Property Hub - Investment Insights & Inspiration - Get Invested: Part 1 - Graham Whitfield’s $2M property pivot: From FIFO to flipping freedom

Episode Date: May 9, 2025

Is the ‘buy and hold’ approach too slow to get you off the hamster wheel? Discover how flipping property helped one Aussie investor make $2M in just four years — starting with a tenant disaster. If you’re tired of being stuck in a job that leaves you time-poor and energy-depleted, and you’re wondering if there’s a faster path to freedom through property investment — you’re not alone. This week on Get Invested, Bushy Martin kicks off a compelling two-part conversation with Graham Whitfield — a former FIFO worker turned full-time property flipper and coach. After a trashed rental property left him $35k out of pocket, Graham decided to flip his script and pursue a hands-on investment strategy that would soon deliver multimillion-dollar returns. In this first instalment, Graham shares the highs, lows and big turning points in his personal journey. You’ll hear how he overcame the fear of flipping, what he’s learned from over 30 renovation projects, and how creative, active investing can help you break free from the long game of traditional property. Bushy also unpacks the current state of the market, the shift away from easy growth, and why active strategies like flipping may be the key to staying ahead — especially as Australia moves into a new property cycle. About Graham: Graham Whitfield is the founder of Red Mane Coaching and a passionate property coach who specialises in flipping and creative buy-renovate-hold strategies. Known as Australia’s ‘un-handiest man’, Graham proves that you don’t need tradie skills to succeed — just the right mindset and a system that works. Special Listener Offer: Graham is offering a free flipping coaching session exclusively for Get Invested listeners! To win, email your biggest takeaway from the episode to: [e-mail] Explore more at redmane.com.au Find your Freedom Formula Success in property starts with your 'why', and then the 'what' and 'how'. Let me, Bushy Martin, lead you through it! Sign up for my Freedom Formula program. The first session is absolutely free, and it only takes around an hour! Find out more https://bushymartin.com.au/freedom-formula-course Subscribe to Property Hub for free now on your favourite podcast player. Take the next step - connect, engage and get more insights with the Property Hub community at linktr.ee/propertyhubau Book a personal solutions session with Bushy to go deeper on your specific property needs or challenges Continue the discussion with likeminded investors and experts on The Property Hub Collective Facebook group Get a copy of Bushy's book, Get Invested, for FREE, and find out what it takes for you to invest in living more, working less Get all Property Hub info here linktr.ee/propertyhubau About Get Invested, a Property Hub show Get Invested is the leading weekly podcast for Australians who want to learn how to unlock their full ‘self, health and wealth’ potential. Hosted by Bushy Martin, an award winning property investor, founder, author and media commentator who is recognised as one of Australia’s most trusted experts in property, investment and lifestyle, Get Invested reveals the secrets of the high performers who invest for success in every aspect of their lives and the world around them. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and YouTube to get every Get Invested episode each week for free. For business enquiries, email [e-mail] omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

when i went into property flipping it was obviously had that light bulb moment i'm like gee okay there's something in this um you know the price i was would have been able to get beforehand versus once it was once it was um renovated and when i sold it okay significantly different so if i can make if i can do you know one house that's potentially 100 grand if i can do 500 five house i might be able to make 500k a year my goal was to do eight houses in my first year so like i said i think i did seven in my first year so welcome to get invested on the property hub podcast channel the leading weekly show for australians who want to learn how to unlock their full self health and wealth potential i'm your host bushy martin and each week i go deep

with the best investors experts leaders and founders to find out what it takes to break free from the grind discover freedom and to live by design subscribe now and join me and get invested in the life that you really want. Let's get started. Hi, Freedom Fighters. Are you sick of feeling stuck in the treadmill and caught in a rat race in a job or J-O-B, which means just over broke, that you don't like and gives you no time to do anything that you enjoy? And if you do have the time, you're just too exhausted to do anything with it. Are you interested in investing in property more as a way out to get your time back? Are you concerned about having to stay in your job and wait for another 15 years or more

before you can make the break. If investing in property is the answer, is there a better and faster way to grow your wealth and replace your income than buying and holding a property long term? What if there's an alternative property pathway that can make up to $150,000 in just 90 days that can go on to help you make

a couple of million dollars in profit in just four years? Because this is exactly what today's guest has done and he's going to unpack the nitty-gritties of what he's done and how you can do it over the next two episodes. Given the massive increase in national property values that's occurred post-pandemic due to the incredible stimulus that's been pulled into the economy along with a period of historically low interest rates followed by a migration tsunami spiking housing demand during times of very limited supply, Australia's just experienced the second highest property boom in the 260 year history of our great country and during this time home

values have increased by an average of 38 percent across the board according to CoreLogic with the greater areas of Perth, Adelaide and Brisbane enjoying the great affordability catch-up with growth of over 70 percent against a long-term average national growth rate of between 5.4 to 6.8% a year. So we've effectively seen 7 to 13 years worth of growth occur in just 3 to 5 years and this has brought forward growth and it's likely to mean that many locations may well come back in value slightly and then flatline for a considerable period of time like we're already seeing in the ACT, Victoria, Hobart and Sydney unless an area is going to experience new future growth drivers, the new improvements in infrastructure, industry and incomes, or what I like to call

the three R's of growth. So if you're coming into property at the peak and you don't secure the right property in the right growth area, then hold and hope may end up being very slow and painstaking. And unless you're good at identifying the shrinking number of outlier growth driver locations, which only hindsight can tell you despite the massive profit predictions that invariably missed the mark, then it's likely that you're going to have to become a more active investor in order to achieve superior returns, while also managing the inherent increases in risk and active time commitment associated with shorter-term property opportunities.

And if any of this is sparking your interest and you want to explore more in relation to the specifics of your situation and what's right for you, then feel free to book in with me for a one-on-one personal solution session by clicking the link in the show notes now. and if more active shorter term property approaches are tickling your fancy with the potential to manufacture equity quickly then listen up as this is exactly what today's guest graham whitfield has managed to do as you're about to hear what some would see as a disaster has triggered what he now sees as a diamond where a tenant who trashed one of his investment properties leaving 35 grand's worth of damage has been instrumental in him becoming a millionaire

out in a matter of years by converting his original form of FIFO, the old flying fly out, to a more profitable flip in flip out, but more on that later. So how did he do it? How has he turned property tragedy into triumph? And how can you learn to do the same? Well, that's exactly what we're going to find out now. As Australia's self-professed unhandiest man, Graeme Whitfield's an active property investor turned coach, specialising in property flips and buy-renovate old strategies. As the founder of Red Main Coaching, he's passionate about helping you and others think outside the box and leverage creative approaches to achieve your financial goals through active property investment. So this week, we're going to dive into the

nitty gritties of Graeme's personal journey before digging into his actionable flipping insights next week, where he's going to share the success secrets of his Red Main property coaching course. So I'm really looking forward to our great conversation. So welcome and let's get invested, right? Thank you. Thank you. Looking forward to the deep dive. Mate, I guess just to kick things off,

and I mean, you're a good sand grouper and I've spent a fair bit of time in the West. I always like to sort of kick things off with a bit of a smile. So can you share with us a bit about probably your favourite funny story that you or others tell about you that sort of captures who you are

and what you're about? funny story for me would be i'm 40 now so but we're not i'm always someone that likes some adventure and probably always had a bit of a risk tolerance so when i was 18 so just out of school i actually left home for europe on a six-month holiday with 500 in the bank that's a pretty that's a pretty slim budget mate so you must have made some instant friends on that journey what i thought yeah i mean just to be fair there was there was meant to be a um a job lined up for me in edinburgh at a pub and when i got there i found out that that no longer existed but you know where there's a will there's a way and i oh yeah i found myself working in a pub in

south of england and yeah i ended up traveling europe for six months and it all started with 500 bucks in the bank well of that mate it's a it's a probably an early indication of what you later did on a much bigger scale which which we'll unpack shortly but I guess just to crystallize then in terms of who you are what do you do differently and why do you do what you do Graeme? Well I mean different to who right like it's that's a pretty pretty hard question I suppose but but for me like I just you know I just know I'm responsible for me I'm you know responsible for my actions and what I'm going to get in life you know as far as results and that it's all going to be you know from whatever I put in sort of thing so what I put in is what I'm going to get

out so I just try and always have an open mind always you know I try and be positive and I just try and essentially you know take as many learnings from everything that I'm that I'm doing and and you know learn from other people that have that have walked the path that I'm wanting to walk sort of thing so yeah glass half full not glass half empty that's that's yeah I yeah I don't take kindly to people that have or that have excuses that you know blame you know circumstances or their own life you know for not being how they want it because at the end of the day I think ultimately we all live the life based on the choices that we've made 100% agree well take us on a bit of a Reader's Digest journey of your life so far, if you like, and we can go from

the trip to Edinburgh and beyond, if you like, but I'd like you to sort of share what you invested your time, energy, money, and this is outside of property, but property is probably an important part of that journey, and talk to us about how that's led you to where you are and what you're doing now, if you can. Okay, so are we talking from working life or are we talking from a kid sort of thing? Yeah, as early as you want to go back, mate, we should get a sense of what you did and why you did it. And you spoke about choices.

We all make them. We'd love for you to share what you did and why and how that's ended getting you to what you're doing now. Yeah, for sure. I think a lot of my motivation and drive comes from, like, my childhood, to be honest. Like, I came from, like, a single-parent family. um my dad was like an alcoholic and drug addict like just not a good guy and and as a kid we

didn't have money like my mom remarried when i was you know well you know when i was about year six or seven or something like that um but we you know we never had money like we were always like and and i know for one some reason as a kid i noticed it like i felt that i felt poor and um it just it lit a spark in me like to not be like that and and yeah so that was it so there was there was that like i know a lot of other kids wouldn't even know if they're poor sort of thing when they're kids but i knew that we were like my mom probably wouldn't like hearing me say that but you know we lived week to week we weren't we didn't you know she wasn't high income earning or anything like that so so yeah so so i had definitely saw people around within my family

that had more of us that had more than us and they certainly weren't you know wealthy or anything like that but i just felt like oh you know they got a nice a nice house sort of thing in a nicer suburb sort of thing so i sort of felt that from a kid so that that sort of motivated me i suppose um when i went to university had no idea what i wanted to do most of my family was all blue collar trades people i just fucking hate that stuff like i'm just not a tradie at all right like i just And, you know, and I remember being, as a kid, you know, my family would always be like, oh, he's never going to amount to be anything because he's, you know, whenever there's hard work, he runs away.

That was kind of like the family, like what they'd say about me because, you know, I'd rather be kicking a footy or, you know, shooting a basketball sort of thing. And I suppose I ended up going to uni. I doubled a degree in psychology and criminology. Never worked in it. Yeah, what was the interest there out of interest? You know, psychology and criminology, that's a pretty specific field.

What attracted you to do that, mate? It was definitely the psychology that interested me. Like, you know, and I still think, you know, the study of behavior is, you know, fascinating, really. You know, how can two people that have pretty much grown up in the same environment, you know, lead completely different lives? And, you know, so it's definitely, you know, intriguing sort of thing. So, and I don't know, I always like sort of always love crime stuff. So it was kind of like as, you know, as a young guy going to uni, I didn't really, there wasn't really anything outstanding out.

So it was just something I did, you know what I mean? But I quickly realised there wasn't going to be a job in that area for me. I wasn't going to be the guy that sat down and listened to people's problems or anything like that. And obviously there's a lot more to psychology than that. I realised pretty early on, like, in the, you know, if you wanted to do the criminology stuff, it was down the police line and they didn't earn enough money for what I wanted to do.

um so i ended up after the uni i was like what am i going to do i've got a job in recruitment and recruitment what is for people don't realize it's it's actually a lot of sales involved you know you're dealing with businesses so it's kind of business to biz for selling you're trying to build you know those relationships when i quickly realized i had a knack for for selling and obviously now knowing a lot more about you know psychology and disprofiling all that sort of stuff i'm a high d um so yeah so like you know and a high i as well so i'm definitely someone who enjoys i'm an extrovert and light selling sort of thing but my passion wasn't recruitment so i only lasted in that for a couple of years and i went into into um selling and i was but we basically

went into real estate i did real estate for a year and then i went into new homes and i did that for about nine years so new home sales i was really good at it made really good money i was always like one of the top sales guys you know in the company sort of thing and yeah and at that you know when i was sort of 27 you know 28 29 30 you know earning you know two 200 grand 250 300 grand a year i thought i was like you know living the dream sort of thing you know you don't have any other bills you don't have you don't have kids at that age or i didn't have kids at that age that sort of stuff um but i started getting over it because it was like there was you know there's still a limit to how much you can earn and doing that sort of stuff and from there um but then what

happened is the market in perth you know you know so from about 2015 to 20 it started getting pretty average but i'm a little bit there mate to be honest that from 2011 when the old resources sector crashed uh you know i mean i've lived in perth myself and i've got a brother down at margaret so i've sort of got a pretty good sense of it but it was pretty much the lost decade really if you Correct. And so I'd obviously had a passion for property. I bought three investment properties that were all heavily negatively geared. About 2019, every year the income was getting less and less. It was just a really bad part of the market or time in the market, I should say. And I had three negatively geared properties. My wife quit work and then we were having

twin boys. So all of a sudden, our income dramatically dropped. And so I decided at that stage to get out of selling or get out of new home sales. And I decided I was going to go FIFO. And for me, I hated bloody FIFO. Like I hated that sort of work, but the job I did wasn't heck, like it wasn't physical or anything. It was more of emergency services. Just like first aid. Yeah. Let me just jump in there. It's a, I mean, sitting in a display home selling in a, you know, they're normally pretty good environments, probably a lot of pressure, no question. But, But what was it in your thinking that said, oh, I need to jump on a plane and spend one or two weeks away

and then I'm way home? It was the only thing that without any other skill set, it was only because all I'd ever done was sales, it was the only thing that I could earn $150,000 a year, which would have been enough to keep us afloat. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, okay, no, mate. That was it.

I wasn't going to get a job in town for, you know, that sort of money without, out you know and like I said it was yeah I'd all I'd been doing all I'd done is sell homes so I was like what else am I going to do so that's why I did it but anyway when I went fly for I knew that it was never a long-term thing for me it was like okay what's next and I always wanted to be in business I want to always wanted to you know I knew I could sell I knew I had like the hunger the motivation all that sort of that drive but I was like okay well you know I'm gonna I'm gonna start a business but I just had no idea and I ended up being in FIFO for two and a half years but in that last year is when i had an investment property which obviously got trashed by tenants

that was early 21 renovated it realized the profit realized the opportunity and then got my coaching did a program went all in um basically after my first two deals i went you know went full-time quit firefly and yeah just realized that i could you know i could make 100k 150k and whatever i and that sort of money per deal and my goal was the first year where I would do eight deals, which I think I did seven. And then, yeah, it just grew from there. I obviously started sharing what I was doing and now I've got a coaching program where I teach hundreds of people

around the country. Yeah, love it, love it. I'm still doing my own projects as well. So it's not like I've stopped doing projects and, you know, I just teach people now. like i still i've got two two projects at the moment that i'm doing uh but i've still got my but obviously i'm on my most of my focus is on the program now yeah you got it well let's unpack your own journey you we've touched on and i mentioned in the intro the the the tenant

trashing the place that sort of kicked this whole thing off can you sort of uh talk us through the nitty-gritties of some of that why did you buy that property what was the strategy at that time How did it go? Give us the ins and outs and thread the needle for us along what you've done and where and focus some of the high points and the low points so that you can share some learnings with us. Yeah, well, as far as the properties that I had, the first property I bought was a unit in a suburb called Como in Perth,

pretty close to the city. I did okay out of that property. I think I made about a $90,000 profit when I sold the property. Um, but then I, the house had actually got trashed. That was the second purchase that I made. And that particular property was, I didn't know what I was doing. I got, you know, at that stage I was all of 20, I think I was 24 when I bought the first place, 25 when I bought the second one.

I had no idea. Like, you know, I just bought in suburbs in Perth that I could afford. I, you know, didn't even cross my mind that I should have invested in Sydney where prices would have doubled and, you know, didn't even cross my mind. Right. So I just didn't have that, that education at the, you know, at the time. There wasn't the same sort of podcasts and property analysts. Getting that sort of information and data wasn't as easy back in 2009, 2010.

Anyway, I ended up selling that unit, made a 90K profit, kept on hold of that house. And then my wife, obviously, before she was my wife, she bought a property, so we had that for the two. And then we bought a house and we got the big mortgage, which did the stupid thing where you go out and get the big house and look at me sort of house because I was selling homes and thought I was going pretty well.

But when the market started going backwards, it was like I had this massive mortgage and we would drop from two incomes to one and obviously cost my income was sliding and that was probably one of the biggest learnings I've ever had was how silly it was to buy that owner-occupier at that stage and that's why even now, like, I don't have an own occupier. I'm just, you know, doing earthly, doing a portfolio property. Yep.

But, you know, we're living, we're renting now in a, you know, one of the nicest parts of WA and yelling up. Yep. And, yeah, so that period, you know, having to sort of, like, swallow my pride and obviously, you know, go FIFO because I didn't want to and did it because I had to and also, you know, that house, knowing that it was a mistake buying that property, it set me back years.

All of those have been massive learnings and I've been able to learn a lot from that and take a lot away from that in order to, you know, get me where I am right now. Yeah. Circling back a little bit there, Graeme, what was the initial interest in property? You know, you picked up free properties.

Why property in the first place? What does that actually do there? I don't know what the actual interest was. I just thought that you could make money from real estate and then obviously set and then working kind of in the industry like selling new homes you're kind of around real estate even though it's you know it's more sort of new new homes and you know it's not really established product it's not like being a real estate agent but it was just it's kind of all sort of related so the interest was you either make money through business or you make money through property

And I was working in sales, so my, you know, my, yeah, I was going to make money through property. That was my plan. Yeah, no, it makes complete sense. Well, take us through, like you renovated the first one that the tenants trashed and you made some dough out of it. Talk to us about the evolution of your flipping approach from there in terms of what were you doing and what were you learning,

what were you doing differently so that you can sort of share some of those learnings with us? So I suppose the first one obviously wasn't really a flip. It was an investment property that I'd had for 10 years. So essentially with that one, there was a lot of learnings. I did a really tight budget on that property. Like it was a very tight reno span, 35K. I watched every dollar.

I didn't have the money to blow or anything like that, you know. And essentially at that stage, it wasn't really in my mind that I was going to then become a property flipper. It was more like I'm renovating this to eventually to be able to sell it and actually make money rather than lose money. That was the thinking. When I went into property flipping, I obviously had that light bulb moment. I'm like, gee, okay, there's something in this.

The price I would have been able to get beforehand versus once it was renovated and when I sold it, okay, it's significantly different. So it was like, okay, I need to investigate this. So I went and got coaching myself and learned the process. what i was trying to do though is and for me at this stage you know it's still it wasn't about wealth creation it wasn't about you know i'm gonna become rich from flipping houses it was more about i don't want to be fucking working fly for anymore and i want to be back home with my wife and my kids flipping houses is an opportunity for me to come home to make way better money than i was

working at burning fifo anyway but if i can make if i can do you know one house that's potentially 100 grand if i can do 500 five house i might better make 500k a year my goal was to do eight houses in my first year so like i said i think i did seven in my first year so for me at that stage when i when i quit fifo it was more about you know being able to work for myself call my own shots be home with the family it was more about just making money not creating wealth or anything like that yeah okay now there's a like anything done well there's a real science and the devil's always in the detail you know because it you know it's having done some flips myself in the past for the the new on the unwary that can be trip traps and that you don't even know about

what sort of a and i'll use the word system did you develop that that was easily repeatable and worked really well for you that uh might be uh interesting for those listening for sure 100 the big thing was was actually using other people's money to fund the project so i used money partners um and you know you know fast forward a few years i've you know built a massive facebook group you know nearly 50 000 people in the group and most of my students in my program that are funding deals they're using you know money partners so to fund their you know fund their deals so or at least fund part of their deals so money partners was it's just ironing it's like well you know people always say that you need money to make money well that's actually

not true like you like i didn't have money when i started and i've been able to get to where i've got to in you know realistically more like three and a half years but that's happened because i was able to leverage other people's money so i was able to show you know and the first couple of deals i was at you know i made good profit and i built relationships with you know with money partners and they've you know that those relationships have grown and you know i've now got you know a lot of different money partners i could use um for for projects but that's a that's a big one like when you start realizing that there's creative strategies and creative finance for doing deals that you don't need to have you know a million bucks in the

bank you know you don't have to have serviceability or i literally had no serviceability like i had three like i said i had three negatively geared properties when i didn't when i got started the bank wasn't giving me a dollar and they didn't so that's yeah that's and i like i said it's not like i hadn't had the money to buy a property i literally first two deals the purchase price was was entirely funded by money partners so yeah that in itself is is massive but just just as well like when i first started i was very broad in my reach like i was doing you know if you look at the first six or seven properties that i flipped in perth they were everywhere like there was one north of the river and there was you know couple close to freeman or and then there was you know a few down

the rockingham way but they were just sort of all over the shop but what i sort of realized after year one was okay let's really just choose a target area and really niche in a market and just smash that out and that's that's how you know the next year how i did yeah 11 or you know i did eight i mean i did eight last year in that same area and you know i wasn't even looking for deals i thought my whole priority was building this this program so yeah niching and and being an area expert goes a long way in this in this in property flipping yeah no worries now just just uh talking about the the uh property partners that you mentioned money partners yeah the money for those that that are listening and it's like i've never heard that term before

and there'll be a few i'm assuming that you're jving with people who had got the the money and they just they just want to make more and but they haven't got the time so they they partner with you to actually make the deal happen is that is that uh how ready yeah kind of so a jv partner and money partner are different so a jv partner like if the j if i you can do jvs jvs the way i look at a jv is that you know two people have different roles within the rock within the partnership typically they might both be more active you know one might be more out there sourcing deals the other one might be more project managing you know yes one person might be funding one person might be project managing the deal but that's a you're going to think of jv's again you can the profit

share can be however you guys structure it yeah but the difference with a money partner is a money partner is they're just getting a return on their investment and they're not getting it they're typically not getting a share in the profit so i typically pay money partners 15 return on investment per annum and i'm in and out of a deal in most of the time in three or four months So I could be making $100,000 profit and the money partner's making $15,000 profit, you know, because they're in it. But they're getting paid no matter, they're getting paid the same amount no matter the outcome, whereas I'm getting paid based on the outcome. You know, a money partner can be, you know, like let's say, for example, me, Graham Whitfield, I could be a money partner. If I've got, you know, $300,000 in the bank, I could money partner your deal as Graham Whitfield.

I've obviously got a couple of companies that, you know, if one of my companies has money, you know, that particular business, you know, could money partner a deal. Or let's say I've also got a self-managed super fund. I've also money partnered out of my self-managed super fund. So a money partner is really just peer-to-peer lending, and you need a solicitor who obviously draws up the agreements and everything's all done, obviously, you know,

professionally and security in place, you know. but it's you know people are assessing you based on rather than your service ability the way the banks start do they're assessing you based on if they like the deal okay this deal is good you bought this well below market yeah you know your feasibility stacks up your funding proposal looks good yep i believe that you're going to be able to deliver on what you say you are and then i'll invest in the in the in the um in the deal and this is you know you know like entrepreneurs and and you know there's a lot of wealthy people that do this sort of stuff you know every day you know but they're not it's not they're doing it on a on a much bigger scale

so yeah no it's spot on i think you've you've opened the eyes a lot of people listening and i have never actually thought about that uh taking on someone who can just fund the deal and we agree what we're going to pay them so they know what they're getting. It's a win for them. It's a low-risk, low-touch, 15% annual return, even if it's only for three months. It's way better than you're going to get it

in most other places at the moment. So it works really well for them. Then I guess I'm assuming that you're pretty much finding the deal, project managing any of the lick and split renovations, et cetera, controlling the costs and the time, the quality on all that side of the equation, or are there other members that you are then introducing to do parts of that? Yeah, exactly that.

So I've got, you know, since I started, I've got a good handyman, good painter, electrician, plumber, tiler, ceiling fixer, like every trade that you sort of need, carpenter, building inspector, a couple of registered builders I've used for, you know, certain structural components. So, yeah, so essentially I basically find the deal. I put the schedule together. so the order that they're going to come in and do the work

and then I just engage those contractors. Obviously, you know, you're using licensed trades for, you know, for your electrician and, you know, plumbing and that sort of stuff. You're using registered planners. So you're using people that are, you know, registered and licensed to do the works and I'm just essentially overseeing it as a project manager. And like I said, I'm living in Yellingup now and I've got, you know, a couple of projects going on now in Perth because I've got that team

and they've been working with me for a few years. you know i can do that yeah and i love that tell us about uh and i guess from my understanding you've done 27 plus deals uh in that three and a half ish years or thereabouts so that that's a that's a big number by anyone's uh score uh amongst those can you sort of drill into a couple that some that have gone really well and why and some that haven't gone so well and why i'd love you to share some of the learnings that have come out of all that yeah well i mean they've all been pretty good except for one i only ever i only really lost money on one and it wasn't really like a big lot significant loss i think i don't know the exact dollar but it would have been probably

in the red maybe 10 grand or something like that the only problem the only issue or the big issue with that one was two things it was in a suburb called freemantle and i've told this story 100 times but um essentially what happened with this one is i got the market wrong like it was an area with a lot of character homes and this house wasn't a character home it was a two-story home had a really nice view but it was when the i secured it before the interest rate started going up in 2022 i think i was settled on it in the april in the may 2022 interest rate started going up and they went up month after month and by the time i went to market july or august or something like that it was august might have been in august september i went to market

Well, the time I went to market with, you know, four or five consecutive interest rate rises, the market that I was going for was young professionals. There was a lot of, it was either young professionals or downsizers. And I knew the downsizers were more interested in the character homes because this house was a two-story. It also had a bit of a funky spiral staircase, which downsizers didn't like.

But because of the interest rate rises, because the market just quietened overnight. So I really, I really, I suppose, got that one wrong. Even though I was exposed to agents and the agents were all telling me I'd get X amount for it, but then when we went to market, so I ended up pretty much selling it just to break it, even though it was a slight loss. To me, it was really just a break even.

I'd invested about 200K of my own money into that deal. Then I was going to get a majority of it all back and be able to move on. So that was one deal that I got wrong. Apart from that, all the others have been pretty good. I made some pretty good money. I mean, last year I did eight deals and averaged about $100,000 profit on each deal while still running this program, not really investing a lot of time.

This year, like, I haven't really invested any time, but I've got two projects, just settled on one this week, and I've got another one certainly within about two weeks. um but yeah so yeah like i've had one other project recently that were just sold which had a bit of an issue believe it or not the day before settlement my plumber went to the property and final inspection was all done everything like that and you know those flexi hoses in the vanity yeah they're renowned for for bursting it burst so the house flooded the day before settlement i could not believe it um but yeah that i but i still didn't lose money on it it was just a pain

in the butt like i've had to like you know i still made made decent money on it but it set it back you know like i literally i think that happened late january and it's just settled monday so which we're what first we're mid-march now so it sort of sent me back about six weeks because i had to go through insurance and all that sort of stuff and insurance you know they're paid out and all that sort of stuff. So that was all good. But they're the only two negative experiences. And I like to say that the deal I just settled on is deal 28. And what I'm going to settle on in a couple of weeks time is deal 29. So I've had a pretty bloody good run. Yeah. Let's look at the flip side. What's been the best deal you've done and why? Why is it so good? Well, the best deal

I've done is actually a reno development deal. So this is one of the only development I've done. All the rest of this has been pretty much reno flip. But the best deal I've done was a property that i bought for 600 and all all up that project owes me about 1.5 so 1.1.55 or something and the value of that one now is probably just over two and a half so there's probably been a million bucks um well there's over yeah it's close to completion like i'm about to get hand over so i renovated the first house we actually moved into that house and then we moved out in january moved down south but i moved into that house while building either side and then the one of them is essentially is that practical completion they're just uh i should get keys next week and then the

one after that will be probably keys the following month but yeah that one has some very good market growth which is obviously like i really timed that one really really well as far as a flip the best for me was about 170k profit but i've had yeah i've had many deals where they've been sort of 140 150 170 so there's been quite a lot of deals in that price range like i said last year my average was about 100k profit across all the deals and then there's one most of my three month in and outs are they yeah so my i typically can get a reno done in about six weeks and then so i And when I do it, my trades are all lined up. So I settled on this particular property and, you know,

I settle on every property and then essentially the work starts straight away. You know, the day that I settled was skipping rocks up and then my handyman is in there doing demo the next day. My electrician and plumber are in there that day, you know, disconnecting and, yeah, ripping everything out. And then, yeah, the trades obviously put everything back together. So six weeks to do the reno and then, you know, Perth's been a pretty good market the last couple of years,

so everything's been selling pretty quickly. And then just depending on how good the buyer's finance situation, if they're cash, they might be able to settle a few weeks later. I've literally had flips. I've had a couple of flips where I've held them for less than 60 days from end to end, from settlement to settlement. And that's been because it's been all the month's sort of renovation and then a cash buyer, and that's why it's been really, really quickly.

but none of my projects are sitting there, nothing happening. All my flips are as soon as a settlement happens, it's all like day after day. There's a different trade there getting work done. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you've certainly got stuck in a fantastic time in WA. I mean, we've done a real catch-up in the last three years given the pretty high time of the 10 years.

Moving forward then, mate, because, I mean, And the benefit of doing flips in a growth market, you're just turbocharging the profit you can pull out of it, really, because you've added the vision to a property that no one else can see. And then you've turned a pig's ear into a silk purse very quickly. And people go, yeah, love that. We'll take that. And you walk away with the cash. Given that we're sort of moving into an area where we're getting back to normal, really, in terms of the old post-pandemic petrol starting to burn out a little bit, what does that mean to what you're going to do where from a flipping or buy-reno perspective moving forward, mate? Yeah, I mean, look, with flipping, you just need a neutral market.

So you don't want to be really flipping in a market where there's prices are dropping. You're thinking about it, but whenever you do your feasibility on a flip, you're always basing it on what would I get for this property if I sell it today when it's renovated. So you're never taking into consideration future growth. If you're taking into consideration future growth, that's the quickest way to losing money because you're relying on the market getting you growth, and if it doesn't,

then you're stuffed. So even through the boom in Perth, I would never, ever do my numbers based on projected growth. It would always be, what's this house worth now renovated? And if the deal didn't stack up, I would find something else. Because for me, I always need at least that 10%. So let's say, for example, I was all in sort of $600,000 or $700,000, then there needs to be $60,000 or $70,000 profit in the deal. Then if I get market growth on top of that, great. So mutual market's fine. I mean, I've got quite a few students in Perth still doing deals i'm going back to perth next week and i've got about four or five student deals that i'm

going to go have a look at yeah um and you know take some photos and video of and they're still making you know really good profits i mean the two deals i've got in perth right now absolutely crack it it's like i just picked up a property in east cannington a three by one on nearly 700 square meters for 400k so that's yeah so and i'm keeping this property long term it's a buy run to hold. But I picked it up for $400,000. Granted, it was November that I got it under contract. It's been a bit of a few months delay, but there hasn't been bugger all growth since November anyway. So pick it up for a steal at $400,000. It'll be worth $700,000 renovated and it's probably a $90,000 reno. So there'll be over $200,000 equity in that property. I've also got another

one in kingsley um and i picked up a you know house a three by one in kingsley on 809 square meters i picked it up for 700 so that property as well will be well at least mid nines uh in kingsley so but it's there's there's so there's always deals out there doesn't matter the market obviously it's great if the market does some heavy lifting but for example these i mean this The Kingsley one, I only picked it up in January. So, yeah, there's always good deals out there, you know, because you're buying other people's problems, right? You're buying houses that are – most of the houses I buy, you know,

are absolute, you know, absolute dumps. Like if you saw the state of this East Cammington one, it would scare you, like when you were – it was bad. Yeah, so a lot of your property is sort of off-market or pre-market, you know, drug properties or deceased estates or – 100%. What sort of profiles are we talking? Yeah, so hoarder houses.

I mean, I definitely have bought one or two drug houses in the past. I've bought, you know, like deceased estates. Like a lot of the time you'll get like, you know, people that just, you know, they inherit a property and it's a burden on them. They just want to get rid of it. Can instead of trashed houses, that sort of stuff. You know, I've had a few of those where, you know, the people that just don't want the property anymore.

Emotionally, you know, they're upset with what's happened. I've had people that are wanting to sell property off market because they don't want certain people to know that they're selling and, you know, trying to get away from a situation, that sort of stuff. But, you know, like I said, these houses are always, they're not a pretty picture when you're buying them. Like they're usually, you know, like I'd say like of all the properties, There's only been maybe a few that I haven't had to gut.

Nearly all of them I've had to gut because they wouldn't be pretty much almost not really rentable as is. The majority of the time I'm gutting it, you know, new kitchen, new bathroom, new flooring, paint inside out. You know, quite often, you know, new grass and re-tick. Yeah, usually having to do everything. Like I said, there has been like maybe, you know, three or four which have been I've only had to do like a clean up.

But, yeah, the majority of them have been, yeah, needing a lot of work. So the bigger the problem, the bigger the potential profit, too, if you do it right. Now, no doubt you've got almost a formula system going through. Yeah, 100%. I've got like a full, definitely, I've got like pretty much a cookie cutter, you know, Renault. So all my Renaults look the same.

All of them look the same because I use the same spec and that sort of stuff. But, yeah, they're all, you know, I'm not taking on stuff that's structurally stuffed. Do you know what I mean? Like I'm not taking, there's been houses I've been to and I've just ruled it out. I'm like, it's too much work.

Yeah. You know, I've gone through, I've gone to houses where a car's gone through the front of the house and it's just like, I'm like, I'm not a builder. This is not, this is what I'm doing. Like I'm not doing this. And quite often those really big projects end up, you know, you've got, you know, blowouts

and that sort of stuff. Whereas because I stick to cosmetic, rip out the kitchen, you know, obviously in WA, everything's pretty much double brick. So it's just, you know, floor and walls when I sort of gut it and then basically put it back together. Yeah, I love it. Talk us through what your investment strategy was

when you first started this and how has it evolved and changed into what you're doing now, where it's going to get you to? Yeah, yeah. So like I said at the start, it was more about like just building up cash flow and having, you know, having that sort of safety net, I suppose, because we had a few tough years there when I went FIFO and we were pretty tight. But then obviously I did a lot of projects and did really well. So I started obviously, you know, building a portfolio as well and doing buy, rent, hold.

So this year I'm moving in more into holding, still accumulated, you know, a decent amount of properties over the last you know a couple of years because i haven't haven't sold every everything but um yeah starting to build that portfolio and there's good equity in those properties because of the buyer and i hold because i buy them really well um and most of them are you know at least neutral if not like they're not stinging me but they're not and they're not really costing me anything to hold on to so my strategy moving forward is definitely more of that buy, rent, or hold stuff. I'm definitely interested in other markets now.

I'm definitely interested in Melbourne, sort of watching Melbourne closely as to what's happening there. Still, there's definitely suburbs at the moment at the bottom end that are starting to have some moderate growth. So I'm sort of watching that area, obviously. Yeah, watching it. But I'm also sort of at the moment doing a lot of research on commercial property as well.

I'm interested in potentially being able to add value to commercial properties and obviously commercial properties are a lot better for cash flow um so yeah so I'm sort of at the moment sort of researching researching that market as well yeah I'm sort of at a bit of a crossroads at the moment because I'm also interested in large I'm sure I'm where I've moved to is a bit of a holiday region in the southwest uh WA so Margaret River region so a lot of airbnbs and that sort of stuff here but there's some really new rules and stuff in there that i've sort of found out since i've been here some you know with a lot of restrictions on what you can actually you know certain only certain zones

can be airbnb and that sort of stuff so yeah i i think i'm definitely going to do some more buy and hold resi like for sure buy rent a hold sorry but i'm i'm definitely looking at commercial as well yeah it's smart i mean i'd uh we dipped our toe in the airbnb uh market and uh it's it's like running a five-star hotel on the house, mate. The expectations are through the roof. The limitations on what you can and can't do because of the supposed, and I say supposed very deliberately, impact that Airbnb properties are having on the rental market, which I think is a load of bollocks personally, but they're a convenient scapegoat to pin the tail on the donkey when Gavin was looking to point the finger. So I'd say what you're talking

about with the the resi and the commercial stuff from a you know funding your lifestyle perspective makes perfect sense mate uh you've learned a lot in a very short space of time uh and clearly are very good at it uh given your own experience what do you believe are the absolute critical keys to being successful with with flipping and when i say flipping i'm saying buy renovate and either sell or hold because it's the it's the buy renovate piece where you're manufacturing the the equity right off the bat yeah yeah hands down like i've obviously got a lot of students in my program now as well and the thing that separates the best is that how good they are at sourcing or finding or hunting for deals like you know like the thing is some people they feel uncomfortable

having to you know put in low offers and that sort of stuff they feel uncomfortable you know dealing directly with people on and off market sales so you know see if that's you you've got to really get comfortable and in you know being uncomfortable in that situation people like me who are you know i suppose come from a sales background and you don't even have to come from a sales background if there's a lot of people out there that are just naturally they're just wired that way so if you're someone who because i worked sales all my life as well i kind of feel like i never worked for like i i could i ate salary jobs like you know like even working for fifa it's like i get the same amount of pay what if i don't do anything yeah so i i could

you know i'm just not an employee but whereas so for me like a lot of people though they're the other way around they're like i'm not getting paid to like find properties i'm not getting paid to do all that so like i don't want to put that at that time and it's like i'm the opposite i'm like you know love you know build it fine you know prospect as much as i can like and then you know watch the uh watch the shoots grow sort of thing so yeah i'm all about prospecting and the people that understand that are the ones that do the best and and i think that goes for anything any business look at you know any salesperson any business you know any business like the biggest issue for a business is always leads right like if you've got plenty plenty of customers then you

then your business is going to do well but a lot of people they struggle with that front end with with getting leads and then turning those leads into customers or clients but it's it's the same with property flipping you have to if if you can't find a deal then you're not going to be able to make renovate a house and make any money but if you're good at you know networking with agents getting out and seeing these off-market properties and if you're good at like you know or you know You do your letterbox drops and all that sort of stuff and hit bites that way. If you're active and good at that, then you do really well. Yeah, I love it.

And I was going to say, you're right down to knocking on doors and sticking stuff in letterboxes. I mean, I'm sure you'd be pretty amazed at some of the responses you'd got from some of the activity that the average Joe is just not even going to pull their finger out and have a go at. 100%. I mean, a lot of people were embarrassed to put their house on the market and a lot of people hate real estate agents, so they won't actually sell that way.

So believe it or not, letterboxes work. I've had most of my success from letterbox shops. Yeah. Yeah, it makes perfect sense, mate. But if you were starting out again, what, if anything, would you invest your time, energy, money indefinitely, right? Well, starting again, probably the only thing I would have changed, I probably would have held a few more properties in Perth.

There was probably only a couple that I would have held that I would like to have held looking back now, but that is what it is. I've still, you know, had some good ones and still created some really, really good equity. So, but as far as, look, I don't think anything. Like, I think I've got to where I am because of the learnings and that that I've had along the way. So I don't really think that there's anything that I would have changed.

Yeah. Yeah, it's, yeah, I just always keep learning and growing, I suppose. Well, mate, I'm now going to give you a blindfold and cigarette and ask you the fast-forward questions that you probably get asked in just about every podcast. And I call it the bushfire round, mate, after my nickname. But if you could have coffee with anyone and they can be alive or dead or an historical figure, who would you choose and why?

Michael Jordan. He's just, yeah, obviously loves sport. But just for him, he was just probably the greatest athlete of all time, in my opinion. And just his mindset and his just absolute killer instinct and, yeah, just an assassin on the, yeah. I just think he was, yeah, just so mentally tough. Like, there was, you know, just handled pressure so well.

And I think sport and business go pretty well together. So, yeah, so I think he would, yeah, everyone just thinks he's the god. I mean, I think if you look at any older guys, you know, NBA guys and all that sort of stuff, they will have him on the pedestal. And, yeah, I'm not saying the basketball is definitely one of my favourite sports. I'm not saying it is my favourite sport, but if I think of all the sports, you know, that I've followed, I just think he's that one guy that just stands out to me.

Yeah, mate, he not only was a legend on the court, but given the deal he did with Nike, he's a pretty substantial property investor too, mate. He owns some very expensive property all over the States, mate. Well, I mean, and look at the deal he did with the Hornets. Look, he obviously bought that and I think he bought it for, well, I think 100 and something million or whatever. I don't quite remember on these numbers, but then sold it for a billion or whatever.

So he's made significant money as a businessman as well. But yeah, I mean, obviously with Nike, yeah, it's, you know, he pretty much changed the whole industry for shoes and that for the whole league and for, you know, every other generation after him. so yeah yeah pretty much absolutely trailblazer mate what's both the worst and the best piece of an investment advice that you've ever received look i think the best piece of advice is only to follow those who have done what you want to do so i think a lot of people there's a lot of people have a lot of fear you know fear of failure fear of rejection you know fear of what others think

and too many people have great ideas or all that sort of stuff and then they don't follow through because their mate who has not achieved anything is telling them it's not a good idea or their mum and dad who, you know, are not well off either are telling them, no, that's a bad idea. So only, you know, listen and follow those who have done what you want to achieve. And I think the worst advice is, and this has actually been a lot,

there's a lot of property guys out there saying it at the moment, but I think the whole buy your own home, pay off the mortgage, I think that's a terrible idea. I mean, it might have worked back in the 70s and 80s and stuff like that, but the young people now, and especially people that might live in Sydney, for example, where prices are even more expensive, so just go out and buy your own home you're essentially setting yourself up in a trap and and i'm i'm proof of that like i bought a you know i had the million dollar mortgage when i was

20 to 28 29 or whatever i was and it was it was like it was just a it was like having the handcuffs on that that that property it was like having handcuffs on so that's why even though i've got could easily go and buy a nice house now but i haven't because i'm just aware that if by investing in property, I can make my money work for me, whereas by spending a few million on an owner-occupier home, you're not getting any return on that. No, no. And the interesting thing is that it locks you out from doing anything else because the massive mortgage prevents you doing it.

And every cost associated with that property is coming out of your after-tax money versus is an investment property where if you configure it right over 90 of the cost has been covered by the tenant the tax office so it's uh it's a no-brainer and mate i don't want to get on my high horse here because i 100 agree with you but the reason why over 73 of retirees over the age of 65 are surviving on just over 15 grand a year right now is because they made the mistake of thinking that paying off the home loan and putting money into super is going to fund their lifestyle. I've done the numbers, mate.

I've written a book that's gone into that subject and compared the two, and it's chalk and cheese when it comes to the outcome. So, mate, you've hit a hot button for me on that one, mate, because it's absolutely 100%. I mean, look, I said we're living – you're from WA, yeah. So are you from WA or not? No, no, I'm living in WA. I'm a bit of a gypsy, mate.

I've uh lived lived in most most states actually yeah I mean I mean I mean obviously I'm just down in yelling up now which is like you know beautiful part of the world sort of thing and there's a block of land on the street look it's it's a very established area where I am there's only about 150 houses in yelling up on the hill and you know like there's a block of land so obviously there's someone's knocked down an old shaft or whatever but that blocks on the market for three and a half mil now and that's on the street that I live in now to build on that the person's I'm not getting any change out of probably another $3 million on the build, right? So, I mean, the house I'm living in, it's a nice house.

It's certainly not a luxury house, but the location, it's, you know, you wouldn't, the house is still worth millions, right? Because now I'm paying $1,200 a week here. Yeah. It's a no-brainer. So if I was to buy this house, I can tell you what, I'd be paying a hell of a lot more than $1,200 a week. Four times that, mate, at least.

At least. So absolutely no-brainer. You know, I mean, like I was a rent investor for years and then picked up where we wanted to live right at the end of the journey, not the beginning of the journey because the portfolio funded it. So not a popular way to go because I think way too many Aussies' egos getting in the way of, you know, look at me. Massive mistake, massive mistake from that regard.

Whereas I just love the flexibility of, you know, We rented for a long time and lived in places that are at a fraction of the cost that it would have if we hadn't been paying the mortgage on the same place. I love your thinking. Sure. Mate, third question on the ambush round. What superpower do you wish you had and why?

Predict the future. Look, I mean, if you could predict the future, then you'd know what to buy, wouldn't you? Like you'd know what – obviously, we can look at data and we know what's happening somewhat. but if I could predict the future and I could see exactly what was going to happen, you know, where and when,

then it'd be a very easy way to make money. 100%. There's a lot of people who pretend they can predict the future in property, mate, and I think about 99.9% of them are always wrong because it makes me laugh, mate. Given the number of variables that affect property conditions, you know, I don't go near property predictions

for that very reason because the chances are you are going to be wrong. So I love that. Last one, what's sort of a daily happy habit that you've employed that you reckon has contributed most to your success today? I just think for me it's just like always been positive mindset. My morning routine, it changes all the time. So I'm not someone who every day does the same thing.

Like I'm just not that person, but I am a morning person and, you know, and I always get up and I always, you know, I'm always motivated to, you know, for another day sort of thing. So I can't sit there and tell you that it's, you know, I get up and go for the, I've been going for a walk for the last 10 years or I've been going, doing the same run for the last year or I've been going to the same, like that's not the case. But for me, it's just like I'm a morning person.

I always get up and it's, yeah, my mindset and I'm always like, you know, I'm always focused and that sort of thing. So that's, yeah, difficult one for me to answer. I don't think I gave you the answer that you were looking for. No, no, there is no right or wrong answer. And my mindset is that most people attach themselves to a thing where they're not thinking that what's on the inside and in between your ears is going to have the biggest impact

on whatever you achieve in life, good or bad. And very few people, most Australians are like this. They're pointing outwards at why, you mentioned earlier, why there's a reason or an excuse why something hasn't happened. But if you turn inwardly and think about how are you thinking and what are you attracting into your life as a result, if you're putting energy into that every day, mate, there's no wonder you're doing well.

Yep, absolutely. Mate, look, we could talk for hours, but I really want to thank you for taking the time to share your very interesting FIFO to flipping personal journeys so far, mate. But before we go, for those that are listening, If you'd like to keep the conversation going in a very safe and open forum where you can take your property knowledge to the next level by sharing and learning with other like-minded property investors and property professionals, where you can get all of your property questions answered, then join Eddie, the Frenchman, myself and a host of others now on the Property Hub Collective Facebook page by clicking the link in the show notes. We now look forward to continuing our conversation with Graeme in next week's episode, where we're going to unpack his secrets to property flipping to buy, renovate, hold, and or sell.

So remember to always get invested in your knowledge and your network before you invest in assets. And we look forward to getting invested with you again then, Graeme. Thank you. Appreciate it. Look forward to the following up on the next chat. Thanks for tuning in to Get Invested on the Property Hub podcast channel, your home for property investment insights and inspiration make sure you subscribe to property hub for free

get your weekly dose of get investing inspiration along with every episode of realty talk australia's top online property show for red hot property investing news and insights direct from industry leaders and influencers and finally i'll see you next time