The Greater Vancouver Home Builders Association (GVHBA) is undergoing a renovation as it passes the keys to a new head of the lobby group.
The GVHBA has named South Surrey’s Bob de Wit to replace retiring CEO Peter Simpson.
De Wit, 44, was formerly the CEO and director of GreenAngel Energy, a green energy technology company. He told The Leader Friday much of the groundwork has already been laid for the association’s success.
“The organization is in great shape, 750 members, well-positioned to do a number of new things,” de Wit said. “I think areas we can improve would be with government advocacy, working with the different municipalities. There are 21 municipalities within our area, and we need to work efficiently with all of them, and hopefully more consistently with all of them.”
The selection of de Wit was the result of a national search that began in the sumer. He has degrees in marketing (BBA) and economics (MA) from Simon Fraser University, de Wit has executive experience in corporate development, finance and competitive market intelligence.
Simpson, 68, has been CEO of the GVHBA for the last 19 years and said he’s going to miss the challenges and the action.
However, he thinks it was time to move on.
“It’s getting to a point where I want to spend some time doing something else,” Simpson said he rarely gets an opportunity to see his wife and two daughters, a situation he’ll be changing when he retires next month.
He feels his greatest achievement has been building the membership of the association from a couple hundred to the 750 it is now.
He did that by showing them the value of membership which includes education and advocacy.
De Wit takes over from Simpson on Nov. 1.
