Watch: What I learned scaling from 0 to 10 HMOs

Andy Graham (00:13.454)

Thank you. It’s a real pleasure to be here today. I’m much more familiar talking to a wall than I am with people, but I’ll do my very best for you today. If it’s okay with you, I’d like to talk to you about my story of how I’ve a portfolio over the last 12 years, but also what I’ve learned from who I consider to be some of the very best in our industry and how they’ve built their portfolios too.

As a student back in 2009 to 2000 and sorry 2006 to 2009 and then shortly after as a young working professional, I lived in several house shares as I’m sure many of the people in this room have done as well. And they were all pretty terrible. Now this isn’t actually a house that I lived in but you know some of them weren’t far off that standard. A lot of my friends lived in house shares as well and

Their houses were pretty awful as well.

I was sure that it didn’t have to be this way. And it actually frustrated me that this seemed to become a standard that we accepted, something that had become normal. But, you know, what could I do about it? I recently graduated from university. I had absolutely no experience in property and I had no money, certainly not enough money to even think about buying a house.

At the same time, as being a student and shortly after working as a professional in the health service, I had these ideas and these visions of perhaps one day building my own business as well. I wanted to be that master of my own destiny. I didn’t want to work at nine to five for 40 years. I knew that then. I didn’t want to have to ask when I could take a holiday and I didn’t want my future to be determined by my boss or borrowing pension.

Andy Graham (02:10.582)

I certainly didn’t want to spend my life doing something that I wasn’t passionate about. But what could I do about that? I had recently graduated from university. I had absolutely no business experience whatsoever. And as I’ve already told you, I had no money, certainly not enough, I thought, to build a business. At least these were all things that I’d been pre-programmed to perhaps believe. These two ideas, changing the standards of accommodation for young people,

and really making an impact in the industry, doing things better, making cool houses for young people, and building my own business wouldn’t leave me, couldn’t shake them off. And the more I thought about them, the more frustrated that I became with myself. So I started to look around, I started to search. I looked for ideas, for guidance, I for examples of people who were already doing this. And you know what, I did find…

that there were some people out there trying to change this narrative, trying to do things better. And there were actually lots of examples of people who’d built seemingly great businesses with very little in the way of resources. So one day, as I stared into the abyss of another week at work, I asked myself this question, Andy, why can’t you do it? And why can’t I build a business? Why can’t I do something about the standards of these houses that these young people are living in?

Now, you’re probably expecting some grandiose idea that came to me here, something that perhaps nobody else had thought about, you know, a shortcut, something that nobody else, you know, had been able to tell me. But the truth is, the three things that came to me were, well, I don’t have the experience, I don’t have the time, and I don’t have the money to do this. But there was one thing, and this one thing was just enough to convince me to give it a go.

have a stab at building my own business and to try and fulfil my mission, to try and change this narrative. that was, well, unfazed by these lists of excuses, I started to become quite obsessed with the idea actually of trying to a portfolio and change this standard. And this one thing that came to me was just that I believed that I could figure it out. If other people had done it, I was sure that I could find

Andy Graham (04:38.605)

a way to do it myself. So for two years, I really immersed myself and tried to learn as much as I possibly could. I saved everything I possibly could as young professional. Eventually, I managed to convince my dad to lend me a small amount of money to buy my first house. And I managed to buy, back in 2010, a real wreck, an ex-local authority house. It a three-bed semi-detached house. And I converted it with no experience, with no help.

other than what I managed to kind of pluck from the universe and the online communities to convert it. And this is what I did with it. Now, if you guys have seen any of my stuff in recent years, this perhaps isn’t what you’re accustomed to seeing, but in 2009, this was pretty groundbreaking. This was sort of market leading. This was quite unique. And I found some tenants and they moved in and they loved it and they started to pay a bit of rent.

I was starting to make a bit of money. So that was in 2010.

In 2012, with this newfound confidence, bit of experience behind me and this additional income, I managed to buy a second property in 2012 and actually pay back eventually that small loan I first took. Then in 2013, I managed to buy a third property, did the same thing again, and with the help of a refinance from property number one. And then in 2015, I bought my fourth property again.

with the help of a refinance from property number two, I was able to get my fourth property. At this point, in my early 20s, I thought I cracked it, I’d nailed this baby. But the truth was, it had taken me nearly five years to do this, to buy four properties. And the impact I was having on house shares in the UK was minimal. And my business wasn’t really growing very quickly at all. And amongst all of that, I’d been diagnosed with thyroid cancer and had to deal with that.

Andy Graham (06:44.074)

And that was a life changing event for me and it really made me ask myself some tough questions and I didn’t have the answers to all of them.

It refuelled the batteries, it really charged me and I doubled down, I invested even more time in networking. I got myself a mentor who’s one of the judges of one of the categories today. I’ve worked with him for a long, time. I was working hard before so I thought I found a new gear altogether. I really, really did work hard. Several years on I even built the HMO community which is now several thousand, I think we’re heading towards five or six thousand members.

And I even started the podcast as a way of learning more and sharing more about our industry. And my results started to multiply. These are some of those projects. They’re student properties, professional lets, single houses, small blocks. Some of these are in different cities.

Andy Graham (07:43.879)

Over that period, certainly those first 10 years, I learned a huge amount about our industry and about building businesses. And along the way, I met some incredible people, many of whom are actually here today that I hope you get the chance to meet. And I.

would like, if it’s okay with you, to share what I think are the five most important things that I’ve learned over the years from this experience and from these great people. Hopefully, if you’re trying to build a portfolio yourself, these ideas will help you do that. And I think, interestingly, this talk that I planned was several weeks ago before all the chaos that’s happening outside the doors today. And I think some of the things that you can take away, and I hope you can take away from today, will really help.

things into perspective if you’re feeling a bit uncertain or panicked about what is going on. The first thing that I’ve learned about this game is that you need to be prepared to work extremely hard and sacrifice an awful lot if you want to build a portfolio. The truth is it is not an easy industry to crack. These are two pictures from two different houses. I think the bottom left is maybe property number six. I’m working in the garden, it’s like a 45-degree garden in

Falmouth and Cornwall and perhaps property number seven up there with my pal and a hammer drill in the bathroom. I’m not as involved in the projects at that level anymore, but that’s what it took. For me, it meant 700 mile round trips of weekends. It meant sacrificing my evenings and weekends. It meant prioritizing saving over spending for a long, long time. And it was hard. For a lot of people that I’ve met along the way, has meant

refinancing their home to get into this game. It has meant selling a business. It has meant making other massive sacrifices, even leaving very stable and very well paid jobs simply to engineer some time back to allow them to do this. The second thing I’ve learned over the years is that this is a game that does need a degree of risk. You need to have a fairly healthy appetite for risk if you want to succeed and build a portfolio in this game.

Andy Graham (09:59.211)

There are lots of different risks. think the best in our industry really understand these risks. They understand which risks are manageable and which aren’t. And they make very calculated risks depending on what the outcomes of those decisions might be. For some of us, they could be around the location. It could be around what we decide to do with the finance. could be concerning who we go into business with. It’s important and I think essential to understand that if we want to grow a portfolio quickly,

And if we want to beat the competition to properties and deals, we have to stomach a certain amount of risk. The third thing that I’ve learned over the years is that the best in our industry prioritise access to finance above everything else. The truth is we’ve picked a very difficult business to start and grow. It’s incredibly capital intensive. You can start a lot of businesses with a few hundred quid, a few thousand quid, but you can’t really start buying property with that.

need more. The best in our industry understand this and they always have a plan. They have great relationships with brokers and high street lenders. They have great relationships with private finances and they’re happy to reinvest the income that they make from their portfolio, their properties back into their business because they understand that helps keep their plan financed. If you’re building a portfolio, you need to make sure we’ve always got access to finance.

The fourth thing that I’ve learned along the way is that you cannot do this alone. There are just too many moving parts to build a portfolio, to build a property business. The best in our industry understand this as well, but not only that, they prioritise their relationship with people. They have great relationships with agents, with brokers, with planning consultants, with architects, with other investors, with their mentors. My advice to you is to surround yourself

with these great people and build great relationships with them. They’ll be able to help you. They’ll be able to lift you up and you’ll get much better results and you’ll be able to get results much more quickly by doing this. The fifth thing that I’ve learned and I think it has never been in the last decade more important to understand this is that this is a long game. The best in our industry understand this. They’re not investing for results tomorrow.

Andy Graham (12:24.979)

besting for results in the next decade.

I wasn’t aware that that was how I was thinking about things. But more recently, in the last few years, it’s become apparent to me that actually that has been an approach that I’ve taken to my portfolio. My advice to you is to make sure that you do the same. There are lots of decisions that we need to make today that are important and the consequences of those decisions are important. But don’t get carried away with all of the short term outcomes. We need to think about

things like capital appreciation. The truth is I’ve done very well over the years from my student professional properties in terms of rental income, but actually on paper, surprisingly, it’s the capital appreciation that’s done better than anything else. When I first got started, that wasn’t something I was really thinking about. I was thinking about the rental income. And I think that’s just one example of the importance of thinking long term. Without the capital appreciation and the ability to refinance things along the way,

wouldn’t have been possible to grow my portfolio. There are lots of other decisions that we need to think about. Where we invest, who we invest with, what we invest in, what we do with our properties. These are all important considerations and we can get overly focused on thinking about the results in the short term and forget that it’s the long term that matters more.

So there we go. Let’s just recap very quickly the five, I think, most important things that I’ve learned from the best in our industry in the portfolios that they’ve built. First and foremost, you need to be prepared to work seriously hard and you do need to sacrifice an awful lot if you want to scale things up quickly. You do need to have a stomach for risk, but you need to make sure you make very calculated decisions. Number three, you need to prioritise your access to finance above anything else. Number four,

Andy Graham (14:23.389)

You need to prioritise building key relationships, working with great people who can help you build your portfolio. And number five, you need to make sure you’re always thinking long term.

The last 12 years has been a real roller coaster for me. It’s 12 years since I think I bought my first property or 13 years. It’s about 15 years since I first decided that I wanted to do something in this game. I wanted to change the standards of accommodation. I wanted to have a real impact. And I’m incredibly proud to see that now things are changing. The narrative is slowly starting to change and the standards, many of whom, we’re going to see great examples on the stage today, are improving.

dramatically. I’m also really pleased and really excited to see that there are so many people, many of whom are in this room today, building great portfolios themselves, taking control of their own future. And with so much noise, I think it’s important to remember that property has been very forgivable over the decades.

It may not seem like that now. I think we’re definitely in for a bumpy ride. But my advice is to keep it simple. If you focus on these five very simple things that I’ve shared with you today, I promise you’ll find it much easier. You’ll get results much more quickly and you’ll enjoy the process much, much more. Thank you.