A few years into my investing career, someone introduced me to what looked like a very exciting opportunity.
It was a substantial property. A lot of work was needed. There were quite a few moving parts to it, including structural issues, planning considerations and multiple units. In other words, it was not the sort of straightforward project where you could look at it, make a sensible list, get some prices, and feel reasonably confident that you knew what you were taking on.
It looked, on the face of it, like a serious opportunity for a serious investor.
I was rather flattered by that idea.
The trouble was, I was not really ready for it.
Not yet.
So I got involved anyway, which was not one of my better decisions.
Now, I got through it. It was not some kind of complete catastrophe. But it was harder, slower and more expensive than I had expected, and looking back I can see quite clearly that the biggest mistake was not that the project itself was impossible. The mistake was that I had taken it on before I had the experience to manage it properly.
That matters more than people sometimes realise.
A lot of new investors assume the key question is whether a project looks profitable. Of course that matters. But there is another question which is just as important, and it is one people do not always ask themselves honestly enough.
Am I actually ready for this sort of project?
That is not quite the same thing as asking whether you are bright enough, brave enough or ambitious enough. Plenty of people are all three. The real question is whether your current experience matches the complexity of what you are looking at.
And those are not the same thing.
One of the reasons refurbishment can be deceptively difficult is that the word “refurb” covers a huge range of projects.
At one end, you have a property that is basically sound but tired. It needs modernising. Perhaps a new kitchen, a new bathroom, redecoration, floor coverings, maybe a few bits and pieces that crop up once you get going. That sort of project can still go wrong, of course, but the work is usually fairly visible, relatively easy to understand, and easier to price.
Then you have the next level up, where there is more going on. Perhaps a full rewire, a new heating system, replacement windows, more substantial plastering, damp treatment, roof repairs and so on. Still very doable, but there is more to organise, more cost involved, and more room for the unexpected.
And then, beyond that, you are into the more involved projects. Structural work. Planning matters. Multiple units. Conversions. Buildings that are not just tired, but problematic. The kind of jobs where one issue leads to another, and where if you do not already have a decent feel for how refurbs behave in real life, things can get out of hand more quickly than you might think.
That was the category I had wandered into too early.
The problem was not simply that it was bigger. The problem was that when issues came up, and they always do on jobs like that, I did not always know straight away whether what I was looking at was serious, manageable, expensive, or merely inconvenient. That uncertainty is not a nice place to be when there is a lot of money involved and the project depends on you making good decisions.
With more experience, many of those same problems would probably have been frustrating, but manageable.
Without that experience, they felt heavier than they should have done.
That is why I often say that, especially in the beginning, it is sensible to match the project to where you actually are, not where you would like to be.
There is no shame in starting simply.
In fact, some of the best refurbishment projects are the simpler ones.
A straightforward single house or flat that needs sensible updating can be a very good project. The work is usually easier to identify, easier to cost, easier to organise and easier to keep moving. You learn how trades work. You learn how costs creep. You learn the order in which jobs need doing. You learn how long things really take, as opposed to how long you optimistically hoped they might take.
All of that is valuable.
And the nice thing is, those lessons are being learned on projects that are less likely to punish you too severely while you are still learning them.
I think sometimes people confuse “modest” with “not worth doing”.
That is a mistake.
A beginner or intermediate project, bought well, managed sensibly, and financed properly, can be very profitable. It does not need to be dramatic to be worthwhile. In fact, there is often a lot to be said for a project that sounds slightly dull but behaves itself reasonably well.
The grander, more complicated opportunities are still there later, once you have the experience to deal with them.
So if you are at the start of your refurbishment journey, I would not worry too much about whether a project sounds impressive.
I would worry much more about whether you can understand it.
Can you identify the main works?
Can you price them with some confidence?
Can you cope if the project grows a bit once you get started?
And if something goes wrong, as it often will, are you likely to know what to do next?
Those are much better questions.
The lesson I took from that project was not that difficult jobs should always be avoided.
It was that timing matters.
The right project at the wrong stage of your investing career can still be the wrong project.
And a more modest project, taken on at the right time, can teach you what you need to know so that later on you can tackle the bigger jobs without feeling as though you are one problem away from being out of your depth.
Here’s to successful property renovating.
Peter Jones (ex) Chartered Surveyor, author and property investor
www.thepropertyteacher.co.uk
By the way, I’ve completely rewritten and updated my course for 2026, The Successful Property Renovator’s Workshop — a comprehensive guide to renovating properties properly and profitably, based on my own experience across well over 150 projects over thirty years. For more details please go to: https://thepropertyteacher.co.uk/the-successful-property-renovators-workshop-2/