In the world of Graeme Fowler, numbers tell the story. And it’s a story worth repeating to anyone keen to succeed in the property game.

In the last 18 months he has bought 40 houses. Fifteen of these have required extensive renovation work (at a cost of between $20,000 and $70,000 each), and have made him an average of $35,000 each in profit.

“With the trades/renos we have made well over $1 million profit in the last 18 months,” he shares.

While renovations are only part of Fowler’s property investment success (he uses a wide range of strategies to achieve his stratospheric results) they are an increasingly important aspect of his business. So much so that his partner Katrina recently left her job as payroll manager so she could work alongside Fowler with his renos.

‘With the trades/ renos we have made well over $1 million profit in the last 18 months’ GRAEME FOWLER

“Katrina is great at colour choices. She has vision of what could be done to make the best use of space and also what people like in a home,” he says.

“She has great taste in decorating and knows how to make a house look like a home.”

Depending on the property, Fowler will either do a renovation and sell it on, or buy and hold. Yields on properties purchased at a good price and renovated can be pretty impressive. One of the buy and holds he recently renovated was purchased for just $136,000.

“It needed a lot of work on the interior,” he explains. “We had it completely painted inside, new carpet, vinyl, curtains and spent approximately $18k on it.”

He says that the property “owed” them around $155,000 after the work was complete. They were able to rent it out for $350 a week, which has given them a yield of about 11.75%.

“It’s a three-bedroom home with double garage on a full-size section in a good location of Flaxmere. I would have rented it for around $300 per week before the renovation and would probably sell it for around $230,000 now.”

He uses another example, this time a property in Hastings that was purchased in 2017 for $288,000. This one they sold post-renovation for $387,000 after a $50,000 renovation.

Fowler is an expert at finding ways to maximise the value of his investments. He recently purchased a two-flat property, which they then put into separate freehold titles.

“It took over 12 months to complete the process and the renovations, but luckily the units were rented out during that time. With all the reno costs plus all the subdivision and associated costs, we spent approximately $70,000,” he explains.

Both units have now sold and he says they made around $75,000 from the sale.

As Fowler is such a high-profile investor, he doesn’t have to look for deals on places like Trade Me – the agents come to him.

“Because we have bought and sold so many properties, we are one of the first investors that agents call for any potential good deals or reno projects. We do buy some privately as well, maybe 40% of the properties we buy are private sales,” he explains.

But he has tips for less well-known people wanting to find good deals in their area.

“For people that don’t have a network, it’s about making a start to build your team. Nobody creates a great team of people overnight, it takes a lot of time building this, maybe a year or two,” he says.

“Talk to other investors, use the Property Chat group on Facebook, your local PIA could also be good to join. Finding your first property to reno involves learning about the market, first of all, and having agents you can talk to. Look at Trade Me and Realestate.co.nz and go to open homes. It’s about taking action, it’s a lot easier as you build momentum, contacts, confidence and your own skills in finding deals.”

As Fowler works all over the country, he uses a big player for most of his supplies.

“We get most of our supplies from big suppliers such as: kitchen sinks, taps, laundry tubs, vanities, kitchen counter tops, tiles, door handles, kitchen knobs and handles, letterboxes, light fittings,” he explains.

One of the main difficulties with Fowler’s “more is more” approach is establishing whether a home is worth renovating, or whether as much value will be added by just putting it straight back on the market.

“We’ve done that with a couple of purchases recently. We could have renovated them both and spent about $20,000 each on them and hopefully made about $25,000 each after the renos. We decided on both of them to list them for a week or two first and if we didn’t make enough we would reno them. Both sold very quickly, one for $40,000 more than we paid and the other was nearly $60,000 more,” he says.

But this hasn’t worked for higher priced properties he bought.

“Recently we have used this way of selling in Havelock North with higher priced properties (over $600,000) and it hasn’t worked. As of writing this, both properties have been for sale for a couple of months.”

When it comes time to sell or rent after a renovation, Fowler swears by staging company Mr Rental. At about $1,500 for five to six weeks, it’s not cheap, but worth the cost.

“We have used them on about 10 occasions as we believe the appearance staging gives to a property when done well will add significantly more value than the outlay of staging.”

Fowler says that the most important thing an investor can do is know the costs, don’t overspend on a project and get several opinions on prices.

“Talk to people about what you can do to a property to add value,” he says.

“After hearing all the opinions, decide what you will do and what you want the outcome to be and work towards that.”

Reno Rundown

Fowler purchased this Havelock North property for $580,000 in January this year. It needed a fair bit of TLC, but the five-bedroom home had a lot going for it – including a swimming pool.

Fowler project manages his renovations himself (with help from partner Katrina) and this one took a fair bit of work to get up to scratch.

“It needed new carpet, vinyl, a new kitchen, work on the grounds, painting, new lights and updated electrics,” he says.

The reno cost in the realm of $70,000 and took two months to complete. The home was recently sold privately for $700,000, meaning there was a healthy profit of $50,000 within just six months.