Property Investory
From the Dubbo Mines to a Multi-Million Dollar Portfolio with Jane Slack-Smith
May 8, 2017
Jane Slack-Smith, originally a miner from Dubbo, now owns a multi-million dollar property portfolio, and spends her time mentoring others on how to achieve the same. From winning Australian Mortgage Broker of the Year, and writing a best-selling book Your Property Success with Renovation, Slack-Smith’s career has been diverse and widely successful.
Tune in to this episode of Property Investory to hear how she started her portfolio at 31 years old, and how she grew it to this size it is today, as well as the resources she utilised to help her achieve it.

Resources and Links:

Transcript:
**SHORT SNIPPET**

Jane Slack-Smith:
And you know, when you're on a mine site, and 300 men are on strike, because they don't want to work with a girl, you've got to sit back and go, you know, ‘Why am I doing this?’

**INTRO MUSIC**

Tyrone Shum:
This is Property Investory where we talk to successful property investors to find out more about their stories, mindset and strategies.
 
I’m Tyrone Shum and in this episode we’re speaking with award-winning mortgage broker, entrepreneur and author, Jane Slack-Smith. Originally a miner from Dubbo, Slack-Smith changed her career pathway for good after starting her portfolio at 31. Join us to hear how she turned $45,000 into a multi-million-dollar portfolio, and stay tuned as she explains how you can do the same thing. 

**END INTRO MUSIC**

**START BACKGROUND MUSIC**


Tyrone Shum:
Growing up in Regional New South Wales, Slack-Smith followed an exciting path upon leaving school. 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(00:29) As a girl from the bush from a farm in Dubbo, I was one of the first to attend any university in my family and I did a mining engineering degree and specialized in explosives. So, I spent the next 18 years working in the mining industry, which was very exciting. In that period of time, I knew that I was probably just working for my money day in and day out, and doing nothing with it. And, I knew I had to do something, and I had a come-to-Jesus moment with a reading of Robert Kiyosaki’s ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’ and started to think more about my future and what I wanted to achieve. 

(1:09) I took my risk assessment skills in understanding risks and likelihoods and consequences of risk to property investment, and built a property portfolio from a mere $45,000 start, way out to a multi-million-dollar portfolio today. I decided along the way that I wanted to teach other people how to do it too. I essentially started looking into how I could assist people in their education on how to find the right property in the right area to get them to their goals quicker. And I realized back in 2004 [or] 2005 that if I did that without having professional indemnity insurance, I was probably going to put some risk around my own portfolio, and the only person, or profession at that stage that could talk about property, was a mortgage broker. 

AUSTRALIA’S MORTGAGE BROKER OF THE YEAR

(1:59) So, I decided to do that part-time; that lasted about three weeks because of the demand of people wanting some assistance. I went full-time and since that start way back in 2005, I've won ‘Australia’s Mortgage Broker of the Year’ twice and ‘Property Investment Advisor’ runner-up in a recent award, which I'm really proud of. And then, in 2012, I decided it was time to put all the education and knowledge around property investing and building my portfolio and all of the thousands of investors I'd worked with into play, and started ‘Your Property Success’ which is an online education platform that assists people in getting to their property success. 

Tyrone Shum:
Slack-Smith's achievements are incredibly inspiring. But what motivates her to keep pushing forward? 

Jane Slack-Smith: 
(2:59) I am perpetually curious, so I always want to learn more and I'm always signing up for courses. And, something like, you know, James Patterson teaches how to write, because I'm interested in how to convey my message and be a better writer. I don't necessarily want to write a book; I have written one book, ‘Your Property Success with Renovation’, but I don't plan on writing anymore. It just intrigues me, looking at people who excel at what they do and short-cutting the path of pain that they've been through, learning from their mistakes, learning their recommendations so I can put those things in place. So, I do courses on photography, writing, marketing, finance; I'm always looking to learn more and I'm always curious about what people are doing so that I can learn from their experiences as well.

Tyrone Shum:
(3:55) Wow, where do you find the time to do all this?

Jane Slack-Smith: 
(3:58) You just have to get up early and you can achieve anything.

Tyrone Shum:
Slack-Smith tells us about her family.

Jane Slack-Smith: 
(4:11) My husband was a consultant in IT, and with the portfolio he stopped work when he was 42, I think. So, he is now following his dream, which is being a full-time artist. He does photorealistic art, and you can have a look at ‘ToddSimpsonArt.Com’. Beautiful works; they go into The Archibald and the portrait exhibitions in London, etc. So, he's following his dreams and unfortunately I don't have a hobby that I could check out with and spend all day at. My hobby is kind of teaching other people, so I'm also following my dream and doing what I love, which is helping others. And, I've got a nine-year-old son who keeps us entertained. As of the weekend, I am the proud completer and designer of a Nerf gun arsenal storage shadow board. So you know, the things that I can do are amazing.

Tyrone Shum:
(5:10) Family always is fun, especially with children as well.

Jane Slack-Smith: 
(5:14) You never know when someone’s going to jump out from behind a wall and shoot you with a Nerf gun in my house.

Tyrone Shum:
Aside from the exciting homelife, how does Slack-Smith spend her time?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(5:32) Essentially, I have the mortgage broking business and I have the education business. So, in a given day I might have three to four discovery calls with new clients who are looking for finance, and we just work out whether we're a good fit in working together because I don't believe that everyone works together well, so for me it's really important in providing some understanding of what each party needs in a relationship so that we can go on, because I really want to be a part of people’s long-term goals rather than a one-and-done kind of loan provider. And then, the rest of the time we're usually in pre-production for podcasts and videos and looking at how to do virtual reality, exciting things with our new videos and looking at how we can update our courses and material for our students. A lot of time is spent assisting the community on our private Facebook pages in answering questions and putting them in touch and getting them to the results that they want. So yeah, a pretty full day.

Tyrone Shum:
So what kind of services does she provide for her clients and students? 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(6:55) One of the things when I started investing, and that was, you know, looking around 1999 [or] 2000, so I guess, you know, almost 17 years of investing, was that there were a few books. Jan Somers, I loved her books. And Robert Kiyosaki. And there were a few educators out there, but you never knew who to trust, and there was always, you know, ‘Buy my course’. And then, ‘Get my loan!’ Or whatever someone was selling. And it was kind of that feeling that it was a transaction. And for me, it's about the stories, and it's about the people, and it's about getting people to a place, that might just be an ‘aha’ moment. I spoke to a lady today who thought that she could do nothing, because her borrowing capacity leads to a purchase price of $160,000. 

GETTING PEOPLE TO THEIR GOALS IS HER MOTIVATION 

(7:49) And we talked about areas and the fundamentals of low risk investing and, you know, looking for infrastructure and population growth and economic growth. And we highlighted a few areas that she could afford. And she was just, she was so excited. She said, ‘This is a revelation to me, I feel I can almost breathe again, because I really want to invest, but I feel that I can't get into the market’. So it's just those moments that for me make my day complete, and which are really exciting for me. So yeah, that's pretty much what we do, provide courses. ‘Ultimate Guide to Renovation’ is our premium course that comes out twice a year, in February and September. We have a ‘Your Property Success Club’, which is a 12 month club, giving people you know, at a much lower price point, but really good quality information every month, because I know that not everyone can afford, you know, fancy courses. And, you know, we do a lot of monthly Q&A calls and support. And for me, it's helping people get over maybe just a tiny little roadblock that they think could stop them. And moving forward. And that moving forward to us is, you know, why we do what we do is getting people to their goals. 

Tyrone Shum:
(9:03) Yeah, that's really good. And it's really inspiring to hear that you're helping in impacting quite a lot of people there. And I know a lot of listeners out there want to be able to get involved in this. Because the fact is, there are so many experts out there, or so-called experts, and you don't know who to trust. And I think the good thing is that you've already proven success with the many years that you've been in the market teaching people on this as well.

**BREAK MUSIC**

Tyrone Shum:
Unconventionally, Slack-Smith started off in the mining industry. How did that come about, and what inspired her change of careers into the property industry?  

Jane Slack-Smith:
(9:46) I had a very wise person tell me once that it wasn't really important what you studied, it was the fact that you learned how to study and learn how to learn. So I knew that I had to have a scholarship to go to university and you know, my family couldn't afford to send me off. And so I looked at where the scholarships were, where my skills were. And you know, they say that you have three careers in a lifetime these days. And that today's life expectancy is going to be a whole lot more in a few years time. So that’s a lot more than three even now!

(10:17) So I knew it wasn't a job for life, I knew it was an opportunity to learn. So I had a lot of strengths in engineering, they were looking for girls in engineering then. And although I don't believe in affirmative action, at the time, I kind of stumbled into the fact that there was promotion of women in engineering, and I looked at all the different engineering courses and a lot of them just seemed to be boring, you know, you’re designing something, and you never get out there and do things. In mining engineering, you learned a bit of mechanical, a bit of civil, you did surveying and geology and you're driving a Ute around big mines, you know, telling dozer drivers what to do and blowing stuff up. 

COMING ACROSS ADVERSITY DIDN’T STOP HER

(10:55) And then I worked underground for a year on night shift as a labourer because there's belief that you can't become a manager and tell other people what to do until you've done it yourself, which I, you know, grew up with, cleaning up stables on the farm. So, you know, we were always pitching in and doing things. But I was the first girl to work in underground coal mines. Another girl and I turned up at the same day, two different mines, after they changed the laws back in 1989 to let women underground, and everyone went on strike. It's amazing to think in our lifetime, there were still those kinds of things going on. But there was, you know, some adversities to get over and, and you just had to get in and do the work and prove that you were willing to learn. And that's what I did. 

(11:42) And I had a really great relationship, had a wonderful career, and a very successful career in the mining industry. But after building a really good portfolio and having so many people ask how, ‘How do you do it?’ And sitting on a mine site waiting to push a button for, you know, a mountain to blow up. People were asking what to do, and I was doing all these kind of toolbox talks on mine sites all around Australia. And I thought, ‘Well, if people are really interested, I could teach this. And I like teaching’. So yeah, that's how I kind of moved from mining onwards. 

MINING ENGINEER BY DAY, PROPERTY RENOVATOR BY NIGHT 

(12:23) So what I was doing was at that time, I was working for a company that was an explosives company, and as an expert, different mine sites would ask me to come and design glasses for them, or do safety audits or, you know, do incident analysis of something that went wrong. So I got by virtue of that, to go to most mine sites throughout Australia. And whilst I was on the mine sites, they'd go, ‘Hey, what have you been up to?’ I’m like, ‘Ah, well, I'm going back to Sydney to renovate a house this weekend’. And they’re like, ‘What? Tell me about it’. So naturally, one thing would lead to another and they're like, ‘How are you doing this?’ I'm like, ‘How are you not doing it? We're on the same income’. So we sat and chatted about how you can make your money work for you, rather than you work for your money. Robert Kiyosaki.

Tyrone Shum:
(13:14) Okay, which is really interesting that you said that. So for example, back then, I don't know if it's changed a lot, but I know that back then mining was paid quite well. So there was obviously a lot of cash flow coming through there. Do you think you had enough money back then to just buy property? Or did you have to renovate in order to actually buy more investment properties?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(13:35) Well, I, like most people, went from a university income of $10,000 a year to a first year graduate income of like, $75,000 a year and my lifestyle expanded quite substantially. I remember getting my first credit card, going, ‘Oh my gosh, this is amazing. I can buy an origin handbag, and I don't have to pay for it’. And then I realised a few months later that I did have to pay for it. I was very much into that disposable world, you know, I hadn't come from an affluent background. So having money, I could help my parents, I could help my sister through school and put her through university. I could, you know, go on holidays. So I did all of that. And I didn't save a lot.

(14:27) And then when I hit 28, and sat down and had the moment with ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’, I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, what am I doing? I'm going to have to help my parents when they retire. Because they'll be on the couple's income because they haven't got, you know, investments that they can fall back on. And I've only got a certain amount of time to do this. So I smartened up. I read a lot of books about budgeting and you know, I had decided to withdraw all of my pay every week. And you know, I'd had green money, silver money, gold money, so I'd have savings money, money I could spend and save, and money that was available for very long term savings and I built up savings of $45,000. And essentially, I then went and did a lot—I was based in Melbourne at the time—I did a lot of research about the suburbs within 10k's that I could afford, most of them I couldn't. 

CAREFUL RESEARCH AND PLANNING ENSURED HER A SUCCESSFUL FIRST TIME INVESTMENT 

(15:21) I came up with three suburbs which were Fitzroy, Collingwood and Carlton. And I just walked the streets and got to know them intimately, to the point where, you know, you go to auctions and predict the price within 1%. And I knew that because I was able to use all of my $45,000 that if I wanted to buy a second property quickly, I had to create equity, or because my savings would take too long. So the renovation strategy was around creating that equity quickly. So I bought my first property for $425,000. $25,000 went straight to stamp duty. So I had a 5% deposit. And then nine months later that $425,000 property was revalued at $700,000. So I took a personal loan out and did a $50,000 renovation. And then I pulled out $100,000 and went to Sydney and did it for the next property and pulled out money, and did it again and built up the portfolio very quickly by using no more than that first $45,000 to contribute to buying the properties.

Tyrone Shum:
(16:23) That's very smart. And I think by doing that you really leapfrog very fast into different parts of the market very quickly. And what time was that when you first started investing in Melbourne? 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(16:33) So 2001 on April Fool's Day, no. So Patrick’s Day. My business was registered on April Fool's Day in 2005. But my first investment property was St. Patrick's Day in 2001.

Tyrone Shum:
(16:47) Wow. How did you feel when you first bought your first property?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(16:50) Oh, my gosh, I felt like every property since. Like buyer's remorse. You're like, ‘Oh, my God, what have I done?’ And then you sit down, go, ‘I've done the numbers, I've done the research, I understand the risks. I've minimised the risks. It's right’. I think when I speak to clients, and we've got people putting in offers on properties every day, and I do reviews for our clients to just make sure that the property fits their buying criteria. And every single time, you know, those people who are not feeling buyer's remorse, I have a few worries about it. And I make sure I also ask extra questions. Because I think they need to understand we're not talking about, you know, buying a packet of chips, we're playing with hundreds of thousands of dollars and potential to create, you know, financial freedom in the future. So it's a big decision. And I think, you know, it should be taken, not lightly. So buyer's remorse is definitely a good thing.

Tyrone Shum:
(17:49) It's something that should be a natural instinct, but some people might not just have it because they just look simply at the numbers.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(17:55) It’s when it actually proves itself correctly in the long term that you could have a worry, but in that seven day cooling off period, if you can satisfy all your worries and concerns, then yes, it's a good thing to move on.

Tyrone Shum:
Slack-Smith went from mining engineer to property investor and renovator, to teacher. At what point did she feel confident enough to turn the teaching into a business?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(18:41) It was more about sharing. So I thought, well, if I can do this, I want to share this with my family and friends. So I actively talk to my best friends, and, you know, my sisters had multi-million-dollar property portfolios, and I wanted to assist them. And then, you know, their friends would hear about what they'd done and how they'd located a great property in a great area and rented it out quickly or added some value to renovation, but it was all about the location that I felt was missing in the education. And as an engineer, that kind of, you know, Excel spreadsheets and using the internet, that was where my forte was.

(19:16) So, you know, just teaching people how to do that was important to me. And then, essentially, when people kept asking, I thought, you know, at some point, I need to have some protection around my portfolio in case someone takes my story as advice, and it goes wrong, and the only way I could do that was as a mortgage broker. So for me, you know, although loans and financing is arguably the starting point to building a portfolio and understanding that, and getting it right. I saw so many people set up with the wrong loans and with banks who were trying to help them out but hadn't structured them correctly and had limited their ability to buy and could not achieve their goals. 

IT’S ALL ABOUT YOUR GOALS

(20:00) So my whole conversation with people around their finance needs is about what the goals are. And it's about the property, it's not about the loan and how the property fits into the portfolio to achieve the goals and the timeframe that people want. So I guess I did things a little differently, in the sense that, to me, it was all about that journey, and having long term clients and being on that journey for the long term with them. So, you know, I provide different services to most mortgage brokers, because I want to facilitate, I think, the total package of what people need when they buy properties that are difficult to get when you're starting out.

Tyrone Shum:
(20:39) Yeah, absolutely. Especially when you're just starting out, as you mentioned, you've kind of got no idea where to start. You know, some people just delve in because they think, ‘Okay, there's a good property, we think that's got the right things’. They buy it, but they don't realise that the structure is so important, because it helps you buy the second, the third and the future properties. I've heard lots of stories of people that have got stuck only on one property, because they didn't structure correctly.

JUST BECAUSE IT’S CHEAP DOESN'T MEAN IT’S A GOOD DEAL

Jane Slack-Smith:
(21:05) I remember there was this one guy, and we talked about how he wanted passive income of $50,000, in 10 years time. And he rang up really excited. He said, ‘I found this property’, and it was like Kempsey, or something, not to say anything against Kempsey. But I pulled up these residents reports, and like, there's zero growth predicted, and there's high vacancy rights, and he said, ‘Yeah, but it's cheap. It's the guy next to my dad's place, and we don't have to go through an agent. So I'm getting it $10,000 cheaper’. And we could see that in the next 10 years, it was still going to be worth $250,000, it was gonna cost $5,000 a year, with the difference between his costs and the income we pulled in, and it had nothing to do with getting him to his goals.

(21:44) And, you know, it was kind of that ‘aha’ moment when I thought, providing people with some thoughts and direction is one thing, but being very focused on delivering a quality education that people can go through at their own pace, and not turn up for a weekend and get the rah rah excitement, but then you get back home and have life kind of hit you in the face. I want people to have a resource they could go to time and time again. And I looked around Australia, and I couldn't find anyone doing online education, full of integrity and honesty and kind of like, ‘Here’s the facts’, and you know, ‘Take the information and do it yourself’. There's no kind of steak knives being thrown in. So I went to the States, and I found an educator over there and spent a year being mentored, just flying backwards and forwards from Australia, and learning best practices in trying to educate people in the best way in adult education.

THE COMMUNITY SPIRIT AND INVOLVEMENT WAS WELL WORTH THE MONEY SPENT ON DEVELOPING THE BUSINESS 

(22:43) Probably could have bought a house with what I had put into developing the education platform, to be able to communicate those stories and sharings. And, yeah, in the last five years, the community that we've built and the students that we have, they're just so lovely, and so supportive. And, you know, just people in the private Facebook groups, you know, they might be saying, ‘Hey, there's a deal online, I'm getting a Ute together to go down and pick it up’. And then someone will say, ‘Yes, we want to help, I can pick up stuff for you and drop it off’. Or they'll be someone else saying, you know, ‘Quick, I need a roof repair here’. And there’s people jumping online and giving people numbers, or, you know, ‘Here's a property I've been looking at, what do you think I could do with the floor plan?’ And it's just the generosity of spirit and that community involvement that I'm just so proud of. And that's what I wanted, I wanted somewhere that people could go and feel that they could have a safe place to discuss property investing without having your friends and family going, ‘Hmmm’.

Tyrone Shum:
(23:45) That's what's missing out in the market a lot of times, and by having that kind of community, I think it just formed a local command ship and also encouragement and support. And that's what we all need. Because this is not a journey that is easily expressed to a lot of people, it's kind of a bit of a lonely journey, if you're not dealing with any partners and stuff. And that's why you need the support. And I totally agree that the community you've set up sounds fantastic.

Jane Slack-Smith: 
(24:08) And it's sometimes you know, it's really hard for married people who, when one's really keen to invest and the other isn't, there's a lot of tension around that. And, often there's a fear of losing your hard earned nest egg. And it's about taking the fear away by understanding the risks, and minimising those risks, and having a conversation about it being a step by step process, that location is key, you know, and that's why we spend so much time where we've developed the suburb selecter software and, and all these different location courses and things to really help people target that, and you know, tools like RP Data professional that I personally, for my mortgage pre-approved clients, I pay the three months of the pre-approval period to give people access to that. Because I'm so focused on helping people you know, make sure that they have the right resources and to be able to find the right property in the right area. And, you know, there's a lot of free and unpaid resources. Just take a little bit of extra work, to make them work for you. But there's also a great amount of paid resources that people can use. And I think just having everything in one place where people can learn where to do it is really important as well. 

Tyrone Shum:
(25:22) Absolutely. And I think you're offering a fantastic package there in service for the people who at least, you know, you're giving them complimentary things that they don't usually know even to access, a lot of people probably may not even know that this stuff existed until they actually found you.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(25:38) That's right, and there’s new websites popping up all the time, you know, and it's really exciting to kind of test them out and, and try to break them and see how I can manipulate them for my communities better good. Like, ‘Hey, instead of paying for access, or doing like a half-an-hour trying to find this information or census, if you go to this website, you can find it in a few seconds’. And I think, you know, as an investor, we can waste hours and hours on the internet searching without really knowing what the destination is. And being really clear on the goal, and then your buying criteria, and then finding the suburbs and then the pockets of potential within the suburbs and then the right property to suit the demographic. You follow those simple steps. And, you know, you're working with the, I guess, foundations of a really good portfolio.

Tyrone Shum:
Stepping back, Slack-Smith takes us back to the beginnings of her property journey. 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(26:45) I was resistant to property, actually Tyrone. I was very resistant. My boss kept saying to me, ‘When are you going to get a mortgage? So I know that I have you for life’. So I just thought, ‘Oh, my gosh’. And the word mort is death, right? So mortgage means death. So I was thinking, ‘Well, there's no way I'm going to be tied down to the white picket fence. You know, I'm footloose and fancy free, I'm only 28’. And so I had a lot of fear around the property investment. And like a lot of people, I didn't realise that you could invest in property without owning your own home. So, you know, I decided that I needed to create a financial future of security for myself. So after I read ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’, I went and signed up to Australian Stock Exchange courses, and I did all of their courses. And then I spreadsheet-ed it and paper traded all of these shares just on a spreadsheet and didn't actually put my money in my pocket for anything.

(27:45) And I couldn't believe it, I'd come up with this great, you know, analysis of a company, and they’d then go and change the board, or they’d change their strategic direction. And all my research had gone out the window and I had no control. And then for my 30th birthday, I decided that I would pay for three financial planners to assist me in putting a plan together, and two of them just wanted to go into shares, and that's when I found out that financial planners are really salespeople. It was the pair of planners in the background that were doing all the work, but they were only confined by the product that they were allowed to sell. So, that really confused me. And then one guy wanted to day trade for my shares, which I don't even think financial planners legally could do. And I asked them about property and they said, ‘Well, financial planners are not allowed to talk about property, because it's not a listed property, you know, security class’. So that all changed only just a few years ago. So I was kind of on my own. So I made this investment, my $45,000. 

THE FIRST ONE’S THE HARDEST

(29:00) I basically monitored what the shares would have been done under the recommendations of the two brokers and financial planners. And I did my property investing at the same time. And obviously, you know, I made like $175,000 in nine months with the property investing and the one lot of shares that I put my $45,000 in would have gone up to $50,000. And the other one went down to about $42,000. So that's it. And my husband had done property investing in New Zealand, where he was from, and he had a little business whilst he was at uni, mowing lawns, and there was like a 24 year old guy who said, ‘Come mow my investment property lawn’. And he said, ‘You did a good job, can you mow the other ones?’ And my husband said, ‘How did you get so many?’ And he said, ‘That first one's the hardest. And once you get the right one, for the first one, you can build your portfolio’. So he was really inspired and when we started dating, he was telling me about property investing, and I was still very reticent. So I was a reticent latecomer to property investing, albeit the fact that I did buy my first property when I was 31. 

Tyrone Shum:
Being naturally cautious, Slack-Smith worked hard to avoid making mistakes by learning from others.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(30:29) Being a really low risk person, it was so imperative to me that I pretty much knocked the risk out of every single thing that I did. And as I said, I've been curious, as a lifetime learner, I also wanted to read everyone's books. And you know, I've got 135 books on property on my bookshelf at the moment. And I really wanted to learn from others' mistakes, so I didn't make them. So you know, I'd go to these seminars, and let's be honest, there's not that much new stuff in property investing, and you go to seminars, and they'd be saying the same thing, but I then wanted to listen to the stories about what they did wrong, because most people get up and go, ‘I lost everything, and then I rebuilt it’. I want to know what mistakes they made to lose everything, so that I never had to do that. So I had the opportunity to jump on the shoulders of those giants. Jump ahead and over the mistakes that they've made. So I can't claim a devastating investing blow at all. I thought at one stage that a property that I'd done all the research for in Darlington near Newtown in Sydney was a bit of a dog, but it did 25% last year. So we're okay with that.
There was a bit of a delay on what I had expected in the growth potential. 

Tyrone Shum:
So what about renovation? Did she manage to avoid mistakes in that area of property too? 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(32:13) I think with renovation, it's a lot about being a bit of a detective sometimes, and being solution orientated. Obviously, you have to be a good project manager as well, and I realised very quickly, I wasn't the person who was going to be on the tools. So, you know, the first properties we bought, were actually, I bought a property and my husband bought a property beside mine, so we thought we'd, you know, we had no money left, you know, we were living around the corner from this wonderful eat street but couldn't afford to eat there and, you know, the kitchen had been ripped out and we're living on, you know, two minute noodles kind of things during the renovation.

SHE WOULD PAINT FOR 20 HOURS EVERY WEEKEND, AND IN ANY SPARE TIME DURING THE WEEK  

(32:54) And I guess looking at the renovation plans that we had, we had a very, very tight budget of what we could achieve. So, you know, we had to paint, so we were up at six o'clock painting, to seven-thirty every morning before work, getting home at six-thirty, painting till ten-thirty at night, doing 20 hours of painting every weekend. And we did that for three months for one property, a three storey huge big property. And then my work wanted me to move to Sydney, we got a painter in to do the other side, exact same meterage, and he did it in five days. And at that time, I was like, you know, I think my time's worth more than this.

(33:34) And other than, you know, I went and did a quick ceiling paint after a renovation in a property in Sydney last year to do touch ups and things. But I was never—I gotta be honest—I was never a great painter. I paint the ceiling, my husband says, ‘We need another coat’. I'm like, ‘It's dulux! One coat paint’. He's like, ‘No, we need another coat’. So he's definitely the finisher. But, you know, I knew my skills are in locating the property and project managing the team and getting the right team together. And that's what I really concentrated on after that. And looking at the potential, making sure that the property had the renovation potential and the differential between unrenovated and renovated properties in the area to be able to create the money. So yep, that's where I concentrate my time. And effort.

**ADVERTISEMENT**

Tyrone Shum:
Coming up, Slack-Smith discusses her relationship with debt.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(00:45) He said, ‘Babe, you better be careful, one day you will owe a million dollars’. And I thought, ‘Buggar. I better not tell him I already do!’ 

Tyrone Shum:
We learn about the adversity she faced in her years of mining.

Jane Slack Smith:
(3:13) And you know, when you're on a mine site, and 300 men are on strike, because they don't want to work with a girl, you've got to sit back and go, you know, ‘Why am I doing this?’

Tyrone Shum:
we discuss her motivation, and how it’s helped her to achieve her current success. 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(7:52) Yeah, look, I'm on a constant quest for learning and doing my best and excelling at it. So I really want to learn from those that are at the top of their game.

Tyrone Shum:
And that’s coming up. I’m Tyrone Shum and you’re listening to Property Investory.

**END ADVERTISEMENT**

Tyrone Shum:
We discuss the mental blocks which can occur especially during the first years of becoming an investor. 

Jane Slack-Smith: 
(0:29) I ran up against this regularly and I think concerned and well meaning friends and family can possibly be something that can hold you back. And I remember having a chat with my dad and he said, ‘Babe, you better be careful, one day you will owe a million dollars’. And I thought, ‘Buggar. I better not tell him I already do!’ So you know, I think a lot of people hear stories around what can go wrong, and you know, I've spoken to a lot of people and I know there's people who've been on your podcast, who are professionals these days, who started out because their dads were taken advantage of, and you know, lost the family fortune, and they wanted to make the world a better place by making that not happen to other people in the future.

THE INTERNET IS A GOOD PLACE TO BE THESE DAYS 

(1:17) So, you know, there's some terrible stories about things that go wrong. And, and I think, you know, the real estate industry does have a lot of spruiking, and people who are in it for themselves, associated with the industry. However, the wonderful thing is, there's so many people that are genuinely out there to assist us. And I think, you know, we've seen a real change in the real estate industry and the level of education and support. Even something as simple as a whole new industry of buyer's agents popping up in the last 10 years. You know, there's so many different ways that you can get into property these days, but there's also so much information available, free and paid, on the internet that people can use to validate their decisions on buying. So, you know, I think it's a good place to be these days.

Tyrone Shum:
What mindset did she have to adopt to implement the renovation strategy.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(2:29) I was very fortunate as a child, my mum used to always say to my sister and I, ‘You can do anything you try, and you can achieve anything you want to achieve. And you can even fly, you know, if you have God's help’. And so she was very motivational. And, you know, we were always set up with the premise that we could achieve anything we put our minds to, and rightly or wrongly, you know, but there's been some interesting experiences where I thought I could do things that possibly I couldn't. But going into any situation, thinking of success, and visualising what the success looks like, has definitely been a key to everything that I've ever done. 

(3:13) And you know, when you're on a mine site, and 300 men are on strike, because they don't want to work with a girl, you've got to sit back and go, you know, ‘Why am I doing this? And what am I concentrating on doing? And why do I want to be here?’ So understanding and being very much anchored by what you're trying to achieve is really important. And it's the same with renovation and property investing. You know, I speak to a lot of people who have a portfolio and I'll look through the fact finder I've got. ‘You've got five properties here’. But I can tell by looking at these every single day, you know, who they've been listening to, where they've got their advice from, you know, and usually you can see someone has a strategic strategy to get to where they want to be. 

SHE SEES WHAT’S WRONG IN OTHERS STRATEGIES AND WANTS TO FIX IT FOR THEM. 

(3:53) And often you look at these portfolios, and they have one place in a regional mining town and another place in, you know, another area that's maybe off the plan or the house and land package. There's no consistency, and it's like they've just jumped to the next hot thing that's come along or been in a magazine. And I think the thing that is the downfall of a lot of people is the fact that they don't start with their goals. So, understand the goals, understand what they need in order to achieve the goals in the timeframe and then focus everything around that, understand your own risk profile and what is acceptable to what you want to do. And you know, when I talk about that, it's like high risk would be developments, low risk would be buy and hold. And understand your strategy and the timeframe to achieve the strategy and what the property has to do to achieve the success it needs to get you to your goals on time. 

(4:47) And then you've got a very tight buying criteria. Once you have that buying criteria, you know, you can easily look at properties and dismiss them if they don't fit it. And you know, we've developed this suburb selecter software that allows people to go through and, you know, I run these location workshops around the country, a one day workshop. And so often, you know, the 10 people in the room, we might have 30 suburbs that are on our shortlist. And I have very strict criteria, if there's not more than 30% renters, they’re out. They’re like, ‘But all the other fundamentals, you know, stand up’. And I’m like, ‘Look, we only need three to four suburbs. There's so many that we don't need to waste our time on, why don't we take out the ones with the biggest risk first?’ 

(5:31) And you can be quite ruthless when you understand what your criteria is. And that's where you can get down to the suburb analysis and understand what suburbs gain to deliver the results you want. And then then you can get down in understanding what streets within the suburbs where renters want to be. And then you can find the right property. So for me, you can take a lot of risk out of everything, by understanding a process and just following it.

Tyrone Shum:
(5:53) Yeah, I love that approach. Because it really, it's like, if you have a step by step plan in place, there's nothing that can really go wrong, because you've actually thought it through carefully. And you're structured everything carefully as well, too. And as you mentioned, it comes back down to you why when you first start, because I mean, anyone can just go buy a property, whether it be you know, down the road or in a different state. But when it actually comes down to making numbers work and investing in a property that will generate income for you or capital growth, it's really a process, isn't it?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(6:25) It is. I spoke to a lady last year, and she had said to me, ‘But we really got it wrong. We bought a house and land package in the outskirts of Melbourne. There were other developers there, there was an oversupply, you know, so we had a house in the outskirts, it didn't work for us. So now we're going to buy a unit in a city’. And I was like, ‘How are you minimizing your risk?’ She said, ‘Well, it's not a house, it's a unit, and it's not outskirts, it's in town’. And I was like, ‘The risk is the same. It's an oversupply risk’. And she’s just like, ‘Oh, I didn't think about it like that’. And you know, it's kind of just getting people over that little ‘aha’ moment like, ‘Oh, my gosh, I was about to repeat the same mistake’.

Tyrone Shum:
(7:06) Yeah. It's interesting, it's very interesting. And I think it also comes back down to having a third opinion or second opinion, to be able to see, because it's very easy to get delved into your own world thinking, I think I've chosen the right property. But then when you actually look and get someone's opinion on it, especially an expert, then they may give you a better insight into which you may not have even noticed at all.

**BREAK MUSIC**

Tyrone Shum:
Being a keen learner, Slack-Smith has been influenced by her fair share of mentors. 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(7:52) Yeah, look, I'm on a constant quest for learning and doing my best and excelling at it. So I really want to learn from those that are at the top of their game. And you know, back in 2011, I was looking around, I thought, ‘If I'm going to make my next significant investment it’s not going to be in property, it's going to be providing education for people so they can have good education in property. Who's the best in educating?’ And I wanted to see who was doing online education because obviously, if you're doing face to face education, you're limited by the number of people you can affect change with. 

AUTHENTICITY IS KEY

(8:26) And, you know, I had the opportunity of being the finance and property writer for ‘Australian Women's Weekly’ for a period of time. I created some videos to help people work out how to get from their home to maybe their first investment property or buy their home a bit better. And I can see that by having access to something online, it was giving people the opportunity to learn in their own timeframe and to be able to go back and look at it again. So I thought, you know, I want to find online educators who could teach me how to do this property properly. And you know, with integrity. I just wanted to be able to be authentic and be who I am and you know, deliver the kind of no BS message.

(9:12) So you know, it wasn't really covered with all the glitz and glamour. And I couldn't find that in Australia. So I looked overseas and I found a mentor there and I spent a significant amount of time and money flying backwards and forwards being part of Mastermind Group and being part of a group of like minded people and in a community. And regardless whether it's property investing, photography or cat raising, whatever it is that your passion is...being part of a community of like minded people, being supported and understanding and speaking the same language is so important. So I just got the most amazing learnings from that and that's when I came back and started ‘Your Property Success’ with the view of passing my knowledge and creating it. Meaning they could share their knowledge.

Tyrone Shum:
Slack-Smith shares some of the mentors she found along the way.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(10:09) So Brendon Burchard was the first mentor I worked with, ‘The Experts Academy’. And then I looked at how to actually deliver online education. So the actual mechanisms and technology behind it. So I looked at Jeff Walker, and I've recently been part of ‘Mastermind Group’ with Dean Jackson, who has a great podcast, ‘I love marketing’, and genuinely I love marketing, I love the opportunity to be able to talk to people and influence in the right way of changing things thinking that will then lead them on a journey to go on as a quest to learn something more. 

(10:42) And yeah, so they're the people I'm working with. For the last year, I haven't been with a mentor. And I know the importance of being stretched and held accountable with mentoring, and I'm heading out to spend four days with a new mentor that I'm working with next week. So he works with, I think, eight people a year. So I'm really excited about that. So yeah, it's kind of, what's the saying? It's, you know, when the time is right the master will come, I think?

Tyrone Shum:
(11:10) Oh, yes. When the student is ready, the master will appear.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(11:14) Yeah, grasshopper.

FIND YOURSELF A COMMUNITY

Jane Slack-Smith:
(11:17) So, I've been a grasshopper many a time. And, you know, as you grow and learn something from someone, it's time to move on. And that's been a great opportunity for me, and I've recently joined a fabulous group also, called ‘The League of Extraordinary Women’, and just a fabulous group of business women, incredibly successful, incredibly generous, they have wonderful events, and just, you know, listening to what other business people go through, and what they've had as great successes and values and supporting each other is fabulous. So I really encourage your listeners to, if you are keen on property investing, find yourself a community where you can have a chat about it, because it really makes for helping you get to your goals sooner.

Tyrone Shum:
(12:03) Yeah, I totally agree. And I'm all for getting mentors and coaches as well, too, because it really does help with, I guess, accountability, but also at the same time, they can also give you guidance that you might not see within yourself, because it's very easy to just think that you know, everything, but you actually don't. 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(12:21) Absolutely. So one of the services I provide for my pre-approved mortgage clients is, if they find a property, and they want a second set of eyes, I do review with them. And this client kept coming up with these properties—and it's a review against their buying criteria—and they just weren't meeting his buying criteria. And we looked at the big picture and the suburb actually didn't meet any of the criteria. So I was saying to him, ‘Look, if this buying criteria is what you need to get to your goals, then you're going to have to move suburbs and do some more analysis’. 

(12:55) And he was saying, ‘It's just taken me three months of analysis to do this. I don't want to move on’. It's like, ‘Well, you know, investing in a 10-15 year plan here, another three months, and getting the right suburb so it delivers your plan for you sooner, is probably better’. And you know, since then, he found the right suburb, and then the right property and you know, put that one to bed. But you know, sometimes you have to kind of move on and sacrifice a bit of time. But you do learn from it, and you learn to get quicker at the processing.

Tyrone Shum:
(13:23) Yeah, it's like opportunity cost at the end of day, you can spend all that time, you've got to sometimes decide, is it really worth continuing or do you keep pursuing it? And sometimes it's just to let it go. If it's not right, then you have to move on to the next step.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(13:38) And there's a grieving period there, I speak to a lot of people like, you know, they might miss out on auction on the dream property thereafter. But you know, if you're very clear on what you want, it's amazing how often within the next 10 days, the right property comes up for them.

Tyrone Shum:
(13:53) It's all emotion, sometimes you gotta separate it out. Yeah. emotion versus logic. And did you seek any mentors also for renovating, when you were building up your equity through that path?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(14:07) Yeah. Back in 2000 and 2001, when I started renovating, there were no renovating experts out there. And so I really had to derive my own knowledge about what would work. And so once again, I went back to the basics of, what's the risk? And the risk is that you over-capitalize or you renovate and people don't like the renovation and my whole key around renovating, and the reason I renovated was for the value up. So getting that valuation up so I could pull equity was the number one reason that I wanted to renovate. The second one was to have it appeal to a renter, so that the renter would rent it and I'd have low vacancies and high rental yields.

(14:48) So, you know, for me, I then worked out that it was the pricing disparity or the difference between unrenovated and renovated properties that was going to be the key to that strategy, and then doing the analysis and finding out, what were the properties that were renovated on the market? How much were they selling for? What was the unrenovated property worth? How much would it cost me to get the unrenovated to the renovated, and was there a profit there? And for a lot of suburbs, there is no pricing disparity between renovated and unrenovated. So many properties deserved to be renovated, but very, very, very few should be. So it was finding that out. That was, I guess, the secret to the success that I then shared with everyone.

Tyrone Shum:
She shares some of the things she looks out for when considering renovations. 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(15:56) I was always looking for the twist. So how could I take a property and take it to a higher value, and better value, and do it as quickly as possible, so I could create more equity to build my portfolio quickly? Because I didn't want to be an active property investor that’s, you know, out there looking at properties every day, I wanted to have a set and forget portfolio that just goes up in value by a million bucks a year, you know, how nice would that be?

(16:23) So I wanted to get there as quickly as possible. And so I found a suburb that had the pricing disparity, Carlton. I then looked at what the fixtures and fittings and standards were, that the renovated properties were selling for. And then I looked at the property that I had, and worked out how I could find those fixtures and fittings at a cheaper price that had the same perceived value, but didn't have their cost. So it was around sourcing the right properties from the right areas and finding and sourcing in those, and putting them in place.

Tyrone Shum: 
(17:09) Just to ask to put in perspective, what kind of house did you buy in the Carlton area, and what was the average pricing so we can sort of get an idea?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(17:14) The average prices were around $400,000. So you know, back in 2001. We kept driving up and down this street, and it was one of the premium streets and had these beautiful mansions in them. Three storey, 1860 built, you know, brick properties. And we said, ‘One day, this is our end goal’. And what came up was that two of these properties were being sold under the same bill of sale. So instead of saying, you know, going once, twice, $400,000 it was going once, twice $800,000. So different titles, one bill of sale, and my husband and I, my then boyfriend and I, were looking at buying a property each, because I wanted to minimise my risk just in case the relationship didn't go well!

(18:05) And I knew that our borrowing capacities were going to be higher individually and less land tax and benefits etc. So, you know, I knew strategically buying individually was a good way to start. So these properties were, you know, three storey, 1860, beautiful old mansions, essentially, that had been built, you know, within a kilometre of CBD, Melbourne, and hadn't been fixed or touched for a long period of time. And my husband had a higher borrowing capacity than I did. And he took the one that had the parking at the back and had a little bit more renovation done. 

SOMETIMES IT’S IMPORTANT TO PUSH YOUR LUCK

(18:46) And mine was, you know, really in a bad condition. So, we actually used the pest and building inspection, and we used the resident valuation report as part of the negotiating tool because when we got to auction it was passed in with the highest bidder. And we went in and said, ‘Gee, you know, look at this pest and building report, it says it's got about $50,000 of works just to make it livable. And, you know, the comparable sales in the street are this.’ And luckily, the vendor said, ‘Okay, fair enough’. And we got the property.

(19:24) And having, you know, access to those material reports, etc. gave us some credibility, rather than saying, ‘I just don't want to pay any more’. So they were sitting there going, ‘Well, if this person thinks this, the next person that gets a pest and building inspection, you know, they're gonna think the same thing’. So, you know, bought it for $425,000, did the $50,000 renovation on it, had it revalued nine months later at $900,000. In 2009 I did a bit of a top up to it as well, as I always rented it since then at $1,000 a week. It's worth around $1.4 million now. And, yep, great location, great property always in demand. I've only ever had three tenancy agreements in that 15 years. So people just keep wanting to rent there. And yeah it's a great little cornerstone for the portfolio.

Tyrone Shum:
(20:19) That's great. So from there, you were able to start that first property off, and then leapfrog to your next property by drawing out that equity to buy other properties, is that right? 

Jane Slack-Smith:
(20:29) Yeah, and we were rent-vestors for 10 years. So we rented ourselves and bought investment properties, often we'd move into an investment property, we had a little unit, on the beach front at Bondi Beach, we moved in there over winter, when no one went, and did a three month renovation and enjoyed that, and then moved out and rented ourselves. So often, just to save some money, we were living in renovations. And anyone who's ever done that, you know how bad that is. You’re covered in plaster dust going to work and, you know, you're cooking in a microwave for months on end. But you know, when you're making more out of the equity gain in a property within a few months, and you're making it work, it makes a difference. 

EVEN THOUGH SHE HAD THE OPPORTUNITY, JANE DIDN'T WANT TO GIVE UP HER DAY JOB

(21:09) And I know a lot of people look at those numbers, and they think, ‘I'm going to give up work or sell the property and release the equity straightaway’. We'd always had the strategy, it was around a buy and hold long term strategy. And work was fine. I mean, I don't want to give up work. So for me, it was around us having the choice to be able to work or not. But also, I knew that I needed to have a job for the borrowing capacity, which is so important, and with the changes of ethics and APA in 2016. You know, investors have to be savvy about what they do and their financing and have the right income to be able to continue investing, and so I knew that I wasn't going to be giving up a job anytime soon.

Tyrone Shum:
So what is Slack-Smith’s portfolio actually worth? And what’s her plan moving ahead?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(22:07) Well, great revelation here, I'm a very boring investor who walks the talk, you know, I wrote the book ‘Your Property Success with Renovation’, two properties, one renovation, a million dollars in the bank. I don't believe you need hundreds of properties, I don't believe you need to be trading properties. I know someone who has a home and accesses equity, who buys a property, has an equity growth that allows them to do a renovation in year three, and equity growth to be able to buy a second property in year five, who can set and forget their portfolio and within 15 years, sell it down. 

(22:44) If you have, you know, typical growth characteristics of an area, sell it down, pay off your mortgage, pay capital gains tax and put a million bucks in the bank. And, you know, for me, it was about having that simplicity. So, you know, we haven't bought a property for many years, and the portfolio goes up quite considerably, well located properties go up quite considerably every year. And this is a thing, it's worth around about $8 million now, with low LVR, just based on the equity.

Tyrone Shum:
(23:14)  And how many properties are there in that portfolio?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(23:17) Seven. They all started around about $400,000 to $500,000. 

Tyrone Shum:
(23:23) Yeah, so you're just a master in buy and hold. And that strategy allows you to be able to have that freedom, because you've got enough equity to be able to, I guess drawdown equity on that too. There are strategies out there. Do you believe in drawing out equity to live on for the lifestyle? Or do you rely on the cashflow?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(23:38) That was really big in 2003. Like, I know, I spoke to quite a few people about doing that. And now there is difficulty in living on borrowed money. And I know there's other people who've been on your podcast who even buy their cars. You and I both interviewed them. But you know, I don't think debt is bad by any stretch of the imagination. I think there's good debt and bad debt. And I know the reality is that a lot of people do live with some bad debt until they get to a position of, you know, managing the money better and understanding their goals and having that destination they can be anchored to, so that they can achieve what they want every day knowing what they're getting towards.

WORK OUT YOUR STRATEGIES AND RISK PROFILE

(24:24) But, you know, I've got clients, I mean, I obviously don't imply my strategies on all of my mortgage clients or my students, I've got clients that do developments, I've got students that are you know, doing granny flats, I've got people who do pull out equity and and live off equity. So, you know, I've got clients on $40,000 with $2 million portfolios, and you know, have been really strategic about how they've bought and been very clever when the lending environment was a bit easier. But, you know, I think that it's really horses for courses. You work out your strategies and your risk profile, and coming from the basis of your goals, and understanding how many properties and what they need to look like to get to your goal.

(25:17) And that's why I developed that calculator on ‘investorschoice.com.au’, the portfolio planner, because I know how hard it is for people to go, you know, ‘I want $100,000 income in 10 years time, how many properties does that mean? I need it now because there's capital gains, tax implications and all of those things’. And I think, you know, you just need to simply understand what you need to be shooting for, and then what are the property characteristics you need to do to achieve that for you? So, yeah, I think everyone has a different way to get there. And we haven't bought a property in many years, because we don't need to, don't want to, the property portfolio’s fine. You know, if I speak to my property managers, once every three months, I'm happy.

Tyrone Shum:
(25:54) Yeah, that's definitely one good thing about buying and holding and set and forget. Or not necessarily forget where you don't come back to it. But that's, you know, the lifestyle that allows you to have that freedom, because you know that property just does its thing.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(26:51) So I know that we've achieved, you know, over 100 million dollars worth of lending in the last couple of years, and helped clients get there. So there's that kind of, I guess, transferred satisfaction of getting people into the properties they want to be in and, you know, we’re kind of hands on, so we're interested in the properties they're buying, and where they're buying and having that conversation around their strategy as well. And also, you know, just the community of these students in the ‘Ultimate Guide to Renovation’ and ‘Your Property Success Club’ just seeing their renovations and their stories and what they're doing. Although I did two renovations last year on existing properties, I'm not actively out there renovating all the time. But it's nice to have a hand in, you know, looking at what other people are doing.

Tyrone Shum:
It’s clear Slack-Smith carries many positive habits and rituals which contribute to her daily success. But is there anything else?

Jane Slack-Smith:
(27:53) I'm really tenacious. So I'm curious and tenacious, so I don't give up. And I'm very disciplined. And so if I have a goal, or something that I want to achieve, regardless of my personal life, or professional aspirations, etc, I will do what it takes to—without hurting anyone or myself—to achieve that goal. So, you know, once I put my mind to something, I really give it my all and I guess, being tenacious is probably the dominant characteristic of that.

Tyrone Shum:
She has had some help along the way, through reading and self learning.

Jane Slack-Smith:
(28:45) I have a long list of books I recommend. Obviously Jan Somers, I think is probably the queen of property investing Australia. No risk, really simple. You know, she got the formula, she cracked it. And she shared it. She was a school teacher. She writes like a school teacher. It's very clear and concise, so that people starting out, I think Jan Somers is fabulous. I think from an inspirational point of view, you know, ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’ is great as well. There are so many writers, and there's so many books out there that it's amazing. And when the publishers approached me and asked me to write a book, I had 120 on my bookshelf, I was like, ‘There's nothing I can say that people want to know. It's different’.

(29:31) They're like, ‘Yeah, they probably just want to hear it in your voice’. So you're often what you read is very similar in some of the books, but there's always one absolute gem that I pick out. So I'm always reading our property books and trying to increase my knowledge and you know, our community's always recommending books to each other as well. But I'd start with the fundamentals. And I think, you know, ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’ and Jan Somers is probably a really good place to start.

**OUTRO**

Tyrone Shum:
Thank you to Jane Slack-Smith, our guest on this episode of Property Investory. 

If you want to hear more about her journey and get a copy of the episode guide on the website, head over to PropertyInvestory.com/guide.

This guide will give you the inside scoop on the little gold nuggets of wisdom all our guest's share from their backstory and all their overall strategies and philosophies. Plus, you’ll get a copy of their advice broken down and shared in a quick and easy-to-consume format!

Just head over to PropertyInvestory.com/guide and download it today.