I have seen many a comment of late in social media forums expressing frustrations as to how investing in buy to let property in high-value areas has become more difficult in the last ten or so years. These observations are quite accurate, but I would also say that back then it was arguably too easy, particularly before 2007 when some lenders were somewhat less than stringent in their risk assessment.

From 2008 onwards following the ‘Credit Crunch’ the combination of stricter lending policies, regulatory barriers and from 2016 the increased taxes, has impacted individual landlord’s returns and the viability of many single let rental investments. As such, in high value areas those who continue to expand their portfolios have increasingly needed to adapt as the marketplace has evolved and in many cases the key difference to achieve success is about having the ability to pay very close attention to detail.

With his career background as an IT consultant, Ealing-based property investor Richard Woodstock was well placed some 25 years ago to utilise his analytical skills and apply them to property investing, as he explained to me when we met.

“I graduated from Brunel University in the mid-nineties and then worked on the consultancy side,” said Richard. “Some readers may recall all the talk then about the upcoming ‘Y2K Millenium Bug’, which meant that a lot of quite lucrative work was available shortly after I graduated. After a brief spell as a graduate trainee I became a contractor working solely for PwC, who in turn supplied my services to major oil companies. So, I found myself in a position in my mid-20s earning a good income but not knowing how to invest as I observed some of my IT Contractor colleagues buying a Porsche and ‘living the dream’.

“For myself this was not my style as I come from a quite humble background where we were taught to respect money and to be careful with it. So, I asked advice of some of the senior guys I worked with at PwC and the common theme that came back was to invest in property. The widely accepted wisdom back then was to buy a flat in London, rent it out and crack on with your career. It worked well at the time but I would probably not recommend this approach to a new investor-landlord in the current market as the numbers on vanilla BTL rarely work in London.”