[Music] hey everyone how's it going John Coleman Norm shriever here p and morgage podcast we have a special edition because John we're up to number 20 believe it or not oh my God I still remember the day you kind of persuade bullied I don't know kidnap might better and these would just be interviewed there be no video in touch and look at us now um but obiously the reason um for today is we well we're you and I are G to do very little talking we I've B on or we've invited along John F from LIF side plant who for our clients who are looking at um building their own um basically from the from from the ground up being their own home John has a lot of wonderful information to share with us and potentially Sav um our clients a lot of money so we leave it to John yeah so te and mortgage podcast episode number 20 uh thanks everyone so much for listening tuning in sharing and our little humble podcast with John Coleman uh today we have an awesome guest John Foley of Life-Size plans who does something really really cool with his business uh John and and John Coleman thanks so much for joining us guys thanks for having it number one here today and that's John Foley so I I'll keep in the background and let John share his wisdom with us you know absolutely always happy to share and and thanks both of you for inviting me onto the podcast um we're a new business we're established here in Dublin we're just located off of Junction 9 on the M50 and what we do is we provide people that are thinking of building extending or renovating an opportunity to physically walk through their home before they build um we also work with Architects and and stakeholders in the commercial sector uh but primarily uh we work with people that are in the residential sector uh as part of the process we take architectural plans so these will typically be presented from an architect or an architectural designer at a scale of one is to 50 or one is to 100 and for our clients we typically see and understand that they have a difficulty in visualizing what the space is going to be like in terms of the actual size of the space they're able to recognize and identify what the bedroom is and where the toilet is and everything else but what we do is we blow up the drawing to the actual size of the house so we have an industrial unit here located in kmore Road uh it's a 6,000 squ foot industrial unit and what we do is we bring the plants into the showroom at a life-size scale and to assist our clients to understand and to be able to visualize ize what their home is going to be like we bring in walls we bring in Furniture beds couches kitchen islands tables and all of those types of things to enable our clients to be able to understand is the space big enough does the flow and function work in the house and as I'm sure as as much as you see John with the mortgage applications coming through to you uh we know how affordable and easy it is to get in the property ladder here in Ireland so what we what what we try and do is help people to uh ensure that they're spending their money wisely uh they're not making mistakes and changes on site and they're getting it right first time our contract uh our contract starts and finishes with the client coming in so we don't take on the design responsibility of the project so we would see clients coming in with their Architects we'd see some clients coming in on their own independently so as part of that process we will project their design on the ground they will have the opportunity to walk through it and fully understand how it is and how it feels and it's amazing when you see couples in the space you will be able to determine very quickly you know whether the design is meeting and delivering on expectations or not now my background is from the industry I studied architecture and I specialized in contract management and project management for the last 20 years and there's a huge commonality that I see across all of the projects that I've been involved in and one of those is dur during the delivery of any project there's always change nine times out of 10 that change typically tends to be design driven or client driven and I thought you were gonna say driven by the wife who who's walking through we don't we we don't want to cause any um issues here no so where I'm specifically referencing is on site so all of these changes are possible but if you're making the changes on site the cost of rectifying something that's already part of the design uh is much more than doing this at the design stage so you know for any client that's building their home they're going to have you know an an agreed contract with their Builder they're going to have a Bill of quantities they're going to have a set of construction drawings and that's going to be the forming the basis of the contract between uh the homeowner and the Builder so any deviation from that in terms of design during the construction process is going to be what's classified as a variation and that's going going to be an additional cost onto the bottom line of the project so what we enable people to do is to be able to make those fundamental changes at the very early stages so as they're not making them at the back end adding on to cost time and money on site now because my background is from the industry I know what's permissible what's not permissible for every client that comes in we recommend that they bring their architect with them some decide to come others don't it's entirely up to them and as part of the process we review every single room individually and we've got wall projection technology as well so we can project the elevations of the house so the clients can physically stand up in front of say their bedroom windows or their front door and really get a sense of the size and scale of each of the rooms so like amazing so we capture all of the changes electronically during the process of a walkth through so at the end of the session it's like a detailed set of minutes that are clients have that they can go back to their designer with for incorporating into the design so it just gives our clients confidence and certainty that they know that they're going to be doing it right first time that's incredible yeah what a fun service and and you mentioned you know that it saves in the long run on cost and time when there's changes and you know and and the hassle of changing things but it's also darn fun for these future homeowners right they I mean they're probably in a process where they have to wait wait wait for their home to be built and they're spending a lot of money so to actually see a mockup of what it's going to look like is probably exciting for yeah hugely and um it's it's always uh very fun as well for the clients because any clients that we've seen in they're so excited at the end of it they're really just wanting to kick on and get going with their project because there's so much Administration that goes through the process of you know uh developing Your Design getting it through planning permission and bringing the true procurement to get your Builder's appointment at times you know you you can start to lose uh lose your focus of what you're actually trying to do so what it really does is it just brings everyone back onto the fundamentals of what they're actually doing and that is creating a home you know it it's crazy like for some clients that we see coming in here we might see a house of maybe 340 Square met or 350 square met and when they're actually physically walk through the space they realize we don't actually require this big of a house so they've got the ability then to reduce the size of the footprint of the design and we've seen clients leave with a house reduction of up to 40 square meters and with the construction economics that we have here in Ireland I know they're a little bit different to medine but that's big big big money yeah yeah yeah and I'm sure there's a lot of subtle changes and a lot of people want big changes but like you know hey maybe we want to take down this wall and we don't want a separate dining room we want a great room instead or you know these common things a bigger bathroom you know maybe hey that closet's small you know let's get but you mentioned something earlier that you encourage people to come in with their architect I bet you you probably are too nice to say this I bet you cringe when they don't because people sometimes maybe are like oh let's move the kitchen to the other side of the of the house how much would that cost and you're like ah I can't really tell you that right yeah well like it depends like for some Architects that are you know that are open to the idea and receptive I would say for a lot of Architects they're in the The Learning phase about what we do and what we're focused on is educating those design stakeholders in the country about our services and what we do we understand they're all very busy but for those that have come in and used the space with their clients it's very quick that they start to realize okay this is going to actually save our practice time and money on our prelims because instead of having five and six design meetings with their clients they're able to Short Circuit the number of times that they meet with their client to get the design right so is you know there's not um an element of Faith from the end user to just trust and believe this is what we're getting it physically enables them to fully see the size of the space like I would I would have thought s that potentially for an architect your service is a great add-on in terms of differentiating themselves from other Architects be able to be able to say well listen folks this is what we offer this is what we do but here's what we're here's so we show you what it's going to look like in real life and and and bring your services to their clients rather than you find the clients and asking them with the architect come along and and see you because again what not said your own business but I would imagine that the people the architects who are kind of using your services it will help get them win the business I would have thought absolutely and that's one of the core functions that we focus on both for the commercial market so say companies that are doing uh designled fit outs that they can use our facility as an event space or as a marketing space to bring their prospective clients in demonstrate look at this is the level of care and attention that we're going to bring you through on your journey of spending you know x amount of money um if you go with us we want to make sure that everything is going to be delivered right and and this is the level of care and attention that you're going to get if you go with us uh for those Architects that have been through with their clients we see them coming back on a repeat basis and they're they're integrating what we do as part of their service so that's a really refreshing piece of feedback from the industry because you can see that there's a shift in terms of um in terms of operating procedure now for any business obviously the process in terms of the way you do things it can be very rigid and to get um you know businesses to alter the sequence with how they oper if they can see your Saving Time people do adapt that's one thing I've noticed within my own business that saving time I I see that as a huge win-win win you know like John pointed out for the Architects the builders you guys and the client and I bet when people like you mentioned use you once or twice and truly understand how much time and energy and money you could save everyone I bet you're indispensable I bet uh you know they come back to you again and again yeah it's interesting it's interesting to see and um like for for an awful lot of clients that that we see coming through um like we always recommend like when we're talking with clients especially when they're at the design development stage if they haven't already you know developed their their power team around them like say with their designer or or their mortgage provider we'd always kind of recommend that they start to get sort of cost certainty around how much it's going to cost and like you know what's a really beneficial exercise for for people that are thinking a building renovating or extending is engaging with um like um a project Q or a quantity surveyor just to get a pre-planning cost estimate because with the costs that are involved with the construction process in Ireland it is quite extensive I go one step further and there's no self-promotion in this I always would tell people that they regardless whether they use my service they know how much the banks are going to lend them because that then is the the starting point as to well what they can and cannot design for their um for the for their self- build project you know so that's almost a starting point hugely and it's critically important as well once you start from that point that you ensure that the design has been developed to meet the requirements of that budget because you know it's all well and good having having you know the Rolls-Royce design of of what you may want but you know when reality hits in terms of what you can physically afford you know there's certain exercises that has to happen to bring to bring the project back in on cost but John a couple questions I'm thinking about when you're talking about this and I know you've been in business a year or more but you have a ton of experience in this so what's the biggest project you've worked on uh residential let's say for homeowners the biggest uh you know uh buildout in your space what's the smallest and uh what's the biggest change that you've seen someone propose after going through your service yeah absolutely so the biggest project that we've worked on um in private residential not commercial now because some of the projects we've seen in commercial are up to 40 40 50,000 square foot the biggest private residence that we've seen was 12 a half th000 sare foot so that was a huge property it was over three stor what was the build I'm just being nosy now what was the build cost for that approximately they hadn't gone to Tender at the time but um I didn't get the impression that uh cost yeah yeah I think I think I I think the triangle of uh time cost and quality was well balanced on that one so it was the smallest like the smallest property that we've seen was um um it was like a 60 square meter H it was like a small townhouse that was getting reconfigured and it's very interesting because sometimes the smaller the property the more creative clients have to be to try and get everything that they require into the space um so it's s to 60 square meters you know so there's a big variance in terms of change the biggest change like like on a on average like we would see kind of the average property in Ireland coming through for walking through their home would be about 2,000 square foot see some kind of between 2 and 3,000 foot but for for for that kind of category we see on average between 12 and 14 fundamental changes per walkth through and that would include that would include always we would see huge amount of change in the master bedroom walking wardrobe on site that layout always gets reconfigured in some shape or form um we would all see always see open plan living uh in terms of kitchen living room dining room getting reconfigured external walls getting pulled out to create that additional flow and space for clients and bathrooms as well so the layout with the bathrooms would always get reconfigured and it's an interesting one because for a lot of clients that we speak to that have this perception oh no sure when we're on site we can determine where the toilet and the bat and the sink is going to go without kind of fully having an appreciation of the build process that the services are going to be going into the ground and predetermined locations before you actually cast The Raft or or or the slab uh and that you know if you're wanting to reconfigure the layout of your bathroom whilst yes you can do it you're going to be breaking out slabs to relocate services to reposition the layout of your bat your toilet and your sink or your shower um so it's always very interesting to see and uh we capture all of these changes throughout throughout the walkth through and it just gives clients the flexibility to be able to trial the layouts uh out but yeah I would say that's probably the biggest change we've seen other changes then is as I've said for the lack of huge houses um when they come in um and the clients actually realizing that they don't actually require the full extent or size of that house and like you know the the the figures for new build that are getting quoted here about two and a half thousand to 3,000 um cost per square meter uh and that's that's excluding you know professional fees site purchase costs I know that development levies are waved at the minute but when they kick back in it's not including inflation as well so if you take there always there's always an overrun then as well always yeah always an overrun but if you take the like a two and a half to 3,000 um Euro a square meter and for a client that's after being in and reducing the footprint of their house from say 350 down to 310 that's 40 square meters and you know the cost impact of that you know economically is huge whereas if they hadn't had the provision to be able to physically walk through their footprint and the next time that they're going to be able to experience it in life size is going to be on the site at at that stage it's too late the foundations are in the design is is too far progressed to try and reverse it back to make it smaller um so yeah it's look it's fantastic to see because the cost benefit that clients experience um it just enables them to reallocate funds for their project fit out yeah that's amazing and so speaking of of the clients and the ideal client for you who should be finding you when in the process should they be finding you and maybe if you want to give a plug you know what your website your social media phone number all that stuff so people could get in touch so the the optimum time or like you have to kind of look at the project stages so for any client that's looking at taking on a project they're going to go from you know the initial early Inception stage of brief development with their architect and engaging with their architect we see clients come in and engage with us as early as pre submission of their planning draws so after they engage with their architect they sit down they're have to working through their project brief about the functional requirements so they've got initial draft layouts they might be after doing the initial review of the layouts um so what they do is they come in and walk through their plans but then we also see clients up to and as early as right before commencing construction on site um so there's there's quite a vast time period between starting to construct on site and uh after initial engagement with their architect but the most critical thing is that it's it's before construction starts on site specifically for those that are going the self-build route um we have seen quite an uptake in interior designers using the space and for an awful lot of the interior designers they're working with the layouts of the rooms as they are currently um so like on our wall projection we can do all of the internal room elevations so if say the interior designer is looking at um displaying look at this is what your fireplace is going to be like with all of the the the impressions of dat rails and and you know feature lighting and all we can have all of that projected so as it's really immersive for the end user to be able to physically walk through this space and experience it um but yeah so that's kind of that's kind of like the high level timeline of when we see the clients coming in um for me you're kind of an epitome of where the modern world is basically going just in terms of Technology just bringing us to a new place and it looks like you seem to be groundbreaking in what you offer that's again i' never actually known about what what you offer until I put it I put it this way like I've been involved in the industry for for over 20 years and in the amount of time that I've been involved in it like probably for the last five years in my career I've been really focused on contract management and and design management and what happens in an awful lot of contracts is there'll be changes made through the process and that will add additional monies onto the onto the project cost and nine times out of 10 the promotion of the project or the end user typically ends up paying so that's the client so for us like we've got so much confidence in the value that we're presenting to the homeowner and to the self-build market in Ireland that we've introduced a money back guarantee that in the first 15 minutes after walking through your home if you don't feel that you're getting the value and the benefit from experiencing what it is we provide we'll provide our clients with a full money back guarantee shake hands and and finish off the session um so we've introduced that now uh as part of our oneye anniversary so we're open a year this month um so yeah it's been it's been it's been fun to sort of see the see the benefits that the clients get and and to be able to provide that confidence and reassurance for people that's awesome that's great and congrats Happ one your anniversary soon huh are are we going to be invited to the anniversary party that's my next question yeah absolutely I don't know how B part is going to be there's only there's only a handful of us here working in the business but um like that that's another aspect of it so with with the business the way we operate it's it's we only ever work with one client at a time so even though our premises is 6,000 square foot when you come in to walk through your house you're the only one here there's nobody else here uh we provide a really customer Centric service there's two of us involved in every walkth through um as I said to you before um the business is myself and my wife so we run the business together um and we work with each of our clients throughout the process in terms of managing you know the technology and the software that's involved in addition to physically dressing out all of the houses with the props uh straight through to to literally bringing them through the Journey of their home and capturing all of the comments and observations that they have so it's definitely interesting to see couples in the space and and you know we've seen a few arguments in our time as well but whatever happened whatever happens whatever happens in life size says in life size that's a great motto right there uh and how should people get in touch with you if you want to drop your email your website anything like that yeah cool so um I suppose one of the easiest ways for people to check us out is to check us out on our Instagram page so the Instagram page is LIF siiz plans lener uh our website is liiz plans ler.com um our email is lster lifis plans.com um and you can contact us if you're an architect that happens to be listening to the show uh what we do with all Architects and and stakeholders from the commercial sector is we we invite you know businesses to come in what we'll do is provide a demonstration of the technology show you the value that we can bring to your business um and and and enable you to sort of fully determine where it is we fit in to how you operate well everyone thanks a million for listening John thank you so much for sharing all that information with us truly amazing looking forward to sharing it with all our listeners and and any future clients who come our way because we were looking to build their own home I think what you have to offer is I love unique things and this is incredibly unique and GR breaking so congratulations again and then thank you all for listening yeah and thank you John thank you John and uh thank you everyone for listening and tuning in to the te and mortgage podcast episode number 20 and we'll see you next month