How I got here

I bought my first investment property in 2004 with no background in finance, no trade skills, and no real idea what I was doing. I just knew property investing was the key to growing my wealth.

I moved fast. Buying 3 properties in 2004, and going on to buy 10 houses in under 4 years.

For a while, it worked. I kept buying, implementing my value-add strategy to each new purchase. I borrowed 100% on all the houses, leveraged up, valued up and grew the portfolio fast. Too fast, as it turned out.

In 2008/2009 the GFC rolled in and the bank came calling. I was over-leveraged and they wanted their money back. I had to sell several properties to get back on solid ground. It was a hard reset — financially and mentally.

I rebuilt slowly and deliberately. That became my value-add strategy. With well over 50 deals done, I know what works, what to avoid & it's still how I invest today.

Why I share what I know

When I was starting out, the advice available was mostly useless. Too generic, too theoretical, or written by people who hadn't actually done it in the New Zealand market.

That's why I started The Value-Add Brief. Every week I write about one property topic — a deal I've done, a mistake I've made, a strategy that works. Real information, for free.

No fluff. No hype. Just straight talk about NZ property investing