Property Focus: The Interview – Mike Dove

MIKE Dove is a highly respected and well-known figure in the Yorkshire commercial property sector.

A former partner at Knight Frank, Mr Dove and colleagues Mike Haigh and Jonathan Phillips left to found Leeds-based chartered surveyors and property consultants Dove Haigh Phillips three years ago.

He tells Deputy Editor Ian Briggs how he and his team are drawing on their experience to prosper during the downturn and why we need to look forward rather than pontificate on the past.

1. What are your views of the current state of the commercial property and property development markets?

“The way to look at the market is that it’s alive with opportunity but stifled by the lack of liquidity. We act for, among others, family-based business, we act for owner managed businesses, publicly quoted business, global corporates and we act for public bodies.

“We act for many family-based businesses including the Thornhill estate. These firms are not about boom and bust. They are about the longer term, they look forward and they work on succession planning.

“They have different values and I think it’s their time. Be it in development or investment they plan long term and we respect that.

“Clients we act for are frustrated by the fact that property deals take up a disproportionate amount of management time. If they want to offload old sites it’s a burdensome process.

“We think that needs speeding up. The whole transactional process needs speeding up. We need a simplified legal system.

“With liquidity what we will see is a gradual change. But property retains a unique feature which is the prospect for growth and value and that hasn’t gone away.”

2. What key challenges and pieces of legislation do you think will most affect your sector over the coming months?

“As the economic downturn progressed we saw a ‘flight to quality’. That flight to quality, including advice, is provided by the conditions that become necessary in business: space to solve problems, to look forward and to step up to the job required.

“That’s why we’ve got a good order book and instructions. The real challenge is looking forward and spotting and delivering next years deals, rather than commentating on last years problems. For us that’s where the challenge is: looking forward.

“We’ve got excellent connections into the market; into decision makers and key stakeholders. We can apply that attention span that is so difficult to achieve.

“On empty rates, obviously the damage has been done now and unfortunately we got the impact of the legislation during a difficult market.”

3. Why do you think Yorkshire is a good place to do business?

“Because people work hard. Because people speak their mind and I think people have values. They’re cost conscious.

“The demographics and individual people are the region’s biggest asset and lots of people sense that.”

4. What is your favourite building/development in Yorkshire and why?

“Prologis Park in Bradford. It’s an inspirational project. You’ve got two businesses; Prologis, a pioneer of distribution facilities, and retailer Marks & Spencer, working together with Bradford Council who are a ‘can do’ local authority.

“It will provide 90 acres of grade A employment development and it’s about much needed jobs for the city.”

5. If you could improve anything in the region, what would it be?

“I think if the public and private sectors could see each other’s positions I think you’d get more respect and I think it would be a big move forward.

“Prologis is an example of that and what can be achieved.

“On a separate note, I’d make Mike Firth’s business conference (the Yorkshire International Business Convention) available to a much wider audience.”

6. What barriers have you had to overcome during your career and how have you overcome them?

“Few property brokers are particularly instinctive about understanding their clients’ needs.

“When Mike (Haigh) and I realised that if you understand how your clients work and what part property plays in their business, at that point we made a quantum leap forward.

“It’s what I call ‘hands on corporate real estate’.”

7. What was your first job and how did you enter your current line of work?

“When I was a trainee surveyor I let houses in Ossett and Dewsbury. That was career building.

“I think careers is the worst taught subject (at school) but I knew I had an interest in property and people.

“I like looking at properties and what fascinates me is what might change and what might be there in its place. Looking forward was what really interested me.”

8. What do you most enjoy about your job?

“You never stop learning. Seeing the team flourish. When a client comes back for more advice.

“We take a pride in what we do so for us it’s learning, client confidence and it’s seeing the team flourish.”

9. What is the best piece of advice you’ve ever been given?

“Begin with the end in mind and remember to do a fair deal.”

10. And the worst?

“When our then London colleagues prevented us from taking part in a pitch for the agency on Wakefield Europort.

“However, several years later Mike Haigh and I won it from the Leeds office (of Knight Frank). Two million sq ft of development ensued.”