The Return: Property & Investment Podcast – Détails, épisodes et analyse

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Adam Lawrence is the Founder of Propenomix, which has many thousands of subscribers across platforms who are keen to explore the economics of property. He’s been involved in over 700 UK property deals in the past decade, using 8 figures of joint venture funding and retaining the vast majority. He co-owns multiple investment and asset management companies that provide end-to-end services to residential property investors. And he is my favourite source of insight on property economics and finance!

In this episode of the podcast, sponsored by Cohort Invest, we discussed whether you should have property in your portfolio in the 2020s - and how.

Topics include:

• The pros and cons of directly owning residential investments in the current economic and regulatory environment
• What returns should you be targeting right now, over what timeframe
• The pros and cons of a ‘passive’ property portfolio, and how investors can diversify their income without taking on a second job
• Common mistakes investors make - and how to avoid them

Sponsor website: https://cohortinvest.co.uk/
Guest website: https://propenomix.com/
Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamglawrence/
Host LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/
Host website: https://www.greenresi.com/

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Damien Fogg is a Chief Financial Officer, chartered Building Surveyor, ex-Financial Advisor and the Author of two amazon best seller books on real estate and investment.

He has helped a wide range of clients, from people who have unexpectedly inherited money to those who have built and sold multiple businesses. He does all this in plain English, so he’s the perfect guest to help de-mystify investing for the future, and navigate how to legally pay less tax. This episode is part of our series on ‘How to make the most of your money’ sponsored by Cohort Invest.

We covered:

• How ‘time in the market’ compares with ‘timing the market’ (answer: very favourably!)
• How investors can approach ethical or sustainable investing when they also want to make an attractive return
• When Robo Advice and Artificial Intelligence actually add value to investors
• What tax planning is
• What tax wrappers you could and should use, including how SIPPs compare with ISAs in practice
• What resources and tools to use, from tradingview to YouTube

Sponsor website: https://cohortinvest.co.uk/
Guest website: https://www.damienfogg.com/investing-made-easy
Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/damienfogg1/
Host LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/
Host website: https://www.greenresi.com/

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I caught up with my friend Jon Daley, who I (not very) jokingly refer to as ‘the Martin Lewis of social and sustainable housing’ because he knows so much about these socially critical topics. He’s also Head of Sustainability at Asset Manager G2M.

For context, Jon and I agree on a lot of things, including that the value of ideas shared increases exponentially, and that collective effort beyond building design is essential for achieving the environmental and social outcomes needed in UK housing pre-2050.

Topics we covered on the pod included:

• What is needed in order to upgrade the huge proportion (80%) of UK homes that we use in 2050 which already exist

• Navigating key regulatory changes, standards and bodies from Rental Reform to COP to the UK Green Finance Strategy to ISSB

• Navigating funding opportunities such as ECO and the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund

Guest LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/jondaley88/⁠⁠
Guest website: https://g2mgroup.co.uk/

Host LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/

Host website: https://www.greenresi.com/

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I'm very excited to share my conversation with Tom Bloxham MBE, one of the best known and loved personalities in the real estate industry and a pioneer of urban regeneration.

Tom is the chairman and founder of leading regeneration company Urban Splash, which has received 419 (!) awards to date for architecture, design and business success.

He has a reputation as ‘the property developer who makes property development socially acceptable’, and the best accolade I’ve heard to date: a portrait in the National Portrait Gallery.

Highlights of our conversation include:

• How to handle challenges, changes and cycles in the property market
  
• Changing mean streets to green streets - lessons learned from spearheading unprecedented changes to our urban landscape
  
• How to prepare for the future as a property developer/investor
  
• Living well by design - the ethos of Urban Splash investments
  

Listen in to hear more.

Resources:

Guest website: https://www.urbansplash.co.uk/

Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tom-bloxham-26055413/

Guest Twitter @TomBloxhamMBE

https://annaclareharper.com/

http://spi.capital/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/

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What’s changing in the UK rental market?

Zoopla’s Head of Research, Gráinne Gilmore, joined me to discuss what’s really happening in the UK Private Rental Sector.

Gráinne was previously Head of Residential Research at Knight Frank, and an award-winning Economics Correspondent for The Times before her role at Zoopla.

So, she’s brilliantly placed to help explain the fascinating and complicated dynamics that are affecting the UK rental market.

Highlights of this episode include:

• What’s driving the entrenched ‘two-speed market’, with UK rent growth of +1.7% vs -5.2% in London’s rental market
  
• Tenant demand 25% higher than last year overall - with particular demand for properties with gardens, parking, garages, balconies and ‘pets allowed’, and a shift away from office-driven cities such as Coventry and Reading
  
• What next for the UK rental market, in a context of reduced investment activity, muted earnings growth and limited affordability for many first time buyers
  

Resources:

Guest website: https://www.zoopla.co.uk/

Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/grainnegilmore

Zoopla Rental Market Report: https://advantage.zpg.co.uk/insights/rental-market-report/

Host website: annaclareharper.com

Host website: spi.capital

Host LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/

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Transparency, liquidity, and listed real estate

I had a fascinating discussion with Richard Croft, Co-Founder and Chairman of leading investment group, M7 and David Delaney, CEO of new property stock exchange IPSX about their first single real estate asset Initial Public Offering (IPO).

Richard and David have exceptional credentials in real estate and finance, with years of experience, and billions of transactions under their belts. Richard is the Executive Chairman and co-founder of the M7 Real Estate group, and has been involved in over €8 billion of transactions across the UK and Europe during his 26 year career in real estate, founded and sold a European real estate fund management business, and is a Non-Executive Director of IPSX.

David is IPSX’s Group CEO. His previous experience includes managing $1bn book of business at Thomson Reuters as Head of Strategic Clients and Solutions, and 25 years at Credit Suisse (where he became Head of Fixed Income Sales for interest rate products) and Barclays Bank.

Richard and David share a deep frustration with the issues that prevent investors from selecting and investing in assets for themselves, the lack of transparency in the listed real estate market, and the lack of liquidity available for many real estate assets.

Their current mission is to solve these issues, through an unprecedented single asset listing of Mailbox REIT on IPSX. So, will it work?

Highlights of the episode include:

• What liquidity is really worth to investors
  
• The high perceived risk of anything new
  
• The problems investors face with open-ended and closed-ended real estate funds
  
• Whether investors really value choice and democracy in investing
  

Resources:

Guest websites: 

www.themailboxreit.com / www.ipsx.com / www.m7re.eu

Anna’s website: 

www.annaclareharper.com & www.spi.capital

Anna’s LinkedIn page:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/

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Would you start an investment business in a recession?

I would, and have.

I wanted to share a bit more about why. So in this episode of the podcast, Damien Fogg, CIO and I explain what we’re doing at SPI Capital and why.

Highlights include:

• The case for change, in life and business, post-lockdown (#1)
  
• The business and social case for investing in built residential assets worth <£5m
  
• Developing strategies and tech to solve property market and investor problems in the £1.5 trillion UK Private Rental Sector
  

This is the first episode in a new series on investing and running a business in the current environment.

The rest of the series will be a mix of discussions with other operators and investors (including some very exciting names from across the real estate sector) and less formal conversations like this, following the journey towards SPI Capital’s official platform launch in January 2021.

Resources:

www.spi.capital

Email: info@spi.capital

https://annaclareharper.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/damienfogg1/

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How do you invest through a crisis?

It’s a cliche so say it, but undeniably we are in ‘unprecedented times’. As a result, it’s never been more important for individuals and families to preserve and grow their wealth, and to plan for the future.

I got the chance to pick the brains of Ann-Marie Atkins, the only female Managing Partner at award-winning Wealth Management and Financial Planning firm, Tilney.

We covered topics including:

• The most common mistakes that individuals, families and business owners make around financial planning, and how to avoid them
  
• The risks and opportunities of recent and proposed regulations such as changes to Capital Gains Tax
  
• Recession-proofing your finances
  
• Understanding your risk appetite and liquidity preferences
  

Resources:

https://www.tilney.co.uk/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/tilney-group/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/annmariebanks/

www.annaclareharper.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/

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It’s not glamorous.

Yet building management has the potential to make or break both investor returns and customer satisfaction.

Historically, it’s been rare for investors to know (and perhaps, to care) how their building can be managed better. Until now.

Ryan Collier has specialised in the management of large and complex buildings for 10 years, and has overseen tens of thousands of homes.

He and his team at leading specialist block managers, Pod Management, provide residential estate and block management services - and comprehensive data analytics - for clients such as Bellway homes, Berkeley Homes and Tipi (Quintain) across some 9,000 homes (contracted and pipeline).

We discussed:

• How data analytics can be used to reduce investor costs and improve customer service for tenants - from optimising postroom staffing to 24 hour ‘between tenancy’ turnarounds
  
• The myth that new buildings cost less to run - since maintenance is about people and the quality of the building, not its age
  
• The myth that more data means better results - it’s not the data, but how you use it!
  
• Optimising building lifecycle costs - and the shocking cost of cheap taps, lifts and gates
  

Resources:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pod-management/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/

Instagram: @podmanagement

www.podmanagement.co.uk

www.annaclareharper.com

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The flight-to-safety, dumb money and real estate

I had a great chat about Family Office, Private Equity and Institutional Investment in real estate in the current environment with Rebekah Tobias, leading investment specialist and Head of Business Development at Private Equity firm, Marcol.

Rebekah’s experience includes Partner and Director roles at Marcol, M7 and Cushman & Wakefield, spanning international capital markets through to operations-led asset management. So she is well-placed to comment, and is brilliant at explaining the complex real estate investment world.

Highlights of this episode include:

• How investors price real estate and take calculated risks in a fast-moving market - including re-pricing retail and offices, the premium required for investing further afield, and the ‘tech effect’ on valuations
  
• Dumb money and the financial consequences of herd mentality - even amongst sophisticated institutional investors
  
• The flight to quality and safety - and perceived low risk of prime real estate
  
• The importance of optimising operations as a way to create value - and how sophisticated investors are doing this across sectors.
  

Resources:

https://marcol.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebekah-tobias-2187b66/

annaclareharper.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/annaclareharper/