Archive for July, 2006

Madeline Hill; Senior Community Pioneer

Monday, July 31st, 2006

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Madeline Hill may be unique among senior community developers. She created her multi-million dollar city, an upscale, yet affordable group of single-family homes, condo s and apartments — not so she could become a rich and powerful CEO, but so she could hand the whole thing over, debt-free, to the home-owner s association.

It was a vision thing. Hill got the idea when she was a high-level bureaucrat with state senior services and saw her friends getting old, needing help and having no place to go but assisted living centers, adult foster care and nursing homes in the big town 15 miles away.

Why couldn t this aging group of friends live near each other for support, have services brought to them (rather than being shipped around to various facilities as their need for care deepened) and, above all, keep and use their hard-won equity to maintain their own home — a much simpler, single-level, maintenance-free home that works for older people?

What decided me was when my neighbor fell and it became apparent she couldn t stay in her home, said Hill. She asked me to help her move to an apartment 12 miles away. She cried in the car and said, I bet you won t come visit me. She said she would never again see her friends, the library, the parks, the friendly cashier at the market and all the things that spell community and make life worth living.

Through the 1970s, the vision took hold helping older people to live independent lives, with dignity and surrounded by friends, family and community. Especially women, who, at that time, hadn t had access to credit and the knowledge of how to handle money.

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I took a seminar called Do You Have What It Takes To Be an Entrepreneur. It was oriented toward women and it opened my eyes that I could do things and be assertive that women could be leaders, make decisions and that it was ok for women to talk about money and power and be comfortable in that realm.

But Hill herself knew almost nothing about money and to prove it, she and her husband Hunter had just lost $40,000 by handing it over to a broker who put it in limited partnerships, which had no inherent value but were supposed to be good tax shelters, Hill said.

It wiped us out and was embarrassing, too. I decided I was never going to put faith in something I didn t understand. I started reading about real estate. The concept came: I knew my town Ashland — the city council and planning commission and the local economy. The was something I could see and feel and learn the opposite of sending money to New York City.

Hill went to the library (this was before the internet) and checked out books on how to make a million in real estate. She also read two life-changing books Phyllis Chesler s Women, Money and Power and David Schwartz s 1959 classic, The Magic of Thinking Big.

Schwartz showed me that, with about the same effort, you can do something to help one person or a whole lot of people. About the same time, a guy came (to her state jobsite) and gave a lecture on the positive nature of change. In doing the processes and games, I realized all the others resented and resisted change and I was the only one who loved it. I knew I had to get out of there.

Hanging onto her job in the meanwhile for cash flow and borrowing power, Hill in 1985 bought her first rental for $19,000. She could choose tenants, check the their credit and divert savings from jobs into something that was growing. (The Rogue Valley was then beginning an enormous surge of immigration, mostly from California, and appreciation in housing prices that s still going on.)

The investment was hands-on and labor intensive. With help from her retired parents, Hill learned how to hang sheetrock and insulation, lay carpets and paint rooms. She liked it. It was real and tangible, with results you could see and feel a sense of accomplishment about.

She joined the local rental owners association, learning from peers and her realtor how to analyze a property with an eye to something that would grow. She told her real estate agent to watch for the next good property. It was a duplex for $72,000 on a nice street in rapidly appreciating Ashland. Hill in 1987 took the big leap refinancing her own home for the down, but getting lower interest so her own payment remained the same.

The magic of investment was beginning to work. She fixed up the duplex (now appraising at $270,000 a gain of over $12,000 a year) refinanced it to lower interest twice, while pulling out $25,000 each time to land two more rentals, since fixed up and sold at profit.

But it wasn t all about the money. Hill was an old-fashioned liberal and feminist, whose values were shaped in the sixties and seventies. Her work was always somehow grounded in the improvement of society, an ethic instilled in her by old-fashioned, hard-working Norwegian parents who lived with and cared for their aged parents and a disabled aunt.

My mom drove a school bus for disabled children and my best friend had cerebral palsy and was in a wheel chair. I got to deeply value disabled people as who they really are inside. As a child welfare worker, my first job out of college, I began trying to move handicapped children out of hospitals and to advocate for them being part of society, she said.

Hill s life mission shaped itself around getting people out of institutional settings and into the mainstream. As a social worker in the 1970s, she did just that with veterans, then, through the 1980s, as regional manager for State Senior Services, got to see the hopelessness of nursing home residents and started doing something to phase them out.

She pioneered the federally-funded Oregon Model for Long-Term Care moving seniors to community-based settings, such as adult foster care and assisted living facilities. The model was the centerpiece for a White House Conference on Aging and was adopted by dozens of other states.

By now, Hill was one of Oregon s leading gerontologists, serving on state councils on aging, the city senior program, human services advisory commissions even a board bringing top entertainment acts to nursing homes. She d created radio and tv shows on women and the aged and been the first woman to run for mayor of Ashland. She had clout, credibility and could get things done.

In 1989, Hill was getting ready for the big leap into building a senior community. Two things pushed her over the line. A seminar on the power of change at her state jobsite ( I realized in the processes and games that I was the only one there who loved change and risk ) and the offering of the perfect 16-acre piece of rural property with smashing views, just on the outskirts of Ashland.

Hill s vision of her senior community was now in place. It would — in keeping with her philosophy of maximum freedom and choice for seniors — be a community with no big buy-in fee, where you own a condo or single-family home and keep all your equity, to pass on to your children.

It would be a community of active, mentally alive older people who didn t care for rocking chairs. As it turned out, 80 percent have college degrees. It would be aging in place, meaning if you became more feeble, you would move into assisted living, but still staying in the same community, near your spouse and friends.

All homes would be single-level, step-free, fall-resistant dwellings and if they were on a second story it would be accessed by elevator. Homes would be senior-friendly throughout plugins elevated, bathrooms with turnaround space, dishwasher up high, faucets with big handles, lots of windows and lights so you have no dark corners.

It would have a central clubhouse and dining hall, where you go (or have meals delivered to you) as you please, paying only for what you use. No three-meals-a-day, one-size-fits-all institutional drill.

Politically, the community would be a liberated zone Hill would buy and sell the homes and condos, but Mountain Meadows would be governed by elected members of the homeowners association.

Now, all Hill needed was money. She sold a historic home she d bought the year before, making $50,000 and using the little known ( People hate reading federal tax regulations, but I was a bureaucrat and was used to it. ) tax-deferred exchange, which basically lets you skip the income tax on the earnings all your life.

The bare land was $125,000. She d been reading a book called How to Develop Property With No Money and gleaned the notion of offering the $50,000 down and the rest in six years. If she defaulted, the seller could keep the 50k.

My realtor laughed and said I was nuts. No one would accept an offer like that. I went to the seller with my resume and references and told her my vision. She said yes. We were off. It was a huge step. I was absolutely terrified.

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Hill, by then a licensed realtor, knew real estate and she knew city politics. But she didn t know land development or building. She needed a partner. She took on Larry Medinger, a former city planning commission member who d built several successful subdivisions. The partnership, a 50-50 deal, worked and Medinger drew architectural style from Craftsman homes a tradition comforting to seniors — in his hometown in Nebraska.

Money came from local friends who wanted to invest in something positive and nearby, Hill said, and from her savings and income selling real estate (and her husband s job). A local bank provided the first construction loan for single-family homes, with all proceeds rolled back into the next homes, as well as development of common spaces walks, parks, ponds, garden and, eventually the large clubhouse and spa.

There was nothing like Mountain Meadows in Oregon, she said. We had to look outside for expertise about how to do this. We went to the National Council on Senior Housing Convention and spent the day with architects brainstorming about how to lay out the community.

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We chose the architect with the best ideas and site design (Mithune Partners, Seattle). We went on to assemble a great team — the best lawyers, accountants, surveyors, engineers and landscape architects. We wanted quality in everything and it came back to us tenfold.

The community has picked up a slew of awards, including Best Small Active Adult Retirement Community in America (from the National Council on Seniors Housing), 100 Best Master-Planned Communities (from Where to Retire Magazine), Best Senior Housing Gold Nugget Grand Award (from Pacific Coast Builders Conference) and Community Development Award (from Jackson County Citizens League).

The community 65 free-standing homes and 160 condos, all housing 225 people has one more building to go, probably rental apartments for seniors who don t want the hassle of owning property or are checking out the town for possible later purchase.

Turning the place over to the residents? It seemed like the right thing to do, said Hill. It has lowered the monthly fees (maintenance, meals, fitness center, etc.) by $150 and it s created a self-sustaining community. They adjust fees to meet their needs, not mine. And they make their own decisions without some corporation dictating to them.

Now Madeline, a resident of Mountain Meadows, just makes her living selling the remaining condos. She won t realize her profit until the last few are sold.

I thought is would be kind of small when we started but it ended up costing much more, taking much longer and being much bigger than I ever dreamed. If I had it to do over again I d get partners with money. We ve had to spend so much on financing, the profit could turn out to be small. But the values that was the primary thing to me, and we ve been able to stick by the values.

About the Author

Freelance writer living in Ashland Ore.

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How to Multiply Your Nicaragua real estate Paid Surveys Profits

Sunday, July 30th, 2006

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Effective Risk Management

Saturday, July 29th, 2006

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Risk is embedded in every opportunity a business faces. And poor risk management can result in large financial costs, or even failure. Risk points can emerge anywhere: small scale project delays, the misguided actions of an employee, or a fire in an inventory warehouse.

This article will help any small business owner or manager better understand what risks are out there, and more importantly, how to better control them.

First, I ll explain why a systematic analysis of risks is important and illustrate a simple risk management architecture. Then, I ll talk about how I helped companies better identify and manage a variety of risks.

What is Risk Management?
Simply, risks are threats to your business or project. They are situations or events that can affect the outcome of your decisions and actions. Therefore, risk management is the identification, evaluation, and mitigation of risks to a business or project.

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Why is Risk Management Important?
All businesses exist for one clear reason: To make a profit. Poorly managed risks have tangible and dramatic effects on the bottom line. Therefore, sound risk management is important to ensure that your business can overcome any problems and continue to grow profitably.

Threats to a small business or project can come from a variety of sources. In 2002, The Risk Management Standard categorized risks into four areas: Financial, Operational, Strategic, and Hazard. Strategic risks can emerge from competitors, customers, or markets of a company. For example, the technological features of a companies product may become obsolete. Operational risks can affect how the company operates internally. Systems such as IT, material procurement, and accounting responsibilities can be compromised by employees. Financial risks can hinge on financial market performance, such as foreign exchange fluctuations. The last type- Hazard risk- can be the most damaging. Events like natural disasters, manmade disasters, and crime can permanently disable a company.

How to Build an Effective Risk Management Strategy
An effective risk management strategy must be systematic and robust. It also must be straight-forward, and simple to implement.

An effective risk management strategy will have three stages:
Identify
Evaluate
Mitigate
During the Identify stage, owners and/or senior managers need to thoroughly examine the business from many different perspectives. All risks facing all areas of a company need to be identified. This should be done with as many people involved as realistically possible to give a complete picture.

During the Evaluate stage, each risk is given a probability of occurrence and a severity of occurrence ranking (This can be done with a simple 1 to 5 scale; 1 being rarely occurring and minimal damage ). This allows senior management to more clearly understand the extent of potential damage.

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During the Mitigate stage, the resulting risks are controlled through a variety of methods. For example, traditional insurance is one way to remove hazard risk. Financial risks can be managed through capital market hedging transactions. Operational risks are minimized by clear check and balance procedures and management oversight within the company. Strategic risks can be minimized by better documentation, such as protecting intellectual property rights.

How I Have Managed Risk
My experiences have given me a clear appreciation for the importance of systematic and robust risk management. What I talk about next is how I identified, evaluated, and mitigated various risks at three different companies in three different industries.

While I managed a Midwestern real estate portfolio for Cohen-Esrey, risk emerged in several areas. The easiest risks to identify and mitigate were the hazard points, such as fire and water damage for an apartment building. More complex issues, such as Slips and Falls on icy steps required us to put traditional insurance in place with a covenant that said employees would also work to minimize any liability by removing snow in a timely fashion. Other problems and solutions were less clear cut. At one point we had issues with employees walking off with tools from the property workshops. To mitigate this problem, we restructured our recruitment and selection process. Vendor relationships also became a liability issue. Only clear communication on a timely basis minimized such vulnerability.

Although most small businesses won t encounter the risks I mitigated at HSBC brokering financial derivatives, the experience built my appreciation for risk. Our team worked on behalf of many global banks hedging financial market risk. Although the market place conventions and contracts were similar, each transaction was done for a different reason. We analyzed the interest rate environment, advised traders as to how to better hedge their risk, and then brokered very large transactions. These experiences instilled in me the importance of understanding and transferring risk.

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Managing a Customer Relationship Project for Reuters is where my risk management became a formalized business process. My job was to coordinate and implement a CRM initiative that stretched over 10 months and included staff on several continents. To better understand what issues would affect the timetable and budget, the team put together a Risk Matrix. This illustrated three key issues: what each risk point was, its potential occurrence and severity, and who was responsible for mitigating it. At every meeting the team would review the Risk Matrix and identify any future risk points. As with most projects, communication is key, and this encouraged a high degree of communication and accountability.

Risk is embedded in every opportunity a business faces, and poor risk management can have profound effects on the outcome of any business endeavor.

Putting an effective risk management system in place is the first step for a small business owner, who can then confidently exploit new business opportunities.

About the Author

Adam C. Park is a business development consultant based in Chicago, USA. He has written articles concerning Effective Team Management, Deeper Cultural Understanding, and Improving Customer Loyalty. He can be reached at acpark@comcast.net.

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