Hello, dear friend,
When I initially shared my story about how I built a building in my sabbatical year without previous experience, I felt exposed, confused, and curious. I don’t often feel comfortable sharing details about my projects, but I was also very interested to know what kind of questions and reactions I would receive.
I was so grateful for all your messages and follow-up questions that I was encouraged to write a second part, more tailored to what you wanted to read. All the following topics are based on your comments and questions.
Ways of communicating: How did I find successful ways to communicate with all the teams?
One of the biggest challenges for me was to find proper ways to communicate with the various teams towards actions and results. My intention was not to segregate different categories of people depending on their jobs, but I felt I was speaking different languages than most of the workers on the building site. They often confirmed all the aspects by looking me directly in the eyes only to do something completely different the next day—or worse, do nothing at all.
At first, I felt frustrated and disrespected. To me, it was unacceptable to tolerate behavior like that. I could not think of any leverage to use with them as I needed their input more than they needed mine.
I learned to bring third parties into the conversations to share the accountability. For example, the windows could only be installed when the building team finished the walls. I connected the two teams to ensure they aligned on the installment date. The window producer was incentivized to deliver sooner to get their money sooner, so he made sure the progress went according to plan.
I established intermediate milestones. Instead of checking the stock of materials every week to make sure we ordered in time, I would informally check the most important ones every other day to avoid activity coming to a stop because we missed a timely order.
I understood it was not about communication or miscommunication—it was more about a different interpretation of results. For me, there were high stakes in getting the results I wanted, but for the builders, there were almost none. I identify myself with my working methods, including my results and how others perceive my work. Most of the workers I interacted with were comfortable with being late, making mistakes, and not paying close attention. I still wonder if it was about standards, lack of implication, or both.
The Design: How did I make the decisions?
I really loved completing the last part of my building project: the interior design. I imagined the details, the vibe of the flats, the types of flooring and ceramics, and more. The problem was that by the time I reached the stage of choosing all these details, my patience was worn thin. I wanted to choose just anything to finish the job faster. I did not care to see all the options and do all the comparisons as I did at the beginning of the project. I only wanted to choose something, install it, and for the teams to finally be out of my sight.
I wish I had been able to keep more energy flowing for this phase for more reasons. I wanted to do something enjoyable in the end, to influence the style of the flats more, and to know that the final decisions were the ones I keep seeing the most. I spent a lot of time and money on the best isolation for the building that no one sees now and made a quick decision on the curtains and shades which I am sure could have been chosen better.
The search for meaning: How did I give meaning to a project in real estate?
After my job at Amazon, I promised myself that I would only initiate projects that I found meaningful. I had the experience of having started the retail business which was subsequently difficult to relate to, so I strongly wanted to avoid that empty feeling while working hard. Aside from getting motivation from the end result contributing to my financial freedom, I needed a stronger “why,” which initially was hard to identify.
I remember visiting the building site several times per day to manage all the teams and assess their progress. All the challenges and ongoing thoughts coupled with climbing the stairs up and down many times per day left me too tired to look at the bigger picture. But I recall a moment six months into the project during the evening as I went for a walk at the job site. It was a quiet and unusual vibe compared to during the day. I stayed in front of the building for a few minutes feeling speechless. It was far from being ready and didn’t look nice—it was a huge concrete brick skeleton. But I felt how one hundred years later this building would still be there telling my story. It gave me a strong sense of legacy, although I am not an architect nor a builder.
It also gave me the sense of having used the time wisely, as sometimes six months pass by just like that without being able to say what that time brought, and in those specific six months, a building showed up according to my imagination.
The myth of passive income: is renting flats out a passive activity?
I had many opportunities to sell the flats or the entire building, but my plan was to rent the flats long-term and create a small community of people who love living in a beautiful, quiet building. So I wanted to meet these people personally to make sure they were my kind of people. And most of them are. But this does not mean it’s easy to be a landlady. I sometimes laugh about creating a social media account named “The Adventures of a Landlady.” I promise you I would have many followers who find my content very funny. I get all sorts of requests and announcements from my tenants, from the noises they hear from their neighbors to the cars parked on the street to the intensity of the gas stove. To their opinion, all of these nuisances have to be checked, moved, or changed by the owner of the flat they live in.
I am still looking for a model that works for me, but so far I can confidently say that passive income from renting is not that passive.
Would I do it again?
This was the most popular question I received from you following my last article. You all were curious about the duration of the project and afterward. When I finished the building and the first tenant was able to move in—which could be the topic of another article—I promised myself that I would never undertake such a project again. I felt it was too far away from my areas of interest and expertise. Plus, it was a little too wild for me.
Four years later I have to admit that I would do it again.
I would adapt the new project with the lessons from the previous one, but I would love to create another piece of architecture that represents my creative and entrepreneurial spirit.
I would highly appreciate it if you share your insights after reading this article, or, if you could share it with people who might find it valuable.
Many thanks,
Alexandra