Off Air... with Jane and Fi - OFF AIR…EXTRA (with Scarlette Douglas and Smart Energy GB)

Episode Date: November 7, 2025

In this special bonus episode brought to you by Smart Energy GB, Jane and Fi sit down with TV presenter and property expert Scarlette Douglas.Scarlette joins the ladies to talk about home improvements, how to make your home more energy efficient and why the nation just can't get enough of property TV shows.To find out more, search “get a smart meter”. Eligibility for your smart meter installation may vary.If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] us on Instagram! @janeandfiPodcast Producer: Eve SalusburyExecutive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This special bonus episode of Offair is brought to you by Smart Energy GB. And I'm delighted to say that we're joined by Scarlett Douglas, TV presenter, to talk through all things, property and smart energy. Now, Scarlett, you're a woman of many, many talents and many different hats, aren't you? So people might think, oh, I know her from musical theatre. I know her from the TV. I know she knows about property. Yes.

Where is your head at at the moment? It's all over the place, I tell you. I'm trying to work out how I can fit all of those things into one big thing, which is always quite difficult. But I think right now, obviously for this, in the bonus episode, which I'm excited about, I am here to talk about Smart Energy GGB and how people can look at what they can do at their property to help them make it as energy efficient as possible. Can we go right back to the beginning, though, when you were in musical theatre?

Yes. A difficult thing to get into? Very difficult. So I studied for three years at Performing Arts College called Lane Theatre Arts in Epsom in Surrey. I always knew I wanted to be a performer of some sort. I'd be running around when I was younger, singing, dancing, doing the catwalk in my mum and dad and my brothers who probably hated it, but I had to put up with it anyway. And yeah, I did musicals from the age of 19 to 27 and I kind of fell into it. I actually went to Performing Arts College where I wanted to be in a girl group who used to love Destiny's Child and Spice Girls and I thought this is what I want to do. and I was in many a girl group actually but it never quite worked out did my musical theatre training

ended up auditioning for shows and then I just did musicals and musicals and musicals and I loved them so much being on the stage is where I feel at home but then I kind of had a side hustle which is doing property development with my eldest brother

he was a professional footballer I have two brothers they both were and he just kind of took me under his wing and said you're not going to be able to sing and dance forever those jazz hands are soon going to look not very nice they'll be... Jazzed her.

Exactly. Not very jazz they'll probably be riddled with arthritis at some point. Oh, he's really simple. I know, he's really selling it to me at 24.

I know. I'm thinking I'll be able to step kit for the rest of my life. No, no, I won't. So yeah, we started doing property development together and it was great because I got to use

I guess my creative side from being on the stage and seeing different sets and seeing how you could turn a space into something really emotive and I brought that into our development so I do the interior design side of things and then my brother works

with the architect and he kind of reconfigures a space. It's annoyingly canny, isn't it, Jay? Yeah, it is. Sometimes you've just got to appreciate people have got bigger brains than us. It's hard to believe. Tell us a bit more about your career in TV property. Okay. So I transferred from musical

theatre into property. Well, you make that sound like a natural step. I know. Basically, the long and short of it is I went on tour with Anton Deck. There we go. There we go. So Saturday Night Takeaway Show, they took it on an arena. tour. I auditioned to be a back in dancer and I was on tour with them for like six,

seven weeks. And it was the most amazing show, amazing tour. And the boys are unbelievable. And I remember selling out arenas and thinking, I want to do this. If I can't be in a girl group selling out arenas, this is another way that I can do it. So we're all out one night, a bit of Dutch courage. I reached out to the boys. They're like, guys, I really want to be a presenter. Can I interview you? Like, yeah, come in early tomorrow and we'll film it. It's like, perfect. Interviewed them. And they were so encouraging. And they're like, Scarlett, this is great. If it's what you want to do, we will help you however we can. So they gave me lots of advice. I managed to get a presenting agent from a competition I did with MTV. So I was like the

face of MTV for a week. That got me an agent. And the advice I got from the boys were you can either go on Love Island because it's coming back and you can be famous that way or you can use an expertise and that can be your way in. I thought, well, don't know if Love Islands for me. My brothers are not going to be happy with that. But I do do property developments and maybe I can use that as my USP. So yeah, great. So I went to my agent and said, this is what it is that I do. You probably don't realise it's my side hustle. Can I use that as a way into television and presenting? And she said, well, actually a place in the sun are looking for presenters that have a property background. We had no idea, but we'll submit you. So I had to answer some questions

on email, did a Skype because Zoom wasn't a thing back then. So did a nice video interview, did a screen test for Channel 4 and then about 10 days later I found out I got the job. So my first ever presenting show was on Channel 4 as a place in the sound which is like the biggest daytime show. Well, we're big fans of places. Oh, obviously. But when these people don't buy the Roddy Place

Oh, my goodness, I tell you what, Jay. Frustrating. When they're going to go home and have a sensible think about it. I mean, it's like, come on. Don't do that. Just put your money down. But it is frustrating. You're filming from a Monday to Friday,

so I think a lot of people come on the show maybe thinking they're going to get a free holiday because, you know, the flights are paid for, the hotels paid for, your breakfast and lunch is covered. Why aren't we honestly? Oh no. Come on. Let's pretend that we want to live together.

Which sometimes what a lot of them are. I'd be prepared to do it. Just pick somewhere glorious. Yeah. Yeah. And you'll get to the end of the week and you've seen some great properties and you think that they're really excited they're going to buy and then normally they don't buy because they don't like the colour of the wallpaper. You think, come on, guys.

Just paint over it or remove it or do something. So there are moments where it's very frustrating but then there are moments where they do decide to buy it and you see how happy they are and I stay in touch with pretty much most of my house hunters from that show I haven't been doing it for about three and a half years but the six and a half years that I did do it I'm still in touch with pretty much all of them which is really nice And is that because you want free holidays?

Absolutely. Well, don't you. Absolutely big, no, just because you spend so much time with them and you really do get on and you really are a vital part of their next chapter so it's hard to let people go and I like my friends always become my family so yeah It is hard at the moment, let's face it, to get on the property ladder. It is. It really is tough. Have you got any advice for somebody who's

perhaps in their mid-20s? They are fortunate enough to be earning, but they're thinking this is a distant dream. It's never going to come true for me. It is very difficult. And I was having this conversation yesterday actually with a guy who has finally bought his first property. He's 31. He's really excited about it. But for him, he stayed at home with his mum and dad for as long as he could and save, save, save. Because that money that you're spending out on rent could be saved to go towards a deposit. So I think a lot of the time society makes you feel like you have to get out of your parents' house and you have to have a home. And if you haven't got all of this sorted by the time you're 30, then you're a disaster. And it's not that at all. Things are very different

to how they used to be. So I think, first of all, if you can stay with your parents, do, and try and save up as much money as you can and use that as a deposit. If you can't, if you're renting somewhere, consider a house share or also consider there are great schemes out there where there is help to buy, whatever scheme it is that you might find if you really want to get on the property ladder, there are ways of doing it. But I would always say start small, don't go big. If you want to get into property development, start with, for example, a studio property that you can maybe flip or a one bed that you can turn into a two bit or look at different

ways that you can reconfigure a space to make as much money as possible. Because then once you've got that profit, you can keep going and then you can use that to actually buy somewhere. But start small stepping stones. And by flip, I mean, this is an American term, isn't it? So let's be terribly careful here. but what exactly is that meaning now? Okay, so if you flip a property,

it's basically buying something in the state that it's in, ideally not great, and then you will put a lot of money into it and renovate it and then you can sell it on, and then it's, I guess, going from like the ugly sibling to the beautiful one. A bit like me and my brother, you know, he's the ugly one, and then I'm the beautiful one.

Oh, right, okay. And then you sell it and you'll make a profit on that. That's what a flip is. And how do you make a place more sellable than it might have been before you took possession of it. So depending on a budget, there are lots of different things you can do. You can start off with a great lick of paint. I think people really underestimate how a good look of paint

can really bring a property up to standard. Sorry to interrupt, but do you go bland or do you go bold? Well, no, back in the day you go bland. It's like, you know, magnolia walls or light-colored walls with a grey carpet. And that's just not exciting anymore. An accent wall, don't you? Oh, and I love an accent morphie, I tell you. I think people need to think about what they would like to live in.

And don't go crazy, obviously, because you don't want to put too much of your own personal flare into something. But because of such social media pages like Instagram or whatnot now, people like to see something that's inspirational. They want to walk in and be wowed. You're not really going to get a wow with a white, worn, grey carpet. So, yes, put a feature all in there. Yes, get pops of colour in the artwork or in the curtains or in the soft furnishings. You haven't got to go big or you haven't got to go crazy. You can if you want to.

But just make something, bring and evoke emotion. That's always what it comes down to is feeling like you want to be in that place. You don't want to be in a space that's just bland and isn't creative at all. And what about the economics of it? Let's say you've got your first place. Yes. And the winter is approaching. Most people, frankly, if they're honest, are a little bit worried about energy bills.

Yeah. What can and what should you do? Well, I always say start small again because it depends on your budget. Of course you can spend loads of money. You can go big like getting solar panels and whatnot. or you can start as small as getting a smart meter so people don't really know how good smart meters are because they are put there for you to really track

how much you're spending when it comes to your energy bills you can get one at no extra cost from your energy provider and basically you can just see on the screen what is that you're using how much it's costing you and then you can decide where you might want to maybe not put the wash on today or not put the dishwasher on for example so you can keep an eye on how much you're actually spending

I think as well with a smart meter which people also forget or maybe don't even know is that they have really good schemes on. So there might be a day where they're going to give you like 50% off if you use your washing machine at this time. So there are all these incentives to help you with your energy bills. I think that's quite important. Outside of that, you can get draft excluders. You can look at getting like walls insulated with injection, even small things like LED light bulbs, a rated appliances. All of these things ultimately are going to help you when it comes to making your home as energy efficient as possible. And then like I said, you can go really big and you can go with solar panels or heat pumps.

But that's when you've got a lot of extra money to be able to do that to your home. And when you first started out in property, did you really think about all those kind of very sensible things? Not at all. Because I think we all like to go for the kind of to-da aspect of property, don't we? Of course. You know, just talking about the interior design or whatever it is. Yeah.

But actually, if you understand the real basics of how. you live and where you live and what matters. Yeah, exactly. It's a good foundation. It really is. I think people are becoming a lot more aware of making their homes energy efficient and sustainability. And I think when I first started out when I was 24, I know that seems like it was last

year because I looked so good. But it was actually quite a few years ago. Darling, you look fantastic. Nothing to worry about girls. It was many minutes ago. We didn't think about those things then as much as we think about them now. So a lot of people are becoming a lot more conscious. So when they're looking for properties to buy,

they're looking to see how energy efficient they are because they want to, I guess, safeguard their future. So definitely things that people should think about for sure. Overlooking, I think, curb appeal more so is important. Obviously, we love kerbapil. My show, we always talk about someone can make up their mind in the first 30 seconds. And yes, it's important, but you can always make a house pretty.

Has the property got certain things in it that's going to help you with your energy bills? That's important. Okay. What are you up to at the moment? So I've just finished series one of Can't Sell Must Sell, which is a brand new show that me and my brother have out on Channel 4. People can go back and watch it.

It was a great show. It was all about homeowners that have had their property on the market for months. They cannot sell it. We go in and we've got two days to turn it around and put it back on the market and see if it sells. Two days is not long when you see a lot of these properties. Because I think people don't really understand that when they're selling a home, home. Yes, okay, they're selling a house, but there are too many of their own things in there

that are probably going to turn people off. Well, are you talking about my collection of China tortoises? I mean, potentially, Dan, yeah. Because that's precious to me. Maybe just put them in a box and store them away for viewings. Really? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. For example, there was a lady we had, bless her, so lovely, but she had over a hundred and something dolls, like lifestyle, life size, stylistic dolls that look like real babies. And it was very, yeah, it was very creepy and very spooky and they were everywhere. And she honestly didn't know why she'd sold. No, she didn't know why she couldn't sell.

And we go in and there's a bit that is quite harsh because we have potential house buyers coming in and they walk around and they talk about the property. But they get filmed and then we show what they say to the homeowners. Obviously, that is, that's the worst part because people are then listening to what other people are saying about their homes and they get very offended, which of course they will. But on the flip side of that, it's because we're trying to help them sell their house. So once we have done the renovations, we do put away the scary dolls and all the china plates and all the crazy things that we've seen, they then see the difference and they're like, ah, okay. And then when these house hunters come in again and they talk about it again, we also show that clip. And the comparison is just, it's just not in there. You know, somebody once described an estate agent described my house as a characterful family home.

Wow. No, you know what that means. ridiculously untidy. And that is something we say, just de-clutter, just have a good clean and tidy. I mean, when it says characterful. Yeah. Filthy.

It was a midden. Do some people, I mean, do you advise, actually, that if you genuinely are cluttered and you know you are, just get a couple of bin bags, shove it under a bed? Yeah, exactly. Would that honestly do the job? It really makes a difference because for me, as a property developer, I'm used to going in and I'm seeing a space,

and I'm like, okay, I can do this, I can do that. But a lot of people, they don't have that eye. So when they walk in and they just see clutter and mess and unmade beds in places and it smells. Do people really not make the bed when they've got... Yeah. You will be surprised, even if you're searching through property websites, how many pictures are taken with beds not made and mess everywhere?

And it's not the duty of the estate agent or the photographer to make sure it looks good, but also you want to sell a house and just make the bed. You know, these are small little things people don't think about, but it can really put people off buying. Oh, too bad. So, yeah, good play and a diglater. What a hideous thought. Just trying to remember if I've made my bed.

Scarlett, lovely to meet you. Thank you so much. Oh, that's you. Thanks for having me. So this episode of Offair was brought to you by Smart Energy GB. Search get a smart meter to find out more eligibility for your smart meter installation may vary. Congratulations. You've staggered somehow to the end of another off-air with Jane and Fee. Thank you. If you'd like to hear us do this live, and we do it live, every day, Monday to Thursday, 2 till 4 on Times Radio. The jeopardy is off the scale. And if you listen to this, you'll understand exactly why that's the case.

So you can get the radio online, on DAB, or on the free Times Radio. James Radio app. Offair is produced by Eve Salsbury and the executive producer is Rosie Cutler.