Some Impressive DIY At Chateau Sutton

Last weekend, I achieved an impressive DIY result at our new home in West Sussex: fitting a new toilet roll holder in one of the bathrooms upstairs. Admittedly, it just involved drilling a hole through pasterboard … and the inside of the fitted cupboard in the adjoining room may now be spikier than it was before. But my wife Xiaofang adjudged it a success, which is all that matters really.

That is absolutely the limit of my tolerance for DIY. Not because I don’t enjoy it, but because I’m not particularly skilled at it, and there have been many times when my lovely wife was not so pleased with my efforts: wonky pictures, wobbly furniture and abandoned, half-completed projects.

Unfortunately, we come across a lot of ‘bodged jobs’ when it comes to legal structures and legal arrangements … often carried out by people who should have known better than to ‘wing it’. Investment structures which unwittingly create collective investment schemes, therefore requiring an FCA authorised operator. Unlawful financial promotions. Taking on investors and unintentionally losing control of the board. Messing up the share structure / directorships and losing the benefit of entrepreneurs relief. Inadvertently giving away 90% of the value of the company by issuing convertible loan notes. Striking off companies which still have significant assets (even a shopping centre). The list goes on and on.

I may have got away with it this time, but the moral of the story: if you’re doing something that matters (and what else would you be spending your time on?), get in the experts.

If you would like to know how not to mess up a property investment syndicate, we have a free guide for you. You can download a copy here.