Global Education Communities Corporation (GECC) and the Pure Group expect to break ground on their $330-million student housing and mixed-use project in Surrey, B.C., by year-end 2025.

The companies’ top executives, Toby Chu of GECC and Steven Evans of Pure, shed more light on plans for the recently announced 49-storey GEC Education Mega Centre (EMC), which is located in the City Centre area within a short-distance of a SkyTrain station, in a joint interview with Connect.

The firms expects to obtain development permit from the city by the fall.

“So, when we say breaking ground, that’s pretty much an excavation permit expected to be [provided in the] later part of this year, somewhere between September to December,” said Chu.

Full construction is slated to commence in 2026. The project is slated for completion in 2029.

GECC holds an 85% ownership stake and will operate the property, while Pure has a 15% interest. Plans call for institutional investors to be added at a later date. The exact ownership structure following project completion will be determined in the future.

“Progressively, we’ll decrease our ownerships,” said Chu. “This type of project is a substantial size of $330 million, so we’ll be bringing in additional financial partners.”

The development site previously housed a rollerskating rink that GECC acquired about seven and a half years ago and subsequently demolished. The project has been going through the development-permitting process in the past four to five years with the company proposing amendments along the way.

“The commercial tenant has been committed by our schools as one, but we may also open up to other commercial tenants that want to occupy the lower three floors, the lobby and second and third floor,” said Chu.

“To understand a little bit better about the building, there’s a lobby floor, obviously for either restaurant or retail. Very small space, not a lot of space available, so it’s tight. A lot of the retail, even a restaurant operator, would love to see 1,380 tenants living upstairs and eating or dining at their location. The second and third floors are typical office space. We own schools. Our schools will take that up.”

GECC might also bring other school operators into the mix. Those operators will have access to 16,000 square feet of gross, and 13,000 net rentable, square feet per floor.

“Anything above the third [floor], all the way to the 49th will be all rental,” said Chu.

Unlike the 10 other GECC student housing facilities across the Lower Mainland, this project will also target prospective multi-family tenants.

“Our ideal situation is to have a more homogeneous, holistic building cater to working professionals and educational professionals [employed] within 200, 300, 400 metres around the building,” said Chu.

“So, that’s sort of the whole concept. It’s education-centric for students, teachers, educational staff, and that’s why we call it the Education Mega Centre.”

Multi-family tenants will be housed on six floors and primarily students attending several nearby educational institutions will occupy the seventh to 49th levels.

“We don’t particularly call it student rental, because we like to be flexible and open, but [the floors] are student-centric,” said Chu.

Leasing efforts have already begun, with GECC holding discussions with Simon Fraser and Kwantlen universities, Douglas College and others. The area’s current and future post-secondary campuses lack their own student-housing units.

So, there is strong demand for student housing in the district, according to Chu.

“We really like this particular market, being able to invest directly across from the SkyTrain station, in this very central hub of activity, which is one of the strongest-growing nodes in the country, really, in terms of the development and population growth that’s going on there,” said Pure’s Evans. “And, echoing everything [Chu] said about the need for student housing there, we just think it’s a great piece of real estate.”

Pure is investing in student housing for the first time. Evans examined several student-housing investment opportunities in Canada and the U.S. before deciding to partner with GECC in a partnership arranged by Avison Young Principal Jason Mah, who had a long-term relationship with Chu.

“Although I looked at a lot of student-housing opportunities in the United States in the past, it’s much more of a fragmented industry here in Canada,” said Evants. “There’s a lot of large student housing owners and operators in the U.S., more so than in Canada.

“But I think it’s a market market sector that’s going to grow in prominence, and we can think of nobody better to partner with than [GECC.] We looked at it long and hard and found that they kind of own the market in Western Canada, and they’re great operators, and that the quality of the product that they’re bringing to student housing is excellent.”

Chu said GECC partnered with Pure because his firm requires partners that enable it to concentrate on operating sites.

“We don’t want to pretend to be everything,” said Chu. “This is what we call partners in enterprise. To build big projects, we need expertise. We need professionals. And, I think that’s what we are getting. We are partnering with Pure because of their experience and their expertise in the development and the financing sectors.

“We will focus on operations so that everybody can focus on what they do best.”

Avison Young’s Mah said he has primarily represented GECC in the project. His role, he added, was to help facilitate the partnership and help push “everything towards the finish line.”

Both GECC and Pure, which owns and operates a REIT as well as a development company, are based in Vancouver.

Pictured: The proposed Education Mega Centre in Surrey, B.C. student housing complex.

Photo: Pure Group/GECC

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