Property journalism ~ Landlord on the fast track

The Times, January 2005

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Mark Garner knows all about crashes. Not property crashes mind, but raw moments of sporting endeavour on the motor-racing circuit. During trials for a national sports-car championship, the former commodities trader had an accident that put him out of action for 10 months.

The crash was a defining moment for him. After his recovery, he eschewed his former racing and broking lifestyles and became a full-time property investor. In only eight years Garner, 38, has built a portfolio of 45 house and flats worth £7 million. Nothing unusual about that, you might say. The difference is that, unlike many other property professionals, Garner has bought all his assets in the same area.

The reason is the Channel Tunnel. "I was brought up in Kent and since work began on the high-speed Channel Tunnel Rail Link in 1998 I have seen it grow from a cluster of ordinary commuter towns into a vibrant boom-town area," he says. Ashford, for instance, which had no cinema, now has a multiplex and two hypermarkets.

Its train station is also a key hub, linking Folkestone near the Channel Tunnel entrance with London via the new Ebbsfleet rail link near Gravesend in north Kent. When Ebbsfleet is finished in 2006 or 2007, the station will be only 15 minutes from St Pancras, two hours 20 minutes from Paris and two hours from Brussels.

Garner says property gives him the same "buzz" as motor-racing. "I like the risk and danger of it all." He also refers to himself as the Boom-time Rat, after the 1980s band The Boom-town Rats. "I don't mean it pejoratively. I manage and maintain all my units and get on with almost all my tenants," he adds.

Two thirds of Garner's tenants are now professional twenty or thirtysomething singletons, but three years ago he was letting to couples and newlyweds. "Prices have shot up and relationships broken down so fast that three-bedroom houses are no longer needed," he says.

Garner used to buy properties at auction, but today almost all his buy-to-let properties are brand new or bought off-plan. "It means I pay 15 per cent more than for a second-hand version, but I find them easier to let. People like the smell and feel of a house or flat that has a new brushed-steel kitchen and pukka fixtures and fittings," he says.

The core of Garner's assets, which have tripled in the last two-and-a-half years, is the key growth area in the Thames Gateway around Gravesend and Northfleet. There, he says, he can snap up a new two-bed terraced house for about £148,000 and a one-bed flat for £125,000. He bought his first buy-to-let for £30,000 at auction in Maidstone, but says: "The market is currently too hot for auctions, and their newly fledged popularity means you are highly unlikely to find a bargain."

Once the deal is clinched, he pitches the rent slightly below market value. "It takes two years, sometimes more, for a new development to be established and allowing prices to settle down, so I charge £75 to £125 less for the first 18 months." The strategy is clearly working. Mark Flemington, a director of FPDSavills, says: "Because of all the fantastic transport links, tenants normally renting in central London are moving here to save money and commute."

So it seems Garner can do no wrong. He has had his moments, however. "I usually see at least 20 properties before I buy. Occasionally a good proposition stares me in the face and I completely fail to act." But then, even former racing drivers can't win everything.

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