Sally Wang’s Property Success Essentials

Giles Adair catches up with Sally Wang, SJW Property Management, to discover how international buyers are continuing to mine the real estate opportunities the UK has to offer.

Tell us more about SJW Property Management

I established SJW in 2015 in response to my own experience after I had moved to the UK in 2001. At that time I was a Chinese student but I found that after more than a decade of living in the country, I was still finding it difficult to purchase my own property. This lead me to feel that there needed to be more help on the market to help first-time buyers, even more so for the non-UK residents and Chinese nationals.

Ten years down the line as a business, we now cover buying, selling, letting and management, as well as building clients' dream houses from scratch. The majority of our client base and service users are in mainland China; but not only do we help those clients, we also cater to investors based all around the world that are looking to purchase a property across four major locations, London, Cambridge, Oxford, and Birmingham.

Why is there such an interest in UK real estate?

SJW properties only represents a very small fraction of the market by comparison, but from what we do have, there appears two main reasons that our clients are focused on UK real estate. Number one is that their children are/or will be studying in the UK. Practically thinking, rather than spending money on rent - the Chinese culture is to buy property. Then if their offspring no longer need to use the home, we can rent it out instead. The second reason is to spread the risk. For example some people buy stocks, the Chinese buy real estate.

What's your best piece of advice for those looking to dip their toe in the market?

To find a professional, trustworthy person or team to work alongside you. The simple reason is that you need this to have as much unbiased information as possible; this will help make the property investment process much smoother. Secondly, if you encounter any problems, this team holds the resources, professional knowledge, dedication and persistence to help you solve those concerns - saving you considerable time and unnecessary stress.

What’s the first step when helping a new client?

We listen intently. It's vital to find out exactly what the client's real needs are and where they are in the purchasing process. Are they familiar with the buying process? Or are they just thinking about buying at the moment? Do they know what they want the property to achieve financially as a bilateral investment or will it be owner occupied? If it's owner occupied, what are the most important requirements for them? It's our role to figure out what their goals are and what they do or don't know about the process and reality of their decisions. Only then can we truly use our professional knowledge to support them.

How do you help international buyers manage their property?

The first thing to note is, it doesn't matter whether they are in the UK or not, our process remains the same. Prior to completion, our lettings and management team investigates whether there are any faults in the finish of the property and rectify them before the handover to the owner. After the completion, we offer a design and furniture procurement service. Then, if needed, we will begin our search for a tenant. For this, we have three different methods.
Number one is our in-house lettings team, where we will list properties. Secondly, we instruct two or three local agents to find tenants for us. Thirdly, we speak to relocation agents for those units that can be harder to rent out for one reason or another. Our goal is to find the best quality tenants within the shortest time period, whilst also achieving the optimum rental that we can in relation to current markets. Once we secure an applicant, our lettings and management team will navigate the tenants moving process and look after the property and maintain it moving forward.

For international landlords, we also offer a number of services that local agents don't provide, for example, we look after community fees, keeping an eye on service charges and ground rents. Secondly, we are active in communicating with the owners. We help them to complete their yearly self assessment returns, and our management team are appropriately qualified for this role. There are legal factors too. We're regulated by the property ombudsman and ARLA, so our professional status is second to none.

Our collective senior team have 25 years plus experience in lettings and management. We're skilled in communicating - in a way that steers confidence with our international landlords. That's why we have so many success stories under our belt and why we're continuing to expand with considerable momentum.

Find out more about SJW Property Management.