Picking The Fruits Despite Some BIG Challenges #BusinessUpdate

In this episode, I’m excited to catch you up on what’s been happening in my businesses over the past couple of months. 

I’m a big believer in starting with the end in mind, and while setting goals and targets for your business is key, I think it’s just as important to have goals and dreams outside of business too—those are the real reasons we build businesses in the first place.

So, I’ll share some updates from my businesses, plus a peek into my personal life. I’ll talk about the challenges I’ve been facing with settling in new tenants for my HMOs, updates on my development projects, my thoughts on the autumn budget, and more!

-

Did you find this episode useful? Please leave us a quick review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!

Got any questions? Join The HMO Community on Facebook!

Connect with me on Instagram or Linkedin for daily HMO tips and advice! 

If you want to join my 1-2-1 mentoring program, you can enquire here. 

Feeling overwhelmed and don’t know where to start? Join The HMO Roadmap on a Premium plan and get all-access to our award-winning library of 400+ resources to help you start, scale and systemise your HMO business. Get instant access here.

Transcript

Andy Graham (00:02.67)

Hey, I'm Andy and you're listening to the HMO Podcast. Over 10 years ago, I set myself the challenge of building my own property portfolio. And what began as a short-term investment plan soon became a long-term commitment to change the way young people live together. I've now built several successful businesses. I've raised millions of pounds of investment and I've managed thousands of tenants. Join me and some very special guests to discover the tips, tricks and hacks, the ups and the downs, the best practice and everything else you need to know to start, scale and systemise your very own HMO portfolio now.

Andy Graham (00:40.652)

In today's episode, I'm going to bring you up to speed and let you know what has been happening in my businesses over the last couple of months. And it has been a busy couple of months. Most of that busyness in fairness has been outside of my businesses. I'm a big believer in making sure that we start with the end in mind. And while I think it's really important to have goals and targets within your business, I think it's just as important to have goals and targets and aspirations outside of business. The real reasons why we actually build businesses. 

Well, the last couple of months for me has largely been dedicated to fulfilling a lot of big picture goals and targets, things that Gemma and I have for a long time been planning and finally had to actually deliver on an execute to make happen. I'm to talk to you about that today, why I've been doing that stuff, exactly what it is and how the way that I have set my businesses up has enabled me to do that. I'm also going to bring you up to speed and let you know what's been happening in my HMO portfolio. Of course, it's that time of the year when we're taking lots of enquiries for the next academic year.

We're also dealing with a lot of settlement, settling in issues. A lot of our student tenants who moved in in July or August or September, they're just starting to settle into the houses, the heating's on, the weather's changing. And inevitably there are problems that surface. And every year, this time of the year, it tends to get pretty busy with general maintenance requirements and a lot of, let's say, finding our feet with tenants keeps us very busy. Plus, of course, I'm going to bring you up to speed and let you know what's been happening in our development business as always full of ups and downs, lots of challenges and lots of exciting stuff happening. 

And then I'm going to round today's episode out with my thoughts on the autumn budget. Now that we've all had time to digest that, I'm going let you know exactly what I think, what it means for us as property investors and how I am going to plan for some of what I think are the pretty terrible changes that the Labour government have just imposed on you and I as business owners and people just trying to do good for ourselves. 

So, If you want to take a look under the bonnet of my businesses, if you would like a dose of reality, then make sure you stick around. Please sit back, relax, and enjoy today's episode of the HMO Podcast.

Andy Graham (02:48.312)

Hey guys, it's Andy here and we're going to be getting back to the podcast in just a moment. But before we do, I want to tell you very quickly about the HMO roadmap. Now, if you're serious about replacing your income, or perhaps you've already got a HMO portfolio that you want to scale up, then the HMO roadmap really is your one-stop shop. Inside the roadmap, you'll find a full 60 lesson course delivered by me, teaching you how to find more deals, how to fund more deals and raise private finance, how to refurbish great properties, how to fill them with great tenants that stay for longer, and how to manage your properties and tenants for the future.

We've also got guest workshops added every single month. We've got new videos added every single week about all sorts of topics. We've got downloadable resources, cheat sheets and swipe files to help you. We've got case studies from guests and community members who are doing incredible projects that you can learn from. And we've also built an application just for you that allows you to appraise and evaluate your deals, stack them side by side and track the key metrics that are most important to you. To find out more, head to thehmoroadmap.co.uk now. And come and join our incredible community of HMO property investors.

Andy Graham (03:58.126)

Okay, welcome back gang. So today, I'm going to bring you up to speed and let you know exactly what has been going on in my businesses over the last couple of months. It's that time when I get to give you that dose of reality, keeping it real with you. This is what it really takes to grow property businesses, to run property businesses, to juggle property businesses and life and everything else at the same time. Now, the last business update was back in mid September and an awful lot has been going on since then.

A lot of that stuff, like I said in the intro, has been outside of the businesses actually, very intentional part of a long-term plan. And I'm really pleased to be almost out of the other side of that now, but it's the businesses that have largely given me the ability to do that and pursue and execute on these goals and aspirations outside of the businesses. So today I'm going to talk to you a little bit more about that. And of course it's nearly that time of the year, isn't it? 

When we we're to be sitting down and reviewing what we've achieved in 2024. And then planning again, what we want to do in 2025. Now we're not quite there yet. So I'm not in a position to tell you exactly how we've done across the year. I'm just going to let you know exactly where we're currently up to against plans and targets and things like that. But the end of the year is absolutely coming down the road at a very, very fast. And look, if you haven't started to think about your goals and targets and objectives that you set yourself.

Make sure you do it soon because you are running out of time to address anything. Don't leave anything on the table this year. And I think as we approach the end of the year, one thing that I am already aware of that I'm really, really pleased and proud of is how well we have executed on our goals as a business. And Gemma and I personally, it often takes a lot of energy to get up and out of the routine, to take the risks, to put the extra work in, to take those big steps forwards. 

And I feel like this year across the board, that is something that we've absolutely been doing, but it is tiring and it is expensive to do. And I am looking forward to a period in front of me next year where actually I'm going to take a step back from some things. I'm going to take advantage of the systems and the processes in my businesses, the team, the people that I work with, and I'm going to keep a lid on that. I'm not going to take on.

Andy Graham (06:17.454)

too much new stuff. I'm actively going to focus on what we've already got and what we've already decided is going to be on the agenda for next year. And I'm going to execute on that as well as we possibly can, but I'm actively going to be taking a step back from the growth, growth, growth strategy and mentality that we've been very much tuned into over the last few years. So look, where are we at today? Well, I'm going to give you bit of an update on the HMOs, on the developments and life in general and how it's all piecing together.

So if it's okay with you, I thought I would start with the HMOs today. It's that time of the year when a lot of my student tenants have moved in. The tenancies typically start in July and often they sort of trickle back to university between July and often mid September with most of them coming back full time in September. And of course what happens in September? Well, of course the weather starts to change, doesn't it? The darker nights set in, the cooler temperatures, the rain.

And as more people live in the house, gets used more and it starts to creak a little bit. Even the newest houses, trust me, they start to creak a little bit. Now we have a term for this and it's called settlement. And it happens with every tenancy. If you're an experienced landlord and if you've been running and operating HMOs for some time, you'll be very familiar with this idea, even though you may not call it settlement yourself. I think we may have coined that term in the HMO space, but that's absolutely what it is. 

And it's a really important time because it's when you build and get the opportunity to develop that relationship and rapport with your tenants. It's really important to get off on the right foot, but it's actually really easy to get off on the wrong foot. Despite your best efforts, you may have missed things at the inspections. There may be mismanaged expectations. There may be some communication bits that you think have gone really well, but actually your tenants on the other side, for whatever reason, don't think have gone particularly well. And often more so now than ever,

That is just a mismatch of expectations. And I think it's really important to be fine tuned into your business and your tenants to make sure that you are looking for these cracks in your service as a landlord. But nevertheless, our tenants have been moving in, they've been settling in, and I'll be honest, there has been an awful lot of stuff this year, more than usual, I would say, by another sort of 50 to 100%. Just maintenance requests, just general communication and

Andy Graham (08:41.154)

queries, how does the heating work? Where do I find this? Who am I bills with? Just lots of that sort of communication type of stuff that takes time and takes effort and takes energy. And yes, very real maintenance stuff. And I'll give you an example just from one house. And I think it's really important to share this because a lot of what we talk about on the show and share in the roadmap is about the success of projects. And there's nothing wrong with that, but the realities are just as important. One particular house.

They moved in earlier in the year. It's a large house. It's a large six bed. It's a house actually that was probably originally built in the 1800s. I think it was originally a piggery. It's been knocked about a bit and it's got a lot of character, but it's a great house with tons of space and a huge garden. Really, really popular with students. And it has been every year since I bought it. I would say it's about a mid spec HMO now. When I first did it, it was pretty high spec, but actually specs have increased and that has gradually over time been worn down a little bit. So it's a mid spec product now, but nevertheless.

There's a couple of bathrooms in this house, one on the mains and one on an electric source. That's as an absolute minimum, the way that I always do it for one particular reason. And that reason is because if your boiler goes down and you've only got mains powered showers, you have a big problem. Where do your tenants shower? And most tenants can tolerate and will be patient enough. If the heating goes down, they will find a solution to keep a little bit warmer. Plug in radiators, some extra clothes, some blankets.

They can tolerate that for a few days if the boiler goes down. But actually if your boiler goes down and there's no hot water and they can't shower, that's different. So I have a policy across the board, always have done, that there must always be a communal electric shower in my house. That's just the way it is. Or everyone's suite is on electric. However, in a particular house, and there were already a few issues grumbling away with this new group, and we had to do a lot of, let's say, education with them and resetting of expectations.

Unfortunately, what happened was the boiler broke, that mains powered shower went down and it was completely out of use until we got the boiler fixed. Even more, unfortunately, was that on the same day, the waste trap under the electric shower failed and started leaking into the room below. The big problem with this one is that I have solid floors in this very old house and it's very, very, very difficult to access this waste trap because there is a low profile shower tray, which was retrospectively a mistake.

Andy Graham (11:08.546)

But that is just the way that it is. And it was very, very difficult to access. In fact, the only way to access it was to pull up the shower tray, which renders, of course, that shower entirely out of use. And it's a really messy job. So as you can see, big problem because both showers have simultaneously gone down. My six tenants had nowhere at all to shower. So why am I telling you this? 

Well, really it's just to keep it honest, just to level with you. This is the sort of stuff that happens when you're operating HMOs. Look, my team had to deal with it. We ended up having to get a room in a hotel just so that our tenants could shower. Fortunately that was nearby. It was very expensive and it took the best part of about a week to sort this out. And this is simultaneous to lots of other things just happening and popping off in the portfolio. General stuff that needed attention, some of it more urgent than others, but a lot of relationship management. That's the sort of stuff that can keep you very busy. My advice would just to make sure that.

When you are moving tenants in, just be aware that there is usually a bit of settlement. Getting used to the house, getting used to you and the way that you communicate, you getting used to your tenant, building that relationship. It's really important that you very quickly build that rapport because that rapport and a good rapport will go so far. And actually it'll help if there are issues down the line. Tenants are much more likely to be patient with you. They're much more likely to tolerate issues. The reality is things go wrong in houses. We know that, you know that.

But tenants don't always know that. And sometimes that needs explaining to them, but in the right way. And if they're on the side and you've got a good relationship with them, it really does help. So making sure that when they do move in, if there are teething issues, when they are settling in, you really jump on this stuff. And to do that, it means you need to be well-prepared. And look, I'll hold my hands up actually. There's a few policies and procedures of ours that are out to date that we need to improve. And I think that had we've done that prior to this check-in season,

we would have had a few less issues to contend with. The other big body of work over the last couple of months with the HMOs has been advertising for the next year and securing tenants for the 2025-26 academic season. So if you're not familiar with student lets, the way that it usually works is that student tenants typically look for their house for the next academic year, about nine-ish months in advance of the start of that next academic year. So around sort of...

Andy Graham (13:24.266)

October, November time, students tend to start looking for their accommodation for next July, August, September. Very common. It's part of the academic cycle. It's actually one of the reasons that I really like the student model because it's very predictable, but it means that there's a big body of work to do at this time of the year. So lots of adverse, lots of inquiries, lots of viewings, lots of deposit taking, lots of new tenancies being generated, lots of application forms being requested and filled out by tenants and then information checked by the team and all of that stuff. 

So lots and lots of stuff going on. But the really great thing is all of my student-lets now are secured for the next academic year. There've been some renewals and everything else has gone on the first few, which is great. But one bit of feedback that I would give you is that we struggle to increase the rents this year. There is absolutely kind of a bit of pushback at the minute now. And I say this as sensitively as I possibly can, everybody's costs have gone up, including ours. 

But I think students have really started to feel the pinch now of the last sort few years of those pretty significant increases in rent. And I think this year that there has been resistance. I think affordability has definitely been a piece here. So actually across the board, I would say about 50% of the portfolio, the prices have been held and about 50% of the prices have gone up between two and a half and 5%. And that's it. In years previous, we've been seeing substantially greater rental increases to keep up with the operational costs. But I think that things are starting to catch up now. So I think this increase in rents is slowing down a little bit. Our costs are not coming down. The increase in our costs are slowing down a little bit, but certainly costs are not coming down operating costs. So just a bit of anecdotal feedback for you, I suppose, but on the whole, everything's going well. If you're wondering how we get things let so quickly, it is because we have a very good system and process.

We have a good renewals process. And like I said, we really try and work and develop those relationships with our tenants so that they do want to stay and renew for subsequent years. A lot of my student tenants will stay for three, four years, which is fantastic. We also take care of the properties. We go in every summer and we do some periodic maintenance. give myself a week to get the teams into every single property where there is a group vacating and we look at things like redecorating, any furniture, repairs, replacement, renewals, just

Andy Graham (15:50.124)

general light improvement and it makes a big difference and rather than trying to do that every four or five years and doing a bigger body of work when eventually you find that it's harder to let, it just means that we keep on top of it. Yes, it's a little bit more work as we go, but if you plan well and you've got good systems and processes and a good team, you can execute this bit really, really well. And for me, rental confidence is so incredibly important. I want to know that every year we are going to let everything without fail.

It helps me sleep at night and it's all of this stuff. It's the relationship, it's periodic improvements. It's obviously buying in the right price and putting the rents at the right level. All of this stuff makes for a good product that is picked off the shelf very, very quickly by students. But for me, that's far more important than holding out for the very highest rent, which in some cases, yet we might have got had we waited a little bit longer, but I like to get everything done. And I certainly like to get everything done before Christmas. All the tenants is eventually signed. Everything locked up. And what that means is we don't really have to think about anything for quite some time after that, which is a nice feeling when you're operating HMOs. 

So moving on to my development projects. This is the stuff that I do with my business partners, Mike and Mark in Arcvelop Investor Group. We've got a few projects on the boil at the minute. So just to bring you up to speed, we've got a 37 units development project down in Kent. Phase one is well on the way due for completion in Q1 next year.

We've got a 10 unit scheme in Norwich due for completion roundabout now. So we're very close to finishing that one. And we've also got an 18 unit scheme, part conversion, part new build in Sheffield. Now that's a project that we bought last year. We've been doing the dance with the planners and all of the various consultees over the course of this year. And we're very nearly there now. So how would I summarise how the last few months have been? 

Well, development is, is a lot of work and a lot of delayed gratification. It is very, very front loaded in terms of costs, resource, efforts, patience, energy, and inevitably things are up and down on day to day, week to week, month to month basis. There's just things that go wrong that you couldn't have foreseen, the stuff that goes well, but it all just takes time and it takes a bit of a toll. It's really exciting that we're getting towards the end of a couple of projects because so much does go into the work.

Andy Graham (18:13.71)

planning and everybody really has to dig in deep on development projects of this sort of size. But issues from connecting to utilities and getting the services set up to finding issues in buildings and cost overruns and weather and all sorts of stuff, you're potentially delaying projects and it needs incredibly careful management. And alongside that, just at the back end, the amount of administration has to be done outside and off the development projects is massive, especially if you are keeping an eye on what you want to do next. 

So that next thing could well be refinancing or selling some units or letting some units or buying another project or maybe getting the finance in place for an upcoming project or trying to get a planning application over the line and dealing with the myriad of consultants that you have to speak with and liaise with and get responses from to just suit the planner's requirements. 

So huge amounts of admin alongside the projects themselves. And actually I think that we would admit that we've found ourselves with a bit of a bottleneck ahead of us, which is actually why we've been looking at our resources as a business, operationally what we're finding challenging, where our strengths and weaknesses lie. And actually we've started to look at what and how we can improve on that. So we've not made any definitive decisions on that yet, but without question, there is a period of consolidation for us and work to be done in making some improvements there. 

It's very easy on development projects to get dragged into a lot of the detail. And often that is absolutely what is required. But at the same time, you can't take your eye off the stuff that allows you to keep steering the group and the whole business in the right direction and the strategic decisions that have to be made, such as who you're lending with or when certain things are going to kick off or whether or not you want to hire anybody, what processes need to be put in place.

Just keeping an eye on redemption dates and everything else like that. Raising finance and managing investor relationships. There's so much to do. So we definitely have felt the burden of the volume of work, but at the same time, we're incredibly excited by some projects getting close to completion now and looking absolutely brilliant. And also the potential for some more projects on the horizon. So one of the things that I've spoken really honestly about on the podcast, not specifically regarding

Andy Graham (20:36.354)

development projects, but more so with HMOs is actually what I think of the two most important ingredients to building a property business. And they are of course, finance, access to cash and access to deals, opportunities. And it's really interesting when you start new ventures and you get out there you put things out, it often takes a little bit of time for the universe to respond. But invariably.

Things start to happen. The more you immerse yourself, the more relationships you have with people, the more chance conversations that you have, the more things that just tend to come out of the woodwork. And I think we found ourselves in a really exciting position where from a financial point of view, we're getting access to a lot of finance and private finance, which is great and it really helps and it accelerates the process of buying and developing and refinancing. And we're really grateful for those relationships. And don't get me wrong, they've taken a long time to curate.

and a long time to make sure that we are positioned so that people feel comfortable enough to reach out and say, Hey, have you got an opportunity? I'd love to lend with you guys or look, we're an institution and we're keen to work with you guys because you're good people and we want to work on a relationship basis. And that's really exciting, but just happening to be in the right place at the right time. I suppose some call it luck. I think it is just where preparation meets opportunity. Deals have been coming out of the woodwork.

And some of them have been incredibly exciting. And we're looking at two very exciting deals at the minute. Now these are long-term plays. These are not things that we're going to make a quick book on at all. I mean, quite the opposite. These are projects that are going to take us into 25, 26, maybe well beyond 26 as well. But it's great to be able to have those conversations. We've had some incredible meetings over the last couple of months. I mean, some meetings where I think the three of us have just sat there and sort of pinched ourselves and thought, wow, we've done all right to get here. We're doing something right. Something special is happening.

I built a number of businesses and been doing this property stuff for a long time. I'm really proud of that. And just being able to say that even if nothing has necessarily materialised from that or those conversations just yet, just being in those environments, just getting invited in there, just feeling confident enough or other people having confidence enough in us to be able to sit in the room and have these conversations and quite seriously consider options. Really exciting. 

Andy Graham (22:52.714)

So what that means is that it's looking highly likely that alongside everything I just mentioned and the projects that have got to be delivered, there's going to be an awful lot more coming around the corner soon and we need to make a lot of preparation for that. So that's just something that we're starting to think quite seriously about now. One of the real challenges this last couple of months has been planning though. We all know that working with planners is very, very difficult at the best of times, but a major applications on larger schemes like these development projects.

There are so many more challenges and lots of liaison with different consultants and everybody wants to have their say and everybody wants their slice of the cake. Everybody wants to earn their fee and it's really, really challenging. And what this has resulted in, give you a couple of examples is that we have been quite substantially delayed on one of our planning applications, which we know is being recommended for approval, but just waiting on.

pretty minor bits from consultants to then report back to the council on for the council then to kind of tick a final box so that it can then be pushed onto the committee. But because it's all taken ages and everybody needs several weeks just to kind of lift their head up from the desk and do whatever from whatever they've been doing and then move it onto the next person. Time just goes by and it drifts. And I think what's really frustrating as a developer is that that time is incredibly expensive to us. We're often sitting on land or sites with

Money and interest cost just racking up every single month and that is part of the game. It's all got to be factored in, but it's very frustrating when it feels like a lot of people who have very little slash no skin in the game at all can have such a detrimental impact on projects. So we're continuously trying to put pressure on our planning applications and everything that's involved to get them through and eventually get them signed off. Cause at that point then we can take the lending and start developing, but it really is very, very challenging.

And on numerous fronts, it is really testing our patience. That's not unique. I'm just telling you what you probably already know, but it's very, very real and it's very, very expensive. We've got a project in Sheffield where we've had to consult Historic England and we've done that early on as part of a pre-app, but frustratingly we've come into some issues now with the major application where they still want to influence the design a little bit more. Now that's okay. We're listening to them. Unfortunately, the planners are very much on board and we're being invited to kind of work with all parties.

Andy Graham (25:09.634)

But it is a little bit frustrating when somebody like Historic England, who's curtailed you are with him, but really doesn't own your building. And it's arguable whether they really should have any say in your building gets such a weight impressed on their opinion of your application. But sometimes you feel like saying, look, if you want to design the scheme, why don't you bloody buy it? So it's very frustrating, but these are all the motions and the hoops that you have to jump through. Like I said, I'm just reporting back just to keep it honest and keep it very real with you. 

But these are delays that taking weeks and months in some cases, and that has a very, very, very real cost to it. And it has a knock on impact because everything then gets delayed, doesn't it? When you can start a project, when you can draw down on the finance and so on and so forth. But on the whole, just stepping back, incredibly exciting period for us in AIG. And I can't wait to see where we're at next year.

The project in Sheffield, that's the one that I'll be kind of taking a lead on and that one will probably in all likelihood be kicking off in around March time, subject to getting the planning through in December, which is what we're expecting. So fingers crossed that that does come through. So I said at the beginning of today's episode, I've been quite busy outside of the businesses over the last couple of months and that is absolutely the case. So why have I been so busy? Well, if you've been keeping up the show and keeping up with me on socials, you'll know that Gemma is pregnant. We're expecting our first baby in January, which we're really, really excited about. 

But as part of a long-term plan, of which that is part, we decided it was time for us to move away from Sheffield where we'd been based for quite some time. Gemma's from Edinburgh and from Manchester, but actually we've got family in North Yorkshire and we love the Dales. And so we had some time ago decided that moving up to North Yorkshire was going to be the right thing for us. And we've been really excited about this for a while, but as you all know,

Moving house is hard work. You've got to get the house on the market, which we did pack everything up, get the removal vans, get a place sorted. And that is just so time consuming and quite draining, but it's something that we've done and it would have been really, really easy for us just to stay put and not quite take that box on a personal level that we really wanted to. And I think there were points when we thought that too, maybe we would do.

Andy Graham (27:27.734)

And because it was just so much easier than the alternative. So just fast forward and where are we now? Well, we're now in North Yorkshire living in Harrogate. We were in a rented house. We really landed on our feet with that, but we decided to rent for a year and just sorted it all out and not have to think about anything because we're buying a house, but that house, as I've mentioned in a previous episode, is going through probate. We got an offer accepted and then the vendor died. That then became a probate sale. 

Anyway, as it happens, we are getting planning permission to substantially extend and improve and alter that particular house. So while it's going through probate, we've got a planning application running simultaneously, which by the way, I've not got anything to report on you for the same reasons, just the usual planning delays and stuff taking longer than it really should do. But we're settled now in North Yorkshire in Harrogate and we're really, really excited. We've been exploring and finding our way and joining the gym and just kind of making new friends. And Gemma has been on the peanut app and she's got loads of nice new mom friends, which is really nice. 

At the same time, we put our market, house in Sheffield on the market. I think we got 36-ish viewings, something like that, day one. That flew off the shelf and that completed on the 1st of November. Very strategically, I delayed the sale because we had an early redemption charge that we would have otherwise had to pay. So all of that has happened and yep, dragging a pregnant lady through all of that is probably not the best piece of advice I could give anyone, but I think we can both honestly say that we're really now pleased that we did it. We're really excited to be here. And honestly, having the freedom and the choice and the time and the flexibility from the businesses, I think has allowed me to do that whole body of work, which I think we could all agree is going to be pretty stressful for anybody as stress free as it possibly could. 

I mean, we both boxed all the house up when we were leaving Sheffield, but largely I've been able to take the time and make sure that Gemma hasn't really had to deal with the stress of any of that. Not good for a pregnant woman. And she definitely appreciates that and it's worked and getting Gemma up here and moved in and feeling really happy and comfortable and stress free has been great. And at the same time, Gemma had to start a new job. So there was a lot there and the freedom and the choice and the flexibility that I've got from the businesses and the systems and the processes and the people and the teams.

Andy Graham (29:49.58)

And the way that everything is structured. I think even to the extent of how it's been designed around me, which is largely a really good lifestyle business, as opposed to a huge empire business, I'm not interested in building an absolute empire, certainly not in my trading businesses that has enabled that. And in previous episodes, in the last business update, I talked about project three months ahead. And this is an early example of project three months ahead in motion. What is project three months ahead? 

Well, it's the ability for my businesses to allow me to step out for an entire three months and not be involved in the businesses. This is the trading businesses. They'll run and continue to operate exactly as they should without me. And that requires a lot of dedication to putting the right people, systems, processes, and things in place. And we've been doing that for quite some time. Now we're not quite there yet, but project three months ahead will really take effect in January when baby G comes along. 

And the idea is then I'm definitely taking some time off. I'm taking some paternity and I'm definitely taking a bit of a step back from all of my trading businesses and I'm going to let them just simmer. So actually we've had a great couple of months in the trading businesses from a sales perspective. We've invited and welcomed so many more new members to the HMO roadmap. We opened up my mentorship program and I've just started working with lots of really exciting individuals in the HMO space.

And that's now being closed ahead of January. And that's been really exciting, but now we want to take a step back. We want to hibernate a little bit. We want to take advantage of what we've done and what we've got and the fact that it's all working and not just push, push, push, push, push. So there's still work to be done. Good example would be getting podcasts recorded in advance, making sure that any of our big deadlines and financial commitments in the business have been reviewed well in advance of renewal dates.

Lots and lots of stuff, accounts. I've done all my accounts for the year. They're all out of the way. And in January, I'm taking that time. So I'm taking a good couple of weeks off on paternity entirely. And then I'm taking a real step back from the trading businesses for three to six months. The development business in AIG is where my real focus needs to remain. And there's absolutely no way I could just take six months off anyway. I would go crazy. So I absolutely don't intend not to work at all, but project three months ahead is absolutely in motion.

Andy Graham (32:11.01)

And I'm getting there with it, not quite there yet, but I think in the next six weeks, absolutely will be there. Just got to hope that baby G doesn't come along any earlier than she should do. So that's where we are at the minute. Fingers crossed our planning application for our new home comes through soon. That is a project that needs to get built out next year. There's still a bit of work to do on deciding exactly what that is going to look like internally and externally, who's going to do that development for us what the budget I'm prepared to put to that is as well.

But this is definitely a period in my life where I want to pick some of the fruits from the forest. I've worked really hard over the last 10, 15 years to build the property businesses and to give ourselves, Gemma and I, opportunity to do what we're doing at the minute, move and kind of create what will be certainly for a period of time our dream home. And that's what we're going to focus on. So we're going to start a family. We're going to do the house.

And yes, it's all going to take us a lot of work and I can hear you guys with young children and babies all saying, Andy, you have no idea what's around the corner. I'm sure you're absolutely right, but I'm doing the best that I can do. And I couldn't not do some of this stuff as well. So would it have been better to do some of this stuff before? Maybe, but then in all honesty, we weren't in a position to do it. We just needed to get over a couple of hurdles in the businesses and get to this point. We also need to get married first and that's where we are. 

So we're incredibly, incredibly excited about the next 12 months and the plan is coming together. But honestly guys, that plan has taken a long time to put together. There's 12 months, 18 months behind this plan and a lot more work and executing on it just yet. So we're not there yet, but hopefully at the very least I'm helping you understand that none of this is happening by accident. I think it's really easy, isn't it? On social media to see what people are doing and

It looks like it's potentially easy or may have happened much more quickly than it did in reality with much less sacrifice. And actually I'm here telling you that that is absolutely not the case. I, and we have absolutely doubled down this year to be able to do what we are doing now. And I'm really proud of that, but I'm okay with that as well. At the same time, I think we've just about kept the balance right, but it absolutely has been really, really hard work at times, but the next year is going to be different. We're intentionally going to make next year.

Andy Graham (34:27.828)

easier in different ways. So, and we're going to take advantage of it and we're going to enjoy the fruits of all this labor. I think that that is about it for today's episode guys. Some ups, some downs, some sideways stuff, but on the whole I'm really, really pleased. And before I sat down to record today's episode, I just had a quick look at our year to date performance. This is across the whole group and it looks like we are about 10% up year on year. So we need a good couple of months to finish off.

And maintain that and there's no reason why we shouldn't do, but I'm incredibly pleased with that. So to be 10 % up year on year, but also have done as much in terms of improvement work and operational development that we have, that's really impressive because actually it's that stuff that sucks time and it sucks resource. It's expensive to do. So to have done that and get into that position where I can take advantage of project three months ahead or even project six months ahead.

And be up on sales I'm really really pleased about so I'll report back in and do a full breakdown like I always do towards the end of the year on my performance against golds in 2024 and then I'm going to share my goals for 2025 there will still be goals but they're just going to slightly different goals next year but on the whole things are looking good and this is going to be my last business update of the year guys that is it for 2024 I will like I said checking at the end of the year and let you know how the year has gone on the whole but

That's my last business update. So at this point, I'm to bid you farewell today. Wish me luck in trying to get the last bits and pieces in place before baby G does arrive in January. Keep listening to the podcast because we've got loads of exciting stuff coming up. 

If you are a regular listener of the show. Thank you so much for tuning in, week in, week out. It means the world to me. If you haven't had the opportunity or found any time yet to leave a quick review, if you could, it would mean the world to me. It helps more than you could possibly know. It helps us continue to able to bring great guests on the show. And by the way, we've got some absolutely corking guests coming to the show very soon. And if you could share the podcast with someone that you think will benefit from this, someone who's thinking about investing in HMOs or someone who's already investing that wants to be able to maybe scale things up, please, please, please do. That helps as well.

Andy Graham (36:36.876)

If you are trying to build your HMO property business and you want some support, some guidance, you want to find out how to level it up, then make sure you check out theHMOroadmap.co.uk. It is the UK's single biggest and most extensive resource for HMO investors and landlords. Everything you could possibly need to know about how to start, how to scale, how to systemise, how to build successful HMO property businesses is waiting for you inside there. 70 plus case studies from our community members.

showing you exactly what they've done with their project so that you can do it too. We've got dozens and dozens and dozens of downloadable resource that'll save you hours and hours of time and thousands of pounds. Trust me, when you look at the price of a membership versus what you get for it, it is an absolute no brainer. Even just some of the documents worth double, maybe even triple your annual subscription costs. And you can subscribe for a month at a time, by the way.

You can access the deal stacker. You can download and watch all of my videos, helping you figure out how to find deals, how to fund deals, how to repair and maintain and refurbish deals, how to find great tenants, how to manage your properties and everything else. Trust me, we've never had more subscribers. We've never had more positive feedback. And if you're not already using it and you do want to build your HMO property business, trust me, you won't regret it for a second. Go and check it out. That's theHMOroadmap.co.uk.

That's it guys, thank you again for tuning in. Don't forget that I'll be right back here in the very same place next week. So please join me then for another installment of the HMO Podcast.