Today I’m delighted to be talking with Jackie Tomes – a favourite of mine in the property world who has built an amazing portfolio and property business along with husband David.
I’m such a fan of hers for a couple of reasons:
- She is laser focussed on creating a business that works for her, meaning she does exactly what she’s passionate about and outsources everything else;
- She has created a business that does exactly what it’s supposed to – allow her to live her dream life, which in this case is an almost endless travel itinerary;
- Her business isn’t overcomplicated, full of buzzwords, or always chasing the latest trend. They buy blocks of flats in and around Margate, and that’s pretty much it.
In today’s episode we’re discussing the 3 major reasons that most property investors actually fail to ever get to live their dream life, and what Jackie thinks you can do to make sure you do hit your goals.
I had a lot of fun talking through these ideas with her, and I hope you enjoy the discussion as well.
Our discussion with Jackie Tomes:
- We start off with a catch up on Jackie’s various travel plans that have kept her busy since covid struck. Lockdown in the French alps, road tripping around Italy, 3 months in the Maldives, and most recently buying a motor home to continue their travels for the foreseeable future.
- From a business perspective, Jackie Tomes and husband David focus pretty exclusively on blocks of flats around Thanet. They don’t buy big conversion projects, just refurbishments, and it’s been the same model for years now.
- Their deals to date are two blocks – one with 13 apartments (for £1.4 million) and one with 11 apartments (£1.8 million) – a long way from their first deal in 2014 when Jackie was worrying about a purchase for £108,000.
- Reason 1 most investors never hit their goals – they get addicted to ‘doing stuff’ and lose sight of why they started investing in the first place.
- We discuss how this addiction to the quick rewards we feel when we complete trivial tasks can make us feel good, but we’re actually at risk of being busy rather than productive.
- Keeping goals front of mind is essential to ensure our actions will get us to where we want to be, vs getting distracted along the way by new ideas.
- Reason 2 most investors never hit their goals – thinking you need to postpone happiness until you reach the ‘end’ goal (hint: you’ll never get there as the goal posts will keep on moving)
Happiness is a choice that comes from within. You don’t need to wait for some external event in order to be happy.
- Making time for things like meditation and exercise have helped Jackie reduce her feelings of anxiety whilst also improving her levels of focus and productivity. She recommends a book called Total Meditation by Deepak Chopra as a good place to get started.
- Reason 3 most investors never hit their goals – we never actually make our dream life a priority. It is very easy to start investing in property and quickly create another job for ourselves, but it’s much more challenging to say ‘hang on, I don’t want another job. I did this to create more free time’.
- We need to build a property business that actually works for us, rather than constantly doing more things and chasing more money because we’ve lost sight of why we started in the first place. Another book recommendation is Die with Zero by Bill Perkins.
- Too much of a focus on building wealth for retirement can result in us missing out on the best years of our lives, when we are healthy enough to do the things we tell ourselves we’ll do later in life.
- If you got into property to spend more time with your family, you need to remain ruthlessly focussed on making that the priority, instead of convincing yourself that going from £10,000 per month to £20,000 per month will somehow make your life considerably better.
- We discuss the IPI Goal Setting process that guides you through calculating the income you need for each of the 3 stages of financial freedom. You can download our goal setting process for free here.
- Jackie’s final tips on getting your business back on track to ensure it helps you achieve your goals:
- Reconnect with the reasons why you started investing in the first place
- Prioritise the life you want to live, and the actions you need to take in order to make it a reality
- Remember that what got you here won’t get you there – it’s time to shift your mindset and your decision making
- Focus on your own efficiency to free up your time, delegate more, and create a truly passive income
You can connect with Jackie about her coaching for experienced property investors at https://property-strategy.com/