The challenge
Financial and legal due diligence are well covered. Operational due diligence is the strand most often missing, and it is the one that determines whether the model can actually be delivered.
How it works
A desktop review comes first where a deal is at first look: market, supply, achievable rent and an operating cost sense-check, enough to decide whether to spend more time on it.
Full feasibility adds site visits and primary interviews — operators, agents, universities or employers as the sector demands. We model the operating cost base from the design rather than from a benchmark, because layout, servicing and access drive staffing more than floor area does.
You get a written recommendation structured for investment committee, with the assumptions stated and the red flags named rather than buried.
What is included
- Market study, competitive supply and pipeline
- Achievable rent evidenced rather than assumed
- Demand-side analysis appropriate to the sector
- Operating cost benchmarking and an NOI sense-check
- Deliverability and design red flags that only show up once someone has run a building like it
- Written recommendation, investment-committee ready
Who is this for?
Desktop review
Early screening
For deals at first look, before committing time and fees.
Full feasibility
Site visits and interviews
For anything going to committee.
Why RESI Consultancy
[Tailor this section — who uses it, and what changed as a result.]
We have sat on the other side of this work. The people delivering it have run the buildings, written the budgets and defended the numbers to owners — which is a different starting point from a framework and a benchmark.
We take no introduction fee or commission from any operator or vendor, and we do not bid for the work we advise on. Any interest that could be perceived as a conflict is declared in writing before an engagement begins.
Outcomes
The operating reality tested
Whether the scheme can be run to the standard the model assumes, not just whether the model balances.
Red flags named early
Design and deliverability issues surfaced while they are still cheap to fix.
An IC-ready recommendation
Assumptions stated, evidence attached, structured for the paper you have to write.
Common questions
Asked often enough to answer here.
What is operational due diligence?
Operational due diligence assesses whether a scheme can actually be run to the standard the financial model assumes — staffing, systems, layout efficiency, servicing, and the cost base that follows from the design. It sits alongside financial and legal due diligence and is the strand most often missing.
Free first conversation
Tell us what is not working.
Most people arrive with a scheme that is not performing, an operator they cannot read, or a board paper due Friday. Any of those is a fine place to start. Thirty minutes, no proposal attached.