View the full episode on youtube here.

In this episode, Paul talks about one of his favourite ways to do land deals - £1 Option Agreements that enable you to effectively buy or control what happens to a piece of land for an investment of £1. If you think that sounds impossible, you are certainly not alone, but you´d be wrong. Paul and other developers have been doing exactly that for many, many years. That is how he does most of his deals.

Listen in and you will learn how to use agreements to control land that you do not currently have enough money to buy and do so by investing as little as £1 upfront.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• JD Rockefeller said, “Control everything without owning anything.”…which is exactly what land options allow you to do.

• Option agreements provide you with the option to do something, without the obligation to actually do it.

• When you don´t use options, the size of the deals you can do is limited by how much money you have.

• The right type of option on a piece of land provides you with time to get planning permission. So, when it is time to pay the full price for the land you already know for sure that your development will go ahead.

• If you don´t get planning permission, you are not legally bound to buy the land.

• Importantly, options are also beneficial for landowners. Paul explains how.

• You need to learn to use the right language to persuade landowners and land the deal.

• It is possible for you to make money from effectively selling your agreement to another developer.

• The deal must be properly worded and registered.

• To make money from options you must understand what the true value of the land is.

BEST MOMENTS

“An option agreement is just a legal agreement that gives you the option to do something, but beautifully, not the obligation”

“I realized that I could control land. I could get an agreement to buy it, even if I didn't have enough money to buy it.”

“For the landowner, you will be typically going away trying to add value to their asset without it costing them a penny. So, from their point of view, there's no risk.”

“You can effectively sell on, assign your agreement to another buyer and you never have to complete on the deal.”

“I´ve never had a landowner even try to get out of an option agreement.”

ABOUT THE HOST 

Paul Higgs is a Chartered Planning and Development Surveyor with 40+ years' experience in land, planning and development and a 100% success track record in winning planning consents.

Paul undertook his first refurb project when he was just 17 and then worked his way up from labouring on building sites to becoming Head of Land for renowned plc housebuilder, Barratt Developments. He managed to escape the corporate world in 2002 to set up what is now a multimillion-pound award-winning property development company, Millbank Group. 

In 2013 Paul founded the Millbank Land Academy, the UK’s first training company dedicated to property development; to teach established and aspiring developers the insider secrets the big housebuilders don’t want you to know! 

Paul is also a founding investor and former board director of the industry-leading PropTech Co, LandTech, and has lectured on Advanced Development Valuations on the MSc Property Development at London South Bank University.

CONTACT METHOD

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-higgs

Millbank Land Academy: https://www.millbanklandacademy.co.uk

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/paulhiggsofficial

YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@InsidePropertyDevelopment