Property Investors Do It Diligently

When considering buying a house that's not in a place you know really well, it's important that you do what's called due diligence - checking out all the statistics, information and facts about the property before you take the plunge and buy it. As well as the usual external and internal housing checklists, you also need to find out a whole load of other details about the property such as facts about the local area, the rental market and certain housing statistics.

What are the local crime stats? What are other properties selling (or sold) for? What is a realistic rental income for the area? What are the local industries? What kind of tenants am I likely to find renting round here? (All these facts feed into the speed at which you'll rent the house, the amount you can charge, and the type of tenant you'll attract).

If you're planning on buying a property to rent to families, are there schools in the vicinity? If you want to rent to young commuters, are there good public transport options available locally? Finding out the answers to many of these questions takes a significant amount of research time, although desk research using the internet is pretty accurate and extremely easy. Sadly, the wonderfully named' UpMyStreet.co.uk' is no more ('UpYours.co.uk has replaced it).

So what are the tools to use if you need to carry out due diligence? I find that Google's streetview is invaluable when assessing the real look of a house from the outside. MOST of the UK seems to have been photographed now, except for the odd Welsh Methodist Chapel that has fallen into disrepair and is situated 3 miles up a dirt track atop a hill.

The benefit of streetview is that you are not seeing the property from an estate agent's rose-tinted camera lens, which is able to make even a 2-bed backstreet slum-like dive appear to have 'loads of character' and 'vintage qualities' on the details. Ironically those Methodist chapels really do have loads of character and vintage qualities. Just that they're too far up the vertical incline for the google cameraman to reach, and they are rarely on the open market as estate agents tend to send them straight to auction.

Zoopla is also a great website for researching sold house prices. A good way of comparing whether the asking price of the property you're interested in is realistic. And if you're interested (ok take that as a polite way of saying nosey) in finding out what local problems might be in that neck of the woods, try Fix My Street - a really delightfully amusing website at which you can while away the hours reading the plights and complaints of local residents. As an example of just how serious things have become in the town in which I live, the top two complaints in order of magnitude are listed as 'Pothole Hell' and 'Doggy Doo'.  Definitely first world problems.

Another site which claims to be 'the only site that helps with property planning to enable you plan your property purchase from end to end with all the relevant information sources in one convenient place' is Property Notepad. It lists many of the most useful websites you'll need, to find a property, assess its potential, and sort out your finances.

Of course there are MANY MORE sites too - let me know which ones you find the most useful and I'll post them here!

So duly do your diligence and you'll find that the results of your investigations will massively help you make the right decisions about property.

System addict

Man realising what his business has been missing

Do you remember that Five Star song 'System Addict'  from the eighties?! (Showing my age aren't I?) I used to think they were saying 'Systematic'. And it's this phrase that is now beginning to regularly run round my mind when I consider what I need to do to create a business that will work smoothly and cost-effectively.

If you look at any well-run business, there is a system in place. It may be hamburgers, clothes, cars or paint - whatever the product, if the business is to be successful, you must develop a system to ensure the fastest and most effective way of getting the product into the customers hands, and getting the customer's money into your hands!

Although property is not exactly a commodity, nor is it a product, I still consider what I'm doing to be developing a business. There is a transaction between myself and the tenants; there is a contract; there are responsibilities on either side. If I am professional, organised, law-abiding, ethical and also nice (a four-letter word not often used by tenants) then I know that I am presenting the business in the right way. After all, in sales you learn that 'people buy people first'. Right now, I am the face of my business. So I need tenants to 'buy me' first.

After that though, there needs to be a system to underpin all that I'm doing. Otherwise paperwork will get lost, deposits won't be filed on time and in the right place (the DPS) and I won't know when rents are due and tenancies have elapsed. Without these important pieces of information logged and routinised (is that a word?) I could easily miss vital actions such as chasing rent arrears or repaying deposits.

I am NOT someone who a) enjoys creating systems (nor is very good at it either - probably because I don't like it) and b) is very good at sticking to systems (it all seems so repetitive and frankly, dull). But I know that right now, just like cleaning my teeth twice a day, I have to develop workable and effective systems to make this business effective. So, Five Star - I doubt I'll ever be a SYSTEM ADDICT - but perhaps I can be a bit more SYSTEMATIC.

(Another helpful article can be found here: http://www.boxtheorygold.com/blog/bid/18628/Six-Qualities-of-Highly-Effective-Business-Systems)