There is a passage by Guglielmo Pelliccioli, founder of Il Quotidiano Immobiliare, that deserves a moment of reflection.
“Builders, property developers, real estate professionals: do you realise how much of people’s happiness depends on you, on the way you bring your projects to life? Perhaps you’ve never considered it because happiness doesn’t appear on a balance sheet and cannot be measured in financial returns. Yet it is the very essence, the ultimate goal, of the sustainability you now, quite rightly, place so much importance on.”
A powerful thought, and a reminder of what truly lies at the heart of our profession.
A building designed today may be home to people for sixty or seventy years, perhaps longer. Families will make their lives there, children will grow up, birthdays will be celebrated and loved ones mourned. And we are shaping the setting for all of this today, through decisions made in meeting rooms, on construction sites, when approving budgets and in conversations with contractors and suppliers.
The industry has learnt to speak the language of sustainability, energy efficiency and environmental certification.
Now another dimension is beginning to receive the same recognition, particularly in the more forward-thinking segments of the market: the inner wellbeing of the people who inhabit these places. It is a dimension that reaches beyond what can be seen or measured, into the feelings of welcome, security and belonging that become part of people’s lived experience, often for as long as they call a place home.
This is precisely where Habitat Evolutivo® works.
The method introduces a dimension of responsibility into real estate development that has rarely been articulated in quite these terms. The memory of a place is acknowledged before new layers are added. The people involved in bringing a building to life are engaged in ways that give deeper meaning to their contribution. And the buyer enters into a relationship with a place that has been approached as a living presence, rather than simply a product to be sold.
A developer who embraces this approach adds something to the value of a project that conventional financial statements cannot capture: the future happiness of those who will inhabit it. An invisible asset, reflected in the lives of families for many years to come.
When you think about your next development, and the people who will be living there twenty years from now, what would you like to leave behind for them?