talent?’
‘Pretty much everything else. Sorting out the money side. The legal side. The contracts. Jonno was the guy for the big picture, the headline coup. That stuff, it’s all vision and timing. Some people love it. Jonno adored it. It’s like the Lord Mayor’s Show. He needed to be in the golden carriage, he needed the attention. Me? I swept up afterwards.’
‘Was that ever a problem?’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Mallinder grabbing the limelight?’
‘Christ, no. At the end of the day it’s about profit, and like I say we carved the turkey fifty-fifty. Jonno was a class operator, don’t get me wrong, but most of these deals turn to ratshit unless you get the small print right.’
‘And that was your job?’
‘Exactly.’
Faraday nodded, waiting for Barber’s racing pencil to catch up. He’d stationed a cassette recorder on his desk and cued it before the interview, but psychologically there were advantages to writing the key facts down. Benskin was on the record and he knew it.
‘Talk me through those first few years,’ Faraday said.
‘Why?’
‘Because it may help. Unless, of course, you’ve got a problem with any of that …’ The smile again, even chillier.
Benskin shook his head, said it didn’t matter. Once they’d got the business up and running, he and Jonno had cut their teeth on small brownfield sites in prime commuting country around London. Already it was obvious that New Labour had a big problem with the lack of new housing starts and a business opportunity was staring them in the face.
‘It all boils down to votes,’ he said. ‘The punters who’ve moved out to the country don’t want some bloody great new estate spoiling their view. But the people left behind in the cities can’t find anywhere to live. So what can politicians do without pissing anyone off? Easy. First off, they commission a survey. The survey finds all kinds of wasted space in what us lot call the urban environment. Derelict land, old warehousing, knackered shops, whatever. Each of these little bits of land could support half a dozen starter homes or a smallish block of flats so next they pass a bunch of laws that force local authorities to start taking this kind of shit seriously. They have to find room to house people. So they start looking round for likely sites and - hey - guess who’s got there before them?’
‘You.’
‘Exactly.’
Benskin was beginning to relax now. This was his story, the narrative that had shaped his professional life, and it wasn’t hard to sense a boastful pride in the way Benskin, Mallinder had set about turning a housing crisis into a personal fortune.
‘What kind of scale are we talking here?’
‘We started with a couple of punts in Enfield. Horrible area but they worked a treat. We assembled four parcels of land, sold them on to a builder or another property developer, and made money on the turn. This wasn’t rocket science but pretty quickly we realised where we were going wrong.’
Their mistake, he said, was selling for cash. On a slowly rising market that would have made sense. But post-9/11, once the world had settled down, house prices had gone barmy. On average a competent builder could throw a block of six flats up in under a year. But within that time, you might have been looking at a 15 per cent rise in the market.
‘So what did you do?’
‘We started selling for cash plus.’
‘Plus what?’
‘Plus a slice of the proceeds of sale. Gross, of course.’
‘How big a slice?’
Benskin looked at Faraday, disbelieving, then shook his head.
‘That’s commercial. In confidence. I’m here to help you out with Jonno. Why would you need to know this kind of detail?’
‘Because it might help.’
‘With what?’
‘The bigger picture.’
‘Really?’ He thought about the proposition then shook his head. ‘No way. Sorry, guys.’
‘OK.’ Faraday shrugged. ‘But it made you money?’
‘Of course it did. That’s what
‘Pretty much everything else. Sorting out the money side. The legal side. The contracts. Jonno was the guy for the big picture, the headline coup. That stuff, it’s all vision and timing. Some people love it. Jonno adored it. It’s like the Lord Mayor’s Show. He needed to be in the golden carriage, he needed the attention. Me? I swept up afterwards.’
‘Was that ever a problem?’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Mallinder grabbing the limelight?’
‘Christ, no. At the end of the day it’s about profit, and like I say we carved the turkey fifty-fifty. Jonno was a class operator, don’t get me wrong, but most of these deals turn to ratshit unless you get the small print right.’
‘And that was your job?’
‘Exactly.’
Faraday nodded, waiting for Barber’s racing pencil to catch up. He’d stationed a cassette recorder on his desk and cued it before the interview, but psychologically there were advantages to writing the key facts down. Benskin was on the record and he knew it.
‘Talk me through those first few years,’ Faraday said.
‘Why?’
‘Because it may help. Unless, of course, you’ve got a problem with any of that …’ The smile again, even chillier.
Benskin shook his head, said it didn’t matter. Once they’d got the business up and running, he and Jonno had cut their teeth on small brownfield sites in prime commuting country around London. Already it was obvious that New Labour had a big problem with the lack of new housing starts and a business opportunity was staring them in the face.
‘It all boils down to votes,’ he said. ‘The punters who’ve moved out to the country don’t want some bloody great new estate spoiling their view. But the people left behind in the cities can’t find anywhere to live. So what can politicians do without pissing anyone off? Easy. First off, they commission a survey. The survey finds all kinds of wasted space in what us lot call the urban environment. Derelict land, old warehousing, knackered shops, whatever. Each of these little bits of land could support half a dozen starter homes or a smallish block of flats so next they pass a bunch of laws that force local authorities to start taking this kind of shit seriously. They have to find room to house people. So they start looking round for likely sites and - hey - guess who’s got there before them?’
‘You.’
‘Exactly.’
Benskin was beginning to relax now. This was his story, the narrative that had shaped his professional life, and it wasn’t hard to sense a boastful pride in the way Benskin, Mallinder had set about turning a housing crisis into a personal fortune.
‘What kind of scale are we talking here?’
‘We started with a couple of punts in Enfield. Horrible area but they worked a treat. We assembled four parcels of land, sold them on to a builder or another property developer, and made money on the turn. This wasn’t rocket science but pretty quickly we realised where we were going wrong.’
Their mistake, he said, was selling for cash. On a slowly rising market that would have made sense. But post-9/11, once the world had settled down, house prices had gone barmy. On average a competent builder could throw a block of six flats up in under a year. But within that time, you might have been looking at a 15 per cent rise in the market.
‘So what did you do?’
‘We started selling for cash plus.’
‘Plus what?’
‘Plus a slice of the proceeds of sale. Gross, of course.’
‘How big a slice?’
Benskin looked at Faraday, disbelieving, then shook his head.
‘That’s commercial. In confidence. I’m here to help you out with Jonno. Why would you need to know this kind of detail?’
‘Because it might help.’
‘With what?’
‘The bigger picture.’
‘Really?’ He thought about the proposition then shook his head. ‘No way. Sorry, guys.’
‘OK.’ Faraday shrugged. ‘But it made you money?’
‘Of course it did. That’s what
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