20 COMMENT
BUILDING A SOLID REPUTATION
xxxxx Hugo Reeve
BRiCS is a new housebuilder on the block which is attempting to raise the bar on quality and sustainability. James Parker speaks to co-founder Hugo Reeve.
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HE BELIEVES THERE’S AN ERRONEOUS EXPECTATION THAT ALL LOANS SHOULD BE COMPLETELY RISK-FREE
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RiCS is a new SME housebuilder targeted at building high-quality homes in the south east, which launched just before the pandemic hit in 2020. It was founded by ex-Crest Nicholson directors Hugo Reeve and Timothy Sadler, and professionals from that fi rm as well as other plc housebuilders. They had seen how it was done at the volume housebuilding end, and wanted to combine their skills to offer a different proposition. Reeve tells me that the focus is on creating designs tailored for their settings that will help create “sustainable communities.” He explains: “We’ve all been schooled in place making and good design, creating places with a more bespoke, individual character that respects its locality and setting.” Supporting this, he says that BRiCS “chooses its architects very carefully, for each scheme to have the right skill set; it is more expensive, but we get a higher value result.”
acked by an investment fund, the fi rm found its feet with a strategy to build schemes ranging from 30 to 100 homes, mainly in Hampshire and Sussex, now with a team of around 12. The aim is schemes “large enough to create a character, with at least a street or two.”
In terms of the business plan, having already completed affordable homes as part of Shopwyke Lakes in Chichester (to a higher quota than the Section 106 required), Reeve says the aim is to pursue a mix of similar schemes in addition to private sale. He says this is partly pragmatic, to give BRiCS a healthy balance between private sale and affordable housing for Registered Providers in its work stream the fi rm is yet to complete its fi rst private sale development.
PANDEMIC ORIGINS The fact that BRiCS was launched a month before the arrival of Covid was not ideal timing to say the least. However the nascent fi rm having emerged from the pandemic a growing success is even greater testimony to its strengths in the current market. At launch, there were a couple of higher-rise Build to Rent projects on the books to tide them over, but as lockdowns loomed, “the opportunities rapidly disappeared,” and it was a slower start than anticipated.
The board had to pivot towards a clutch of smaller “suburban” projects, says Reeve. ortunately, the fi rm’s investor was very patient” and believed in the combined
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