Toronto The Pemberton | 215.79m | 68s | Pemberton | a—A

Pemberton is more than capable of not cheaping out and doing a good job, BUT ONLY if you overpay them significantly. If I'm not mistaken, U condo was charged 800-900/sqft initially (when every other condo was going around 400-500/sqft downtown back then).

Currently living in another Pemberton's building (Social) and I can without a doubt tell you the corner is cut everywhere I can see and can't see. In addition to the sub-par craftsmanship inside the unit, I can hear my upstairs neighbor walking/dropping stuff/partying, fire alarms, flooding, rusty pipe, hot water issue etc. The list goes on and on.

As in the case of 33 Yorkville here, you are looking at ~2k/sqft which is almost double the current average DT market price, so I don't doubt that the buyers will get a relatively high quality product in this case. They know not to mess around with their rich clients.
 
SevenPlus said:
Currently living in another Pemberton's building (Social) and I can without a doubt tell you the corner is cut everywhere I can see and can't see. In addition to the sub-par craftsmanship inside the unit, I can hear my upstairs neighbor walking/dropping stuff/partying, fire alarms, flooding, rusty pipe, hot water issue etc. The list goes on and on.
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Hey, it's called Social. They want you to experience all the social feelings that come with noisy neighbours and their repairs, to cower together in terror in a creaky elevator a hair's breadth from plummeting 40 storeys, and to socially interact with all the repairmen who must be summoned to fix all the defects in your unit. It's evidently all about bringing people together.
 
Strange Advance said:
Hey, it's called Social. They want you to experience all the social feelings that come with noisy neighbours and their repairs, to cower together in terror in a creaky elevator a hair's breadth from plummeting 40 storeys, and to socially interact with all the repairmen who must be summoned to fix all the defects in your unit. It's evidently all about bringing people together.
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Okay thats it, when can I sign up to move in?
 
SevenPlus said:
Pemberton is more than capable of not cheaping out and doing a good job, BUT ONLY if you overpay them significantly. If I'm not mistaken, U condo was charged 800-900/sqft initially (when every other condo was going around 400-500/sqft downtown back then).

Currently living in another Pemberton's building (Social) and I can without a doubt tell you the corner is cut everywhere I can see and can't see. In addition to the sub-par craftsmanship inside the unit, I can hear my upstairs neighbor walking/dropping stuff/partying, fire alarms, flooding, rusty pipe, hot water issue etc. The list goes on and on.

As in the case of 33 Yorkville here, you are looking at ~2k/sqft which is almost double the current average DT market price, so I don't doubt that the buyers will get a relatively high quality product in this case. They know not to mess around with their rich clients.
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Very sorry to hear that. Unfortunately, this is only going to get worse as the last generation of trades moves to retirement and the next comes fully in. The difference in the skill, work ethic, drive, pride in output, etc. of the new cohort is...remarkable.
 
ProjectEnd said:
Very sorry to hear that. Unfortunately, this is only going to get worse as the last generation of trades moves to retirement and the next comes fully in. The difference in the skill, work ethic, drive, pride in output, etc. of the new cohort is...remarkable.
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You'll have more experience w/this than I ............

But I have to say it does sound like a pretty standard generational trope.

I don't wonder if the quality/work ethic you witness has as much or more to do w/the employer/client than with the generation of workers per se.

Pride in work tends to come from believing you've been well trained, that your contribution matters, that you're fairly rewarded for your efforts and given due credit; and then likewise accountable for your shortcomings.

If work invariably goes to the lowest bidder; work quality be damned; the bosses seem more angry w/lost time if someone says 'This isn't good enough or this product isn't working out, we need to change it" than they are pleased that their workers care...........

Does your employer carry you through tough times? Work is lean, but I'll pay you to do something in our yard, or at my house, or for a charitable work.......or are you laid off the moment business is less than robust?

Some skill comes from practice working with top notch materials, and trainers/mentors and clients with high expectations. What happens when your only training is with B-grade crap, you get thrown on to a job site the moment you have legal minimum hours to work unsupervised and when you do have mentors/trainers they aren't much good and shrug a lot?

I'm disinclined to blame a generation of workers rather than a generation of employers.
 
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...and the generation of developers who pays them for putting out the lowest common denominators. /sigh
 
I've trained many apprentices... at least one thing contributing to the decline that isn't widely spoken of is the pool we recruit from. It used to be that everyone was someone's brother, nephew, son, fishing buddy... and yes nepotism was rife and yes it excluded many people, but when Tony was being a lazy sod his uncle would straight up smack him in the head and smarten him up.

Our recruitment pool is much more inclusive and diverse now (which is great!), but we've lost a lot of those community/familial ties that really set the tone and imbued a certain set of expectations and standards.

None of this is a call to action. Just the tired musings of someone who's very, very tired from a long day of handholding yet another batch of new apprentices
 
I think Pemberton uses their own subcontractors? If that's the case, to me it feels like they just didn't get paid enough to not rush. With the shortage of good trades/the good ones retiring, plus the rising cost of labor and material these days, this is what we ended up with. (Social was capped in developmental levy so they couldn't charge us more even if they wanted, fortunate and unfortunate in both ways now I look at it) So yes I think it's a combination of all the problems people have described here.
Not in defense of Pemberton, but I feel no builders will build if they can't make a decent profit. The pandemic/inflation really got everyone good.
 
From this morning; they are still pouring ground level here:

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