Cary Green may be chairman of Greenwin, but he vividly remembers as a 14-year-old being put to work to learn the family
business at the ground level.
Working part-time and in the summers doing outside work and mechanical maintenance, Green discovered his real love in the property development game was construction.
“Construction has growth and change on a daily basis,” he says. “You can see something positive occurring on a construction site.
“You know you’ve starting something on paper but you can visualize the ultimate outcome which is people walking in and out of the building and leading their lives there,” says Green, who after graduating high school, travelled for a year, worked and then went on to university before starting full-time with the his dad Harold’s company in 1982. “It was not expected that we would automatically go into the family business, but I always liked the construction aspect of it all.”
In 1984, Cary left the construction end of the business and joined the development division of the company. “There’s a wholeness to it that’s very rewarding; you’re contributing and helping people create their lives. It’s a naturally rewarding business,” he says.
After 60 years in the residential rental housing and commercial real estate market, the founders of Greenwin were recently recognized by the Federation of Rental Housing Providers of Ontario (FRPO) with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Albert Latner, Al Green and his brother the late Harold Green were all recognized for their contributions to the rental housing market in Ontario.
Greenwin Property Management manages more than 50,000 rental apartment and townhomes, of which over 7,000 are affordable/social housing units. Over the years Greenwin has also developed, built and managed thousands of condominium homes, plus a portfolio of more than three million square feet of office space.
In fact Greenwin ( www.greenwin.ca) received three awards at the FRPO’s annual MAC Awards Gala in December. In addition to the Lifetime Achievement Award, they were recognized for Property Manager of the Year, dedicated to Eugene Bussoli of The Oaks at Jane St. and Wilson Ave., and an award for Outstanding Community Service.
“Eugene manages one of our most challenging residential portfolios,” says Haya Zilberboim, CEO of Greenwin Inc. “His dedication to community revitalization and the well-being of our residents have positioned him as a leader within the company. He truly deserves this recognition.”
“We’re truly grateful to FRPO for acknowledging our community service work,” Greenwin president Kevin Green says. “And, on behalf of our company’s founders, I’d like to thank the Federation for presenting us with this year’s Lifetime Achievement Award.”
The company owns and manages residential and commercial properties across the Greater Toronto Area, Hamilton, Cambridge, Ottawa, Montreal, Halifax, Dartmouth, Moncton, Saint John and Fredericton.
The Greenwin legacy goes back to the early days of development in Toronto. “Greenwin Developments was the three guys — my dad, my uncle and Al Latner, and their core business was affordable rental housing,” says David Green of Greenrock Property Management Ltd. and the son of Al Green. “They worked together for so many years, into the 1980s, and each of the partners started developing their own family’s companies. When I think of what they did to change the face of this city it’s just phenomenal.”
In 1979, rent control came into effect and new rental housing stopped virtually overnight, so the partners started to diversify and various companies were spun off. But at its core the company and the family name was known for the innovative way it went about creating housing in Toronto during the boom times from the 1950s on. As David Green points out, the Greenwin team owned everything from Yonge St. to Avenue Rd., the north side of Pears Ave. and south side of Roxborough Rd. They also formed the Metropolitan Toronto Apartment Builders Association.
“Greenwin was known from its earliest stages for the integrity and quality of construction,” says Cary Green, whose father, Harold, died in 2004. “People lived in Greenwin buildings with a lot of pride, whether it was houses, apartments or condos.
“My father ran the construction end of the business. He was a master bricklayer and an artist who also taught art in our house. His eye, when it came to design and construction, was second to none. It separated him from the rest in the industry. It’s something we hope to carry on.”
Even through the tough times in Toronto’s rental market, Greenwin stood the test of time and maintained its philosophy that development must happen for people of all walks of life and budgets.
“We’ve stayed in rental against the odds,” says Cary Green. “It’s been very tricky to do both market rentals and government rentals. We’re one of the largest producers of affordable housing and we plan to maintain that. Tthere’s a critical need for it in the city and the province as a whole.”
Even when other companies backed away from producing affordable housing, the Greenwin family continued to find ways to fill the gap.
“Part of the mandate lead by my dad was you take some of your profit and put it back in for affordable housing. It’s an essential part of what makes up Toronto,” says Green. “There are a lot of working people who could not afford to pay brand new market rents today. There has to be a place for them in the city and it has to be good quality housing. They’re hard working people and they’re entitled to first class quality accommodation and we continue to do that.”
Through the years, Greenwin also adapted to the demand for more energy-efficient buildings.
“We’ve been working with energy efficiency for the last 20 years. It has to be balanced with cost effectiveness with reasonable paybacks. As an industry we came up with R20 walls and energy efficient buildings in houses and apartments before people were talking about it,” says Green.
The company has 1,800 highrise units planned for the east end of Toronto — a mix of rental and mid-market condos and retail — as well as construction at 100 Lower Ossington Ave. with 176 affordable rentals and 21,000 feet of retail in the works, a project funded in part by the company and the three levels of government. “We plan to be moving people in at the end of May,” says Green.
When asked if the next generation of Greens will take on the family business, Green replies in a very matter of fact tone: “They can start the same way their uncles did — we’ll give them a broom and a shovel and they can work their way up.”