IT project manager James Travers and former model Lisa Dugard have built a successful holiday let business in their first year after joining Samuel Leeds’ academy. In one month alone their rent-to-rent portfolio made a profit of £10,000. The couple even managed to move house while setting up their venture and are still not finished yet. Next on their agenda is using their pension pot to buy commercial property.
‘I realised I’m never going to get rich doing what I do’
James’ job is to deliver IT systems for governments across the world. It pays the bills, he says, but it is a means to an end.
After a 30-year corporate career he wants to focus instead on making money from bricks and mortar.
“I could stop working tomorrow and we would be OK,” he explains. “But that’s not our goal. Our vision is to accelerate this. Keep the corporate job for a year or two and then use that money to reinvest in property, build that passive income and then I can stop.”
It was Brexit that led him indirectly into the property industry. It played a ‘big part’ in him wanting to make a change in his life. He felt lied to by politicians in terms of the benefits that leaving the EU would bring.
James believes those benefits never transpired and it made him want to be more aware of what was happening around him.
“I realised I’m never going to get rich doing what I do. We then had Covid. I was working from home more. I like to consider myself quite entrepreneurial and at the time I saw an opportunity to start doing work with multiple clients which is what I did. But I also found some downtime in the afternoon.”
While browsing YouTube James discovered Samuel Leeds and his property investing channel.
He remembers being drawn in by Samuel’s personality and successes. “I sat there for a while just watching the video, thinking I could do this.”
His first step was to enrol on one of Samuel’s £1 crash courses.
James roped Lisa into coming along with him to the event in July 2023. Lisa admits she was slightly cynical about the course beforehand.
“I hadn’t felt that buzz for a while because of Covid. I thought it was going to be a big sales pitch and like an old boys’ club, and it really wasn’t. I came out of there going, I haven’t felt like that in a long time.”
Both James and Lisa were impressed by the energy in the room, and the detailed content in the course.
Only around 15 minutes of the eight-hour course was dedicated to upselling the advanced training.
James was immediately interested. “When Samuel offered me that deal I was off the chair before he’d finished and at the back. I listened to what Samuel and the other mentors were saying. I thought I need a piece of this.”
Having had a tough ten years after going through a divorce, James saw it as his route out.
He and Lisa joined the academy two months later. They each put £5,000 into the business.
“I was like you’re not doing it all,” says Lisa. “I’m going to get a loan out. I didn’t know what was going to happen. I just quit my job, got my loan out and here we go.”
Lisa recalled what Samuel had said about the difference between good and bad debt and concluded that he had a point.
“We’ll always have some sort of debt. There’s a difference when you’re in your twenties and wasting debt to now we’ve got some debt, but we’ve also got profit coming in – and we’ve got a vision and a journey.”
James, who celebrated his 50th birthday a few months after becoming an academy member, was also willing to take a leap of faith. “I had little chance of a good retirement. I had to throw it all on red and it’s the best thing I ever did.
“It was a calculated risk and here we are a year later.”
Lisa and James clinch five rent-to-rent deals
James and Lisa used their money to set up a rent-to-rent business. Through their company, Travard Properties, they control five flats, renting them from landlords and then renting them out for a higher amount. Three are in Brighton. One is in Windsor and the other one is in West Drayton, just a few minutes away from Heathrow Airport and the Elizabeth rail line.
They took on their first rent-to-rent in Windsor in January 2024. The agreement is for five years which gives them a chance to recoup the money they spent on it.
Their plan was to turn it into luxury accommodation, but they felt the bathroom let it down. So, they replaced it at a cost of £8,000.
James concedes it was a gamble, especially as it was their first one and they didn’t even own the property, but it allowed them to increase their nightly rates.
“Therefore, we are getting better customers coming to us because of the quality of the property.”
The location makes it ideal as a holiday let. It is five minutes from Legoland and a mile from the station.
The couple got engaged in Windsor. So, it is a place ‘close to their hearts.’
While the property was being renovated they got a tenant in for a couple of months which covered their costs. By April they were ready to hit the short-term let market.
Since then, the occupancy rate has been ‘85 per cent plus.’
James adds: “The great thing also about Windsor is our next-door neighbour is our housekeeper. She does all the cleaning. She meets and greets the guests if they need any help. So, we just let that run itself.
“That’s clearing about £2,500 to £3,500 profit a month.”
Lisa says sometimes they panic if it is not busy, but then they get last-minute bookings because they offer one-night stays.
“People go to Legoland, and it works. We do it in Brighton as well. We get so many. This week (Sep 2024) one of the flats in Brighton was out five days and we’re fully booked now.”
One of their places in the seaside resort is a studio which is also performing extremely well.
“Our cost on the studio is about £1,500 a month. That clears easily £3,000/£3,200 a month [profit],’ James says.
Lisa points out that the studio is easy to run as it takes her less than 40 minutes to clean it and complete the changeover in readiness for new guests.
James agrees: “It’s on the way out of Brighton. We do the two main ones which are next to each other and then on the way out we just quickly go to the studio to sort it out.”
The partners manage their portfolio themselves, systemising their processes both in their business and at home. Lisa is out on the road most days cleaning and preparing the flats. James, in the meantime, spends a couple of hours a week on the administration side. He also takes care of the washing and ironing when working from home.
They use Uplisting software to manage their bookings through sites like Airbnb.
They also have an enquiry only type of listing where they accept the rental, as opposed to an instant booking. It allows them to move bookings around, as well as giving them more control over who stays in their apartments.
However, Lisa and James recognise that they need to move into more of an outsourced arrangement as their operation expands.
Their guru Samuel Leeds teaches that a property investor needs to be hands on in the beginning to understand the ins and outs of managing holiday lets.
Lisa believes that in the first five years it is not about getting rich. It’s about getting good. Nevertheless, they are already making good money.
In August, James says, they turned over a total of £20,000, leaving them with £10,000 after deducting their costs. “This month we’re turning over £29,500. The running cost is about the same. That’s off the five.”
They staged two of their properties in August and so September is their first full month of all five properties being rented out.
Dealing with bad guests
The life of a property entrepreneur has its ups and downs. James and 35-year-old Lisa have had to contend with some bad guests. One couple left the place in what they considered to be a disgusting state, leaving Lisa with the task of clearing it up.
On another occasion they suffered a flood which they believe was caused by wipes being put down the toilet. In that case, booking.com covered the damage and Lisa and James cleaned it up.
Once they had the frustration of receiving a bad review about the facilities which they felt was unfair. Rather than being confrontational Lisa says they ‘killed it with kindness.’
She replied, saying that she took the guest’s comment on board and would take positive action.
Lisa started off her career working for a hairdresser’s and learnt from a young age how to deal with people’s gripes.
“You’ve got to be calm, listen [and say] I’m sorry about that. What can we do to help? Ask questions.”
Samuel recommends thanking people who leave a bad review as it gives a business the opportunity to improve.
James is philosophical. “People are going to have their views and you can’t please everybody all the time.”
For their first two rent-to-rents the couple had to pay a deposit, plus one month’s rent. With furniture to buy on top of that, the set-up cost came to about £10,000 for each one.
However, now that James and Lisa, who live in Liss in Hampshire, have built relationships with agents they try to avoid paying deposits. They negotiated no deposit on one of their Brighton flats and have also saved money by buying furniture at auctions.
The entrepreneurs play to their strengths. James understands spreadsheets, while Lisa is good at paying attention to detail.
They spent two days with Samuel at his house which gave them focus. Lisa also took part in a charity run organised by her trainers when she was feeling the pressure to succeed.
“I’d had a couple of setbacks from agents and hit a low. I thought I can’t do this and then I went on the run. Everyone was struggling on the way round. I could see Samuel struggling and thought if he’s struggling, and he’s this amazing guru, that’s life.”
She related the run to the marathon of being in property and it gave her encouragement.
James too has felt the positive effect of being in the academy, describing it as phenomenal with a rich tapestry of people from all walks of life creating an incredible environment.
“Since joining the academy seeing these strategies and making them work my whole persona has changed. I’m so much more out of that dark zone. It’s been amazing on many different levels.”
James and Lisa’s tips
- You have to invest in yourself to be successful in life.
- if you don’t try you’ll never find out if you could succeed. There are so many opportunities if you apply yourself.
- Get the training and take action. If it doesn’t work out, go again.
- Everyone needs to have clear roles in a business.
Samuel Leeds’ verdict
“It’s been really good working with Lisa and James. I’m proud of them. They have invested their money wisely and are getting excellent returns.”
