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Who you're dealing withI left a job I liked to do this. That's how seriously I take it.
Thirteen years in oil and gas, ten different roles, eight countries. Then a Saturday in Fife with a property that nobody else wanted.
From project delivery to property.
I spent thirteen years in oil and gas, most of it delivering projects in places that weren't easy to deliver projects in — Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Australia, Namibia. Aberdeen before that. The work was largely the same thing over and over: work out what it actually costs, work out what could go wrong, then make sure neither of those things surprised anyone.
By 2025, I'd been living out of a suitcase for years. A hundred flights in nine months is not a life, it's a schedule. I was offered roles in Houston and elsewhere and turned them down. We'd already lived in Houston for six years and had just moved home. I didn't want to move away again.
So I bought a property for £38,000 instead.
It needed everything. Roof, wiring, heating, kitchen, bathroom, the lot. I did the project management myself, with a crew of trades I'd get to know very well over the next twelve months. It took longer than planned, cost more than budgeted, and taught me more than any of the previous thirteen years had about how buildings actually work.
It's now let at £795 a month. And since then, seven more.
- Based Fife, Scotland
- Also holds property in Aberdeen
- Properties bought and worked on Eight since 2025
- First purchase £38,000
- Background 13 years, energy sector
Three things I got wrong.
Anyone in property who tells you year one went exactly to plan is either lying or hasn't costed it properly. Here's what I'd do differently, which is probably a more useful thing to know about a developer than a list of achievements.
1. The refurbishment always costs more than the first estimate
Not sometimes. Always. The first property had a roof I thought was sound and a damp problem I thought was cosmetic. Both were neither. I now budget a contingency on every job and I don't pretend it's pessimism — it's the cost of not knowing what's behind the plaster until you open it.
2. Cheap trades are the most expensive thing you can buy
I tried to save money on a job once. I ended up paying twice — once to the person who did it badly, and again to the person who put it right. The crew I use now I've worked with repeatedly, and I'd rather wait for their availability than bring in someone unknown to save a week.
3. The deal is made at purchase, not at sale
If the numbers don't work when you buy, no amount of good refurbishment rescues them. That's why I walk away from most of what I look at. It's also why the properties I do buy tend to be the ones nobody else wanted.
None of this is a one-man operation.
A refurbishment is a dozen trades in a small space, in the wrong order, on a deadline. The people below are the reason the work finishes properly — and most of them have been on every job since the first one.
Joiners and builders
Timber, roofs, studwork, floors, doors, kitchens. The people who determine whether a room feels right or feels like a room.
Gas, electrical and heating
Boilers, heating systems, full rewires, certification. The work that has to be right before anything else can be finished.
Windows, glazing and guttering
The outside of a building does more for how it's perceived than anything inside it — and does more damage when it's wrong.
Named trades are listed on request. Several work independently and we don't publish their details without their agreement.
Four things I won't compromise on.
The building has to be sound before it's pretty
Roof, damp, structure, services. Nobody notices them when they're right and everybody notices when they're wrong. They get done first, and the budget for them is not negotiable.
Certificates, not assurances
Gas safety, electrical certification, building warrant where it applies. If a piece of work needs a certificate, it gets one. "It's fine, I've done hundreds of these" is not a certificate.
The budget is agreed before the work starts
No open-ended arrangements. Scope, price and programme agreed up front, variations in writing. That applies whether it's a trade or an investor.
Say the difficult thing early
If a property isn't going to work, if a cost has moved, if a date has slipped — you hear it from me as soon as I know it. Not at the end, dressed up as a surprise.
Most of the work is documented as it happens.
Refurbishments get photographed and filmed as they progress, partly because it's useful and partly because a lot of people asked. The Instagram account is where the day-to-day of it lives.
Worth a conversation?
Whether you're selling something or backing something, it starts the same way.