Jim Haliburton
Jim Haliburton began buying property in 1991 and letting them to students, organising or doing the work on the property himself. The tenants/students all came from the College where Jim worked as a lecturer.
In July 2003 Jim left his job as a College Lecturer and decided to invest in property full time. At that point he set himself a target to purchase a further 50 properties before the buy-to-let boom finished. In the end it took him 18 months to achieve this.
Jim now owns over 86 HMO’s / Multi-Lets with over 500 tenants. On top of this he has about 20 houses and flats which are let as single-lets. He is now acquiring properties using Lease Options and keeps on telling himself to stop accumulating property and consolidate his position, but anybody in the property business will know how difficult it is to stop buying once you have started.
To contact Jim email jim.haliburton@justdoproperty.com
Please leave your Questions and Comments Below:
how do you manage so many i have 12 properties half of them hmo
I have almost 100 properties now with well over 500 tenants. As a result I now have a number of staff and contractors to manage and maintain the properties. The areas are split into two and so I have two Area Managers who are responsible for the collection of rent, filling the voids and ensuring they are maintained.
I found it far easier in retrospect to manage the properties myself although at the time I didn’t think so, as I felt that I never had the time and was frustrated by having to do menial tasks. It took me on average 1 hour per week per property once they were up and running and full. The secret is to have all your properties within a few minutes drive of each other and local to you, or only let to professionals who pay you by standing order.
You need to develop a laid back attitude to it all but at the same time, do the best you can and realise that you will never satisfy all your tenants, all of the time and the more you do, the more they expect.
Remember that you are the boss, be as professional as you can but at the same time you very occasionally have to say to your tenants that if they are not happy, they are free to leave.
Do not make the mistake of thinking that employing staff is the answer. It causes more problems than it is worth, but that’s another story.
If you would like to learn more about managing HMO’s I run courses and mentorship programmes. For details go to the training course section in Just Do Education :-
http://www.justdoproperty.co.uk/education/training-courses#haliburton