Vita Group's ‘uhaus’ brand demonstrates the evolution of BTR.

Vita Group's new uhaus brand of BTR aims to "tilt the balance of daily life in your favour", says Russell Hayes, director of residential at the Group.

Fuelled by the results of regular in-building research and Vita Group’s large research projects, which found "new working and living habits" requiring "new, purposefully designed spaces to create a cohesive build-to-rent ecosystem" for the resident of today, millions of pounds has been invested into what Vita believes "represents the future of BTR".

A pioneer in the sector, Vita Group opened the doors to its first BTR scheme at the start of 2021. ‘Vita Living’ Circle Square East was the first of two towers at Manchester’s Circle Square.

Amenity rich, with resident lounges featuring places to work, a gym, and private dining rooms, the buildings achieved stabilised occupancy ahead of schedule. However, around the same time as opening the second tower, residents' lives started to return to ‘the world of new normal’ or ‘post-pandemic living’. According to Vita though, the ‘new normal’ wasn’t the function the Group originally designed its buildings for, and resident needs’ were evolving quickly.

“Let’s be clear, Vita Living was and would still be considered a state-of-the-art build-to-rent brand, offering a product which provided a very high standard of urban living", commented Russell Hayes, Vita Group director of residential. "However, our habits surrounding the way we live and work have changed more over the last five years than they have in the two decades which came before them, and whilst today there are BTR products launching to the market which mirror Vita Living’s product offering, we strongly believe that that product offering doesn’t meet the needs of today’s residents.”

As such, uhaus was born.

When reviewing its data, Vita Group found that hybrid working had spawned hybrid living, and Vita Living’s resident population was spending more time at home than ever before. Thus, their apartment was being called upon to be more functional.

Vita Living’s amenity floors whilst they had been designed to be functional resident spaces which residents can work from, they hadn’t been designed for the scale in which working from home had been adopted in the building. Around 86 per cent of the building’s population worked from home, just under a third of which (29 per cent) worked from home every day and half worked from home at least a few times a week (49 per cent), most (72 per cent) were doing so from their apartments, with residents predominantly venturing onto the amenity floors for calls or a change of scenery.

Russell Hayes continued: “Getting work-from-home right was, and will remain crucial to the uhaus proposition. We firmly believe that if you’re designing amenity floors which try to be both co-working and resident lounges at the same time, whilst they’ll be functional to an extent and they’re aesthetically pleasing, they’re not what residents need. We’ve invested millions to create office grade co-working floors, floors which we believe rival those you see on offer in the likes of WeWork or Spaces. They create a real point of difference in a crowded and competitive marketplace filled with gimmicks.

“Varying sized sound proofed bookable meeting rooms and call booths, beautiful office grade ergonomically designed desks and chairs, loads of places to plug in including importantly computer monitors, a break-out space with kitchen, these are stand-out components which are everyday in modern co-work office buildings but simply aren’t in build-to-rent environments being delivered today. It’s one of the components we’re really confident we’ve got right with uhaus, and the early adoption rate, and the response we’ve had from residents using the space echoes that, it’s work from home done properly.”

Supporting the industry leading work from home offering, uhaus has also tailored part of its events programme to motivate, inspire and support residents, from wind-down events to help them switch off at the end of the day and inspire them when they have a thirst for to learn more.

“If we can amplify the way residents work from home and also make it easier for them to switch off at the end of the day, they’re going to have a better quality of life. That’s really important to us, and it’s at the heart of the uhaus brand proposition, tilting the daily balance in their favour and amplifying each moment", Russell added. "The dedicated co-working space means people’s apartments don’t get taken over by work life, creating better separation, the events complement this, providing inspiration when it’s needed and separation when it’s not.”

The uhaus service proposition is also said to be different to other build-to-rent brands - an ‘Everything Included’ offering which is much closer to a luxury hotel rather than a residential brand.

“When we designed this brand, we regularly returned to the thinking, by doing X will a resident get a better quality of life as a result of what we deliver, if 95 per cent of the people who live in the building use it once, if at all, it’s not adding value", continued Russell. "So, we did a lot of work to really define what that service proposition includes, challenging the value add to the resident and questioning would it tilt the daily balance in their favour? Would it amplify their day?”

Alongside the co-working space, there’s a wealth of resident amenities across the two buildings which include a state-of-the-art gym complemented by Les Mills fitness classes to help residents with their training goals. There are also group fitness activities like run clubs and external sport sessions that residents can take advantage of.

There are two beautifully styled resident lounges creating an extension to a resident’s apartment that they can use to hang-out, socialise and entertain in. They’re brought to life with a busy events programme designed to bring the community together.

On the 35th floor of the North Tower residents have access to their own resident’s bar. Lounge 35 is open three nights a week (Thursday – Saturday), serving cocktails and poured pints (uhaus has its own pilsner!) with what’s arguably one of the best views in Manchester taking in the Peaks, the Cheshire planes and Rivington’s Winter Hill. On Friday and Saturday nights, resident DJs and live singers set the ambience.

There are also a number of bookable private dining rooms which residents can use to host friends, family, or even client meetings. Complementing the bookable spaces, uhaus’ 24-hour concierge team offer a range of bookable experiences, from light-bites and refreshments for business meetings to private chefs, drinks packages and party experiences, the team is on-hand to take the stress out of playing host.

The concierge team is also there to help make residents’ lives easier. At the front desk, residents can book anything from dog walkers to requesting their shopping is delivered to their apartment ready for when they return from a holiday.

Gas, Electric, Water and WiFi is all included in the rent at uhaus. Born from a desire to shelter residents from spiralling utility bills during the cost-of-living crisis, uhaus’ ability to purchase wholesale energy helps to reduce costs for residents too.

Moreover, housekeeping is also included, with apartments cleaned every two weeks. Should residents wish, they can book and pay for upgraded housekeeping services too such as ironing and laundry, appliance deep cleans and more frequent visits. New residents can also take advantage of a complementary move-in service.

Russell concludes, “The aim was to create a product which holistically responds to post pandemic living, where our homes became so much more than the place we sleep. uhaus delivers a level of service for its residents which hasn’t been delivered in UK residential before.

"It’s all conducive to living a more fulfilled lifestyle where you don’t have to sweat the small stuff like cleaning and laundry, and you can get on with enjoying the things which you love, that could be working or working out or it could even be going out whilst you’re staying in! It’s living designed around the needs’ of the resident, equipped to make their life easier and create a harmonious place to live.”

You can find out more about uhaus here.

All images used courtesy of Vita Group