It’s always good to get the chance to go to a show or exhibition. One or two a year is definitely enough for me, but I enjoyed the opportunities and conversations at the recent Property Investor Show at Excel in London. I also drank in a couple of the seminars, which gave me some food for thought, and this month I wanted to take things in that direction, hopefully to share some insights and my own take on some of the wisdom that was shared at the show.

Working on building a portfolio without regularly reflecting on the chosen strategy will always lead to mistakes. Trying to build a portfolio alongside a demanding job, or running one or more businesses, will lead to inefficiencies at the very least - if you aren’t able to pay for maintenance, management, insurance and mortgage - you don’t have an investment grade property in my view. In spite of this, one of the places that costs can be saved at the moment is of course on management, and more landlords will, more by being forced to than making a sensible decision, be taking properties back “in-house” if you will (just as compliance keeps going up, and up, and up!).

Maintenance isn’t an ethical or long-term solution to cost-cutting, and the rest is very difficult unless you are sitting on cash - and that cash, instead of adding to the portfolio, will then just pay down debt, and manage the problem but reduce return on equity in a time where investments are struggling, or failing, to keep up with inflation.

I appreciate the time that I have between journeys on days like that. It offers that reflection time, and the peace - when the mobile isn’t ringing - is useful. I spent the first nine years of my portfolio building career with only minor strategic tweaks - mostly just adding more tools to the repertoire, and finding new sources of good value property; and then having to make three or four really significant changes in the past three years or so, due to the pandemic, and the resultant economic stimulus and its impact on the property market, interest rates and rents.

That’s tiring - but I’m hardwired to attempt to rise to the challenge, and by spending the amount of time that I do reading and listening to relevant sources about the economic landscape, I have made my business better despite the overall landscape not being as favourable as it was when 3% mortgages were available by the boatload.