My Property Management Experience in London

I accidently fell into the property business back in 2007 when I graduated from the university with a degree in International Relations and European Studies. I landed a job as a lettings negotiator for a relatively big London Estate Agency. I worked 12 hour days, was constantly running between the office and the properties, making 100 calls a day, generating tenancy agreements, scanning documents and trying to find a happy medium between the landlord and the tenant. It was a great experience, I worked hard, my phone would not stop ringing, I quickly learned the ropes and became successful. But my heart just was not there.

So when a friend of mine told me about a job at an agency working with investors, educating them about how to build a buy-to-let portfolio, I jumped at the opportunity. And while I was in the job for a relatively short period of time, this was the place where my personal love for buy-to-let property started. As part of my role I got to speak to very successful individuals who came from all walks of life but they all had one thing in common – desire to create and multiply wealth. And this inspired me, and at a tender age of 21 I could not wait to become a landlord myself.

I then moved on to another estate agency, a leading one in London with 24 offices at the time. With some lettings experience under my belt I became a Tenancy Manager. I was one of 15 people who collectively looked after 10,000 properties. This was the job where I learned what “busy” actually meant. My phone would not stop ringing, my email inbox was exploding, it was intense. The housing Act became my best friend, I learned it more or less by heart. I was processing tenancy terminations, serving notices, releasing security deposits, checking tenancy agreements and answering accounts queries. After 3 months in the job I was promoted to a Property Manager. This meant that I only dealt with properties that were managed by me personally. I looked after 170 properties, 170 landlords and 300 tenants. I was also one of two property management contacts for the busiest and most profitable office in the company with 30 members of staff. This was the place where I learned how to manage 100 daily incoming emails while answering 50 phone calls, I learned how to negotiate a deposit release so that everyone goes their separate ways happy even if the other party just took £2000 of their money. I learned how to fix every possible maintenance issue under the sun – from exploding sewage drains to collapsing ceilings, from squeaky floorboards to ever pressure losing boilers. I learnt how to successfully collect rent arrears, end a neighbourly dispute and much, much more. I learned how to resolve real life problems, stay calm and collected when someone is having a complete meltdown on the phone because the light in the kitchen is not bright enough. I was exposed to the most beautiful properties of Central London with rental figures up to £25,000 per week. After 2 years in the job I was promoted to a Senior Property Manager and took more of a supervisory and training role while still looking after my own portfolio of properties. I was in the job for 4 years, I was exposed to the best training in the industry, state of the art custom made software but most importantly I was surrounded by a very successful team of individuals who constantly challenged tradition in order to improve the way the industry operates. I became a confident, knowledgeable and very experienced property professional, the one that landlords, tenants and colleagues could trust and reply on. I became a wiz in organisation and learned how to effectively spin 20 plates at any one time while making each and every client feel valuable and one of a kind.

The desire to grow took me to this time a smaller Central London Estate Agent with one very successful office in Westminster. I was appointed to lead a small team of 6 property managers managing 500 properties. This was my time to shine and the list of challenges that were facing me was endless. So this is what I did:  I rewrote every single process that existed, created a computer based filing system, recycled about half a ton of paper that was taking up valuable space of a very expensive office, I completely changed the way the team worked, introduced morning meetings and focus days, goals and visual boards, ensured that all communication between the departments was via email, long gone were days when a negotiator would sit on a property manager’s desk charming them with their smile into to something that served no purpose. I streamlined everything that was being done, introduced order and efficiency, crated a number of positions for the support staff. As a result, the portfolio of properties experienced a rapid growth and my team doubled in size. I then took over the in-house maintenance team and an inventory team. The desire to be a one stop property expert for the landlords and tenants lead me and the board of the company to create an in-house cleaning team and an interior design team. At this point I was managing a team of 35+ people who in return were looking after a 1000 properties worth over a billon pounds. The company became an accredited, multi-award winning agency with 70+ members of staff based over 2 offices in London and 2 in the Far East.

And did I mention that while doing all of the above I also bought my house in London, became a landlord of my own buy-to-let portfolio and started a business? And all you need to do now is to allow me to share my experience with you!