The Conversation: Concert Properties’ David Podmore walks us through three decades in Vancouver’s real estate industry

David Podmore has more than a few stories. The co-founder and long-time CEO of real estate developer Concert Properties officially retired at the end of September (though he still holds the chair emeritus title). We met at Concert’s Downtown Vancouver office to talk Expo 86, the Olympics and other tales from over three decades in the real estate industry in Vancouver.

You’re from Vancouver but were living in Edmonton before you came back to work on Expo 86. What’s the story behind that?

I got a call from the president of Expo 86, who told me to get down to Vancouver right away. So I went down, we talked for a couple of hours and he said he wanted me to buy a house in Vancouver and be here in two weeks to take a job as the vice-president of planning, design and engineering for Expo 86. I talked to my wife, she agreed and we did it.

What was it like being on the ground floor of Expo?

It was really exciting. I started my career in engineering then went into planning and then business school. So it was an opportunity to learn more about how you do a project at that scale. The story was that they had the land for Expo 86, but they didn’t. It was 225 acres, 150 or so titles. We had to negotiate each one of those. There was an active railyard, we had to take it out and find a place in South Vancouver for the rail.

I was responsible for everything permanent. Expo 86 was one of the few world’s fairs and most of them did it with temporary roads, sewers, water and all that stuff. We said, Look, we’ve got 225 acres in False Creek, so we did all permanent utilities, roadways, built [BC Place], built the Cambie Street Bridge. The intent was that at the end of the world’s fair all the temporary stuff would be removed, and all of the permanent stuff would be services for the future development.

After Expo, you co-founded Concert Properties. How did that come about?

We partnered with the telecommunications workers’ pension plan and created a public company with private owners with myself, Jack [Poole] and some others. The first thing we did was with the City of Vancouver—we entered into an agreement to build rental housing on nine sites along False Creek. At the time, people were destroying rental buildings and building condos. That model was a bit ahead of its time, partnering with developers and using city land.

Then in 1992, we were growing fast and had big cash requirements. We researched how a pension fund could own a property like this and develop it and avoid risk to their pensions. It’s quite unique; there are only three in Canada, and we have two of them. Then we bought out the private owners and sold our interest to the pension ownership, which still owns it today. [Ed note: Today, Concert is owned by some 50 union and management pension plans and institutional investors that represent over 200,000 Canadians.]

What have been the biggest challenges over the last three-plus decades and how have you been able to overcome them?

We haven’t fared too badly at all, honestly. We did go through a couple of recessions. And certainly in the last 20 years I’ve consciously diversified the company. We do industrial—we have a large industrial holding, and we do seniors’ living facilities.

I wanted to diversify so that we gave ourselves some protection in times of downturn. And the latest test of that was COVID. We didn’t do too badly in that. Our rental apartments in Toronto dropped to about 65 percent vacancy but we had other things that were still strong so we were able to recover quite nicely.

How can the government fix the current housing crisis?

Well, you’ve heard it before and it really  is true. There’s a serious problem with [the time it takes for] approvals. We’ve got Langara Gardens [in South Vancouver]. We can build almost 3,000 units there across 22 acres, with a lot of social housing and lower-cost rental. We’re in our eighth year now trying to get approval for that.

Different levels of government have announced a lot of different housing initiatives. Are they on the right track?

They’re not going fast enough. They have to get permits and approvals done in a timely way. Those are the two big ones. And this might sound odd, and I may be alone on it among my peers, but they’re going too slow, expecting way too much and not doing any good planning. Broadway is a great example of that. One day you sit down in a room, put a line around 500 blocks of a city and that’s your plan. It doesn’t work like that. It’s not a way to get good quality.

Is that where you think that Concert separates itself, in the quality aspect?

We have a founding agreement that has three principles within it. One is that, because we’re owned mostly by union pension funds, the expectation is long-term, not short-term, gains. And because we use 100-percent union labour on our sites, we believe the quality reflects that. And the third one is that we’ll work to give things back to the community. Often that means we design projects, supervise them and operate them, like BC Place or Vancouver General Hospital. Then we give to things like BCIT’s Trades and Technology Centre, the St. James Cottage Hospice and the BC Burn Fund Centre.

Along with Expo, you were heavily involved in the Olympics, including helping to secure the plebiscite  vote that brought the Games here. What was that process like?

I think there have been 17 plebiscites for different Olympic Games and only one city [that had a plebiscite] ended up hosting. [Former premier] Gord Campbell was good with me. He gave latitude to make decisions. Normally, everything would have to go through committees of ministers and Gord said, “No, you decide what you’re going to put in and you put it in.” It maybe sounds a bit corny, but the governments and the municipalities have to do more of that. They have to find the people they know will do it right and trust. But there was a lot of campaigning. There was a period when I was out every breakfast, lunch and dinner. We had a limited window to get it done. But it worked out.

What was the night like when the results went down—do you remember?

Yeah, I do. I said, “Phew.”

That’s it? No party, no champagne?

I was too tired.

This conversation has been edited and condensed.

Quick Hits

Pet peeve: Dirty windows.

Hobbies: Woodworking, fly fishing, blacksmithing.

Most memorable concert: Seeing Jesse Winchester in a small bar in Richmond, Virginia.

Guilty pleasure: All shellfish, but B.C. spot prawns are the best.

Last book I read: Cattle Ranch [by Nina Shoroplova], the story of the Douglas Lake Ranch