Getting Started in Supported Living: What Every Property Investor Should Know with Lisa Brown

In this episode of the Girls in Property podcast, Athena Dobson is joined by Lisa Brown for a deep dive into the world of supported living. Lisa shares her inspiring journey from a career in nursing to becoming a property investor, shedding light on the highs, lows, and life-changing moments of creating safe, supportive homes for vulnerable individuals.

Together, Athena and Lisa unpack what supported living really means—how it differs from assisted living, what property investors need to know, and why getting it right can be both financially sound and socially impactful. They explore key challenges like navigating finance, understanding property valuations, and ensuring homes meet the standards set by providers.

The episode also gets candid about the realities—think property mishaps, tough questions from providers, and the importance of building strong community ties. It’s a real, honest conversation about being an ethical landlord, investing with purpose, and making a genuine difference through property.

Whether you’re just starting out or already on your property journey, this episode will leave you reflecting on your ‘why’ and feeling inspired to approach investing with both heart and strategy.

Get in touch with Lisa Brown here: www.supportedlivingproperty.uk

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Transcript

0:01

Good morning. Welcome to today's episode of the Girls in Property podcast. Welcome back. Hope everyone is having a fabulous, fabulous weekend going into the week, of course, of the following one. Today, I am really looking forward to this episode because I think that this is a really hot topic at the moment. And you know what I'm like, whenever I'm trying to get like different guests on the podcast, I love getting different people's opinions. I love getting different experiences within the industry. And I love getting conversations where potentially I've had quite a lot of DMs around particular conversations and topics. I think, hmm, who would be the best person to maybe have that conversation with around that particular area? And I hope you could all agree, I have got the best person to for the job today on this podcast. So without further ado, I'd love to introduce Lisa Brown. Hey Lisa. That's okay. Yeah, you've actually, gonna, we were talking about earlier before you came on the podcast, you've of course been on this podcast before back in the day when Sophie was running it with me, which I was saying to you, feels like about 50 years ago, even though I'm not that old. And it's wonderful to get you back, of course, to talk all about supported living, which let's face it, is a really sort of interesting topic, hot topic, people are. wanting to know more about it, understanding it. And so that's what we're really going to cover today and the differences of the different sort of social housing aspects as it were, which is brilliant. Yay. So Lisa, before we begin, some people are going to know you because you're very, very prevalent within the industry, doing incredible things, which we're going to be getting into in more detail. But for those who don't know you and are meeting you for the first time on this podcast, could you please introduce yourself, tell everyone kind of... about you, how you even got into property and the supported living space, and then maybe just something interesting about you that potentially somebody might not know. okay. uh So my background was a nurse. I was a nurse for a long time. I worked in the emergency department. I worked in the community. I always thought I'd be nursing, never really thought I would be doing anything else. And I'm still a bit shocked that I'm not a nurse, if I'm honest, because I never really thought I wouldn't be. But I was also really interested in property and I'd always, you know, really used to, in the days when before there was Rightmove, I'd hang around the state agents windows looking to see what there was there. And, you know, I just always loved property. Anyway, we moved to Devon. And I struggled to get, I thought we moved for a lot of different reasons to get the kids settled somewhere different and for a different lifestyle. And I didn't, it never occurred to me that I'd struggled to get senior nursing work locally and uh couldn't. So around the kids and around the flexibility that I needed. So I thought, right, fine, I'll just spend a bit of time trying to work out on what I'm going to do for a while. Fell into doing some property investing really kind of by accident. Cause I thought. Do know what, maybe I'll get a holiday let in the village that we live in. It's a really pretty village. Perhaps that's what I'll do. Started researching holiday lets and at the time that felt a bit scary to be taking on a big mortgage and all the, all the bills without knowing that I was definitely going to get that filled. So I was like, Oh, maybe I won't do that anyway. So I've listening to podcasts and I love podcasts for many reasons, but there's so much value you can get out of podcasts isn't there when you're starting. So I listened to podcasts, read a few books, got my head around a few things and realized that perhaps I could. refinance our house, pull out some money and buy a couple of, buy some property. So I brought this property that was two flats that was, hadn't really got planning. So was just a terraced house that was divided into two flats, didn't have planning, was in a really bad state, sorted it out, really enjoyed that process, refinanced it, split the titles, pulled all my money out without really realising that was quite an amazing thing to do at the time. So, that's great, let's go again. And just as about to do that, I was approached by Specialist Housing Association. who said, looks like you're a landlord in Devon. We've just had a landlord pull out of purchasing a bungalow for a young man with learning disabilities. And he just wondered if you'd be interested in picking it up. And I was like, sounds really interesting. I've got this pot of money to go again. Jumped in with two feet, brought this bungalow, refurbished it to meet this young man's needs. He moved in. All the good things that happen when someone moves into a home that's right for them. and his support needs dropped from having four to one members of staff 24 hours a day to having two to one. He was in the right home and he felt happy and safe. I can talk about that bungalow for hours, but basically it was really pivotal for me. But what happened then was I tried to get it refinanced. What do mean I can't get a mortgage because the tenant has learning disabilities? Well, that's ridiculous, isn't it? What do you mean I can't get insurance? What do mean the surveyors come around and told me that I've ruined this property because I've adapted it a little bit? So I went on about, well, this is stupid, isn't it? And I then started being approached by other local housing and support providers going, what you've done is brilliant. The local authority was using it. It's a case study of collaboration. And they were like, we need more of these. Can you do us more? And I was like, well, no, I've just been burnt really badly, actually, because I've left all, you know, what should have been quite a good property deal ended up being quite a bad property deal because of the down valuation. So that's kind of a very long explanation of how we ended up falling into supported living. And then because of that kind of injustice and thinking, well, this isn't right. Why is it so hard to invest in these kind of properties as a private property investor? And this was quite a few years ago now. I decided to try and find other people who were doing this, set up a Facebook group, which ended up being just as a kind of stake in the ground to meet other people, started interviewing people into that Facebook group that morphed into a podcast and the YouTube channel. And then I realized there was a real need for people to come together. There was a real need for all the providers that were approaching me going, we need these properties. I was like, well, how do I get them to the property investors who were also messaging me going, I've got this property here. How do I? So then I've just been trying to solve this problem for the last few years and trying to help everyone understand it. And it's been really interesting, Athena, because it's kind of gone from initially me going, there's this thing called supported living and you can lease your property to these organizations and it's a really great way of doing it. To now me almost going, now it's being everywhere, every social media platform, everyone's talking about supported living and social housing and how great it is to have a lease. And I'm almost going the other way going, yeah, yeah, but you've got to get it right. And actually, we don't necessarily want everyone jumping into it in this way, we need to be doing it carefully. And so it's really interesting. It's like turned completely around on its head from me spending hours and hours writing social media posts trying to convince people that they really should look at this to almost going the other way round. oh so interesting Lisa and this is why I wanted to get you on the podcast to talk about this and this is why I felt like you were the right person to get on because you make such a fabulous point there actually which is a couple of things actually number one is I love the fact that you have this this background in um Nursing and the NHS as it were and you know what? don't know if you found this just because of your background but for me with girls and property loads loads of staff members from the NHS nurses doctors They're all wanting to, lot of them want to get into property. I can't believe how many girls within the Girls and Property Community Group have an NHS background. NHS and teaching is rife. It's the most fascinating thing. And so when I do my calls with people or they come and they DM me, they're like, hey, Athena, I've got 10 years as a nurse within the NHS. I've got five years as a nurse within the NHS. I'm like, my goodness. Like, this is really interesting about why they want to get into property. And I think what I didn't realise coming from that nursing background was all the skills I brought and actually how useful all those skills are that when you're coming from a public sector background that you're good at communicating with people. That's what you've done for years. You're good at making judgments about people and making those assessments. And there are so many skills that you bring that you don't really value until you start getting into it and thinking, actually, I can just do that. actually, other property investors maybe don't understand that part of it. so much for saying that because the amount of people I speak to who lack confidence and say, I don't know anything about it. And I constantly say to them, you have such incredible transferable skills. And let's face it, when you're looking at trustworthy people and things, NHS staff is a good way to start, think. Exactly, I mean they're joking that I've gone from like the most trusted profession, everyone's always like all nurses and nurses and nurses, know, to being like the most hated profession as the landlord in the press at the moment. So it's kind of interesting that I've kind of done that transition. But yeah, absolutely. and the other thing I'd love to touch on is, first of all, it's hilarious when I speak to so many really, really successful property investors such as yourself, and a lot of them always start with the same. go, I fell into property. This is how I fell into property. And I'm like, yeah, here we go. But also I love the fact that this is, it was almost like your values from your background and your values of who you are, then set you up to do this going forward. And I love what you said there. You make such a... a good point actually, which is I do know what you mean when you're saying this is almost becoming like a trend or a hot topic or something that people are latching onto because it's a good profitable way to invest. But actually let's remember why we're doing this. It's about creating homes, as you said, for people who need adapt accessible homes to live in. Like we, we, I'm thinking about this from, from, you know, we might take these things for granted. being able to live independently and being able to walk upstairs and being able to go to the bathroom and to step into our bath. There are people in this world who don't have that luxury and therefore the fact that they've been able to have these accessible homes that they can live independently is massive. And I think we must always remember the why it's important to do that and not just the fact that yes, we can make a quick buck out of it. I think that's important thing that you just said, definitely. Yeah, it's really key and I think it's, it's work and realizing you're working with some of most vulnerable people in society. So therefore when you're setting up homes for people and you want to be setting them up in the right way and you don't want to be screwing every penny out of, there's lots of different organizations involved when you're working in supported living particularly, but you don't want to be screwing every penny out of all the partners within it because actually it's going to not work in the long term for you. And so you need to understand how, how to set it up properly. And there's a lot of people. selling the dream on social media at the moment, but not really understanding it. Yeah, well let's change that today. Let's do a really great podcast where anyone who wants to get into it, they can know some great information today. So before we step straight into it, Lisa, can we first of all talk about what we're celebrating at the moment? So what are you celebrating? So I'm celebrating growing the team, actually. we've had, uh yeah, I've grown my team. So we've now got four members of the team and me working. And it's brilliant. And that's really exciting. So that's a big um thing, getting to that point. So yeah, I'm really excited about that. Yeah. Yeah. let's face it, when we all start, we do everything, don't we? We literally are every single thing within the business. And you feel guilty about stepping back because if you don't do the work, nobody does the work. So a team of four is massive. So who are you like in terms of what their bits are? Like if you've got a team of four, what's the team so far? And they're all part time, they're mostly moms and they're mostly, you know, they're working. it was brilliant because it just works really well because I can offer really flexible work around what people need and people can work, you know, from home. So and we've just got such a brilliant team. love it. So I've got my ops manager who's been with me from very beginning and she's brilliant and she just understands all the spreadsheets and the tech and the stuff that just isn't my head and makes my head hurt. And then we've got someone who is offshore who does all our bookkeeping and some of the admin tasks behind the scenes and she's absolutely brilliant. And then we've got someone who's working business development in sales and someone who's working in sort of like member support and keeping members happy and being the person at the end of the phone when someone's struggling to log on or doesn't know how to upload a property and stuff like that. and she's there to help them with that. So yeah, it's brilliant. I know, and they are brilliant. So it's really exciting. So yeah, so for me, that feels like a really big achievement. yeah. Yeah. of if I was yourself. That's brilliant. And you said something which I loved, which I did a post the other day about the things I wish I knew before I started in property. uh One of the people that commented on that, they said, I wish I'd known at the start that I don't have to be good at everything. you know, let's face it, we're constantly learning as business owners, okay, I enjoy this, I don't enjoy that. I'm good at this, I'm not good at that. So when you were like, when you said, I've got an ops manager who does... the spreadsheets and all the things that I'm not actually interested in. I'm like, yes, I hear you. It's so good because otherwise what you do is even though if you're trying to do all of it, you then inevitably avoid doing those things that you don't like, you know, and they will always be the thing that's at the bottom of the to-do list and you know you've got to do them and maybe they'll wait till tomorrow again. Whereas actually if you've got someone who loves doing that kind of stuff, then that all happens without you having to, yeah. Yeah, team, teamwork, I love that. And then my celebration is that I spoke about this the other night actually, which is I'm now instilling positive habits or I'm trying to instill positive habits into my life. So I went to an incredible event recently, which was Alice Darnall's Business and Life by Design, which I loved. I love Alice. She's a time management coach and she's amazing. Highly recommend you check her out. And we were talking about... life and we were talking about why our life is a certain way and I had a realization that I had a lot of bad habits that are in my life many many bad habits yeah but actually when I reflected on these bad habits I was like this is actually making me unhappy because these habits of what I've programmed myself to believe is what will make my business successful but actually what does being, and this is something that I keep going over and over again and I still haven't come to the conclusion of, is what does success actually look like? Because you hear people all the time talking about, well successful businesses will look like when I get to a six-figure business, but then you have the conversation when people have got to a six-figure business and they're like, actually it wasn't that great. Like it is great because it's six figures, but actually there was no like, woo, it was just a, okay, now what? And I'm like, oh, so that doesn't constitute success then. For me, I've been realizing that in my day-to-day life, I just uh dreadful some of the habits. And so I've said to myself, I've myself a mission, which is to instill positive habits into my life. And they're really, really small things, Lisa, they're tiny, such as putting my phone on aeroplane mode before I go to bed so that when I wake up, I don't get bombarded with all these messages. I allow myself to just wake up. Whereas before I was listening to Mel Robbins' podcast, and when I used to wake up in the morning, I'd still be horizontal in my bed. and just my phone would just ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping with all these messages, all these emails. And I'd responded to about like 30 DMs before I've even got out of bed. Like that's insane. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then suddenly your gender is someone else's agenda, not your own. Yeah. absolutely. My agenda is 100 % someone else's agenda, definitely. Right from the beginning of the day till, and then you have no energy at the end of the day. also I don't read a lot, because I'm dyslexic, reading for me is quite a difficult thing. So I've started to read atomic habits, a chapter a night before bed, so little things, but I really recommend that everybody just reflect and think what's one positive habit. that you can actually instill in your day-to-day life today because for me it's only been tiny but I can already feel my shoulders relax and just feel a little bit healthier so I highly recommend it. Yay! So two good wins today! Okay, let's dive into it Lisa. So when we're thinking about what um supported living is, so if we could have a definition of it so that people could understand Okay, this is what supported living is and then understand how it differs to say assisted living or social housing. Like I'm still learning myself Lisa, like I'm still learning. yeah. know, there's, and particularly in this area, you're never done. It's always, there's always stuff to learn. So social housing is like an umbrella term that sits over the top of all of it. And it's, it's housing that's funded by the public purse, really, in its most basic, there are some more um discrete definitions, but really, that is the what you need to know. So it's like, there's a range of different housing that is funded by the public purse by the government for people who need housing. And that can be lots of different things. So that you can sort of get emergency accommodation, temporary accommodation can fall into that. That's when people are suddenly made homeless. If someone's, you you suddenly find you can't be in your house, there's been a domestic abuse situation, something like that, you need to be swooped out and the local authority has a duty to house you. So that's what the emergency accommodation is. So that sort of fits under it as well. And then there's lots of different things and you have some elderly care schemes. They're sometimes referred to as assisted living schemes or. you know, what we might think of as warden controlled living schemes, things like that would probably fall under it. And some of the residential care homes would also fall under that for older people. Then you've got uh general needs social housing. So that's kind of like where we talk about people who don't really have a support need, you know, people who for an economic reason need to be in social housing. So, you know, there's a financial reason why they can't afford private rental sector rents or to own their own homes. So the government. historically provided homes. We've lost a lot of those homes. There's a big drive to rebuild them, whether that's going to happen to the scale that we need, who knows. So that would be sort of, and that is generally when most people are about to talk about social housing, that is generally what it is. It's generally kind of like it's housing for people with an economic reason. Supported living is housing for people who have a support need. So alongside their housing needs, they also have a support need to live in. to be able to live into the community. So that means it's a bit different and there's more organisations involved in that set up. And that tenant group can be, there's about 14 or 15 different groups of tenants that could fall into that. So that could be people with a learning disability, it could be people with a long-term mental health problem, it could be people with autism or a physical disability. And those groups of people are people who are gonna need support throughout their lifetime. is not going to grow out of their support need. that make sense? They're not going to get enough support that suddenly they don't need it. They're going to require some level of support throughout their lifetime. But then you also have the shorter term support needs where you have people who maybe we're talking about people who've been homeless, who've been sleeping on the streets, maybe we're talking about people surviving domestic abuse, maybe we're talking about uh veterans with PTSD, we're talking about there's so many different ones. young people transitioning from the care service who need some support to learn those independent living skills. And these kind of cohort, this group of people, need some support for a few months, maybe a few years. So it's short term, but it's not like just two weeks of support. It should be a good period of support to get people to a point where they can then live independently. So the intention is that they can then move on and transition onto that and take their own tendencies and some. So that's supported living is where there's an element of support wrapped up with that housing need. Wow, I love that. See, there's so much to it. There's so many different divisions within it and learning. But what an amazing thing to be involved with. As you're speaking, I'm thinking to myself how rewarding that must be as an investor because you're changing people's lives. um And I always talk to people about when you're looking to get into property, a question I always ask people is why. And I want to know. And sometimes the answer is that they want to actually do good. Mmm. got a background or potentially they might have had their own situation with domestic abuse sometimes I've had. And so they want to go into emergency accommodation, provide homes for uh women, men, whatever it may be. uh And I love it. I love it when those conversations happen because it's all about um understanding your why of what it is that you want to do and create a difference. And I think you're right. think that landlords and investors get such a bad rep in the industry uh or just the world. And it's like... UK we are like the most integrated group of people. and I'm like well actually there is some good that also happens here so also just providing, you know, just being a private rental landlord, providing a high quality property and looking after your tenants, you're making a massive difference to those tenants as well. So I don't think people should just discount being a good landlord because I think there's so few good landlords around that you can really stand out by being a good landlord. to think I'm a good landlord. I like to think that. One of my tenants just had a baby, her, recently and she sent me pictures and she's like, my God, she's here. Because the thing is, I didn't ask her because you never know with pregnancies these days. So I just kept absolutely quiet. And then one day she's like, she's here and sent me a picture and I was like, my God, thank God. um And then I sent her some baby grows and a card and things like that. And she was like, my God, thank you so much. So I like to think I'm a good landlord. I think so. Yeah, and that can make a big difference that way. But you do see some real transformations by getting people into the right homes. And being part of that is hugely rewarding and being able to make that difference for people who really, really struggle to find accommodation that meets their needs. uh It can be hugely rewarding. I can imagine. Okay, so that's supported living and understanding that. So when people would come to you and say, what's the main difference then, just to reiterate between supported living and assisted living, just one more time. So. not really a difference. Some people use these terms interchangeably. some people will use them just completely interchangeably. Normally, in a lot of areas, assisted living schemes will refer to elderly care schemes, but not necessarily. So I know some commissioners who will use the terms interchangeably, assisted living, supported living. yeah. So there's not like a defined, this is definitely what this is, and this is where this box ends. So it's just. using the terminology that she's locally, I went with supported living, started using supported living, so just felt like I needed to nail down one term. And to me, that was the clearest term. So that's the term that we use. Yeah. have you seen that things differ sort of across different counties or the UK or different councils? Like what have you found with that? Cause you're, you're Devon based. Is that right? so I live and invest in Devon, but the support and property network I run is across the whole country. So yeah, we see huge differences. I mean, even down here in Devon, we've got two unitary authorities, we've got Plymouth and Torbay, and then we've got Devon and various different Devon councils. Each one operates differently. They'll be five miles apart from each other. And there's huge difference and variations. So yeah. you have like an example where something might be different just to give an idea? I just think it's just structurally how they operate and how they, you know, like in some areas you might have a commissioner, so commissioner is the person who will make a lot of the decisions around supported living schemes and about where they're funded and what they need. They kind of should be taking that strategic overview for their area and making the decision, okay, right fine, we need to bring online another five of this type of properties and 10 of this type of properties in the next year. So they're quite key in the decision making. But in some areas you'll have a commissioner who will only cover learning disabilities and autism. Others would cover learning disabilities, autism and mental health. And in other areas they'll have children's services as well. They'll cover a whole range of different stuff. So that makes it complicated in who it is that you approach. You need to kind of learn the person who's got the decision making. There's so many different variations. Yeah. good gracious. So when everyone goes, it's really easy supported living. You're like, yeah, yeah, that's right. no, definitely not. So Lisa, as we know, like lots of people when they want to get into property investing and they want to start learning, as you said yourself, they consume a lot of free resources and information such as podcasts. So let's say that a person who is brand new into the industry, they're listening to you right now and they're thinking to themselves, do you know what? I really like what Lisa is saying here. I like the fact that it works with my values, my ethos of who I am. I'd really love to get into it. What advice would you give as an absolute starting point for somebody wanting to get into supported living? I think you have to um do your research around, you have to understand property first. So I think sometimes I get approached by people who are complete newbies who don't have any understanding of how property investing works. And I think you need to make sure you've got your head around that because you still need to be able to identify a good property deal and be able to recycle your money as best as you can. So I think, you you need to be able to do that as well. But I think then it's taking some time to understand it. I've got masses of free resources on my website. um You know, I've got podcasts, YouTube videos, there's loads of guides and all kinds of stuff. So I purposely and intentionally put out an awful lot of free content because I want people to understand it. So there's lots of stuff on my website that people can go to if they're looking to learn more. Okay, brilliant. And then you just said something which I just wanted to touch on what you originally said as well, which was you need to understand property and about sort of how to pull your monies back. what going back to what you said originally, so what happened in regards to the fact that they, they were really funny about it, like the downval and, and all of that, like what happens within that then? challenge, I tried challenging the down valuation, but I don't know you've ever tried challenging a surveyors valuation. It doesn't really, it doesn't really work. It's like closed shop. Everyone goes, yeah, this is just the numbers and you have to accept it. So, so I did try, didn't get anywhere with that. So I ended up with this deal where I left a whole chunk of money and I wasn't planning on doing so I ended up, but it's worked in the longterm and refinancing that property now it's gone up. a big chunk because now people are going, maybe it's worth what it was. And I can pull, just in the process of refinancing and pulling out some money to go again. So this is my question then. So that happened to you back then when you did it. So now, for example, is there possibilities where they see it completely differently? So if somebody was to say, literally start today, know, learn all about it, do it the right way, and they wanted to then understand it, what are, I'm just trying to understand. So I, of course, know the whole by refurbishment refinance. Like I've done it, I understand it. How, m I'm trying to understand how it would differ them with supported living in terms of, okay, I've now put in these extra things for, let's say a person who's in a wheelchair, I've made it accessible for them, I've made it what they need it to be. How does that then differ when it comes to then, you know, the lenders and everything coming to view this property? What are the differences? So the issues we have are that the lenders still are quite cautious about coming into this space. So I've been banging this drum now for many years and we're beginning to see some new products coming out. And we've been part of designing some of those products, which is exciting and that's good, but it's taking its time. so what happens is your standard buy to let mortgage, you probably won't know this because your mortgage broker will probably just hit the box for you in most cases, um actually asks on an application form, there vulnerable tenants in the... Now that's not a particularly nice term, but it's a term that is used by the underwriters and that means someone with support needs and that means they would then go, no, this isn't for us. We don't want to get involved. And they talk about reputational risk. So they're concerned that if I stop paying my mortgage, that young man with learning disabilities uh would, they would have to evict him to re, to repossess the property. and they say it doesn't look very good on the front page of the local paper if Lloyd's Bank or whoever it is who's lent me the money is then a victim of this young man. Now my counter argument is I think that's quite discriminatory because you're very happy to lend me money for my single mum with three children who's in one of my standard vitalettes. That's not going to look great on the front page of the local paper either, it? Does that make sense? So why? Because he has a learning disability, is that not OK? So I've been banging this drum saying I think there's an element of discrimination. I think also if I'm being kind, there's an element of not understanding it by the underwriters and the underwriters going, actually, it's a bit too complicated. It's easier for us just to say no rather than trying to understand it. Because in Supported Living, you have a whole host of different organisations involved and we'll talk about that in a minute. But it means that you have to, from an underwriting point of view, they have to look at a few different bits and pieces. But when I went in and I've been talking to underwriters, it was clear they really didn't understand how it all worked. And by educating them, they were like, oh, actually, I understand that's not quite so scary now. We can offer it. You know, so it's, yeah, it's interesting, but we are seeing more, more mortgages coming into the space. I think as it's being accepted more and more as a model, I think we're where it's becoming easier to get, to get finance than it ever has. Wow, that's huge. And you're sort of, you're part of leading that charge. to be, you know, after shouting about it for so long on social media to actually be able to make a change about it is what I've wanted for a long time. So that's been great to be part of those conversations. Absolutely. It's funny really isn't it? So many times agents, landlords, um lenders are all the same. Instead of trying to learn about it and trying to understand, they're so just stuck in their ways and going, no, we don't do that. It's like, well, you could just take a moment to understand it. um But it's easier, isn't it? It's easier not to understand it. It's easier just to push you to the side and just tick the box for the next person that comes through. Yeah. hang on, we need to develop some new products and be innovative. Most of them are really, really busy just doing the stuff they're doing. So they're not feeling any pain at the moment. They have to go, actually, how can we be creative to create more work? Yeah, that's amazing though that you're being part of that change. That's incredible. Yeah, so, okay. So for those coming up then and those wanting to get into it for all the right reasons and wanting to make a positive change, um if they wanted to go forward with it, there are ways that to really understand it. And I'm just thinking like when they are to do like their numbers and they're to look at how to do the refinancing, I presume that there are different types of criteria that they would need to. look into as to what would add the value to the property to get the valuation that they wanted and therefore the lenders would be the right people to speak to about that. How would that work? Who should they speak to? Yeah, just understanding what's required to get that. Yeah, so I think it's going to a lot of your basic bi-refurbish refinance models, you know, and looking at ways that you would add value really. If you're looking, if you think you're talking about commercial valuations that you might get on a lease value, is that where you kind of going with that question? Or was it? No, no, Yeah, yeah, that's great. No, no, no. So, yeah, so I think it's going back to your basics about how are you going to add value to that property so that that property becomes a property deal. But at the same time, you're having to find an organisation to lease that property from you. So what you do in supported living is you don't, you're not going to have an AST with your tenant. You're going to have an organisation who's leasing the property from you. Yeah. And so that organisation is going to take the shape of many, many different types of organisations. They're going to be care companies, ah CICs, community interest companies, charities, housing associations. There's lots of different organisations in this space who are looking for properties. So they're going to lease that property, they're going to give you a criteria, list of criteria that they're looking for in their properties. The good established ones are, some of the new ones are going to go, oh, not quite sure which one to house. And you're going to have to pin them down to get the criteria out of them because they're not so sure exactly it is what they want. But the established providers are going to basically go, here is our spec. It's a 40 page spec and that's what it needs to look like. Right, okay. So in that case, before you go sort of like shopping for the house, what's best is to actually go and find a provider. um I presume that's done by making a lot of phone calls, Google, finding it in your area, connections. there's a guide you can download on my website that takes you through step by step how to find providers, but it is hard. And I say at the moment, we're seeing a lot of providers being swamped because so many property investors are trying to get into this space. More than ever, I'm seeing providers just going, I'm not picking up the phone to any of them because they're all annoying. And what happens is you might be brilliant and a really ethical property investor, but you're following the footsteps of all those. 30 other people before you who've gone in and demanded very high rents or had unrealistic expectations of how it was going to work. So you're having to convince them to go, actually, no, I am different and I can do this right. And we can work together and we can find a way to collaborate. But you kind of have been tarred by the same brushes, the people who've gone before you. And sometimes they're not the right people. So ah it's one of the reasons I set up the Supported Living Property Network to make it easier to bring providers and property investors together, because it's just it's really challenging. I can imagine. I know it's not the same, but it reminds me of my days back in the rent to rent world where we were tarred with the same brush. And I'm like, no, no, I'm actually half decent over here. Don't, don't, you know, I know you've had some rubbish. Yeah. Yeah. uh hard, you know, and so you kind of have to just sort of prove that you're different and prove why you can operate. And I think one of the things that's what I'm hearing more and more from providers is they're spending a lot of their time educating property investors, and they're getting fed up with it. You know, they're like, I don't have an hour on the phone to explain to you how my lease works. You need to understand this. So actually, I think to stand out more and more, need to understand this. You need to make sure that you are the person who is easy to work with. Okay, and the way to do that is of course, yeah, getting the understanding, um looking at leases. it all, you know, to learn how it all works. um And just, yeah, taking that time to want to work your way through it all. I've got some training on my website. I never wanted to do training because I hated property training so much. But I just was fed up with people trying to train people the wrong way. So there is some stuff on my website, but I don't do a big hard sales on it. you know, there's a lot of information you can get for free as well, you know, and it's just trying to work your way through those. learning to do it the right way, exactly. Okay, so I'm just trying to think to myself, so now they've got the provider, that the provider would then give them the shopping list to say, right, we need them to be this many square meters, we need this many bathrooms, this many this, handlebars, whatever it may be, and then you can literally go and create what it is that they're asking for. it is a little bit of chicken and egg because some providers are looking for a property now and they're not all of them are looking for adapted property. So a lot of the people that need support might just need a standard HMO, might just need a standard, you it might just need a bit more communal space in that HMO than you're used to doing on an HMO course you generally taught to convert every space into a bedroom. You know, it might be that actually they want two downstairs communal rooms, you know, but other than that, they might just be looking for your standard HMO that you happen to have or you might have in the millivere fervour at the moment. If you think about like organisations supporting young people transitioning from care, they might be looking for a house for three or four young people to share with some staff on site. So actually they don't need any adaptations to that property unless one of those young people has a disability. The chances are actually they just want what would work in the private rental sector a good quality, you know, property. So there's a lot of There's a whole range of different properties needed. I've got organisations who are just looking for one bed flats, dispersed one bed flats around the place, two bed flats, and others are looking for small blocks of flats and detached bungalows are always going to be popular because they tick the box for a lot of people with long term support needs. But there's a whole range of different properties needed. So there is a chicken and egg element where actually if you've got a property already, you might find there's a provider who's really looking for that property. Hmm interesting. Yeah, sometimes we don't need to over complicate it I think maybe I was over complicating it there in my head, but actually it's like yeah, of course They only need like this and this so yeah needs to be good quality safe property. know, and we've got providers looking, I've got shopping lists at the moment for so many properties that our providers are looking for, you know, and they fill that in on the demand portal on our website. But you also can upload your properties to the property portal so they can just see what properties you've got and go, actually, yeah, I'm looking for one of those perfect, you know, so, so yeah. isn't it? It's funny in life how you, as you said, fall into things and then it almost presents itself. You find a gap, you find a niche and you're like, actually, we need to plug this. I can see that there is something here that doesn't quite work. And sometimes you have a calling where you're like, I think I'm the person to really try and change this. It's interesting, isn't it? Yeah. It was never anything that I thought I would end up doing with my life. But yeah, it's what I spend my days doing now. Yeah, I love it. Absolutely. And then when you're when you're talking to people in general, because I'm sure lots of people contact you who are interested in this sort of supported living space and everything, what would you say the general conversations or questions that people would say? What would be a typical question that someone would come to you with? Is my property suitable for supported living? That's one question I get a lot. So it could be if it's a good quality property, then very possibly, you know, it's finding the right provider for that. um I would say less of our providers. The one that I get messaged a lot about is that it's perfect for supported living. It's a 30 bed HMO. Anyone who's managed HMOs knows all the... issues you get. If you've got 30 people in there, yet alone 30 people with a support need, you're going to be a brave provider to take that on a lease. There are some organisations, but there are very few who are going to take great big HMOs. But other than that, would say providers are looking for most types of properties. So, yes, I think that is one of the questions I get asked a lot. Another is how long is the lease? People keep hearing down the pub about 25-year leases and those days have gone in most of the sectors. Most of the good providers that you'd be working with are going to offer you a three to five year lease. But actually, if you think about that, that's still in those safe three years, five years, you're not responsible for void. So you're going to get the money every single month. You're not going to be responsible for a lot of the maintenance and wear and tear within the property. Anyone who's managed by to let's for a little while knows that's actually a really appealing prospect. And if you're setting something up like for the young man who's moved into my bungalow, you know, all those years ago. Although I was only offered a five-year lease, the intention is he's going to be there for life. So that five-year lease just keeps renewing, and that's going to be his home, that is his home. So it's a really nice, long, secure investment. Yeah. Is he still in it, your young man? well actually the original man passed away very sadly. but he'd had the few years that he lived there, he had an amazing quality of life and was out and about and doing stuff that he hadn't been able to do with a great care team. And sadly, he passed away when he was actually out on a day trip that had he was out doing something whereas before he hadn't been able to leave the home and been Yeah, so it was tragic, but it was part of him having a quality of life as well. then, then The commissioner literally phoned me up the next day and went, do not take that property back. I've got a waiting list of five people, Lisa and someone else. just do a few more changes to meet this young man's needs and he's been in there for a long time now and it's really settled. So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's great. Yeah. Yeah. like I just, yeah, I love it. I love it when there's a purpose and that there's goodness that comes with it. know, I used to live in some of these HMOs, for example, that literally the ceiling used to be falling down. And like somebody would be having like a shower upstairs and the shower water would be coming through the ceiling as I'd be cooking. And I'm like, stop showering. I'm cooking and then the landlord will do nothing about it. And I just, you know, I, know there's lots of different ones and we're good landlords and everything. There's different people. Yeah. nurse living in London, I lived in some terrible power flats, but we're just so unsafe. Just awful. I love these stories because these stories like lift me and I just think, yes, this is what it's all about. This is why we do what we do to create good lives for people. So in terms of then the people, I haven't talked about this for a long time and people have been DMing me going, Athena, where have the property disasters gone? Come on. I really miss the property disasters, the property mishaps, things that go wrong. And I'm like, you're right. I've totally. taking my foot off the gas for that one. So Lisa, tell me about maybe a time where something hasn't gone to plan, something has gone a bit, let's do so. went completely wrong really from an investment point of view. So that was, you know, that was my first one that was a complete disaster really. um But I suppose more at the moment, I'm renovating a block of eight flats for supported living for tenants with learning disabilities. I brought this big old Victorian villa that been divided into eight flats should have been a fairly straightforward refurb. has ended up being a catalogue of disasters because everything we uncover that all looked like it was all fine is just like, yeah, another 3,000 pounds, brilliant. Another 5,000 pounds, brilliant. So yeah, so and we've had stud walls falling down that were made, they're about an inch thick that were made of this. I've never seen it before. It's like a honeycomb cardboard inside. It's what they used in the 80s apparently. So yeah, luckily it fell down on us, not on, didn't hurt any of my builders, but not on a tenon in the picture. We're having to rebuild this from the inside out in a way that I wasn't anticipating and wasn't in my budget. So currently living a big property disaster, if you like. Oh, do you know, it's funny isn't we always talk to people about this. You're like, whatever you think is going to happen. Think again. And I thought I'd put loads of contingency into this budget, but nowhere near enough. yeah. So, you know, it's great because we're getting the, you know, social workers are coming around and we're matching flats for tenants and here are some really amazing stories, well, really tragic stories of people who desperately need to be moved into this. And we're going to create such a brilliant community here. We're going to have loads of like, there's a big garden, so there's a communal space for gardening and activities and potentially some animals on site and some really fun stuff. but it's, yeah, living through the pain of trying to get a refurb over the line as well is, yeah, it's not easy. And I think everyone, it's very easy in property, isn't it, for people to portray all the positives and talk about how easy it is and how great, and I've just made 300,000 on this deal and aren't I amazing? They're not talking about the grief and the sleepless nights and the hassle that goes into it. And every single property I've done, I've had periods where I've gone, oh, this is awful, why am I doing this? This is ridiculous. And it keeps you awake at night and you think it's horrendous. And then five years, seven years down the line, you're looking back on it going, yeah, but that was a great property and it's just paid me money and it's worked really well. It's worked out with hindsight, you know, but at the time, every single one is grief and stress. And I think it's, I don't think people put that across, do they, on social media? Yeah, definitely. think more and more people are trying to do that. I've seen sort of the newbies trying to do that quite a lot because I think there's so much where I think people actually appreciate that a lot more when people are really honest and open and that's why I want to bring property disasters back to the podcast. a post about it last week because I just went, do you know, I'm tired. I'm juggling all of this stuff. This is going wrong. This is happening. This, you know, I've got a teenager going through A levels. That's a lot of pressure as a single parent, you know, there's a lot of stuff happening. And, and so I just put that on and actually a few people messaged me and said, I thought you were like super women. Really nice to hear that you're human. I was like, oh, I'm so human. Yeah, I- I- I s- not done it enough then. You know, it's interesting, isn't it? That's why I've sort of taken a turn to do it more as well because people used to message me all the time going, you just look like you have everything together. I'm like, you have no idea. I'm like, I am like the definition of like a duck with like my feet underwater. So I'm like, okay, I need to change this perception because this is not okay. Like I don't want people to feel like they're falling behind because they think that something that is happening is not actually happening. Like that's not okay. No, it's not. it's, you know, the real life is property is a long game, isn't it? And it's the it's with the hindsight and the holding for a while. And that's where it forgives a lot of your mistakes as well, if you haven't made mistakes, but also, it's just what gets you through. it's worth doing is it really is, but it isn't necessarily easy as you're going through these bits. And each time as you grow and like now we did like I'm this block of eight flats, it's like, then all the problems are just amplified eight times. you do. Yeah, exactly. And it's never boring, is it? That's one thing. m never, never boring. Lisa, so many people are going to want to get in contact with you who are wanting to do that. Because I think what's so great about this podcast is to create a platform to give voices where I feel like I'd really love to get this person on because I see you and I see you doing really great things within this particular sector for it. I'd love for people who are genuinely interested in supporting living to get in contact with you. So with that, where is the best place for people to come and find you? So just my website, it's just supportedlivingproperty.uk em and you just go there. There's loads of free resources and you can get in touch with me through the website as well if you need to. So yeah. amazing. And I really feel like this is such an interesting topic as well and so many people are interested in it. So um if you're up for it as well, I'd love for you to come and like speak for the community and just get you involved really more because I know that you really want to make a difference in terms of getting people educated in the right way. And that sits with me. I want to educate people in the right way. You know, finding the right people and connecting the right people. So if you're up for it, hopefully we can do a bit more with girls and property going forward as well, which would be great. Yay. Thank you. Thanks, Athena. That's right and as always guys if you want to find me I am Athena Dobson underscore official come and find me drop into my DMs um And then I'm also girls in property of course on Instagram. We've got our workshops coming up for this year We've got three workshops coming up So if you want to find out in any information about that, let me know I'm doing them as in person workshops now because the feedback I got from a lot of the girls was that they want the in-person interaction So I'm doing a lot of that I've also got for the community, so community members, we have a free social media meetup on Bournemouth Beach, of course, because I'm down in Bournemouth. That is happening on Saturday the 5th of July. So if you want to be part of that, come and speak to me about joining the community and you can come Saturday 5th of July down to Bournemouth and we'll all be there. Give me the word beach if you want more information about that one. And just come and ask questions. Like if you've got any questions at all, or you want to be connected with the right person, or you need my advice about anything, just drop into my DMs and just come and say hi and let's definitely have a chat. um But Lisa, what would you say would be like your parting words today that you would love to leave the listeners with? If you could give like one, yeah, one bit of great advice to finish the podcast on. I think that all property investing done well makes a difference. And I think it's very easy to overlook private rentals, like I said, I know I should be pushing supported living because I do feel like it's really there's huge need for it. But I think all kinds of property investing done well makes a difference to the lives of the people who live in your properties. So just make sure what you're doing, you're doing well. I love that. think that's perfectly said. And for me, one that I always find because just going on what you just said there, Lisa, sometimes when people start out, they think, right, I've got this pot of cash and they get shiny penny syndrome. um And I've actually got a podcast that I'm to be doing all about shiny penny syndrome with em Jackie Tomes, who's amazing. We had such a fun, fun episode about this because people are like, but I could do HMOs or I could do service accommodation or I could do this. But just remember guys what Lisa just said also, is like, but why, why? What's your ethos? What's your values? Like, why would you want to do that? And actually let's not forget the standard buy-to-lets. They are brilliant. Like I do my buy-to-lets, they're fabulous. Don't always just disregard them thinking that massive yields, HMOs up in Derby and all these other places when you're all the way down in Cornwall. It's like, yeah, but no. But you're like simple, yeah. Simple it doesn't have to be complicated guys. It really doesn't but um as always reach out to Lisa reach out to myself Have the most amazing week. Hope this helps. Hope you enjoyed it um Enjoy your week and let us know what you think. Have a good week guys. Take care. Bye