Nicheliving boss speaks for first time, believes ‘divine intervention’ has helped his company

The boss of embattled Perth residential builder Nicheliving believes God is on his company’s side as 200 families continue to wait for the dream homes they were promised – some up to four years ago.

In his only sit-down interview since the extent of Nicheliving’s building failures came to light and its building licence was cancelled in June – then dramatically reinstated in August – managing director Ronnie Michel-Elhaj said “divine intervention” had helped him assemble a team he claimed would get those long-suffering customers into their homes.

That promise comes after a year of white-hot public anger from customers – some of whom have been left financially ruined and virtually homeless – capped off by an on-camera tussle with veteran 7News TV reporter Geof Parry and a public dressing-down by WA Premier Roger Cook.

An unfinished property in Tapping.Credit: Ross Swanborough

Michel-Elhaj dismissed criticism of construction continuing on his wife’s luxury Applecross mansion as sexist; claimed he had poured $1 million of his own money into the business; and said the company had $100 million of assets to draw on to keep the business operating.

He also offered to meet with disaffected customers – some of whom signed contracts in December 2020 on the promise their house would be delivered within 12 to 18 months.

Speaking from his Northbridge office, Michel-Elhaj urged those angry customers to stick with the company, declaring the Nicheliving brand will “live on forever”.

Divine intervention

Discontent from customers over lengthening home build delays grew from grumbles in 2022 to a deafening roar over the past year, peaking in July when WA’s Building Services Board decided against renewing Nicheliving’s building registration over concerns about its financial state.

Nicheliving successfully secured a stay of that decision in the State Administrative Tribunal in late August and is preparing to argue at a hearing in November that it is financially sound and should retain its registration.

Nicheliving managing director Ronnie Michel-Elhaj.Credit: Nicheliving

It was through Nicheliving’s stay application that the extent of its building delays became apparent, with the company admitting more than 230 homes remained unfinished.

Michel-Elhaj said that number was now around 205, that Nicheliving had delivered 10 houses since the stay, and there were around 80 homes at the lock-up stage requiring finishing trades.

He said a higher power was helping his company.

“We’ve been very fortunate. I think I call it divine intervention, right? So I’m a Christian person, and I like to see that there is God assisting the company and our team,” he said.

“We’ve got really strong, high-calibre individuals now working on the delivery side that are really working very hard.”

‘Is this Christmas?’

Nicheliving’s problems arose from the about 450 contracts it signed in 2020 and 2021 following the $20,000 state and $25,000 federal COVID home stimulus grants – double a normal year’s worth of sales, Michel-Elhaj said.

He said the company went from 50 leads a day in February 2020 to a company-record 148 leads after the federal stimulus was announced. The next day it hit 178 and, with the state grant, hit 250 daily inquiries.

From 2019 to now, Nicheliving signed contracts on about 548 houses.

The first contracts signed were those in Nicheliving’s Willetton and Tapping developments. Many of those customers vent daily about the delays via a 150-person strong WhatsApp group.

Asked whether the company stopped to consider its ability to deliver so many homes in such a short period, Michel-Elhaj said the homes were not all sold at one time and build delivery was always going to be staggered because of the readiness of titles or customer finance.

Despite initially thinking, “Is this Christmas?” after the state grant was announced in June 2020, Michel-Elhaj placed much of the blame for his company’s woes on the stimuli, which turbocharged home construction and exposed the whole sector when COVID disrupted housing material supply chains and labour availability.

7News Perth reporter Geof Parry and Nicheliving managing director Ronnie Michel-Elhaj made headlines when they were involved in a tussle last month.Credit: 7News Perth

He said the entire industry went through these issues, but his company had, in his opinion, unfairly copped the brunt of the media scrutiny.

He also blamed the government for not helping Nicheliving with its COVID hangover.

“No one knew what was going to happen and of course, naturally, as a business, if you own land, you’re a land developer, and you’ve got stock to sell, you’re going to sell it,” he said.

“What I’m trying to say is that this is a government issue – a government issue that they should have helped and addressed at the time.”

Customer rage

Michel-Elhaj admitted the company had gone slower on home builds where it was losing money, using an example of the middle stages of a home build where the claim available was $48,000, but the work costs $60,000.

“How fast do you think you can go as a company? If you go too fast, and you’re doing it alone without government intervention, you’ll go broke,” he said.

Blaming the government and COVID would be cold comfort to the people who have been left homeless or stuck paying escalating rent payments and mortgages.

For many, the most frustrating part of the saga has been the lack of communication.

Richard Hamilton signed with Nicheliving for his Orelia home in December 2020 and has been paying a mortgage on the land while also paying rent.

During this time, he has avoided homelessness by subletting from friends and even moving to Bali for a few months to escape the Perth rental market.

Hamilton said he had several promised finish dates that kept getting pushed back and described communication from the company as abysmal.

“Either they ignore your emails or send you some standard bullshit response. I’ve lost all trust for them.”

Nicheliving customer Richard Hamilton

“We apologise if customers are not happy with our progress, but we’re certainly trying very hard, and we can do better with customer support,” Michel-Elhaj said.

Pressed on whether he would meet with disaffected customers, Michel-Elhaj said he had in the past and his door remained open.

However, he distanced himself from customers’ pain, saying of pressures on rent, interest rates and building delays – he could only control building delays.

Michel-Elhaj also bristled at the suggestion hundreds of customers were angry.

“It’s not hundreds of people. It’s the same group of people, right? That I’ve personally met with, by the way,” he said.

Ultimately, the Nicheliving boss said if his customers stuck with the company they would do well financially because of a longstanding policy of not passing on building cost increases.

“We have suffered these major losses, but I think just seeing it through to the end with the customers, they will financially do very well,” he said.

Asked why Nicheliving persisted with that policy when increasing prices to reflect home building costs could have resulted in homes being finished sooner, Michel-Elhaj said whenever he discussed passing on increased costs to customers they had refused.

An unfinished Nicheliving home.Credit: Ross Swanborough

He said those who had poured tens of thousands of dollars into rent would also come out on top, using an example of a $600,000 Nicheliving house-and-land purchase that might be worth $900,000 when the customer moved in.

However, it’s not just customers who are frustrated.

There are 11 court actions on foot from companies seeking a collective $250,000 from Nicheliving.

Michel-Elhaj said his company was paying its trades and rejected any notion the court actions reflected poorly on its relationship with suppliers.

“When you’re a large organisation, you’ve got X amount of turnover, of course you’re going to have disputes with certain people, some of them are founded and some of them are unfounded,” he said.

Wife home build critics ‘sexist’

One of the burning sources of anger for Nicheliving customers was that work continued on a luxury Applecross mansion, owned by Michel-Elhaj’s wife, after the company’s building registration was refused.

Michel-Elhaj called the criticism – which even WA Premier Roger Cook weighed in on – sexist.

“That’s highly sexist in my opinion ... are you saying that a female is not able to generate wealth in her own accord and this is the only project that is being conducted by that person?” he said.

Ronnie Michel-Elhaj’s wife’s house in Applecross.Credit: Ross Swanborough

Nicheliving was managing the project, but Michel-Elhaj said he moved the job to another builder.

“I wanted to distance everything that was related-party away from Nicheliving, even though we have this stay right, even though we were able to build,” he said.

Asked if the house would be his family home Michel-Elhaj responded: “Who said it will be my family home?”

Will the family move into the home?

“We might do. I’m not saying we will, or we won’t.”

Fixing the problems

Speaking ahead of reports that the government may intervene in Nicheliving’s backlog of housing issues, Michel-Elhaj said he believed the government could still help his company through payroll tax cuts or loan schemes that helped middle to large-sized builders.

He also wanted the government to give companies like his a bigger slice of the pie on “profitable” social housing jobs.

Michel-Elhaj said Nicheliving would no longer be a home builder and would focus on land development and real estate in the future. But he remained steadfast that the company was best-placed to complete the homes on his books.

He confirmed the business had $44 million worth of debt but rubbished suggestions it did not have the financial firepower to complete the builds, claiming there was $100 million worth of land and contract assets to draw on.

“For as long as we can keep fighting, Nicheliving will be around for forever.”

Nicheliving managing director Ronnie Mihael-Elhaj

“$100 million in assets and $44 million in liabilities – decent number, right?” he said.

On Tuesday, Cook vowed to make it his priority that Nicheliving would “not lay another brick until they fix the homes of those people who are waiting for their homes to be built”.

“They have to understand that they’ve let these customers down,” Cook said.

Michel-Elhaj claimed he personally had poured about $1 million dollars into the business in the month after the stay was granted.

“We were able to sell some positive assets to inject capital, so we’re lucky that we’re in a position to do that, and that’s probably the reason why we are still here today,” he said.

Michel-Elhaj highlighted the recent sale of the Swansea Street Markets site in East Victoria Park, which according to Pricefinder was worth about $8.4 million, and the $3.3 million sale of 66 Waratah Avenue, Dalkeith.

“We’ll keep selling as much as we can sell to support the company and our customers,” he said.

Michel-Elhaj also defended the business’ sizeable tax bill, which was revealed to be more than $7 million in the August SAT hearing.

“We’ve had an ATO debt for many, many years, and every company in Australia would have a similar situation,” he said.

Michel-Elhaj said the extra capital being poured into the business was being used to hire trades, and he was trying to assemble teams of finishing trades through labour hire companies to blitz houses at lock-up stage.

Recently Nicheliving shifted its real estate business under the company’s Australian Property Alliance banner and registered a new company called Urban Infill Pty Ltd but Michel-Elhaj was adamant the Nicheliving brand was not going anywhere.

“Our vision one day is to have Nicheliving on one of these signs in the CBD.”

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