Starting a rent to rent business, like any other business, is going to be a tussle between earning sufficient money to cover your living costs and the time you can afford to spend on growing it.

The good news is that it is possible to begin part-time in rent to rent, however, to build your wealth in your business, you need to become full-time as soon as you can.

In the short term you can get by with:

·      Working your evenings, lunch breaks and weekends

·      Recruiting a ‘handy helper’ in each house where possible

·      Sharing walkthrough videos and talk through remotely with prospect tenants

·      Getting help from a trusted person who can conduct viewings for you

·      Find a reliable handyman who you can trust to respond effectively to maintenance issues

This will get you going, and enable you to build some positive cash flow, but beware! Managing HMO’s is a very hands-on business, and without care and attention, there is a very real risk of situations developing that can be costly for you.

If there is one lesson in business, it is that you can rarely rely on anyone else to take as good care of it as you and so everything needs to be well managed.

Here are some of the reasons you need to be hands-on and visit properties regularly:

·      House shares have a tendency to become less attractive as a result of maintenance required, worn decorative finishes, rubbish, unwanted possessions, mess in gardens & communal areas etc

·      You have a duty of care for your tenants in terms of health and safety which takes active management in the property

·      It is best to conduct your own viewings; you will be the one managing the tenants and in a house share, personality and behaviour is important; you want to be the one gauging people while they view the property

·      Book viewings swiftly to reduce your voids and conduct them at a time to suit your applicants, not your own availability

·      Check your cleaners are doing a good job and aren’t billing you for time they haven’t spent there

·      If a tenant reports a maintenance problem, you should always assess it yourself; you would be surprised how often what they tell you isn’t accurate, and it is easy to waste contractor call out fees

·      Anti-social behaviour and urgent maintenance must be managed closely and you will need to be on hand to deal with matters as they arise

And that is just the property. If you are serious about building your wealth, that means generating surplus revenue as a result of scaling your operations to create a great business asset of value which can be sold.

To quickly scale your business from a standing start, you need to allocate sufficient time for your marketing:

·      Produce printed business & promotional material to show you are serious

·      Attend regular networking events to build hour contacts

·      Be regularly communicating across social media platforms

·      Conduct lots of property valuations with prospect landlords

·      Develop relationships with your local property agents

·      Database building with prospect landlords & local employers

A successful rent to rent business will enable you to generate a good income and a valuable business asset and that is going to take a lot of hard work and dedication. Working part time towards that goal needs to be a very short term situation so you can get on with the serious work of growing a healthy and profitable business.

In our experience, those who don’t get to working on their business full time within a few weeks of starting do not ever establish a credible business with value. The only way to do that is to use all the hours you can possibly find!