If your property business is not getting the results you want, the problem may be lack of accountability. I’m not just referring to the individuals in the business, there are multiple layers and players in this. Take a moment and think about the key parties involved in the end to end process of a property deal- this could include you, an agent, a vendor, a lender, a solicitor, a builder, an architect, the council……the list goes on depending on the type of deal. Everything needs to fall into place for a successful deal to happen to the desired timeline and budget, and for that it requires everyone being accountable to their word.

We all know how painful it is when someone in the chain doesn’t keep their word. The challenge sits on the shoulders of you as the investor and deal maker to be the one who expertly manages all the moving parts so that everyone stays accountable.

So how can property investors and business owners improve this? Would it surprise you if I said there is no silver bullet? Instead, it is a mindset, a culture. We’ll circle back to that culture and it’s importance in a moment, first a couple of definitions.

A few years ago I discovered Greg Bustin’s book “Accountability: The Key to Driving a High Performance Culture”. Greg Bustin is a business and leadership consultant, an international speaker, and a Master Chair for Vistage International. In the book he explains this powerful trait in easy-to-understand components and as you will shortly see, there are important lessons for property investors of all levels.

What does accountability really mean?

Greg Bustin writes about accountability from the perspective of creating a high performance culture in your organisation. This in itself is extremely powerful however I feel that property investors can, and need to, take it further by looking at how accountability can also be carried outside of your immediate company and applied to the other key parties in your power team and in the end to end deal.

Let’s start with Bustin’s explanation of accountability, which captures it brilliantly:

“Doing what you said you would do within the time frame you agreed to do it.

Practiced effectively, accountability is a way of thinking and acting all the time and ultimately trumps any financial, intellectual, structural, or technological ability. The reason is simple: Accountability is not based on circumstance but rather on an attitude of accomplishing a task or achieving an objective despite circumstance.”

Bustin’s final paragraph is my favourite,

“Accountability is critical to anyone leading a group of people, because, after all, every business is a people business. Accountability is how people get things done—or don’t get things done.”

This is so relevant because anyone in property knows that it really is a people business.

 

The Seven Pillars of Accountability

In the pursuit of understanding what separates high performing companies from the rest, Greg Bustin undertook more than 5000 interviews with successful CEOs worldwide. What he discovered was a mindset grounded in seven distinct characteristics.

Using the memorable acronym C.U.L.T.U.R.E, he calls these characteristics the Seven Pillars of Accountability. From all of his in-depth research, Bustin concluded that culture is a significant predictor of your future performance.

As you read through these seven pillars ask yourself the challenging questions that each point raises. Whether your property investing business is a company of one or a company of many with partners or staff, this is all relevant. Is yours a culture that is created and nurtured intentionally, or is yours a culture that occurs by happenstance?

Here’s the Seven Pillars:

Character: An organisation’s character is shaped by its values, and these values are clearly defined and communicated. The organisation does what is right for its customers, employees, suppliers, and investors, even when it’s difficult to do so.

Unity: Every employee understands and supports the organisation’s mission, vision, values, and strategy, and knows his or her role in helping to achieve them.

Learning: The organisation is committed to continuous learning and invests in ongoing training and development.

Tracking: The organisation has reliable, established systems to measure the things that are most important.

Urgency: The organisation makes decisions and acts on them with a sense of purpose, commitment, and immediacy.

Reputation: The organisation rewards achievement and addresses underperformance, earning the organisation and its leaders a reputation, both internally and externally, as a place where behaviour matches values.

Evolving: The organisation continuously adapts and changes the organisation’s practices to grow its marketplace leadership position.

“Just as you cultivate a garden, you must cultivate a workplace environment where high performance is the expectation.”

Conclusion

In his book, Bustin talks about accountability being an ‘all or nothing standard’. Does the idea of accountability being consistently present sound too idealistic? Well, he makes makes a very strong case for it by pointing out that “wee problems”, which can seem inconsequential, can create much bigger issues.

It doesn’t need much imagination to think of the ‘wee problems’ that can arise and compound along a property deal, potentially causing it to fail….ie the deal you jumped into without fully completing your due diligence, the vendor failing to disclose critical information that delays conveyancing, the local market research for SA demand that you didn’t do, the botched job that a poorly selected tradesperson does and has to be re-done. There can be so many, and these are the kind of dropped balls that can cause the deal to fall over, or at least not go as smoothly as hoped.

Going back to Bustin’s point about culture, accountability really has to become part of our property business DNA. When this happens the investor will set each deal up for optimal chances of success by setting the foundations for accountability with all key parties from the beginning, and then managing that high standard throughout the process.

The way I see it, what starts in your business as a culture underpinned by the 7 pillars, must then extend beyond the organisation as the ‘culture’ of every property deal.

 

Being accountable to yourself and having the integrity to do what you said you would do will likely be the most powerful trait you can practice, and also seek out in those you choose to work with.

Here are some questions to help challenge your thinking about accountability in a constructive way:

-What “wee problems” are taking root and damaging your business’s results and/or culture?

-What would the typical ‘culture’ of your property deals look like?

-What would an impartial visitor to your business see, hear, and experience?

-How would the observed behaviour align with the behaviour you say you want? 

In closing, what are your thoughts on accountability in property?

When you see a headline like this, ‘HOW TO GET GUARANTEED RESULTS IN ANYTHING’  it catches your attention, doesn’t it? This is the title of a Peter Voogd podcast I listened to this week – it was like a mini workshop talking through an exercise you can complete to help stay consistent and to maximise the results in your life and business. 

These are simple questions that you really want to have clear answers to and have those answers at the forefront of your mind. 

Anytime you’re feeling stressed or not getting the results you want, you can take time to go back through this workshop.

This is a bit of longer post but well worth working through the 7 questions in the exercise I’m sharing from Peter V below. 

I took a little time to complete this exercise and I encourage you to do the same, if you’re interested in really achieving the results you want. 

 

Here are the 7 essential questions to ask yourself:

#1 WHAT’S YOUR BIG FIVE? – ie what are the five things you want to accomplish in the next 30-60 days (the things that if you accomplished these you’d be excited, fulfilled, proud, confident, happy…)

Maybe it’s systemising a part of your SA business, or hiring an assistant, or sourcing a new property deal…

A great quote I noted down from Peter is this, “Remember, nothing works unless you do. And if you don’t work, work through your team. The people who really do the work and move with clarity are the ones that get the results and build the businesses.”

So what are the your top five things you want to accomplish in the next 30-60 days?

Here are some of mine:

-secure 2 more mixed use commercial deals

-find a buyer for one of our packaged SA properties

-complete the first draft of a book

 

#2 WHAT ARE YOUR TOP FIVE VALUES? 

In other words what are the things you value the most and are you in alignment with those? Are you working with intention, purpose and clarity?

Everyone will have their own unique combination, it may be freedom and flexibility, or money, or family, or….(you fill in the blanks).  If you’re not entirely sure there’s a simple questionnaire you can use on Dr John Demartini’s website to help you determine your values.

My top 3 are becoming the best version of me in each area of life, wealth creation, and creating rich experiences with my family. 

Once you are aware of your highest values you need to make sure everything you are doing is connected to what’s most important to you. 

Being clear on your values gives you a very powerful filter to assess all the requests and opportunities that come your way, and decide what’s for you or not for you. So when a request pops into your inbox you can be asking yourself – ‘is this going to contribute to my values or contaminate?’

By using your own personal filter like this you’ll feel more empowered to say no to certain things that aren’t connected to your values and therefore live more on purpose. 

#3 WHAT ARE YOUR TOP FIVE PRODUCTIVITY PRACTICES – that you know when you are executing these you’re at the peak of your productivity.

Here are my top 5, in no particular order

-review the week that was and plan the next wee on a Sunday by identifying my top 3 proactive actions for the week

-start my day with my morning routine (which includes exercise, healthy breakfast, a short meditation and reading to learn/develop)

-complete a 90 minute focused session progressing one of my top 3 projects with no distractions (ie no email, phones or any notifications)

-practice effective transition between each task (I use a simple little technique I learned from Brendon Burchard)

-set an intention and visualise the completion point of a task before I start working on it

When you’re at your best what are you thinking? What are you doing? How are you starting your day?

#4 WHAT FIVE NEW BELIEFS NEED TO BE INSTALLED IN YOUR MIND?

Your behaviours are a reflection of your beliefs, so if you’re not where you want to be, what do you need to believe in order to become the next version of you? For example, if you are thinking about venturing out to secure your first R2R property but your beliefs are that getting a R2R is hard and no one will want to do a deal like that with me, then that needs to be replaced with an empowering belief. For example, getting a R2R is easy and there are lots of people who want to do a deal like that with me. 

Maybe it’s about finding great people for your power team or JV partners – so you’d be installing something like ‘I attract great people to my team”.

Think about your limitations, where they may have stemmed from and what new beliefs need to be installed to replace the limiting ones. Whatever we play over and over in our heads becomes a reality so be very conscious about what you’re telling yourself. 

 

#5 WHAT’S YOUR ONE GAME-CHANGING MOVE?

What’s one big thing that will help you accomplish your other goals?

Is it reaching out to someone? Is it creating a keystone habit that will have a positive ripple effect into other areas of your life?

For Chris and I it would be securing an end user (ie tenant or buyer) in advance for one of the shortlisted deals we are working on.

 

#6 WHAT ARE YOUR TOP THREE TO FIVE LIFE LESSONS THAT YOU’VE BEEN TAUGHT THE PAST TWELVE MONTHS?

What this is referring to are the perspective shifts, breakthroughs and lessons that life has taught you over the last 12 months?

A stand out one for me which might resonate with some of you is to focus more on how we show up than on how fast we are advancing.

#7 WHAT ARE YOUR TOP FIVE NON NEGOTIABLES?

What are you going to do every week that will be non-negotiable, things you have done before that have proven to give you results?

It could be daily exercise, committing to x amount of business development calls, or connecting with a certain amount and type of person. For me these include the things I mentioned above like the morning routine, the productivity practices, I also block out every Wednesday night for a date night with my wife.

What will your non negotiables be?

 

Once you have answers to all these questions then wrap the exercise up by completing this sentence, “I know I’m successful when….”

 

…ie when I’m living life on my terms

…when I’m positively impacting others

…when I’m staying true to my values

…when I bring joy to my family

 

This will only take about 15 minutes to complete. If you do work through this I’d love to hear just one of your answers to the questions.

In previous posts I’d written about the importance of deal flow. In other words to create a consistent flow of property opportunities to consider so that we don’t get in a position of trying to force fit one deal. [if you missed that one I’ll attach a link at the bottom of this post]

 

So, once you have your deal flow working, the next thing of course is to analyse the deals you select for your shortlist. Much of our desk based time these days is doing exactly this and with our focus being on the acquisition of mixed use buildings (ie commercial on the ground floor with opportunity to create flats with the space above) we need to take the time to break down the deal into its potential component parts, before piecing it all together to assess the full building/site.

 

Here’s a brief overview (no particular order and not going into massive detail) of the kind of analysis process we are going through with each short- listed opportunity.

 

ANALYSING THE COMMERCIAL PARTS

(Note the properties we prioritise are the ones in locations where we have some information about a brand looking to expand there or we have some information about a commercial tenant interested in leasing the vacant property).

 

#1 Overview of the area ie to get a sense of area population, state of the high street (ie occupancy of shop fronts, make up of nationals, independents etc)

 

#2 Break down top line figures on a spreadsheet 

-floor areas ie unit 1 is 57 SQM and 615 SQFT etc

-rateable value (you’ll find that here www.saa.gov.uk for Scotland and here https://www.gov.uk/correct-your-business-rates for England

-a range for market rent/SQFT in the area (we get that from commercial agents/surveyors)

-a range for vacant possession value in the area/SQFT 

 

#3 Calculate conservative end value 

-using annual market rent for your size of unit, we start by divide that annual rent figure by .10 (representing a conservative 10% yield) to arrive at a projected end value (we also speak to a couple of commercial surveyors to understand the range of investment yields they have used for valuations for bank lending in the area)

-calculate the money out at refinance ie at 70% LTV (loan to value) 

-gauge the monthly net income after finance interest

-derive a figure you would be happy to pay for the commercial part of the building ie working backwards from the amount that could be drawn down using commercial finance

-take into account all acquisition costs ie legals, commercial stamp duty/LBTT plus any remedial works to create a decent shell for incoming tenant

 

ANALYSING THE UPPER PARTS

#1 On the same spreadsheet list out the number of flats you can create with the upstairs space ie 1 x 1 bed, 3 x 2 bed etc and the associated floor space

#2 Assign an end value to your proposed flats

-we typically start with building up a list of comparables using rightmove sold prices in the area, and also properties currently for sale

-compare the size and finish of the properties (HINT if the floor space isn’t listed on rightmove you will find it on the EPC register)

-Next step is to call at least 2 – 3 local selling agents to get their take on end values to add into your spreadsheet

-Now you have a low to high range of end GDV (gross development value) for the flats you can calculate the amount of borrowing that can be drawn down at a 75% LTV. This figure will help inform how much you could allocate to the purchase and conversion of these upper parts

 

#3 Calculate your conversion costs to create and finish the flats

-this is the part where you will need to call upon your trusty builder in your power team

-unless you have a description of works you’re not going to get a line by line accurate estimate but you can at least collect some ballpark figures and layer in some contingency

 

#4 Calculate your cash flow opportunities from the flats

-a lot of this will likely be informed by your local knowledge of operating single lets/HMOs/SA in the area but you will definitely want to build out cashflow projections of the various options onto your spreadsheet

-speak to 2-3 letting agents to seek both demand and market rent insights

-speak to SA agents/operators seek both demand and booking revenue insights

 

#5 Piece all the information together and consider all the inputs/outputs and exit options

-You will want to look at key figures like: 

-total money required to buy and create desired end options

-total money out from refinance

-equity created

-monthly cash flow

-overall return on capital employed

-You’ll want to compare the pros and cons of all your possible exit options (and you will want multiple exit options) ie to create higher value and sell on, to refinance and cashflow or to do a hybrid of both

-This of course will be heavily informed by your knowledge/research at the demand end of whatever it is you are looking to create. That’s where you really want to be starting from, the source of demand and end user/audience you are going to be serving. 

 

There you have it, a simplified overview of what we’ve been working on.

 

I’m curious, for those who read my posts, do you prefer reading most about tactics like above, or other topics related to property investing like personal development, mindset, productivity, or something else?

 

Link to post titled “THE IMPORTANCE OF DEAL FLOW FOR INVESTORS” 

http://adaeroproperty.com/the-importance-of-deal-flow-for-property-investors/

It’s probably fair to say that most people in amongst these property communities are here to learn, to grow, to become more, to become the kind of property investor they aspire to be.

As such we will be investing time and attention into learning – to reading, listening, watching webinars, attending live events and courses etc.

Over the summer holidays in particular we can probably allocate more time to reading, whether it be with a physical book or with audible.

So to that end it’s important that we don’t just consume information, and that we don’t just know it, but rather we use it and grow because of it. Wouldn’t you agree?

Some people have the belief that you are either a quick learner or you’re not, but that’s not true. Research has proven that learners are made, not born. So, here are 8 tips I curated from Darren Hardy that will massively improve your learning capacity:

#1 BECOME COMFORTABLE WITH THE STRUGGLE OF LEARNING
We can all recognise that in modern society technology spoils us with instant answers at our fingertips, so can be that anything demanding us to think hard almost seems like an offence to the brain, like having to calculate yield and return percentages when we have a calculator on our phone.

When we are learning something new the brain has to work hard to literally be ‘re-wired’ and create new neurotransmitters (chemical messengers). It’s your brains equivalent of going to the gym to workout, which is what can make learning feel like mental hard work. But that hard work is what makes the muscle grow and pay dividends. So the message here is to accept that mental pain, and remember the old adage no pain, no gain.

#2 BECOME MORE CURIOUS
Our traditional schooling system told us what to learn and what questions to answer in order to be ‘right’ and achieve a good grade. As opposed to discovering the new or different by going off-piste from the syllabus. Hardy encourages us to break free from that way of thinking by questioning everything, challenging assumptions and challenging ourselves to ask better questions. This practice will gradually lead to learning more, not only that but identifying opportunities to solve problems and create value.

#3 HAVE A GOAL FOR YOUR LEARNING
What exactly are you trying to learn? Because we are bombarded with information and sensory input overload through all we see and hear, our brain has to deal with that data in some way. That’s the role of our RAS filter (Reticular Activating System) and without a focus the brain will filter most things out so our heads don’t metaphorically explode with information. We have to proactively tell our RAS filter what we want to learn so it will find it for you, show it to you and store it for you. When we give our brain a learning goal, it will go to work for you and massively enhance your ability to find what you’re looking for and learn.

#4 LEARN IN FOCUSED SESSIONS
Studies have shown that learning in concentrated sessions of 30-90 minutes is optimal – anything less is not enough to hit deep focus and bed in what you’re learning, anything more is too much to take in at one time. I’ve personally adopted Darren Hardy’s practice of 30 mins learning (on the subject matter I want to grow knowledge or capability in at the time) as part of my morning routine, before I get started on the day’s business.

#5 SPACED REPETITION
In other words learning in chunks spaced out but with regular frequency, rather than cramming it all into one day. For example 5 sessions of 60 mins per day over the week is better than 5 hours packed into one day. The spacing gives your brain time to digest what it’s taken in and for the neurotransmitters to reset ready for the next session.

#6 GO DEEP VS WIDE
It’s much better to go deep on one subject than shallow on a wide variety of disconnected subjects. If we go too wide we are in danger of ‘over learning’ ie taking on board ‘not useful now’ information that will overwhelm you. That will actually hinder the learning process and your retention.

#7 REFLECT, REVISIT AND REVIEW TO IMPROVE
If we really want to learn something it requires us to revisit and review it several times. Repeating information over periods of time sends a stronger signal to the brain to retain it for swift recall. And just like creating a new path through long grass, you need to travel it over and over until a clear pathway is created and the ground has been well trodden.

#8 TEACH SOMEONE ELSE
Darren reminds us that, ‘you don’t really know something unless you can explain it convincely to someone else’. When I hear new wisdom nuggets that I value, I’m regularly sharing them with my wife and kids before anyone else. It may bore them or inspire them but if they don’t understand then I know I need to go back and revisit. Getting what you think you know out of your mouth and into the head of someone else is a whole different level of knowing. This is often referred to as the protege effect. [HINT- I’ve just revealed a little selfish reason for writing this blog post :)]

So there you have the 8 step formula for optimising your learning this summer, and hopefully well beyond.

What other learning tips do you take advantage of?

You’ve been pushing hard the last few months working towards your big 2019 goals – now that summer is in full swing are you taking some time out or are you worried about taking time away in case you fall behind?

Now I’m sure that many reading this don’t need to be told to take a holiday, but how many of you take that holiday and then struggle to actually switch off from your property business?

It’s all too easy for us to fall into the mode of trying to ‘outwork’ the next guy or gal and keep pushing through with grit and a string of late nights at the desk. This is OK at times but the longer term result is willpower depletion, motivation depletion and reduction in overall effectiveness.

This is where summer holidays can really come to the rescue.

[As a quick bit of back context it’s important to understand (I’m sure many of you do) that our mental energy and willpower is a like a tank of finite resource that gradually depletes over the course of the day/week/month.

Our ability to solve problems is directly related to our mental energy. So if our mental energy and willpower is depleted, you can guess what happens to our problem solving ability!  Specifically, our ability and strength in these 4 key areas dramatically reduces:

-thought control -i.e. your ability to avoid rabbit holes, bright shiny objects

-emotional control – i.e. your ability to control your mood and choose positive thinking

-impulse control- i.e. your ability to resist temptations

-performance control – i.e. your ability to engage in focused problem solving, perseverance]

So now you know a bit more of the neuroscience behind what’s going on with the grey matter when we push hard on the work front, what can be done about it on holiday?

Here’s the ONE-TWO punch suggestion I got from my business psychologist mentor and have been using for several summers:

Punch #1: Come up with bold ideas over the summer – this might be ideas to do with how you find that first JV partner, how to double your SA portfolio in the next 6 months, or introduce a new revenue stream idea. Here’s some ideas to fuel the creative and strategic thinking that you struggle to do when your head is in the ‘weeds’ of the day to day business:

• Read (holidays are a great time to give yourself permission to read for way longer than usual, so use the time to fill your head with the right “ingredients”)
• Have conversations with interesting people (you never know who you’ll meet through travel, events, dinners, sport, picnics etc so look for opportunities to tap into smart people, be open to alternative expertise outside of your industry, you may not have to look any further than a family member at a BBQ!)
• Be open to tangential connections (mull things over, give yourself permission to think creatively and laterally- new holiday environments are great for helping with this)
• PLAY! (literally, feed your mind the problem, go have fun being where you are and fully engaged in the activity (I find tennis and snowboarding are great for this, and in the summer water sports are great too:)) then leave it alone for your subconscious to get to work on coming up with some solutions.)

Punch #2: How to replenish your energy tank and build back up the discipline muscle:

• Sleep (holiday is the perfect time to let your body wake up naturally in the morning)
• Get your diet right (yes enjoy your food and drink but use the luxury of time during the holidays to choose and prepare healthy meals/snacks that don’t peak and trough your blood sugar like processed foods and refined sugars)
• Don’t make big decisions (i.e. put on hold big decision making that may stress you out until you have replenished the tank)
• Spend time on “Implementation Intentions” (if/then planning – these are v powerful but a whole post in themselves, if curious learn more here http://99u.com/articles/7248/how-to-use-if-then-planning-to-achieve-any-goal or here http://www.developgoodhabits.com/if-then-plan/ )
• Transmute R&R into motivation (if you truly let yourself indulge in some downtime, you’ll probably find you naturally become motivated to get stuck into some meaty work again- this really works!)
• Give your Inner child gratification (this is a big one. In other words, if you’ve been pushing through and working hard for weeks it means you’ve probably been suppressing your inner child i.e. that part of you that just wants to go outside and play. This uses up tremendous willpower. So, let your inner child out, kids are great for helping you with this so get out to some waterslides or the beach with your kids and say yes to playing with them and letting your own inner child out.

I’m personally fascinated with this behavioural science/human performance stuff so I do hope it’s useful to others out there.

Until next week, happy holidays, and do share what you do to hit the reset button.

Anyone who’s been reading my posts for a while will be aware that our primary trading business is in serviced accommodation – and in February I shared the post titled, ‘4 KEY LEARNS FROM MEETING WITH OUR BOOKING.COM ACCOUNT MANAGER”.

 

A little over 3 months on we were invited back to the Edinburgh B.com offices to meet with our Account Manager – we met with her this week and I’m so glad we took the time to do that. 

 

In addition to some local market insights, which are always fascinating, we took away several action points to work on/implement. For anyone running their own SA properties and interested in optimising their B.com account, here are the key points from this recent meeting. 

 

LOCAL MARKET INSIGHTS

*In the Edinburgh area market serviced apartments have been out-pacing hotels for bookings throughout spring and up to August however the hotels tend to capture a lot more of the business from September to December. The reason is because hotels typically offer more rate flexibility. SA operators will need to start thinking more like hotels when it comes to pricing and flexibility in order to encourage the bookings further out into the future (see the pic “Attracting Advance Bookings”).

*B.com have seen a decline in the number of advance bookings across the market so they have added an ‘Early Booker Plan’ to help operators attract as many advance bookings as possible e.g within the “Rates & Availability” tab the new early booker rate plan allows you to incentivise bookings far out into the calendar using a discount value of your choice.

 

*As many Scottish operators have probably observed, there has been a massive increase in the number of serviced apartments available in the Edinburgh area, in particular from SPO’s (B.com speak for ‘Single Property Owners’). These SPO’s often present the lowest cost accommodation to the market as their operating costs are proportionately lower than that of a business. The result is that the ADR (B.com speak for average daily rate, which they track in each major markets) has been dropping.

 

SO WHAT CAN BE DONE TO OPTIMISE BOOKINGS?

*INCREASE TRUST

In amongst this fast growing sea of properties available, it is important to increase the trust a potential booker can have with you and your listing. To do this be sure to create a professional Host/Company Profile with logo and background details to help guests feel at ease and in safe hands. 

 

*IMPROVE LISTING CONTENT

Check your content scores that they are up at 100% and also check the order of your pictures. According to the B.com team bookers like to see a clear external photo of your property early on. The minimum recommended number of pictures is 24 so think about your properties key selling points and features ie is it the amazing kitchen and living space (ie features that hotels don’t have) or the fact that you have all the kitchen utensils and equipment needed to cook full meals at the property?

 

*NEW MOBILE RATE 

Make use of the new mobile discount rate. B.com have seen significant growth in the number of people starting to book via their mobile device, so to serve that sector have launched a new product which is the mobile rates discount. By offering a 10% mobile booking discount they are tracking an increase in bookings made on smartphones of 26% on average. 

 

 

*HIGHER VISIBILITY IS BETTER THAN JUST PRICE DROPPING

More bookings will come from higher visibility and better conversions, that’s why it’s better to find ways to be seen by more potential bookers rather than just drop prices and hope to be found. The key methods for increasing visibility are:

-via the Mobile Rates discount [note you have to be comfortable offering a 10% discount]

-via the Genius Programme [this makes you visible to more committed bookers ie repeat travellers and business travellers, again you need to be OK with a 10% discount for this]. *Note, if you sign up for both Genius and Mobile discount that will be a total of 20% so do one or the other.

-via the preferred programme [your listing has to hit a certain performance score but once you qualify you will be boosted to more people. No discount is offered to bookers but B.com will charge 18% instead of 15% comms].

-and finally if you drop to a 2 night minimum stay you will appear in more searches [and to protect your margins you can create a 2 night rate that is more expensive per night than say a 3 night rate, you can also choose when the 2 night min stay can apply].

 

And there you have it, our learnings and insights from another great meeting with b.com. 

 

What other tips can you share for optimising bookings with the online travel agents?

Have you ever had a week where a particular lesson, theme or message cuts through all the noise and clearly lights the ‘Ah-Ha’ bulb in your mind?

This was one of those weeks for me. Over the course of cutting grass, exercising and driving I happened to select and listen to 3 different podcasts that all carried a similar, very clear and strong message that I felt compelled to share. Why? – Because it highlights one of the key things/ways of being that I value highly and recognise in successful people that I learn from. And everyone, I really mean everyone can benefit from it too.

Whatever we are trying to achieve in life, whether it be related to health, relationships, business, property investing….you name it, our results and success boils down to a few simple keystone things.

These 3 podcasts I’m referring to cut right through to what I feel is THE key thing – IT ALL COMES BACK TO INTEGRITY, with yourself that is. In other words following through on your promises and doing what you say will, even when no one is looking.

The 3 podcasts I listened to were:

*Ed Mylett interviewing Chris and Heidi Powell [see Ed Mylett Show]

*Pat Flynn interviewing James Wedmore [see Smart Passive Income]

*Ed Mylett describing the “Echo of life” [see Ed Mylett Show]

I highly suggest you look each up and listen to them thoroughly to draw out your own notes, but for now, here’s my topline takeaways from each:

#From Chris & Heidi Powell on keeping promises to yourself

-Whatever you are working towards, seek to build INTEGRITY MOMENTUM. In other words build up a practice of keeping promises to yourself, start small and simple and then roll it out to bigger things across the important areas of your life.

-The Powells remind us that. “Self belief and self love come from keeping promises to yourself”

 

#From James Wedmore on how to actually make progress

-People often think they need more information to achieve results but most of the time that’s not the case. The bridge between knowing something and having the results requires a shift from knowing to BEING.

-Integrity is a way of being. Integrity is simple but it’s not easy. You’re either honouring your word or you’re not. It starts with awareness ie to be aware of what and who you are giving your word to, and then make a concerted effort to follow through on that. Try it for the next few days.

-Wedmore points out that, ‘as an entrepreneur, there is no one managing you. The buck stops here. And if we don’t make our word golden, then think about the ripple effect.’

-Adopt this as a value, something that’s important to you in your life and practice it (the practice of keeping your word to yourself), it becomes a motivating and fulfilling cycle.

-Harvard Business professor, Dr. Michael Jensen who did a study on self-integrity, and he said companies that adopted self-integrity as their number one core value, saw anywhere from a two hundred to a four hundred percent increase in output without any additional increase of input.

-Here’s a fitting quote on integrity that was shared,

“Integrity is a mountain with no top. Therefore those who set off on this task must learn to enjoy climbing because there is no end to the process. And as the climb continues life continues to get better.” – Werner Erhard

 

Ed Mylett on Life’s Echo

-If you have not got the results you want stop and look back 60-90 days, did you stop doing the things said would? ie did your diet get worse, did you drop the exercise routine, did you not make those business development calls?

-Ed says our ‘Lives are like reading the newspapers today but we’re actually reading the headlines for 90 days ago. The news was made 90-100 days ago.” Think about that and let it sink in, you know it’s true.

-We have to continue to do the activities we say we are going to because 90 days from now we will read today’s news. That’s how it works. If you’re not eating the way you want to, or not doing the property viewings, not making the business development calls etc, you’re going to pay the price for it in 90 days.

-There’s an ECHO FOR TODAY’S BEHAVIOUR and it applies both positively and negatively

-If we don’t follow through on the things we said we were going to do, we will see the effect of that within 60-90 days.

-If we do follow through on the right things and do what we say, the payoff might be in as little as 90 days, but in success it’s often way more than that. But we have to maintain faith that the delayed benefit will come, because it will if we keep taking the right action.

-The negatives tend to come faster than the positives but we have to accept both echos to our actions/or lack of.

 

Circling back to why these podcasts resonated so strongly….

If you were to ask my kids what our self chosen family motto is, they would tell you this, ‘we do what we say we will”.

Of course they are kids and far from perfect, there still learning, as are we learning all the time, and practicing. It’s something that  we’ll likely never get totally perfect at. We are humans, we’re always going to fall short in some way. But it’s not about that, it’s about making this a value, something that’s important to who we are and how we show up. If we they can absorb that then I’m confident it will serve them well.

I’d love to hear if this concept of self-integrity resonates with you and who will be adopting it as a core value.

With a title like that you might be thinking, ‘What on earth is he talking about…leverage your future self?’. Well bear with me and I’m confident it will make sense and pay off for those who read on.

 

First to quickly circle back to last week’s post on deal flow management [I’ll put a link at the bottom of the post if you missed it]. That post received a lot of great comments and response so thanks for that, it clearly resonated with many of you. In follow up to that post, here’s the update- one deal we were hopeful about fell out of the shortlist and this week the one we had a last ditch attempt at with a second offer came through! So, we had our offer accepted on a commercial deal whilst also nudging two other potential deals an inch further. I won’t share more detail on the shop and uppers deal yet as the paperwork isn’t formalised but will look forward to doing that in the weeks to come.

 

So back to the quirky theme of this week’s post. These two techniques I’m going to share will take you being a little more open minded and certainly being a lot more proactive….if you’re interested. They come courtesy of Darren Hardy, one of my favourite authorities in the personal development and business leadership space.

TIP #1: YOUR BEST MENTOR IS YOU 10 YEARS FROM NOW

Here’s how to leverage that concept – add 10 years to your current age and fast forward in your mind to that time. Visualise how you are living out your best life ie what you have already accomplished, what you are now working towards, how you speak, how you act, what behaviours you demonstrate, what choices you make.

 

The you 10 years from now knows exactly what to do now. So, if you’re up for it, take the time to visualise the future you, in your minds eye ask questions of your future self and take your own advice.

 

As Hardy advocates, “Your goal is to live up to the person your 10 year future self knows you can be.”

 

So in the context of your own property investing journey, what does this look like? Are you wondering what your next move should be? Or maybe it’s your first move in property that’s the question. You might be wondering what property strategy to allocate your time, energy and resources to. The answers will come be asking yourself how you want to be involved in your property business, the kind of conversations and activities you want to engage in, and how it all aligns with your values and your financial goals. Only you can answer those questions and in particular your 10 year future self will know what to do now. Give it a go.

 

[By the way this is a more customised take on another effective exercise you may have heard about where you can visualise your own private boardroom of advisors and you choose whoever you want sat round the table ie Branson, Gates, Bezos, Buffet, Huffington…. and you imagine what advice they would give you.]

TIP #2: GIVE YOUR FUTURE SELF A GIFT

This second tip is super effective for helping you deal with tough ‘in the moment’ decisions. For example, you’ve got an hour scheduled in your diary to call and email leads to generate direct bookings to your serviced accommodation properties – you could get stuck into those calls or you could start google researching various search terms to ‘kid’ yourself you are busy.

 

Everyone will have their own version of this in their business and personal lives. In the moment you are doing battle with emotions to overcome this and ideally give your future self a gift ie in the example above it would be more direct bookings. In other words you want to be thinking, how can I be a hero to my future self by doing X task in the present. A simplified example might be that even though you are tired after cooking a big meal for the family, by clearing the kitchen before bed you can wake up to a fresh start the next morning (your future self will thank you for it,  especially when the head is a little dusty from the night before).

 

What you’re doing is flipping the conversation in your head so that instead of the task being drudgery in the moment, it feels honourable because you are not putting off something your future self will have to deal with later.

 

This is not rocket science, it’s the essence of delayed gratification. You’ve heard it before packaged in different ways but more often than not we need reminding of what we know more than we need new information, and sometimes hearing it from a slightly different perspective is what it takes to finally action it.

 

I recall at the beginning of this year I heard Dan Pattrick share one of his favourite quotes which really resonated with me, and it follows the same message. Here’s the quote –

 

“Do something today that you will thank yourself for tomorrow”.

 

What are you going to do today as a gift to your future self?

 

P.S. Last week’s post on deal flow http://adaeroproperty.com/the-importance-of-deal-flow-for-property-investors/

Over time we have grown to appreciate the importance of having a pipeline of deals and to have patience not to force things. Our mentor Paul has reminded us of this on several occasions.

 

And the last couple of weeks have been a very real reminder of the up and down journey to source and secure a satisfactory property deal.

 

This week we had to draw the pragmatic conclusion that a particular development site for 11 apartments was not going to be viable for us to proceed with. When you invest so much time into the diligence of a deal, you like the area, and even get to know the vendor it can be a difficult decision to say no and walk away. Difficult as it is to fight the temptation, there is no point making decisions based on the most optimistic of outcomes for a site. That wouldn’t be safe for you as the developer or the JV investor putting the money into the deal. It has to present a good enough exit from a worst case scenario and for this particular deal, it sadly didn’t.

 

On another hopeful looking deal -a shop and upper scenario – it’s also been a bit of a rollercoaster.  The property has been on and off the market the last few weeks, an initial low offer from us has been rejected and now we’ve learned that the vendor may look to retain it and do a deal with a family member instead. We will have one last attempt at that one and then will have to move on.

 

Whilst it would be nice if everything that makes our shortlist for serious diligence could come off, it’s just not realistic. However, we do have 3 other opportunities going through the deep analysis stage and we’re confident that we will uncover more in the months to come too.

 

So, what’s the point in sharing all of this? People only want to hear about amazing deals coming off and success stories, right? Well, not always. It’s great to share news of deals coming off but from my experience people also want to hear about the deals that don’t come off and the lessons along the way to the ones that do.

 

The below is by no means an exhaustive list, but here are seven key points that Chris and I keep front of mind along the property investing journey:

 

#1: You can’t be too emotionally attached to any one deal and you certainly don’t want to stay down and disappointed for too long when a deal doesn’t go your way (that could hold you back from seeing the next opportunity)

#2: The antidote for deal disappointment is to have multiple deals to consider, hence the importance of DEAL FLOW

#3: Having a selection of shortlisted deals to consider will prevent you from becoming too emotionally invested in any one deal. With only one deal on the table it can bring about a sense of ‘this has to work’ and that can lead to force fitting, irrational thinking and accepting unnecessary risk.

#4: A decision to proceed with a deal can’t be based solely on the most optimistic outcome playing out. It’s wise to bottom out multiple exits and to see a way to be satisfied with a conservative/secondary outcome.

#5: Deal flow comes when you can be clear about the end audience you are serving, be clear on the kind of properties/sites that meet your range of criteria, and you know the input activity required to uncover the kind of deals you seek.

#6: Getting to a no decision on a potential deal should be framed as a mini victory in itself – it should serve to refine your analysis skills, validate what you really want from a deal and get you a step closer to the good deals.

#7: Keep a record of the deals you have shortlisted and analysed because they may just come back round and present an opportunity to acquire cheaper/or create more value than you previously expected. [Our current prime contender on our development shortlist is a site we first identified over 18 months ago].

 

In closing, it hasn’t been all setbacks, this week has been shared with some great successes e.g. 1) we picked up the keys for the completed purchase of packaged SA we are doing for an investor client and we already have corporate booking for 1 month+ ready to check in next week; and 2) our latest R2R SA went live and secured 2 weeks of summer holiday bookings within a few days.

 

What have been your highs, lows and lessons on the property deal front recently?