A property investor and developer from Norfolk hopes to transform the local construction industry - by making it greener.
They say that if you do what you love, you will never work a day in your life, but for Remi Coghiel, one half of property and investment firm Durrell & Wolf, it’s a lot of both.
He’s been in the construction industry since he was 19 years old. After doing a bit of travelling, he returned home to Norfolk and bought his first full-size project, a little bungalow in Sprowston. He did it up and sold it on, becoming the first in an ever-growing portfolio.
Remi says he “scrimped and saved” for a second property, doing a lot of the work himself and finding bargains on online marketplaces like Facebook and eBay to kit it out.
At a networking event, he met Tom Durrell. The pair had actually gone to school together, Remi says, but hadn’t seen each other for 15 years. They discovered that they had similar values, particularly around sustainable building, and decided to give it a go.
“We just jumped straight in, basically,” says Remi. “We bought a little bungalow in Norwich and refurbed that and then managed to buy a plot of land – by extreme luck, really, just divine timing. We bought a plot for one unit and built that, sold that, and then we built two and sold that. Now we’re building three.”
The pair “wear all the hats at the moment”, says Remi. This involves finding their projects – which he says they generally do through the open market and by building relationships with agents, securing funding and project-managing the build.
“Our business model is using private investment,” explains Remi. “So we do all that as well – investor relations, sales, everything really. It’s a lot. We’re busy. But we need to keep growing to be able to grow the team.”
Initially, the pair sold on the properties they had renovated but have just started to keep some as holdings. This, Remi hopes, will be a way to help future proof the business.
“There’s probably going to be some turmoil in the future,” says Remi, “and I think holding some properties will be our steady income. We don’t own huge vast sums, but it will help us ride the future should there be something.”
They have kept a terraced house on Edinburgh Road, Norwich, which they run as an Airbnb, and they’re also working on a property on Magdalen Road, held between Remi, Tom and an investor, which comprises a café with a flat above, which they will also let out on Airbnb.
Alongside their growing portfolio of renovations and refurbs, Durrell & Wolf are also making their name in the world of new homes, where Remi says his passion is.
Their new project at Larling, called Williams Meadow, comprises two three-beds and one four-bed, all of which are timber-framed and fitted with air source heat pumps. This not only makes them very thermally efficient, Remi says, but also quick to build. Only seven weeks in, the team has two roofs on, and the final one is expected to be on by the end of the month.
The homes, which are being marketed through Minors & Brady and priced from £375,000, will be Durrell & Wolf’s largest raise so far. “It’s our biggest project,” Remi says. “It’s quite a proud and nice moment, to think we’ve come this far.”
Part of the reason Tom and Remi clicked is because of what Remi describes as their “fairly lofty ambitions” for sustainable building. “Our built environment, the house we live in, equates to a hell of a lot of our emissions,” Remi says, including something as basic as concrete.
“A lot of people don’t understand the impact – just us having, you know, luxuries like power and water and a lovely home – on the environment.
“Building regs are fine but we really need to be building passive houses, A-rated homes, so the small project we’ve got in Norwich, that me and Tom are going to hold, we’re going to build and brand as our own little passive-style house.
“It’s going to be air tight, it’s going to be thermally efficient, it’s going to have a heat recovery system inside, and that’s going to be almost our benchmark for houses that we want to build, going forward.”
A dream of Remi’s, he says, is to one day build a self-sustainable village. “I’d love for someone to buy a Durrell & Wolf home and they don’t have a bill,” he says, but knows he needs to build up to that.
“It’s very difficult as a new company to be able to borrow money to build a product that hasn’t necessarily got a market behind it already, and this is the biggest step towards us building a somewhat passive house.
“The tenants inside will have virtually no bills – that’s our goal – and then we can try and scale that. That’s definitely something we’re trying to tap into, and the cost of living is just going to expedite that really, and hopefully create demand.”
Remi accepts that, to change building practices, he’ll have to do it from the inside out – which is also what they’re trying to achieve with their brand. “We’re learning, as a new developer, that people want to see history and what you’ve done, which is completely understandable, so we’re trying to build that, to say, this is what we’ve built and what we do and also to document how much we enjoy what we do, because that gives people confidence.”
Durrell & Wolf also offers a developer guarantee. “If anything goes wrong, they’ve got my number direct, they deal with me direct, and I’ll sort the problem no matter what it is. We want to stand by what we do. If we’ve made a mistake, we put our hands up and we’ll sort it – everything is a learning curve.”
Learning is important to Remi, not just because of the business but also because it’s intrinsically linked to who he is. “I like learning all the time. I like science, I like history, I just like learning and knowing stuff – the day we stop learning is the day I’ll probably be bored,” he says.
His desire to learn, and to become better at business, has seen him start up his own podcast, where he and Tom chat to other professionals in the area.
It’s so far been well received, he says, and has featured guests like Jamie Minors, from Minors & Brady, and Kelly Cartwright from Core Recruiter, formerly Jark. “There might be things that people do in other industries that we don’t do in construction,” he says, “but we can adopt that and make people’s day a little bit better.”
Durrell & Wolf has achieved a lot since since 2019 – but it hasn’t been without its complications. The Covid pandemic naturally brought with it unforeseen challenges, including a booming housing market and issues with the supply chain. “We’ve gained probably 10 years experience in two or three years, I should imagine,” says Remi. “It’s been a blessing, really. Truth be told.
“Trying to secure deals in an environment where there’s money being thrown around everywhere is very difficult,” he says, “and I think how we navigated that was our relationships. We just wanted to be honest: we do what we say we’re going to do, we don’t mess agents or anyone around, and so far it seems to have worked.
“We love what we do and we stand by what we do – I wouldn’t be able to build three houses in three months if I didn’t have those relationships delivering what I want on time.
“We borrow money. We have people invest in us, in our business, which is a humbling and scary and exciting thing, but we need to deliver. So having our trade partners and our working partners work with us is so important.”
Remi hopes that the brand will continue to grow, eventually becoming a regional housebuilder. He has a lot of respect for other brands, particularly those who are local. “Being a national housebuilder is beyond what I personally want to do,” he says. “It’s not in my interest – I think that’s too big.
“I love Norfolk. I’ve travelled quite a bit and I’ve always come home. I’ve lived abroad and I’ve come home and you know what? Norfolk’s nice. It’s a nice pace of life. We’re near the sea. We’re in the countryside. I love it.”
Visit durrellandwolf.co.uk to find out more.
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