Why do Perth people resist apartment living?

Perth travellers love staying at hotels and Airbnbs in the world’s great cities — Paris, Barcelona, Rome, New York — so they can experience what it’s like to actually live smack in the middle of a bustling metropolis.

When you hail from Perth’s suburban Sahara you don’t need to spend hours in museums and churches. You get a huge high by simply rolling out of bed and stepping into a cafe, joining the crowds on the bustling boulevards, people watching on park benches and, after dinner and a show, walking — not driving — back to your back to your digs. Big-city bliss!

Yet you suggest to the average home owner they downsize and move closer to the Perth CBD to live like a European all year round you’re likely to cop a spray from the garden hose: “You’re not getting me out of my castle!”

Our resistance to apartments can be traced back to a lack of tradition, according to Mt Lawley-based property developer Tim Willing.

“Apartments are the norm for Europeans. Most of us grew up in large homes on big blocks so are not part of our collective memory. Those now making the move are the first generation of apartment dwellers,” Willing says.

“Our lack of experience with apartments has led to the belief that apartments are lesser than single residential homes. You buy an apartment not because of the benefits — the closeness to amenities, the sense of community, the ease of locking up and leaving — but because you can’t afford anything else,” he continues.

“But it is not just a Perth fixation. It’s a national problem. It is almost seen as a god-given right to build a bespoke four-bedroom, three-bathroom brand-new home and affordability is predicated on that, which is an incredible proposition.”

Our resistance to apartment living and what can be done about it will be discussed this Friday by Willing, Human Urban development director Corey Sidone and Hillam Architects principal David Hillam as part of Perth Design Week, an invaluable once-a-year examination and celebration of our immediate environment.

Sidone says that buyers are so used to the luxury of space it is understandable they balk at paying a similar price for something smaller despite the attractiveness of the location. It’s all a matter of good design and education, he says.

“Our apartments are actually much bigger on average than, for example, Sydney, where they are building much bigger projects with smaller products, because it is what our market is demanding,” Sidone says.

“Buyers are beginning to understand that with good planning a two-bedroom space of 85 to 90 square metres is a place you can actually live in.”

Willing, like Sidone, believes that the prejudice against apartments is waning because those travellers to the great capitals are staying in apartments as luxurious as the single-residential homes we’ve become accustomed to.

It is these upscale apartments and not the dog boxes of our prejudiced memories and imaginations that is driving medium and high-density developments in Perth and helping to alleviate the housing crisis and the urban sprawl and all the costs and nightmares that brings.

“Old-school apartments reeked of institutions. Everything was the same. There was no character. Even the name was terrible. Flats. There was no way to express yourself,” Willing says.

“We haven’t had the apartments they have in places like Paris or Milan or Europe, with more space and grandeur. We are now seeing these kinds of apartments being built in Perth and it is changing attitudes.”

Willing also believes that this change of attitude is not just the experience of staying in luxury apartments in Europe but the whole experience of living in vibrant, densely populated cities of Europe.

“People are becoming more aware of what they’re missing out on in suburbia. They see that losing a bit space is more than made up for by the easy access to amenities and the opportunities for connection,” Willing tells me in the cafe at the base of his award-winning residences on the corner of Clifton Crescent and Central Avenue in Mt Lawley that’s become a model for closeness creating community.

Sidone agrees that when building apartments the environment is as crucial as the quality of the build, which is central to the philosophy of Adrian Fini’s Hesperia spin-off Human Urban (H-U). The company’s adaptive reuse of the Shenton Park Rehabilitation Hospital is a stunning example of not just building apartments but creating an attractive environment.

“Access to amenities and a generally vibrant atmosphere is what you need to draw people away from homes into apartments. It is the trade-off for losing space. So activation of an area through such things as restaurants, shopping and entertainment is a big part of what we do,” says Sidone.

“Density doesn’t make any sense in outer suburbs. If people have to get in their cars and drive 20 or 30 kilometres to get to a restaurant or to see a movie you are defeating the purpose of density. But, of course, you have the challenge of NIMBY-ism,” Sidone says.

Poor construction, high strata fees — the perennial barriers to entry

While the eye-popping apartments being built by Willing in and around his beloved Mt Lawley, Sidone’s team at H-U and Hillam, whose Riviere Residences is the latest addition to the forest of towers in Canning Bridge, are changing our view of apartments.

However, the prejudices remain, which I found when I posted the Perth Design Week event on Facebook.

My page was hit by a series of angry posts about exorbitant strata fees and poor build quality, together with the kind of nightmare stories that featured on Four Corners in September last year.

Willing acknowledges that inferior design and construction, which bump up strata fees, has been a big problem, citing imported cheap Chinese materials as a major contributor to the poor construction. However, he believes the government is working to fix this.

“We now have Design WA [“a suite of policies that aim to create built environments that reflect the distinctive characteristics of a local area”] that is leading to better design outcomes,” Willing says.

While there is clearly a demand for this new generation of high-end apartments that are perfectly suited for well-heeled downsizers and families who can afford larger, more luxurious apartments, these quality builds will not make much of a dent in the housing crisis.

“The cost of construction is too high to make the numbers stack up for moderately priced apartments. They cost more to build than what they can sell them for. Some builders are able to make them work because of their special circumstances, but in general they are currently impossible to make work,” says Property Council of WA executive director Nicola Brischetto.

“If you build a premium product in the Western suburbs for $2 millions you will find willing buyers. If you build a multi-storey tower in Midland you are not likely to find enough buyers willing to pay the price to cover costs,” Brischetto says.

While Willing builds exclusively in the luxury end of the apartment market, he is keen to assist in alleviating the housing crisis with more modestly priced projects that will enable those on lower incomes to put a roof over their heads. This will only happen, he says, if the government partners with the building industry.

“The price of land is the problem,” Willing argues. “The biggest thing the government could do is identify land that is lazy and make it available to property developers at little or no cost or perhaps a commitment to buy a number of units for social housing.

“The land along the railway from East Perth though to Maylands and Bayswater should be full of innovative, beautiful housing that is relatively affordable. A partnership between the government and the building industry could turbocharge construction and make an impact on the housing crisis.”

Perth Design Week is from March 20 to 27. Mark Naglazas is chairing a panel on apartments with Corey Sidone, Tim Willing and David Hillam at The Mark in the State Buildings on March 21 at 12pm.