This month has been about the pennies. For some time now we have been working with cashflow forecasts so we not only track our historic data but we can use forecasting to look ahead into our business. This task has proved extremely valuable, particularly with HMOs where there are multiple moving costs. In fact, during my recent investor interview with Nick Carlile (page 22) he said one of the things that attracts him to investing in hotels is his ability to cut costs and increase revenues. As you will see from my interview from him, HMOs don’t have as many lines in the budget when it comes to costs that we can cut down on, however, the practice is still a valuable one.

This month I have focused my attention on utility usage in our HMO properties. I have spent time looking at consumption in comparison to the previous years to see if there has been any trends developing. I have also looked at price fluctuations now we are out of contract with our current provider and looking at the difference this is making to our bottom line. In conclusion I have found the data extremely useful and now we are moving to tenant education in terms of appropriate utility usage. There are limited things we can do, however, they still make a difference and over a portfolio pennies make pounds.