Growing A Family Business

When Martin Gillespie, president of Heartland Homes, talks about the company's success as a homebuilder, he gives credit where it's due. In Heartland's case, much of that credit goes to Alan Gillespie, Martin's 62-year-old father, who started the homebuilding business in 1984. "He did the hard part," said Gillespie. But now 38-year-old Martin and his brothers, Casey and Brian, are doing their part as the management team in a family business that has earned an enviable reputation as one of Pittsburgh's quality homebuilders.
The senior Gillespie built his first house for his family in Upper St. Clair, where he still lives, and where son Martin grew up. That was the beginning of Heartland Homes. Martin went off to college in Northeast Ohio, at John Carroll University. On graduating, he opted to enter the corporate world. He joined a Fortune 500 company, working in sales and management, and lived in several major cities throughout the country.
In 2000, however, Gillespie came home and joined Heartland. Why the change of heart? "I had had the experience of working for a big corporation, and I wanted to try something different. My father had this business, and I thought maybe we could work with something this good and grow it." And how it has grown.
In 1990, Heartland Homes custom built a respectable 80 new homes. In 2007, the number of new homes built had risen to 427. "We're going to do even better this year," said Gillespie, unphased by some of the gloomier predictions for housing in 2008.
Another measure of the homebuilder's growth is found in the number of people it employs. When Gillespie returned to Pittsburgh, Heartland had six employees. Today it has 80 people working for it. "We've are now something of a hybrid," said Gillespie, "becoming a combination of a family business and a well-run corporation."
Always a builder of custom homes, Heartland in the early 1990s began building somewhat smaller houses than in the past, but without relenting on its high standards. From concentrating its efforts in South Hills, Heartland Homes expanded into North Hills, where it developed and built its first community. Known as Northridge, it comprises 135 single-family homes, townhomes and villas, all of which were sold in the short span of three years between 2002-2005.
Master-planned communities followed on the heels of Northridge. Heartland currently has a presence in three extraordinary developments that meet the definition of "master-planned communities." The first of these, Sonoma Ridge in Moon Township, comprises nearly 300 acres. It offers single-family, quadplex, carriage and estate homes, as well as amenities such as a pool and clubhouse. Residents also enjoy walking trails that lead to the Montour Trail, a paved rail-trail open for all kinds of non-motorized recreational use. In North Fayette Township, Heartland is a featured homebuilder at Fayette Farms, a community with a rural feel that is only minutes from Pittsburgh International Airport. North of Allegheny County, in Cranberry Township, Heartland Homes will build more than 100 single-family homes in recently opened Orchard Park. All told, the homebuilder now has a presence in 33 communities throughout southwest Pennsylvania.
One of those communities is in the heart of downtown Pittsburgh. Heartland Homes has taken on the job of marketing, selling and doing the finish work on 65 luxury condominiums at Piatt Place, a prestigious mixed-use project under development by Millcraft Investments. "It's a little bit of diversification for us," said Gillespie
There's also a bit of personal interest in the project. When he worked in the corporate world, Gillespie lived for three years in downtown New Orleans. "I loved it, loved the energy of the urban environment." The opportunity to become involved in Pittsburgh's reinvigorated downtown had lots of appeal for the former urban resident. "I believe we'll be involved in another downtown project at some point," Gillespie said.
Gillespie has little doubt that a reputation for quality has spurred Heartland Homes growth. As much as he has enjoyed that growth, he doesn't take it for granted. "The only way you grow in the homebuilding business is by having a high-quality product," he said. "Too often, the word ‘quality' gets diluted. So when we say it, we mean it."
To that end, Gillespie said, Heartland Homes uses the best name-brand products. "That's true whether the price point of the home is $180,000 or $1 million. Everybody gets them." Further, the homebuilder takes pride in offering a 12-year structural warranty and a 30-year waterproofing guarantee for basements. "The popularity of our homes," he added, "has made us the number-one custom home builder in the region."
In addition to a quality product, Gillespie attributes success in the new-home market to what Conrad Hilton once said were the three most important aspects of the real estate business: location, location, location. "The home you're building is the most important thing," Gillespie said, "but the next most important thing is that it is in a desirable location.
In the national housing picture, Metropolitan Pittsburgh has its own edge as a location.
It can be summed up as a market that has seen no big booms, but no big busts. That's far better than other locations in the country that have suffered big hurts in housing.
Gillespie advises seizing the day in the local new-home market. The longer potential buyers sit tight in their existing homes, he said, the more they are going to miss out on the appreciation they would have realized in a newly built home by making a commitment to buy at today's modest prices and interest rates. You'll get a quality-built new home, and a new neighborhood. It's just good timing."
When it comes to locations, Gillespie is more than happy with what his return to Pittsburgh, and the change in his career course, have meant. "I'm fortunate," he says, "to be working with good friends and family. There's nowhere I would rather be."