of real estate increases as you go up the floors, we recognize that an alternative solution would be to put all the flex spaces in the podium and make them smaller, similar to a We Work.
Additional services like washrooms, lounge and board rooms, as well as, a separate elevator from the street would also add versatility to the proposal make it more attractive. The main goal is to capitalize on the benefit of the free area that amenities give to developers and monetize them. However this is something we will explore in the next iteration of the design.
8. What is the cost for the developer and for the residents?
Each flex floor would have an area of about 6,800 sq.ft. and if we consider that the construction cost for a high-rise is around 381 $/sq.ft., each of that floors would cost around 2.6 M. If we have a total of 5 flex floors in the development that would translate into a 13 M cost.
It is important to mention that this part of the building would be exempt from taxes from the city so the cost that the developer should make up for would be just the construction.
It might seem quite an extra cost but it is also a benefit for the residents, and the developer would be able to transfer that cost to the building residents. We will explore some business models later below.
9. The business model
We have identified two potential models:
a) Sell product
In this model each of the flex spaces can be purchased by an apartment owner. In this case each flex space would be sold at market value and the developer would have to pay construction taxes when building them.
That spaces could be sold by and used by building residents.
b) Rental Product
The second option is to maintain this flex spaces as part of the strata property and rent them for a fixed time to an individual resident.
If we have a total a total of 34,000 sq.ft of flex space and we assume a rent of 1.5 $/sq.ft that would generate a net income to the strata of 51,000$.
A new building has a strata cost around 0.6 $/sq.ft which thanks to the extra income generated by the flex spaces could bring down considerably the strata cost for the residents. A self sustained building, with very low maintenance fees, would be a great selling feature.
10. How is it managed
Nowadays technology is key. All this flex spaces could be controlled and booked though an app. An app would allow for a different rental models as well were the flex spaces could be booked for weeks or days with ease and reducing the administrative hassle for the strata.
11. The value proposition for cities
Solutions like this could transform dramatically the core of cities. There would be no need for strictly “Business Districts”. Cities that focus their downtown area as business districts become dead zones at night and weekends. Walking the streets of Vancouver during the pandemic illustrates the need for promotion of mixed use zoning to make active communities everywhere rather than focused in certain zones. City’s need to encourage this by permitting applicants to exclude such features as amenities.
This is just an example of how new buildings can respond better to a pandemic situation to improve not only the work-life balance of their inhabitants but also to contribute to a model were the building generates revenues for its residents and makes it more affordable to live in it.
Thanks to Gwyn Vose for sharing his insight with me while producing this article and providing valuable data and help refining it.
And to all of you, thanks for reading!
