Not-In-My-Back-Yard (NIMBY) opposition is a qualitative risk that’s rarely factored into the investment calculus of sustainable real estate projects. This absence of risk management practices has caused a NIMBY Law of Attraction that exposes an untold number of sustainable real estate investments to political and social liabilities around the globe.
This “rolling of the dice” paradigm directly inflates the risks that leads to billions of dollars in quantitative losses for investors, shareholders, executives, and developers.
We get a sobering example with a 2011 U.S. Chamber of Commerce study, Project No Project, which looked at 351 energy projects that were delayed or denied by NIMBYism. The sample study found that NIMBYism cost the American economy $1.1trillion in economic losses and 2 million new jobs – that’s just for one sector!
What if I told you that as a real estate investor, you could significantly reduce the risks and losses of NIMBYism by as much as 80 percent? No more betting on status quo forces mobilizing to delay, disrupt and defeat your real estate investments. No more Russian roulette uncertainty. No more black eyes to the reputations of corporations and partners.
It’s a matter of understanding how a broken system and outdated business models consistently alienate communities and empower angry opposition with an “us vs. them” posture. Once you know how to correct these self-inflicted practices, then you can take action.
That action is fostering community goodwill for your sustainable project, which is the secret to proactively hedging your investments from NIMBY risks and losses
Prologis has been an outlier in this area, demonstrating how building bridges in the communities that grant the license to operate is the pathway to greater success.
I will highlight more of Prologis’ success, but first, we must understand how theNIMBY Law of Attraction is created and why anti-development agents are costing investors billions of dollars in lost capital, shareholder value, revenue, and market share.
DENYING THE REALITY OF RISK
The uncertainty of status quo opposition is the white elephant in the room that no one wants to recognize or address. More often than not, the community-at-large is relegated to local project managers and consultants who believe their sustainable projects will win the license to operate within their time tested “legal, logical and sustainable” constructs.
This is a false reality that enables hundreds of thousands of real estate professionals to blindly ignore, overlook and underestimate the community-at-large. This short-sighted perspective is what causes the perception of contempt that increases risks and losses associated with NIMBY opposition.
There’s an aversion toward community engagement, which creates a NIMBY Law of Attraction that emboldens anti-development opponents (alienated citizens, professional activists and competitors). These groups freely and adeptly manipulate social perceptions that influence “political, emotional and ego-driven” constructs.
As we all know, political anxieties nearly always trumps rational narratives, especially when it pertains to controversial land use projects during an election year.
This partly explains why a lone individual with a smartphone and an axe-to-grind, can single handedly defeat an international corporation’s multi-million dollar project. It’s not an isolated case. There are thousands of reported media stories featuring the David vs. Goliath genre that almost always ends in political defeat of good real estate projects.
THE SECRET IS COMMUNITY GOODWILL
The secret to hedging NIMBY risks is securing community goodwill.
The cultivation of community goodwill has become more prominent in corporate sustainability practices. A small, but encouraging number of corporations are embracing “top/down solutions for bottom/up success” when it comes to neutralizing NIMBY related risks and conflicts.
Prologis is leading the way on corporate sustainability practices that are the result of the REIT’s E.S.G. (Environmental Stewardship, Social Responsibility and Ethics/Governance) standards. In its recently published 2015 Sustainability Report, the company included both community and government stakeholders as part of its priorities for fostering community goodwill.
Under its “social responsibility” section, Prologis reported community “meetings before, during and after the development of properties.” The word “before” is a significant step forward in the development of new risk management standards and practices.
Prologis is not waiting to see if a project comes under attack before it engages a community to cultivate goodwill. By the time the NIMBY genie leaves the bottle, it becomes less likely and more expensive to secure stakeholders to support a demonized project.
The fact that a global, public company, such as Prologis, has formal practices that require community engagement increases the odds of winning the approval of more projects, in less time, less cost and less uncertainty.
EXORCISING THE STATUS QUO
What do real estate developers and anti-development professional groups agree upon? Neither wants to see the “legal, logical and sustainable” way of doing business changed or altered.
Anti-development groups know that without establishing community goodwill, the perception of greedy, arrogant and wealthy developers comes into play. These DC-centric and local anti-development groups have published “playbooks” on “how-to” exploit the time-tested blind spots reliably exhibited by developers beholden to their status quo business models.
Real estate thought leaders need to come together to fashion risk management standards and best practices that will help shift industry perspectives toward proactively and confidently securing community goodwill.
If we can overcome the status quo attitudes within our own industry, then we can begin hedging NIMBY risks and losses that will turn the NIMBY Law of Attraction into an attractive record of success and greater return on investments.
In the meantime, what are you doing today to secure community goodwill for your real estate investments?
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Patrick Slevin is one of few national speakers, trainers and consultants considered a “NIMBY Expert”. Mr. Slevin is a former Florida mayor, who for three decades has spoken, consulted, and written about mitigating the risks associated with status quo opposition. Mr. Slevin provides “top/down solutions for bottom/up success” for corporate clients who want to secure community goodwill for sustainable and controversial real estate projects. Go to www.PatrickSlevin.com for more information.
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