HENNESSY BUILDING PROJECTS is a Gold Coast-based company well known for delivering new homes, renovations, and commercial projects to satisfied clients. Since forming in 2009, they have made customer service their main priority, keeping customers happy from the start of the project all the way to the end. “We pride ourselves on our service and close client relationships,” says Aaron Hennessy, founder and director of the company. “And by using our family name in the title, we want our clients to know how proud we are to put our name to every completed project.” “In a small place like the Gold Coast, we know how important a reputation is,” he adds. “We do everything we can to make sure ours is a good one.”

Aaron’s experience in the building industry dates back 26 years, to when he left school and started a carpentry apprenticeship. From there, he ran his own successful subcontracting company in Sydney, which grew to employ up to 15 people during the Sydney Olympics. He has also spent some time overseas, doing project management for an architecture firm in London, England. After returning to Sydney and earning more project management experience domestically, Aaron started Hennessy Building Projects. In Sydney, Hennessy Building Projects evolved from doing extensions and renovations starting at $100,000 to doing $5 million commercial refurbishments. After moving to the Gold Coast five years ago, that evolution began all over again.

Today, the company takes on a wide variety of projects – at the moment, for example, they are doing both a $400,000 renovation in Mermaid Waters and a $1.5 million renovation in Byron Bay. They also continue to do commercial works, such as shop fit-outs and office fit-outs. “We’ll do anything from $100,000 up,” Aaron says. “We have the manpower and the versatility to take on pretty much anything that comes our way.” According to Aaron, the company’s clients – no matter the sector – all choose Hennessy Building Project for the same reason. It’s because they are committed to delivering not just high quality buildings, but high quality customer experiences as well. “We’re very easy to get along with,” Aaron says. “We make clients comfortable through every step of the process. We look after them as if they were friends, which they often are by the end of their project.”

The company’s exceptional client experience starts with transparent pricing. Aaron has heard many stories of other builders hitting customers with extra costs once the project has started. To ensure that is never a worry with Hennessy Building Projects, the company offers a very comprehensive quote with everything included, right from the beginning. The company also ensures positive experiences by pairing clients with a project manager who can walk them through the building process every step of the way. Clients will always know who to call with questions before their project has started, during the build, or upon completion. Their project manager will also meet with them on a regular basis, ensuring the building or renovation process remains comfortable and stress-free. Hennessy Building Projects’ roster of longstanding and reliable tradespeople and subcontractors also do their part in taking care of the client. Many of them have been working with the company since they moved to the Gold Coast, and some have relationships with Aaron that go back even longer. Aaron trusts all of them to deliver a quality project, and he also trusts them to communicate with the client in the right way. “A building company’s success is all about its team,” Aaron says. “We’ve been very lucky to score a lot of really high quality tradesmen who really care about what they do, and who are also really lovely people.” Then there’s the company’s commitment to completing projects on time. Aaron and his wife Dianne have acted as developers themselves, so they know first-hand what it feels like for a project to miss its anticipated completion date.

To keep that from happening, he and his staff do their best to ensure that every project is scheduled and organised carefully so that it runs on time. Having reliable subcontractors also helps with that. Finally, even after a project is complete, Hennessy Building Projects checks in with the client at least once or twice a year to make sure the home has lived up to their expectations. And because the company is financially secure and well-established, the client can feel comfortable knowing they will still be around to provide that service. “We do everything we can to make sure the project is successful and the client has a happy experience,” Aaron says in summation.

RECOGNISED EXCELLENCE

Over the past few years, Hennessy Building Projects has earned a long list of customer testimonials and industry accolades to show for their excellence. Recently, at the Master Builders Housing & Construction Awards for the Gold Coast, the company has received multiple awards for multiple projects.

In 2015, for example, Hennessy Building Projects won the category for Home Renovation / Remodelling Project $276,000 to $575,000. That award-winning project was a renovation on a waterfront property in Sorrento, which was in desperate need for a re-design to make the river views the main feature of the main. To achieve that, the company gutted the entire house, took out the internal walls, and propped the ceilings – which really “opened the house up,” Aaron recalls. An interesting feature of that home was the large roof over the entertaining deck, which was constructed out of structural steel, recycled hardwood, and lined with V-joint lining boards above the rafters. The same detail was also duplicated on a side gazebo entertaining area.

Also of interest was the pool, which was located in the rear waterfront yard with a view to the water. It was stripped and relined with two millimetre pebble. A swim out section was also added to the shallow end, and waterfall features and LED lighting was installed to make it look “sleek and revitalised.” The rest of the rear yard also included new frameless glass balustrade, tiling and land-scaping, “transforming the entire view from the house.” That was the client’s goal, and that’s why Aaron was particularly proud of the end result.

Aaron was also proud of the result his team achieved on a more recent project in Varsity Lakes, which won a 2016 Master Builders Gold Coast Award for Home Renovation / Remodelling Project up to $275,000. That project involved a first floor renovation of a 15-year-old house, which happened to be Aaron’s own home – which he and his family lived in throughout the building process. The goal there was to achieve a “modern-style resort” feeling, with a lot of recycled timber and exposed steel. For the roof, recycled timber was brought from an old barn in Roma, and then finished with V-joint lining on top. The outside entertaining areas and front entry, meanwhile, used spotted gum decking, which complimented the spotted gum flooring throughout the lower level of the home.

The home also incorporates an indoor outdoor kitchen, which was designed to match with one another – and with the rest of the project – by bringing modern appliances and stone together with a timber veneer finish to the cabinetry. There’s also a poolside area, which was revamped with natural granite pool coping and Italian porcelain tiles next to a spotted gum sundeck. Aaron describes that project as a culmination of much of the company’s previous work, including the Sorrento home. “We put together a lot of what we’ve learned from other projects,” he says. “We wanted to create something special, and something that would be good for people to look at and take ideas from.”

Finally, also in 2016, Hennessy Building Projects won a Master Builders Award for Home Renovation / Remodelling Project over $1 million. The company earned that prestigious prize for a full house renovation in Tallai. The clients of that project also stayed on the property during construction. Their vision was for a large family home with quest quarters and separate living zones for the children. Once the guest wing was complete, the clients moved in there while Aaron and his team started demolition on the main house. The home was built with an “ecological approach,” Aaron recalls, so they kept the existing slab and some of the external and internal walls. All roof structures were constructed with structural steel and LVL timber, however, and the heavy structural steel meant the existing slab needed to be underpinned in some area.

The project was also built with a careful approach to acoustics, as the home included large open areas as well as a music room, where echoes needed to be limited. This was achieved by using acoustic fabric and painted slats for aesthetics. All walls, ceilings, and floors were also heavily insulated. The project was also interesting due to the client – a designer who has frequently worked with Hennessy Building Projects, including on Aaron’s home in Varsity Lakes. He did the design on his own home as well, and he included interesting features that represented his family’s Asian heritage. A peace corridor links the guest wing and main residence, shoji screens separate the guest wing study and the library to the reading room, and lantern pendant lights are featured in the building. Though that project was likely the biggest home renovation Aaron had ever been involved with, he says the process went exceptionally smoothly. “The client was great, and the team worked together to make sure that everything was done right,” he says. “There were a lot of challenges, but we overcame them together, and we delivered a very high quality project at the end of the day. The whole thing was just a joy.” For those reasons, Aaron is proud of the award recognition the project garnered – just as he’s proud of all the awards that he and his team have won. “The awards are special,” he says. “When the Master Builders judges come through your projects and tell you that what you’re doing is unique on the Gold Coast, you appreciate that. It’s always great when you’re told that you’re doing your job well.” “It’s especially important for our team,” he adds. “They take a lot of pride in what they do, and the awards prove that.”

SERVICE COMES FIRST

Moving forward, Hennessy Building Projects aims to continue delivering award-worthy quality with every project they undertake. As for the kind of projects, Aaron says he’s happy with what the company has been doing, and he hopes to do more of the same – which means more new homes, renovations, and commercial projects for clients that care about quality. At the same time, the company is also getting involved with more of their own developments. They enjoy the process of purchasing a block of land, designing a project from scratch, and then selling them. Currently, Hennessy Building Projects is in the process of completing a pair of duplexes in Palm Beach, and plan to have another couple up by the end of the year. “It’s a whole different avenue from building to clients, but it’s pretty exciting,” Aaron says. Beyond that, Aaron says they are looking forward to adding an in-house estimator and further growing their team – but without ever growing so large that they compromise on what makes the company special. “We don’t want to grow to a point where we can’t give the kind of customer service we are known for,” Aaron concludes. “That will always come first.” To learn more about Hennessy Building Projects, and to get in touch with Aaron and his team, visit https://henbuild.com.au/pages/contact