Calm, practical guides for property buyers.
Short reads from the same thinking that powers the Home Compass system. No fluff. No fear-mongering.
- Buying guides
How to read listings, shortlist neighbourhoods, run viewings and time the process — from first search to keys.
32 guides → - Risk guides
The defects, legal traps and cost surprises that show up after the offer — and how to surface them before it.
21 guides → - Negotiation guides
Evidence, leverage and discipline: how to open, where to hold and when to walk away.
16 guides → - Investment guides
Yield, stress-tests and exit thinking for buyers who need a defensible yes or no.
16 guides → - Lifestyle guides
Commute, light, space and daily life — the soft factors that decide whether you still love the place in year three.
16 guides →
- Buying · 9 min read
The property due diligence checklist buyers actually need
A complete financial, physical and legal due diligence checklist for residential property — and how to run it in an hour instead of a weekend.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
The first-time buyer's playbook
A calm, structured way to think about your first home — without the noise the property industry runs on.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
The hidden risks that cost buyers tens of thousands
Subsidence, knotweed, leasehold escalations, climate exposure, and the maintenance bills no one mentions until you've moved in.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 6 min read
How to negotiate without giving away your floor
The opening offer, the target, the walk-away — and how to read the agent's reply.
Read guide → - Investment · 6 min read
Buying an investment property without falling for the listing
Yield, capital growth, void risk and liquidity — the four numbers that matter more than any photo.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
How to read a property listing like a professional buyer
The words agents use, the angles photographers skip, and the details that decide whether a viewing is worth your Saturday.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
The 20-minute viewing that saves 20 years of regret
A structured walk-through that surfaces more in twenty minutes than most buyers see in three visits.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Freehold vs leasehold: what the tenure actually costs you
Ground rent, service charges, forfeiture risk, and the small print that turns a bargain into a liability.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Chain-free properties: real advantage or marketing myth
When 'no chain' matters, when it is a red flag, and how it should change your offer strategy.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
How to shortlist neighbourhoods before you shortlist homes
A repeatable framework for choosing a street, not just a floorplan.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
The buyer's timeline: from search to keys, week by week
What actually happens between offer accepted and completion — and where deals typically stall.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Off-market properties: how they surface and when to chase them
The channels that leak deals early, and how to build a two-way pipeline without being annoying.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
New-builds vs period homes: a decision framework
Warranty, layout, running costs, resale, character — how to weigh what actually matters to you.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying at auction without buying a disaster
The legal pack, the reserve, the room dynamics, and the three properties you should never bid on.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
How to spot a fair asking price in under ten minutes
Comparable sales, days on market, price history — the fastest sanity check before you book a viewing.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Second viewings: the ten things to check that the first viewing hid
Water pressure, phone signal, evening light, neighbour noise — the quiet variables that shape daily life.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a flat above a shop, restaurant or pub
Noise, smells, insurance, mortgageability, and the discount that makes it worth it — or doesn't.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a home with a garden that actually works
Orientation, drainage, boundary disputes, trees and the maintenance bill no one mentions.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying near a school: the premium and the trap
Catchments shift, ratings change, and the price you pay assumes today's map holds forever.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a property that has been on the market too long
Why it lingered, what to check twice, and how the delay changes your offer position.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a home in a conservation area
What you can and cannot change, the costs of consent, and why the street usually holds its value.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a listed building without buying a lifetime of paperwork
Grade I, II* and II: what each grade actually restricts, and the maintenance premium that comes with them.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a converted flat: church, warehouse, school, office
Insulation, layout quirks, service charge history, and the resale market for unusual homes.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a home you plan to extend
Permitted development, planning history, party walls, and how to price the extension into the offer.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying in a market you don't live in yet
Long-distance buying without losing your judgement — remote viewings, local proxies, and calibration trips.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a period home: what to survey twice
Timber frames, lath and plaster, chimney stacks, and the running costs of a house older than the road it sits on.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a corner plot: opportunity or overhead
Extra land, extra boundary, extra maintenance — when the corner pays and when it costs.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying with pets in mind
Access, garden security, flooring, and the resale implications of a pet-first refurbishment.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying an ex-council flat
Structure, service charges, mortgageability, and the price/quality trade-off compared with private stock.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a home in a new development phase 1 vs phase 3
Snagging, price growth, amenity completion — why the phase you buy in matters as much as the plot.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying jointly: partners, friends, family
Tenants in common, joint tenancy, exit clauses, and the paperwork that prevents an ugly break-up.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying with a growing family in mind
Bedroom count, bathrooms, storage, and the five-year needs most buyers forget to plan for.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a home that will age with you
Stairs, thresholds, bathroom layout — how to buy at 40 for how you'll live at 70.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying a fixer-upper without underestimating the work
The projects that always cost more, the ones that reliably pay back, and how to price both into the offer.
Read guide → - Buying · 7 min read
Buying near future infrastructure: transport, schools, regeneration
How to price probability, and how to avoid buying the press release instead of the postcode.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Flood risk: how to read the maps that actually matter
Surface water vs river vs coastal, and the insurance implications each carries.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Subsidence, heave and clay soils explained
What surveyors look for, what remediation costs, and how to price the risk into your offer.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Japanese knotweed: the risk, the reality, the paperwork
Distance from the property, treatment plans, insurance-backed guarantees, and mortgageability.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Cladding and EWS1: what buyers still need to know
The current status of external wall system reviews and how they affect flats above 11 metres.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Damp: the difference between cosmetic and structural
Rising, penetrating, condensation — three different problems with three different price tags.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Roof age, roof condition, roof replacement cost
How to estimate remaining life from the pavement, and what a re-roof actually costs in your area.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Electrical installations: the EICR and what a bad one means
C1, C2, C3 codes, rewire costs, and the negotiating power a poor certificate gives you.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Boilers, heating and the true cost of a system on its last legs
Age, service history, replacement pathways, and the heat pump question.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Asbestos in post-war and mid-century homes
Where it typically lives, when it must be removed, and when it is safest to leave alone.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Radon: the invisible risk with a simple test
Which areas have elevated levels, how the test works, and remediation cost.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Ground rent escalations and toxic leases
The doubling clauses, the mortgageability cliff, and how to check before you offer.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Service charges: reading three years of accounts
Reserve funds, one-off levies, and the questions that surface hidden liabilities.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Party wall risks and neighbour disputes
The awards, the surveyors, the standing costs, and the resale disclosure implications.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Restrictive covenants and easements
The old paperwork that quietly limits what you can build, park or change.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Non-standard construction: concrete, timber, steel-framed homes
Mortgageability, insurability, longevity, and the discount they typically command.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Trees near the property: roots, shade, subsidence
TPO status, distance rules of thumb, and the insurance conversation you should have before you buy.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Coastal properties: erosion, salt, insurance
The specific risks the mainland ignores, and how to underwrite them yourself.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Homes near railways, motorways or flight paths
Noise, vibration, air quality, and the discount that makes it defensible.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Mining, quarrying and made-ground legacies
Coal Authority searches, historic maps, and what a positive result actually means for the property.
Read guide → - Risks · 7 min read
Climate exposure: pricing a 20-year horizon into a 20-year mortgage
Heat, flood, storm and drought — how to think about them without either panicking or ignoring them.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
The opening offer: how much below asking is defensible
Market temperature, days on market, condition, and the numbers that back a low first move.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Escalation clauses and best-and-final rounds
How they work, when they are worth entering, and when they are a trap.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Sealed bids: how to bid without overpaying
The psychology of unknown competition, and a rational framework for a single-shot number.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Negotiating after the survey
How to convert a survey into a price adjustment without the vendor pulling out.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Timing pressure: exchange dates as leverage
When the calendar is worth more than the number — school terms, tax years, chain deadlines.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Negotiating for chain-free buyers
How much your position is actually worth to a vendor — and how to price it in.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Negotiating in a rising market
Discipline when everything feels like it's slipping away — and when to break your own rules.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Negotiating in a falling market
Reading the direction, not the current price, and the moves that professional buyers make when others hesitate.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
How agents actually get paid, and why it matters
Sole agency, multi-agency, tiered fees — the incentives shaping the person on the other side of the phone.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Negotiating with developers on new-builds
Upgrades, incentives, stamp duty contributions — where the flex actually lives in a new-build deal.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
The gazumping problem and how to reduce your exposure
Lock-out agreements, deposits, insurance and speed — the toolkit of a serious buyer.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Gazundering: when it works, when it backfires
The last-minute price cut — its rare legitimate use, and its far more common cost.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Negotiating an off-market deal
No public price, no benchmark — how to price and pace a conversation without a listing to anchor to.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
Negotiating fixtures and fittings without losing the deal
Curtains, appliances, the shed at the bottom of the garden — small numbers with an outsized ability to derail exchange.
Read guide → - Negotiation · 7 min read
The 24-hour rule for accepted offers
What to do in the first day after the phone call — practical steps to lock in your position.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Buy-to-let in a post-tax-relief world
How the Section 24 changes reshape the maths, and which structures still make sense.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
HMOs: the yield, the licensing, the reality
When an HMO is a business and when it is a full-time job in disguise.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Short-lets and holiday rentals: the numbers behind the Instagram
Occupancy, cleaning, platforms, seasonality — the yield after the honest deductions.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Serviced apartments as an asset class
Corporate demand, licensing, operator risk, and how to underwrite the operator's numbers, not just the property's.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Commercial-to-residential conversions
Permitted development pathways, layout traps, and the exit market for unusual stock.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Section 21 changes and the modern landlord risk profile
Regulatory direction of travel, and the tenants and properties that will still make sense in five years.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Gross yield, net yield, cash-on-cash: what to actually track
The three numbers that matter, and why gross yield alone is the number that misleads.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Refurbish, refinance, rent: the BRR cycle honestly
The cases where it compounds, the cases where it compounds mistakes.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Portfolio structure: personal name, LLP, limited company
The trade-offs the tax adviser will not explain until you pay them.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Property vs index funds over 20 years
A calm side-by-side, including leverage, tax, transaction costs and time.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Investing in student housing
The town matters more than the property. Pick the university first.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Off-plan investing: the risks that don't show up on the brochure
Developer solvency, valuation drift, completion delays, and how to protect your deposit.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Overseas property: when it makes sense, when it doesn't
Currency, tax, management, exit liquidity — the checklist that keeps holiday dreams from becoming holiday losses.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Rent-to-rent: the model, the legality, the exit
Where the numbers actually clear, and where the model quietly breaks.
Read guide → - Investment · 7 min read
Land banking and development plots
Planning history, hope value, holding costs — the numbers behind the pitch.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Buying a home that supports how you actually work from home
Broadband, acoustics, natural light and the extra square metres that pay for themselves.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Downsizing without downgrading your life
The rooms you actually use, the ones you tell yourself you use, and how to plan the release of equity.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Upsizing when your family outgrows the flat
The three-year plan for growing families, not the one-year jump you'll regret.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Moving to the countryside from a major city
The romance, the reality, and the honest checklist of what daily life will cost you.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Moving back to the city after the countryside
The unexpected calibration: what feels small, what feels loud, what feels right.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Buying near ageing parents
Proximity, layout, access — decisions that will feel more important in five years than today.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Buying for a hybrid work-week
Two days in, three days out — how the maths of commute, cost and space rebalance.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Buying near green space: parks, rivers, trails
The premium is real. The health return is real. The maintenance premium of tree-lined streets is also real.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Buying in a walkable neighbourhood
Walk scores, day-to-day errands and the compounding lifestyle return of a car-optional life.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Cycling, commuting and where the bike actually lives
Storage, showers, secure parking — small property details that shape a daily habit.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Homes for cooks: kitchens beyond the photograph
Extractor runs, gas vs induction, natural light, and the layout that survives real meals.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Homes for entertainers
Circulation, kitchen-to-social flow, outdoor connection — how to design your search around how you host.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Homes for introverts
Retreat spaces, sound insulation, single-aspect quiet — designing a purchase around calm.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Homes for hobbies: workshops, studios, home gyms
The garage, the loft, the outbuilding — where practice actually happens.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Homes for growing older in place
Level thresholds, downstairs bathrooms, futureproofing without making the house feel medical.
Read guide → - Lifestyle · 7 min read
Homes for city renters becoming first-time buyers
The mental shift from monthly cost to lifetime cost — and the moves that make the transition survivable.
Read guide →
Kopen of verkopen in Nederland?
- Woning kopen
Beoordeel de woning, de vraagprijs en je eigen aannames vóór je bod.
Bekijk pagina → - Woning verkopen
Bepaal vraagprijs, timing en onderhandelingsruimte met structuur.
Bekijk pagina → - Bouwkundige keuring: kosten en wanneer
Wat een keuring kost, wat erin staat — en wat er níet in staat.
Bekijk pagina → - Wat is mijn huis waard?
Vier manieren om je woningwaarde te bepalen, met kosten en nauwkeurigheid.
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