Passion delivers: individuals that are rebuilding the retirement living sector

The modern retirement village sector was built by passionate businessmen and women, like Chas Jacobsen, Tony Baldwin, Mavis Gannon, the Knowles brothers, Loretta Byers, to name a few. Today a new breed is emerging with a drive to get things done faster, better and with greater resident focus. In this issue of The SOURCE we cover Alex Jimenez (pictured centre), a QLD developer who out of nowhere has five retirement living projects in development. How did he get them conceived, approved and in development? Jamie Sterland (pictured right) and Braden Johnson’s Teman Group has built the group to nine villages since launch in 2019. Jamie commenced his village career as a village gardener. How did they get the funds and management expertise?

Passion that only individuals can deliver is the key says Mark Bindon (pictured left), in a conversation with us this week.

Mark sold and departed from Oak Tree Retirement Villages last month where he and his partner Franco De Pasquale built 29 villages over 20 years.

He gave the example that his experience is that a DA approval should take 12 months for a new village and then two years to build, rather than the five to seven years talked about by the corporates.

Mark says he, as CEO, would make all the approaches to councils and planners, to personally explain why their village was vital infrastructure. He would often demand a meeting with the Mayor as well.

The results speak for themselves – over one new village created every year. This compares to a current new village build rate of around just 20 a year for the whole sector.

Over the next few months, we are going to showcase each week a passionate leader that is creating new villages and seniors housing. Watch this space.