The Business of Property

Stuart and Simon are joined by mortgage expert Lee to discuss more of the impacts of COVID-19 on the property world, this time with a focus around financing and mortgages. We chat about all sorts of changes and impacts including: Mortgage holidays and how lenders are adapting to cope with the demand. Desktop valuations and their increased role. Looking for new approaches, maybe with drones! Enquir...

Emma returns to join Simon and Stuart, chatting about why and how she got started in her property business. Discussion topics include: Emma's two businesses - speech therapy and Estate Agents Hub . Getting to know your customers, being open and honest, always putting them first. The science and non-science of property valuations. Being super flexible for the benefit of customers while balancing fa...

Simon and Stuart are settling into the new lock-down normal, struggling to keep track of the days, but otherwise still moving forwards with their property businesses. Following the supposed shutdown of the property market, Stuart still seems extremely busy. With valuations, refinancing, building works and title splits there's a lot going on! And it's almost all continuing at almost full steam! Stu...

Stuart and Simon chat about updates in their property businesses, especially in light of the rapidly and drastically changing world we currently live in! (Please accept our apologies for slightly more background noise than normal on this episode.) Note this episode was recorded several days before release and before the most dramatic "lockdown" imposed early this week! What does the current world...

Simon and Stuart are joined this week by Emma! Given everyone is talking about the current virus outbreak, we thought we'd join in. The conversation covers what's happening already in the property world as well as what might be coming. Sales transactions are being cancelled, viewings are down and those that do happen are more difficult. But there are video tours! Stuart's flip project is nearly re...

Stuart and Simon talk about financing property and how they do it. Simon's oldest mortgage is actually still a residential one with consent to let and it's an old mortgage! In fact his oldest two mortgages are both very low trackers which makes them hard to give up, despite the potential to extract further funds. Stuart doesn't have any old mortgages! He's strictly a short term, fixed rate, mortga...

Stuart and Simon provide updates ranging from football coaching to property angel investment. Simon is soon expecting his money back from a small angel investment project. Stuart and Simon discuss many of the aspects around making angel investments in property companies - effectively an unsecured loan to that company. Why would you? How does it work? Is there actually a "Boris bounce" in the early...

What can you do with a property? Buy it! Stuart and Simon cover a few terms around various property investment strategies: Buy to sell (also known as "flipping") Rent to rent (R2R) Rent to HMO (R2HMO) Rent to SA (R2SA) Below market value (BMV) - does it exist? Off market sellers Motivated sellers Buy to let (BTL) Single let / vanilla BTL House of Multiple Occupation (HMO) Article 4 / HMO planning...

A starter glossary for some of the "stuff" that we talk about in property. Have your calculators ready to follow along as Stuart and Simon discuss and define a number of the basic financial terms that are commonly used in property investment. The key terms covered in this episode are: Yield of the "gross" and "net" form. Mortgage, along with Loan to Value (LTV) . Return on Investment (ROI) , or sh...

One property, two estate agents, 150k difference in valuation! Simon and Stuart discuss property valuations, from estate agents, RICS, their own guesses and Zoopla. Wherever the valuation comes from, it can have a big influence on how your property is perceived in the market.

Where do you spend your time? How do you know? How do you plan your future time? Simon talks about his obsessive tracking of time, using Toggl and a helper app that makes switching between common items really quick. Stuart discusses his time planning strategy and how the 12 Week Year approach has helped. It's important to focus on "the big things" rather than letting your time get filled up with a...

Every year brings new regulations and changes to the property market. Stuart and Simon discuss some of the changes landlords need to be aware of that are coming in 2020. With only a few distractions along the way. The landlords changes in 2020 discussed are: All rental properties (including those with existing tenancies) must have an EPC rating of at least EPC E from April. The EPC Register site....

Stuarts talks about his ongoing experience with the legal ombudsman about a potential SDLT overpayment. Simon discusses (very little) progress on selling a property a property which spawns a chat about being fair to tenants (and landlords) when trying to sell tenanted properties.

Happy New Year! Let's set some property goals. Simon and Stuart both actually managed to take a rare break from property and work (but not family!) over the Christmas period. Of course it wasn't 100% restful - a leak did feature. Sell, buy, buy, buy and focus; are the key plans! Books mentioned: The Road Less Stupid The 12 Week Year The sound quality on this episode is especially poor. I'm very so...

Stuart provides an introduction and update for his latest purchase - a flat that he's adding a bedroom to with the intention of flipping it. There's a fleeting mention of the ongoing market uncertainty and then it's onto talking about other property podcasts: Inside Property Investing Executive Juice The Property Podcast Contropreneur episode and Mike's videos Starting property investment with 20k...

Simon provides an update on his investment plans, or rather lack of them, for the moment. The discussion wanders through the considerations and calculations when releasing equity to fund further investment and the returns that need to be achieved. Then onto remote investing, potential deals that hang around for a long, long time and taking on property challenges. Somehow the chat progresses to an...

HMO vs Single Let! Stuart and Simon discuss the merits, or not, of their chosen (primary) property investment strategies.

Stuart and Simon discuss auction results, recent and from the more distant past. With a wider chat about "reading" auction rooms. Simon talks about potentially remortgaging to pull out some equity to provide new deposits, with the basic financial details around that. Followed by a slightly deeper discussion about mortgage options, loan to value and rental cover stress tests. Simon can't do mental...

Simon and Stuart chat about what they look for when viewing properties. That leads onto a little about each of their chosen strategies and how that effects the type of property they look for.

Stuart and Simon talk about some properties that they've recently viewed as potential investments. Stuart has viewed a ex-convent and Victorian house that's currently flats, both coming up for auction. Simon also talks about a house that's currently split into flats, seemingly the left-overs after it's garden had been built on. Plus a grade II listed Tudor house that's interesting but difficult to...