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What is Quality?

The hallmark we all aspire to when purchasing property is to purchase something of quality. When we attend other areas of our lives, we want the same. We want the fish that arrived that morning at the fishmonger, not the one that came in yesterday. We want the bread that was baked today, we want the clothes well-stitched to last, we want the car that will get us from A to B in comfort and with the least trouble. We want the wine that does not give us the headache the next morning.

Excellent property has both intrinsic and socially constructed qualities in play when one tries to determine what is good and what is to be discarded. That is the Secret Agent house view.

First, we can say that a quality property sets up the conditions for one to thrive: whether for a single person or a family, for a home, a place of business, or an investment. At the very least, a property will have the characteristics that make thriving in the future possible, so that the underlying conditions are there to make good on that potential.

A quality property can have a thousand faces. Its position should be right. The building structure should be sound and deliver what is expected of the property’s intentions. A quality property is usually flexible and adaptable in use. Financially, over the long term, a quality property provides value to its owner. Not just in capital appreciation, which can never truly be known in advance, but in the reduced stress of things not going wrong and upkeep being manageable because of the existing sound structure of the place. Quality, too, is a judgement that cannot be made without some understanding of the user and how they will interface with the property.

Usually, a quality property’s initial inheritance is good. The most solid and well-built Victorian terraces are usually the same sought-after homes today, well over a century later. Many things tend to hold constant: good dry, elevated land, well-ventilated building structures, orientation conducive to natural light, sturdy materials, potential for additions and improvements, clear title documents free of complications, friendly neighbours, pleasing aspects and views, good design and fine architecture.

Yet things also change. Rapid shifts in the urban environment can increase or diminish a property’s long-held quality. Nearby development can erode amenity to the surrounds or provide benefits. Infrastructure projects can do the same. In the urban setting, things are constantly being added and taken away. The climate imposes new realities, areas become prone to flooding which were not before, and some locations are likely to be more greatly impacted by heat than others. Property has plenty of what economists call externalities — sometimes positive, sometimes negative — which need to be factored into decision-making. Complicating the picture is that they are often unknown, dynamic and shifting. Deep complexity is rooted in all decisions across the urban terrain.

Quality property often limits the extent of the outside world penetrating through. Property is partly an exclusionary device, so that one can retreat from the hustle and bustle of outside activity and create a sanctuary for one’s own thinking and repose. It is also a bundle of rights with certain privileges — schools, libraries, parking, among many others. The rights attached to certain addresses provide much more than the mere land or structure at a location.

There are intrinsic elements to a good property that are long-lasting, and there are social preferences that are revised with time. Some properties are prone to being fads — judged quality one decade and not the next. Others are more constant in their classification. Quality property should be enduring. Warehouse living might be all the rage in one era only for it to be completely out the next. Preferences over home floor plans change with social practices. The tension between open-plan living and more compartmentalised ways of living is an enduring one that overlaps eras.

In recent times there has been an overwhelming focus on a property’s internal services: the size of the bedrooms, whether the ensuites are abundant enough, the technology in the home, the butler’s pantry and appropriate tapware in the kitchen. Less attention is paid to the quality of the property’s carcase — the bones of the place — general materials, the craftsmanship, the overall building structure. Herein lies the opportunity.

The work-from-home era has changed work practices and shifted what is meant by ‘quality’ in certain locations. But the long-term trend of rising inner-city demand should continue to mean that a quality address near a major commercial centre will usually prosper. The richness of transport, the best in food and drink, parks and general services, excellent schooling and work opportunities — these still give such locations a unique edge. There is, though, much more nuance here than was the case in preceding decades.

A changing climate will also bear on what marks a quality property in the future. We have not been very good at pricing in elements such as air quality and health considerations, many of which are still to be discovered. Social preferences may change, but biological preferences will not change greatly in a single lifespan. We know that there are biological reasons to do with safety for why we like to be on a hill looking down rather than in a gully looking up. We know that views are pleasing not just based on beauty but on biology. Those types of things will not change.

In Secret Agent’s eyes there will always be intrinsic elements to excellent property that are timeless. Fads and changes on the social front will usher in trends that come and go. Yet a changing world — climate, new scientific discoveries on health impacts, evolving working habits and social practices — means that what we expect from the built environment is going to change, and we must be willing to revise what we expect of it.