For over 14 years a team of infrastructure experts delivered a managing agent service primarily for Annington Homes and their customers’ who lived on former MoD estates. The residents’ company model used by Annington to own non-adoptable infrastructure on these estates is robust and transparent and has been refined over many years of operation. This infrastructure team passionately believed that community assets, private infrastructure and green spaces could be managed better, in a way to help bring communities together; so in 2011 Preim was born.
Today, we are a leading residential property management company based in Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, with experience in managing a range of estates. Our team of experts successfully manage 12,000 homes on 160 estates across England and Wales – from just a few homes, to garden villages with large communities and facilities.
At Preim we help residents to build and shape sustainable communities, where people love living.
As joint owner of Preim, Neil has spent the last 13 years building expertise and a proven reputation delivering a managing agent’s service. At the heart of his business philosophy Neil believes that an infrastructure stewardship model with good governance, transparency and openness is the foundation of providing a great service.
Andrew’s business career has a strong infrastructure bias, having worked at a senior level for house-builders, consultants, contractors and local authorities.
As joint owner of Preim, Andrew believes passionately that you can use a private infrastructure model with good governance to engage, empower and help build great communities – where people love living.
that provide long lasting communities, building legacies for the future. In essence, place making for the generations to come.
How Preim works with developers
Preim will work with lead developers and their developer partners, where appropriate, to provide seamless and pro-active support from the very outset of planning for a new property development scheme.
We provide unrivalled private infrastructure support having worked with some of our existing clients for the past 14 years, providing on-going property management services to 12,000-plus properties on more than 160 estates across the UK.
The benefits of working with Preim
Our expertise is based on our belief that we are all place makers – together with our development partners we are creating sustainable communities, a legacy for the future.
Preim not only understands this concept, it is already working with developers on specific
With the assistance of a professional managing agent such as Preim, developers are able to provide a community footprint that will stand the test of time and become a legacy for future generations.
For instance, Preim continues to work with Crest Nicholson and its partner developers on their
Planning green space within a development to be communal and owned by a management company can be an alternative sustainable solution to satisfying a developer’s Section 106 obligations. There could also be a potential cost saving on local authority adoption and commuted sums.
In addition to these practical considerations, a balance of green open space further enriches the environment of a community and will help maintain, and increase, property values.
Creating community green space will have intrinsic benefits for everyone. There will be the social and leisure aspects as well as the environmental perspective. All, will help to engender the sense of belonging within the community and nurture a growing pride in the local surroundings.
Making the most of the green outdoor assets
By choosing to outsource community green space management, developers and resident companies look to a trusted and professional property management maintenance service, such as Preim, to protect these assets on their behalf.
We understand the value of green space and communal facilities to both the developer and the community. We will refine existing maintenance models or create bespoke maintenance service contracts to meet the particular requirements of a developer or resident company.
Preim’s outdoor green spaces maintenance is all encompassing and can run way beyond the limits of a traditional service. For instance, we work with ground-breaking developers and resident companies that are committed to making real inroads into understanding and caring for their community environments.
The importance of placemaking
The theory of building communities around places to live isn’t a new concept. However, placemaking, in the context of a true community development process, has increased rapidly in popularity over the past decade and Preim is at the forefront of this.
What is placemaking?
Placemaking is a multi-pronged approach to the planning, urban design and management of public spaces. It maximises a local community’s assets, inspiration, and potential, with the intention of creating public spaces that promote people’s health, happiness, and well being. In essence,
The concepts behind placemaking date back to the 1960s, primarily in the US, when conversations first revolved around designing cities that catered to people, not just cars and shopping centres. Talk was of lively neighbourhoods and inviting public spaces.
A decade later, landscape architects and planners used the term to describe the process of creating squares, plazas, parks, streets and waterfronts, attracting people primarily because they are pleasurable or interesting. This was based upon a school of thought that said ‘while we are good at putting up buildings…we are bad at making places.’*
Some 25 years later, and placemaking strategies are finally becoming recognised and accepted approaches for building communities of the future and creating a legacy for generations to come.
The benefits of placemaking
represents more than a few acres of green field. A new development with a sustainable legacy provides a real opportunity for developers to be placemakers. And this is where Preim can help.
