The New York Sun, Dec 4 2003
The Negotiator
Owner’s Representative Stephen Carter Will Talk to Your Contractor so You Don’t Have To
By Julie Satow
There are few experiences as fraught with stress and frustration as the renovation of a New York City apartment: The work inevitably takes twice as long as expected, and costs twice as much.
Enter Stephen Carter, owner’s representative, who promises to remove the angst from remodeling by representing the homeowner’s interests when working with architects and general contractors during the renovation process.
The role of owner’s representative is common in commercial real estate developments, but far less so in residential real estate projects. Similar to hiring a lawyer instead of representing yourself in court, an owner’s representative is meant to get you the results you want more efficiently than you could get them yourself. The owner’s representative is different from a general contractor, because the former solely represents the owner’s interests, while the latter also answers to the workers.
An architect and a general contractor himself, Mr. Carter knows the real estate and development worlds well. He has worked with I.M. Pei as the project manager constructions such as the Arco Tower in Los Angeles and the Denver Mall. He was the project director for buildings such as the Minneapolis American Express Tower He graduated from the University of Kansas and the University of London with degrees in architecture, was a Loeb Fellowship Nominee in 1990 at Harvard University, and attended the New York University’s Real Estate Institute.
“Owners often find themselves stuck between architects who have a lofty design in mind, and construction managers who speak a somewhat different language,” Mr. Carter said.” It can often be adversarial, and an owner can’t always know which way to go. This is where I come in and alleviate that stress.”
Five years ago, Mr. Carter founded his owner’s representative company, the Carman Group. After living in New York since the 1970s and witnessing the confusion that nearly always envelops homeowners when renovating, he thought to offer them the same services that commercial developers have when renovating larger sites. “Just because you are doing a single home rather than a large building, doesn’t mean you don’t run up against the same issues,” Mr. Carter said.
Depending on the scope of the job, Mr. Carter will charge by the hour, as a percent of the total construction cost, or based on a cost per square foot. His services can range from full design and construction management to monitoring permits, acting as the liaison between the board and the project, or solving post-construction concerns such as water leaks.
The full-service menu seems to agree with clients. “I liked having someone who was on my side, who interviewed people for me, made all the phone calls so I didn’t have to, and generally kept things on track so I didn’t have to worry,” said Mitchell Fischman, a New York lawyer who used Mr. Carter’s services when he renovated a home in Washington, Conn.
Mr. Fischman paid a lump sum at the onset of the job. “I can’t be sure if I saved money, because it wasn’t a controlled experiment, but I know that Stephen prevented me from making mistakes, and also provided me with peace of mind that someone knowledgeable was overseeing the work,” he said.
Mr. Carter’s service is beginning to catch on with real estate professionals. Even those inimitable salespeople — brokers — are calling on him to help them close deals. One broker at Corcoran Group, Cheryl Nesbit, said he was largely responsible for a deal on an apartment on Central Park South. The apartment needed a lot of work, and she called in Mr. Carter to help the potential buyers, a young couple with a new baby, visualize what it could look like and estimate how much the renovations would cost.
“They were really worried it would mean another $800,000 to do what they wanted, but he calmed their fears and gave them a realistic assessment,” she said.” Without Stephen’s services, I don’t think I would have gotten an offer.” Mr. Carter provides his services to brokers for free in the hopes of winning new clients.
Surprisingly, general contractors have also been enthusiastic about working with an owner’s representative. “Working with an owner’s rep saves me money because it saves me time,” said general contractor and president of BC Interiors in Brooklyn, Robert Tobin. “Instead of having to stop a job for a week while we locate the owner and get him to make some decision, the owner’s rep is right there and keeps the process moving.”
When they stop work, contractors have to pay out additional salary, which cuts into their profits, while prolonging the anxiety for homeowners, said Mr. Tobin. Having an owner’s representative in the picture “makes residential jobs work like big jobs, where the developer or owner has a rep on the job site handling the small stuff so he doesn’t have to be bothered,” he said.
Mr. Carter may be a pioneer in a growing trend, real estate insiders say. “It is amazing the concept of owner’s reps hasn’t caught on before — it is such a simple idea,” Ms. Nesbit said.
Mr. Carter’s success could also be attributed to his personal style. Jan Golann, another of Mr. Carter’s clients, has been using him to explore renovation ideas for her apartment. “I like using him because he doesn’t traipse through my house saying, ‘This is dreadful,’ or ‘you have to get rid of that,’” she said.
“He isn’t judgmental of what some may consider a mess,” she added. “Personality counts for a lot.”