Month: January 2017

Quick update on the growth goal. We’re still in conversations about the potential to accommodate some contractors and viewed a local farm cottage for potential R2R.

The aim for January was to secure two new R2R for SA units, we have one about to undergo a light refurb so still chasing down the second

Also viewed a small commercial conversion opportunity in Edinburgh city centre and continue to carry out due diligence on a couple of other opportunities.

Overall a productive week had with plenty of new information to contemplate and take action on.

With the end of the month comes our VIP meet and it was a great session. Thanks Aniko for a brilliant 1:1.

This VIP took on a digital marketing theme and we had 2 excellent guest speakers introducing us to some key insights. Daniel from http://www.brandpromise.uk  got us thinking about our brand as it relates to our property business and I look forward to completing his free workbook. If you look at a brand as an asset, a good brand frequently achieves in excess of 400% ROI in terms of investment in and revenue back.

Jack Porter-Smith from http://wsipaidsearch.com walked us through an intro to the four key components of digital marketing:

1. Strategy
2. Implementation
3. Measurement
4. Optimisation

It’s mind boggling to see how paid search can be used to bring potential guests to your SA units or indeed attract JV’s to work with you.

I also found myself on Paul O’Mahony’s excellent social media webinar this Wednesday where the key take-away was, “Never use social media to sell, use it to build your list”.

Going into a new year we can fall into the trap of consuming so much information designed to help us, that it can actually overwhelm us. I was reminded of this important lesson this week and to be conscious to avoid it – i.e. consuming a lot of good info but never stopping long enough to act on it.

Quite often we don’t need more information, lack of implementation is the problem. So, the key is to be intentional about selecting one or two things at a time that will help, act on them, then review and adjust. Act, review and improve. Then repeat. This is how winning habits are created that compound throughout the year.

What have you learned recently that you will be implementing?

Week two of the year kicked off with a bang, here’s a quick summary.

Chris and I spent Monday manically sourcing SA options for a potential opportunity to accommodate a group of contractors in our local area.

I then had two days in Sheffield for my monthly meeting with the Development Discovery mentors Alan, Pauline and Aidan. Big thanks to guest speaker, Accountant Phil Dawson, who gave us a sobering summary of all the tax implications for landlords. Did you know that in a year’s time all landlords will be required to submit a quarterly return to HMRC outlining all rents and costs for each property? Read more here: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/484668/making-tax-digital.pdf

We have a site secured to develop 11 luxury apartments in Devon and are in discussions with a potential JV investor for funding, fingers crossed.

Thanks to Mike and Jamie for having us at the Derby PPN this week where Pauline and Alan gave an overview of targeted commercial development. Great to meet some fellow investors and really enjoyed hearing George Gannon’s impressive journey using the commercial conversion strategy.

The week finished off with viewing commercial conversion and SA opportunities in Fife and then the Scottish Borders.

P.S.

I mentioned previously that systemisation is a key part of our 2017 theme, with that in mind, I’m reading Michael Gerbers latest book called Beyond the E Myth http://www.beyondemyth.com/

During the Christmas break we listened to the Progressive Property podcast # 9 and have made the commitment to take action on Mark I’Anson’s advice and publish a little ‘weekly paragraph’. In part to share our learns and experiences so that we might be able to pass on value to others on their property journey, part to make ourselves known to those who may wish to collaborate with us at some point down the line, and part to keep ourselves accountable to our growth activities.

In this first post I thought the logical place to start would be to mention our end of year review and planning process. I personally love the down time between Christmas and New Year, and the early days of January (I say downtime but Chris and I both have energetic young families – he has three girls and I have three boys 🙂 ). In amongst the family time, we invest a good deal of hours over this period to go through a comprehensive end of year wrap up and planning session that follows along this outline:

• Intelligent reflection
• Vision
• Goals and implementation plan

(If you haven’t already gone through a process like this I have a template I’m happy for you to use, just PM me for a copy).

For those who we haven’t met at Progressive events, my business partner Chris Dornan and I have a small but growing SA business which we intend to scale this year alongside generating complimentary/additional revenue streams through commercial conversion, new build development and flips. Our overall theme for 2017 is exponential growth, strategic partnerships and systems.

We are part of the Scottish Progressive VIP Community and are excited about taking action on our goals under the mentorship of Paul & Aniko Smith.

Follow our posts on our facebook page, or ignore as you wish. For those with whom we resonate, we hope that the posts to come provide value or interest along the way.

Wishing you all a 2017 of good health, growth and fun.