Expat UK Property Story
Expat Property Story is a UK property podcast for expats, overseas investors, foreign nationals and digital nomads who want to build and manage a UK property portfolio remotely.Host John, The Expat Property Guy, has been investing in UK property from Hong Kong since 2018, and the show shares what he and his guests have learned along the way, mistakes included.Each week, John talks to expat property investors, mortgage brokers, accountants, letting agents, sourcers and auction specialists about the practical realities of UK property investing from abroad.Topics include expat buy-to-let, expat and non-resident mortgages, HMO investing, UK property auctions...
337: Why Bungalows? A UK Property Strategy for an Ageing Population
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The UK has an increasingly ageing population, and research by the Homeowners Alliance points to a large and growing demand for bungalows, yet hardly any are built anymore.
In this episode, I talk to Jo Child, whom I met in Coventry on my recent UK property tour, about the three bungalows she has renovated with her brother, who is a builder.
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336: What’s Holding You Back in UK Property Investing? We Want to Know
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For the first time in 336 episodes, Expat Property Story is running a listener survey.
The aim is to understand the main challenges you face when building, or thinking about building, a UK property portfolio from overseas.
Whether you haven't bought yet, own one property, or have ten and are thinking about slowing down, your answers will help shape future episodes.
Take our two-minute survey
The survey is mostly multiple choice, with just two open questions, and takes two or three minutes to complete.
Listeners based in...
335: How to Analyse a UK Buy-to-Let Deal: Area, Street, Property and Numbers
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A text arrives at 5pm Hong Kong time with a batch of discounted UK properties, at least 25 other buyers in the race, and a condition that contracts must be exchanged within six hours.
That leaves less than an hour to analyse the deal.
In this solo episode, I walk through how to analyse a UK buy-to-let deal from overseas, from the wider area down to the street, the property and the numbers.
At the end, I reveal what happened on that evening in November 2022.<...
334: Do I Need a UK Property Tax Accountant If I Live Abroad?
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Once a month, Simon Misiewicz from Optimise Accountants joins us to tackle a UK property tax topic — with one eye always on those of us based overseas.
This month we’re looking at what to consider before seeking advice on your UK property investments when you live abroad.
If you own UK property and live overseas, the right tax advice depends on more than the property itself.
In this month's tax minisode, Simon Misiewicz of Optimise Accountants explains why UK-only advi...
333: UK Property Auction: The £70k Flat That Became a £210k Refinance
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Would you buy a one bed flat with a short lease, a hole in the roof and the smell of bacon wafting up through the floorboards from the greasy spoon blow?
Jess Macaulay host of Phoenix Property Meet did!
She picked it up post-auction for £70,000 because no one else wanted it and after extending the lease, fixing the roof and reconfiguring the layout to add a second bedroom, had it revalued at £210,000!
She bought it for...
332: UK Buy-to-Let Hotspot in the North West
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Darren McNeill from our sponsors FMP joins me for our regular North West spotlight, this time on Darwen, and the numbers he shared make the case for a genuine UK buy-to-let hotspot.
Once a month, Darren McNeill from our sponsors FMP joins me to look at the North West property market.
Darren reports that Darwen showed 8% asking price growth in January 2026, against a UK average he puts at around 1 to 2%.
He also says good properties there are s...
331: UK Property Investing: Why Some Towns Will Lose the Population Race
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A rising population is one of the classic drivers of capital growth, alongside jobs and infrastructure.
But what happens to UK property investing when a country's population stops rising?
Demographer Dr Paul Morland joined me to explain what falling fertility and an ageing population actually mean for where you should and shouldn't buy.
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330: UK Mortgage Rates Rise Despite Base Rate Holding at 3.75%
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The Bank of England held its base rate at 3.75% this month, but that didn't stop UK mortgage rates from climbing.
Shaz Ahmed of Elan Property Finance joins me for our regular Mortgage Monday update, and the average fixed rate has now crept up to around 5.59%, from 4.9% at the start of the year.
If you're assuming a steady base rate means steady borrowing costs, this episode explains why that assumption doesn't hold.
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329: UK Expat Property Conveyancing: How to Beat the 135 Day Average
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The average UK property purchase takes 135 days, but a cash buyer who skips every optional check can complete in 24 hours.
This episode's guest is Gerard Davis, a solicitor at Talbots Law who spends his working life untangling exactly why that gap exists.
We delve into why UK property conveyancing takes so long.
And how to speed it up.
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<...328: UK Property Auction Update: Why Half of All Lots Are Failing to Sell
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Once a month, auction specialist Jay Howard from Hammered Auctions joins us to report from the front line of UK property auctions.
August is always a quiet month for UK property auctions, but the headline number still raises an eyebrow.
Jay Howard joined me for our monthly auction update, and the official success rate came in at just 60.6%.
Once you factor in the lots that were quietly withdrawn, Jay reckons the real UK property auction success...
327: How Supported Living UK Property Leases Can Collapse Overnight with Aston Haslam
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Aston Haslam, and his business partners, twin brothers Adam & Alex Flynn are from Bury in Lancashire.
Together have raised £10M from investors and scaled their UK property buesiness from two £44k houses to a £12M portfolio in just five years.
However, it wasn’t all plain sailing and they nearly lost everything after a supported living provider went bust.
You’re going to love this episode and if you keep listening till the end you’ll learn all the lessons that Aston lear...
326: Second Home Stamp Duty: The Expat's 6-Month Trap
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Once a month, Simon Misiewicz from Optimise Accountants joins us to tackle a UK property tax topic — with one eye always on those of us based overseas.
This month's topic is stamp duty land tax, or SDLT.
If you'd like a free PDF summary of everything below, you can grab it by subscribing to our email list (Don't forget to click 'Accept Marketing)
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325: Renters Rights Act 2026 Summary With Examples
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The Renters' Rights Act came into force on 1 May 2026.
This episode is a plain-English summary of what changed, what landlords must do now, and what the penalties are for getting it wrong.
It includes clips from past guests and a real eviction case study to show what the new rules mean in practice.
This is not legal advice — for anything specific to your situation, speak to a qualified professional.
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324: UK Property News: Seven Stories - One Might Get Me Into Trouble
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Seven UK property news stories this week.
Six are the kind you can act on.
The seventh is the one to stay for.
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323: Renters' Rights Act: What UK Landlords Must Demand from Managing Agents
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Expat Property Story · The twice-weekly UK property podcast for remote investors
If you’re a UK landlord managing properties from overseas, you’ll already know the Renters’ Rights Act has changed the landscape.
Section 21 is gone.
The grounds for ending a tenancy are narrower, the notice periods are longer, and getting referencing wrong from the start is a far more expensive mistake than it used to be.
My guest today is Samantha Powell.
Samantha has been in the industry for over thi...
322: Expat Mortgage UK: Confidence, Not the Bank of England, Is Setting the Market
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Hello there and welcome back to Expat Property Story, the twice-weekly podcast for remote investors in UK property.
It's Mortgage Monday again. Once a month I hand the mic to Shaz Ahmed of Elan Property Finance, our resident expat mortgage UK specialist, so you get the numbers instead of my usual musings.
This month's chat turned into something more than a rates round-up. It became a lesson in why the UK mortgage market rarely behaves the way you'd expect.
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321: Ten Principles of UK Property Investing Every Expat Investor Needs to Know
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I’ve trawled through more than 300 episodes to pull out the 10 principles that I keep coming back to...
The ones that have shaped how I think about UK property investing and that I’d want any expat investor to have in their head before they spend a single pound.
Each principle comes with a clip from a past guest who said it better than I could.
If you’re new to the show, this is probably the best single episode to start with.
And...
320: UK Property Auction Update: Why the Flat Market Slump Could Be Your Best Buying Opportunity
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Once a month, auction specialist Jay Howard from Hammered Auctions joins us to report from the front line of UK property auctions.
Jay and his business partner Piotr Rusinek are property traders, authors of the UK's number one bestselling book on auctions, and the people behind the Auction Buyers Club, Property Trading Academy and Beyond the Hammer
This month: a market that’s quietly holding up better than the summer calendar would su...
319: How an Economist Spots the UK's Next Property Hotspot
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About six weeks ago, in Episode 305, UK Property Market 2026: Is Now the Time to Buy? I talked to James Sproule, chief economist for Handelsbanken's UK division and former senior economic adviser to two UK prime ministers at 10 Downing Street.
That conversation was about whether you should buy UK property at all right now.
James walked us through affordability, yields, and why he sees a long-term upward bias in the market.
Right at the end, he touched briefly on something called "p...
318: North West Buy-to-Let 2026: On the Ground in Rawtenstall, Darwen and Burnley
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On Tuesday the 28th of July, I spent the day with Darren McNeill from our sponsors FMP driving along the M65 corridor through Rawtenstall, Darwen and Burnley.
This episode reveals what I found.
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317: Is Your HMO Managing Agent Actually Doing the Job? Here's How to Check
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If you own an HMO in the UK and you're managing it from abroad, this episode is for you.
Today's guest is Mithila from Ideal Urban Group (Tel: 07300 204451) — an HMO specialist agency covering Surrey, Berkshire, Hampshire, and Greater London.
Mithila and her business partner Lisa didn't start the agency because they saw a gap in the market.
They started it because they couldn't find anyone good enough to manage their own properties.
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316: Section 24 Explained: Why UK Landlords Are Paying Tax on Profits They Never Made
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Once a month, Simon Misiewicz from Optimise Accountants joins us to tackle a UK property tax topic — with one eye always on those of us based overseas.
This month: Section 24.
If you hold UK property in your personal name and you have a mortgage on it, this one directly affects you.
And if you're a higher-rate taxpayer, it may be affecting you far more than you realise.
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315: Why Your UK Leasehold Flat Could Be Unsellable: The Cladding Crisis Explained
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Can you imagine going to refinance your UK property and the lender's surveyor comes back with a zero valuation?
That is the reality for owners of an estimated 258,000 leasehold flats across the UK logged with dangerous cladding since the Grenfell Tower fire.
Today's guest is James Barry — an expat, a property investor, and someone who has been living through the UK cladding crisis for six years.
We explore the issues through the lens of James's own portfolio to make a complicated subject as clear as...
314: Expat Property Finance: UK Mortgage Rates, Bridging AVMs and Stamp Duty Changes
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UK mortgage rates are rising even as the Bank of England holds.
Bridging lenders are embracing automated valuations.
And a potential overhaul of stamp duty and council tax is being discussed at government level.
In this month's Mortgage Monday, the Expat Property Guy and Shaz Ahmed of Elan Property Finance unpack what's actually moving in UK property finance right now.
And what it means for expat and overseas investors (and UK based investors too!)
314: Expat Mortgage UK: Confidence, Not the Bank of England, Is Setting the Market
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In this month's Mortgage Monday, the Expat Property Guy and Shaz Ahmed of Elan Property Finance unpack what's actually moving in UK property finance right now.
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313: Why Property Investors Repeat the Same Mistakes: The Psychology Behind Your Patterns | Bahdar Shokar
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If you're tempted to skip this one because it sounds like it's not for you — that instinct is probably worth examining. It's exactly what Bhadar Shokar would say.
Bahdar is a psychotherapist who has spent over 20 years working with vulnerable children who've experienced trauma.
In that work, he watched early experiences create deep patterns — ways of coping with the world — that shape a person's capacity to trust, regulate emotions, handle stress, and build relationships.
He then noticed those same patt...
312: Don't Be the Monkey: Auction Bidding Psychology and UK Property Market Update
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Once a month, auction specialist Jay Howard from Hammered Auctions joins us to report from the front line of UK property auctions.
Jay and his business partner Piotr Rusinek are property traders, authors of the UK's number one bestselling book on auctions, and the people behind the Auction Buyers Club, Property Trading Academy and Before the Hammer
This month: a 100% clearance rate, the monkey brain that costs investors real money...
311: Finding Builders You Can Trust From Abroad: Tony Walker
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Someone in the Expat Property Story network recently shared a scary story.
A remote investor had a camera set up on site so they could check progress from abroad.
The builder knew exactly where the camera was pointing. Everything in frame looked fine.
Behind it?
Chaos.
That's the world we're operating in when we run a UK refurb from Hong Kong, Dubai, or Singapore. And it's why this episode exists.
For a free PDF on this episode, subscribe he...
310: How to Spot the Next UK Property Hotspot: The Accrington Regeneration Story
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Here's a question worth sitting with: how do you find the next UK property hotspot before everyone else has already found it?
Not by following property magazines. Not by watching what's trending on Rightmove. The answer, it turns out, is more systematic than that and in this episode, Darren McNeill from our sponsors FMP uses Accrington in Lancashire as a live case study to show you exactly how it's done.
This month's property is a three-bedroom mid-terrace, purchased in July 2021 for £85,000. It's now...
309: EPC Changes 2026: Why 67% of UK Landlords Aren't Ready
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EPC rules for UK landlords are changing from October 2026 — and a recent Nationwide report found that 67% of landlords have no idea it's coming.
This episode is here to make sure you're not in that 67%.
Energy Performance Certificates are about to get a major overhaul in England and Wales, and if you're a remote landlord managing UK property from abroad, these changes affect what you can rent, what you must upgrade, and how much it could cost you.
To break it all down, I...
308: "Non-Resident Landlord Scheme UK: Are You Paying Too Much Tax?"
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Once a month, Simon Misiewicz from Optimise Accountants joins us to tackle a UK property tax topic — with one eye always on those of us based overseas.
This month we’re looking at the Non-Resident Landlord Scheme.
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307: Down Valuations UK: What Really Happens Behind the Scenes
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Picture the scene. It's a Tuesday morning in Hong Kong. March 2023. I'm checking emails and there's one with the subject line: Valuation report attached.
My stomach churns — exactly like A-level results day.
We'd spent months refurbishing a block of four one-bed flats bought at auction. We needed a specific number from the valuer to move the deal forward. I open the attachment. Scroll straight to the bottom, the way you always do, skipping past the caveats.
The figure is £20,000 short of...
306: UK Mortgage Rates 2026: Why Swap Rates Say One Thing, Lenders Do Another
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UK mortgage rates are sending mixed signals in 2026 — and if you're investing in UK property from overseas, the contradiction is worth understanding before you fix your next rate.
This month's Mortgage Monday brings Shaz Ahmed of Elan Property Finance back to explain a puzzle:
SWAP Rates, the real engine behind mortgage pricing, are quietly climbing.
Yet some lenders are cutting rates and fees at the same time.
Shaz unpacks why that's happening, and what it tells you...
305: UK Property Market 2026: Is Now the Time to Buy? (Economist James Sproule)
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Is now a good time to buy UK property, or should you wait?
It's the question every overseas investor is asking in 2026 — and this week I put it to James Sproule, a former senior economic advisor at 10 Downing Street who now leads economic forecasting for a UK bank.
This explores the UK property market outlook, and whether the timing is right to buy.
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304: The Best UK Property Investment in 2026: Flats?
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UK property auctions are seeing a wave of caution following Keir Starmer's resignation
Not to mention uncertainty around Andy Burnham's stance on landlords and stamp duty.
But according to auction specialist Jay Howard from Hammered Auctions that nervousness is creating one of the best buying windows in years for an unloved asset class: flats.
In this month's auction update, the Expat Property Guy and Jay break down why one and two-bedroom flats are sitting unsold at...
303: Why This Yacht Captain Invests in Affordable UK Property from Overseas
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Do you struggle with the idea of investing in UK property from overseas because of being hundreds or thousands of miles away?
Well in this episode, you can draw inspiration from someone who’s not quite in the same boat as you, but he’s more than likely in a boat right now.
Stefhan Malherbe is a South African yacht captain with over 20 years at sea and a passion for UK property.
He started investing in South Africa, then bought duplexes in Flor...
302: Buy-to-Lets in Burnley: The Ripple Effect
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If you're looking to buy UK property from overseas, you might want to consider Burnley.
Once a month I’m joined by Darren McNeill from our sponsors FMP to look back at a deal he sourced for a client 5 years ago.
This month, we discuss a buy-to-let in Burnley, Lancashire BB11 2LN.
Darren explains how Burnley has benefited from the Manchester 'ripple effect' and how the outskirts of Burnley are undergoing the same process.
We re...
301: An Insider's Guide to Estimating Refurb Costs Remotely
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When you’re thousands of miles away from your chosen investment patch, and you’re looking for a deal, one of the first things you’re going to have to do is to estimate the cost of bringing the property up to the standard of the value of the most expensive property on the street.
But how can you estimate the refurb cost from a video tour or even the photos alone?
Or how can you verify that the refurb costs you’ve been...
300: Expat Property Story at 300: A Look Back at Our Favourite Podcast Features
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To celebrate Episode 300 we take you back through some of the features that have fallen by the wayside.
Think of it as a nostalgic trip down memory lane for those of you who’ve been here from the start or a way to pique your interest in the back catalogue if you're a more recent listener.
I'm sure you'll have as much fun listening as I did putting it all together.
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299: How to Vet Your UK Property Team
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Whether you’re thousands of miles away or even just hundreds of miles away, you’re going to need people to help you.
So I’ve trawled through the back catalogue to find the best advice on choosing who to work with.
And how to go about it.
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