New opening
collaboration with Avery is already leading to new opportunities for the company. “A few other care providers have made contact with us – some quite well-known and prestigious.”
In fact, Phil tells me that with several potential new care home projects coming into view, the only thing holding Horizon’s ambitions back is the care sector’s use of performance bonds – whereby a contractor is obliged to give a significant financial guarantee that it will meet its obligations and successfully build the care home as per the terms of its contract with the provider. In practical terms, Phil tells me that the “ten per cent of ten per cent” rule applies, which means that for a £10m construction job, Horizon would need to have £1m on its balance sheet (ten per cent of £10m) in order to buy a £100,000 (ten per cent of ten per cent) performance bond. As Phil explains: “If I wanted to build four £10m care homes, I would have to have £4m on my balance sheet … so there is a restriction on how much we can do for the care world, which I find quite frustrating because my key role in the business is to find new work. “But what we find is that the funders of the care world will not bend the rules.”
Build and sustainability Braintree Mews, then, is a £8.4m care home, built over a period of 18 months and delivered by Horizon on-budget, with only a short delay in completion, which Horizon agreed with Avery ahead of time. The overall cost does not include the site itself (originally the location of an old college
building, which was demolished prior to Horizon taking control of the site), nor the final fit-out with furniture etc, which Avery themselves will carry out, and which had yet to happen when I visited Braintree Mews. Nonetheless, a couple of weeks away from completion, Braintree Mews looked highly impressive both inside and out, and I was particularly struck by the way the building incorporates three distinct finishes – two sections completed in two different types of brick, a third rendered and painted white – to break up what could easily have been a rather monolithic structure. As with any new build, there were a few construction challenges along the way. Phil tells me that, unlike Maplewood Court, sourcing timber was not an issue this time around, although Horizon had
some difficulty getting hold of bricks and steel, as well as the aggregate needed for the concrete flooring. In fact, looking forward, rather than the supply of materials, it is the global financial outlook – rising interest rates and so forth – that Horizon sees as being the most significant hurdle for future builds.
As always, sustainability played a key part in the build, and will continue to play a key role in the operation of Braintree Mews. Courtenay explains that, while Braintree Mews does not have BREEAM requirements, the entire project – from the initial design to the materials used in the build – was carried out with sustainability in mind. “We’ve got a procurement manager who manages all of our waste and tries to make sure that the waste that comes off of site is actually then reused or recycled rather than going to landfill,” she tells me. “She does a good job of liaising with the supply chain to ensure that they know that [sustainability] is something we are passionate about. “The majority of our suppliers are local, which is another benefit of picking a local main contractor.” Avery were specific regarding the sourcing of local materials, particularly when it came to bricks. Phil tells me that, while the sourcing was a logistical challenge, they did arrive without too much detriment to programme. “Avery wanted local, and we got local,” he says. At the end of the day, a high-quality build should mean, at least in theory, fewer issues going forward. “Operationally, [Avery] are looking to
keep their costs as low as possible,” Phil explains, “so the installation standards, the
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