Investing in property offers us the opportunity to create wealth using a variety of strategies. Until recently the North London based Thomas Knust's approach to property investing was one replicated by many people, but in the last year he has made a quantum leap by acquiring and trading property using some creative strategies and is now making some very healthy returns from his trading partnerships.

I ask Thomas why and how he started investing in property.

"I've been a homeowner since 1999," replies Thomas, "but I only started building an investment portfolio in April 2009 when I joined a one year property education programme with Simon Zutchi's company. I have always been attracted to the concept of holding long term assets which grow in value over time and which also generate income along the way.

"My day job back then was more restrictive and as I was deskbound during the week my approach was to find other people to work with who would help me to do successful property projects. My main focus was to find and cultivate relationships with investors and to find property sourcers who would bring me the deals, bringing people together and using my own funds where appropriate. I also joined up with four other investors to pool our capital together to enable us to do bigger deals on trading projects."

So what sort of properties did you initially buy and what was the outcome?