Expertise
Capabilities proven across seventy years of projects.
The firm delivers two kinds of work: ground-up construction taken from raw site to occupancy, and value-add construction, meaning additions, renovations and adaptive reuse of buildings already in service.
01 / How we work
Ground-up and value-add capabilities.
New development
Ground-up construction, from site work to occupancy.
LEF Construction plans, prices and builds new projects, handling budgeting, scheduling, subcontractor buyout and field supervision. Completed work includes:
- Healthcare facilities from 60 to 720 beds, in fifteen states
- Apartment complexes and planned communities up to 1,130 units
- Manufacturing and distribution buildings to 193,000 SF
- Hotel, structured parking and mixed-use construction
Value-add and repositioning
Work on buildings in service.
Additions, expansions, renovations and adaptive reuse, including projects sequenced around occupied facilities.
- Facility additions from 28 to 185 beds on operating campuses
- Warehouse and plant expansions of 32,000 to 40,000 SF
- Adaptive reuse, including a historic Savannah hotel converted to offices
- Renovation of older apartment buildings to add units, modernize systems and raise value
02 / Sectors
The work, sector by sector.
Senior Living and Healthcare
- Projects on record80
- Beds delivered15,000+
- Project range28 to 720 beds
- Markets15 states · 50+ cities
Skilled nursing facilities, homes for the aged, supportive living, and convalescent and extended-care centers, built in more than fifty cities and towns across fifteen states, from Massachusetts to Florida on the East Coast, through the Midwest, to Colorado, New Mexico and Utah.
Nearly all of these projects were built as investments and leased to qualified operators. From 1993, the principals operated eight skilled nursing and five supportive living facilities themselves. The supportive living portfolio includes six Illinois facilities of 149 beds each, from Aurora to Springfield.
Multifamily and Communities
- Units built2,800+
- Largest complex1,130 units · 5 towers
- Master-planned land137+ acres
- MarketsIL · CO · FL · MO
The residential record runs from garden apartments to high-rise concrete towers to master-planned communities. In Chicagoland, the firm's principals built and managed a five-tower, 1,130-unit complex until its sale in 1978. Talisman Towers in Glenview paired 110 apartments with an integrated shopping center and professional offices.
Several of these communities were owned and managed for years after completion. Lamplighter Garden Apartments in Wheeling, 464 units across 11 buildings, was held from 1963 to 1971 and opened with one of the first indoor-outdoor pools in the country. Woodsmoke Apartments in Denver, 419 units across 39 buildings, introduced a no-lease rental concept later copied across that market.
In Kansas City, three planned communities on more than 137 acres combined single-family homes, duplexes through fourplexes, apartments, condominiums, a life-care community and an office building.
Industrial and Commercial
- Projects1M+ SF
- Largest building193,000 SF
- Repeat-client projects3rd and 4th for one owner
- Delivery modelBuild · own · lease-back
Manufacturing plants, warehouses, distribution centers, offices, showrooms, supermarkets and shopping centers, for a client roster that has included Schwinn Bicycle Co., Acco International, Field Enterprises, Howard Johnson and the U.S. Post Office Department.
Much of this work was repeat business. A 193,000 SF international headquarters and a 141,261 SF Eastern distribution center were the third and fourth projects for the same office-products manufacturer. A 90,000 SF plant was the second for a candle maker, and a 68,000 SF office and warehouse was the third for a metal-products company.
For many of these clients the firm also acted as investor, retaining title and leasing the facility back.
Hospitality and Special Projects
- Hotel202 rooms · luxury
- Parking structure15 stories · downtown Chicago
- Adaptive reuseHistoric hotel, Savannah GA
A 202-room luxury hotel with nine meeting and banquet rooms, an auditorium, an indoor pool and a full health club, built as the third major project for the same client. A 15-story parking garage in downtown Chicago that carried leased hospital parking, staging for CBS News vans, and the first McDonald's opened inside a parking structure.
In Savannah, the firm converted a historic hotel into offices and a health club.
03 / What sets the firm apart
The factors that set LEF Construction apart.
Financing fluency
Projects financed through major insurance companies, savings institutions, HUD programs and Industrial Development Bond issues, with relationships that have included John Hancock, Northwestern Mutual, Continental Illinois and Cole Taylor Bank. That experience helps keep lender requirements, draw schedules and budgets aligned during construction.
An owner's discipline
For most of the record, the owner and the builder were the same people. Facilities were built as investments, then leased or operated by the family, so budgets, systems and finishes were chosen by people who would live with them for decades.
An integrated development platform
LEF Construction operates alongside LEFT Development and Leftbank Holdings, a platform that develops, owns and operates its own projects. Clients get a builder with in-house development, underwriting and property management experience, and the resources of a larger organization behind every job.
04 / How we deliver
A documented process from preconstruction to closeout.
Preconstruction
Site acquisition support, design and engineering review, and disciplined underwriting before a shovel hits the ground.
Estimating and Buyout
Documented assumptions, scope-tight bid packages, and a critical-path schedule the whole team can hold to. Subcontracts include incentives for on-time, on-budget delivery.
Trade Coordination
All trades meet before work begins and at each major milestone. Getting every trade in the room aligns sequencing, uncovers conflicts while they are still inexpensive to fix, and cuts delays.
Field Execution
Hands-on supervision of the trades that gate occupancy, with daily logs and disciplined change control.
Closeout and Turnover
Punch, commissioning and a clean handover, with the documentation owners and operators need.
Share the scope, the site and the schedule.
We will come back with an honest assessment of how we would approach it.