Overall, property development is inherently risky, with the high barriers to entry reflecting the cyclic and capital intensive nature of the sector and the typically slow payback period. This sees many risks evident throughout the property development process and needs for effective risk management strategies for successful property development.

Pacific Rim Property Research conducted a risk rating survey involving large, medium and small size property developers. The survey spread over the five (5) stages (pre-construction stage, contract negotiation stage, formal commitment stage and post-construction stage) of the property development.

To assess the impact of the scale of property development operation on the risk ratings, the Table below represents the risk ratings for the five (5) stages of the property development process for large, medium and small scale property developers.

Sucessful property developer will use wide range of risk management stratgies throughout the development process, with key strategies to mitgate property development risk being in-house management of critical processes, quality assurance procedures and contractually allocating risk to others.