In the last week Dunedin property valuers Adam Binns and Chris Scott have inspected a police station, coal mine, supermarket, car dealership, butchery, six industrial properties, four shops, a yoga studio, a converted chapel, seven student flats and two houses.
"Life is never dull in valuation-land," Adam Binns Commercial Ltd director and valuer Adam Binns said.
His company has recently added another registered valuer to its ranks after graduate Mr Scott completed his qualifications in recent weeks.
He had decided while running a cafe in his late 30s to get into commercial property valuation and approached Mr Binns to ask about how to become a valuer.
He retrained extramurally through Massey University for three years and that was followed by a three-year practical element.
For that he worked full time at Adam Binns Commercial Ltd, first shadowing the company’s senior valuer, Mr Binns, before doing his own valuations under Mr Binns’ supervision.
It was a profession in need of new blood, Mr Scott said, with several experienced valuers coming close to reaching retirement age.
"Dunedin and where it is right now is booming," Mr Scott said.
"There’s a real influx of investors in the city. As a valuer there’s lots going on and there’s a lot of opportunity."
When he discovered the qualification would take six years to complete he said it was daunting, but something he believed he could manage, having already completed two degrees at the University of Otago.
"I was under no illusion of what was required and I felt I had it within myself. The most difficult part was juggling family, running a business and retraining at the same time.
"There were a couple of years there that were pretty crazy."
Mr Binns said he gets the odd inquiry from people interested in getting into the business and they often lost interest immediately.
"You can see their interest kind of dwindle in the face instantly, because it is such a big commitment."
The pair of commercial valuers say Dunedin is booming right now in both residential and commercial property and that made valuing a property challenging.
"What you’re essentially doing as a valuer is you’re using historical data to work out where the market is right now," Mr Binns said.
"There’s the challenge.
"In a rapidly changing market, using that historic data, it can be outdated so you’ve really got to keep on top of it."
Covid-19 and the period of the lockdown made things even more difficult for the valuers.
There was little to no activity in the commercial property market — and comparisons with recent sales is a key piece of information they rely on to decide a value.
"We kind of had to look at stuff much earlier, pre-pandemic," Mr Scott said. "Which means it’s probably slightly less relevant ... so that was a real challenge."
The valuation industry as a whole released new guidelines to help valuers in the period following the lockdown.
The period of time after the lockdown has had activity increase markedly, Mr Scott said, with a lot of sales and new leasings coming to the market.
Dunedin had an exciting future with the hospital build and the new ACC building going in at Dowling St. Both those projects would change the fortunes of building owners in the near vicinity, especially around the hospital, Mr Scott said.
"There’s a lot of fringe commercial buildings around where the hospital is going to be. You’ll see quite a few changes over the period ... you’ll see some tenancies that relate to the hospital.
"Accommodation for doctors and retail outlets and stuff."
