Hello there!
I’m Suzanne Smith, aka The Independent Landlord, or indie_landlord on social media. If you’re looking advice and insights about investing in property, you’ve come to the right place!
A bit about me
I’m a landlord with a portfolio of Victorian houses in Maidstone, which I manage and let myself. Also, I’m an Accredited Landlord Member of the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA).
Before becoming a landlord, I worked as a business lawyer in the life sciences industry for 25 years. When I left the corporate world to get more balance in my life after turning 50, I needed to earn an independent income. So I decided to decided to invest in property and started out as a landlord.
As well as being a landlord and a qualified solicitor, I have an MBA, and spent many years advising management teams on creating successful and sustainable businesses. Also, I’m currently studying a part-time MA in French literature for fun.
During my legal career, I saw how successful businesses have the needs of their customers at the heart everything they do.
It’s no different for landlords. We also need to have the interests of our customers at the centre of what we do, our renters. Being a good landlord is good business. Even when times are difficult.
This approach is also part of being ethical, and I’m delighted when I was accepted as an official member of Ethical Influencers in April 2023. Click here to find out what being an Ethical Influencer means. Here’s my profile on Ethical Influencers.
A bit about The Independent Landlord blog
I set up this blog in August 2022 to provide reliable, independent tips and advice about both practical and legal topics that affect landlords and property related businesses. The sort of things I wish I’d been able to find out about when I first started.
Here’s my first blog post from July 2022. Since then, I’ve broadened the scope of the blog beyond landlords to the wider property community, and have been posting consistently once a week, and sending a weekly newsletter.
I also comment a lot on the legal aspects of investing in property. I do this not to give legal advice, but to flag issues that property investors should be aware about. However, as with everything, you need to do your own research. If you’re not sure what to do about a legal problem, the best thing is to get specialist legal advice, and not rely on things you read in blogs.
Finally, the fact I’m not part a lettings company and am not looking for investors or mentees, means you can be assured that the advice I share is impartial and independent. There’s no ulterior motive. I do it to pay forward.
Whilst I recommend products and include affiliate links on the website, I’m very selective about who and what I promote. Most of the time, they’re products and services I’ve bought myself, and I don’t have any generic advertising. Here’s my policy on affiliates and partnerships.
Subscribe to my newsletter
I send out a free weekly newsletter on Friday mornings to my subscribers, who are a mix of property investors, landlords, lawyers, estate agents, service providers and mortgage brokers.
As well as including links to any new content on the website, there’s an exclusive news round-up that I don’t publish anywhere else. In the news round-up, I share what caught my eye in the week, and why it matters to property investors. I also include the latest on the Renters Reform Bill.
I’ve got a good track record of flagging things before the larger property websites. I guess is an advantage of being a one-person band, and writing the newsletter first thing on the day it goes out.
If you’d like to sign up, you can subscribe by clicking here. I won’t spam you and don’t pass on any email addresses. You’ll also receive my free Manual for New Landlords ebook in your welcome email.
Follow indie_landlord on social media
The alter ego of The Independent Landlord on social media is indie_landlord.
Here are direct links to indie_landlord on Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and TikTok.
I post regularly on Instagram and Twitter. Every blog post has has a pin on Pinterest, and I occasionally post on TikTok. I also post and comment regularly on LinkedIn under my actual name, Suzanne Smith.
You can click here for the story about how indie_landlord came about.
Supporting The Independent Landlord
All my content is free, even the newsletter. There’s no catch. I run the blog on a shoe-string and do it all myself, from the original building of the website to the on-going SEO and content creation.
It’s a deliberate decision of mine to bring no-strings, reliable information to property investors. Running this blog is my part of paying forward, and helping others in what are challenging times in the private rented sector. I also enjoy it enormously.
Although the website is entirely free, you can support The Independent Landlord in a couple of ways. However, there’s no obligation. I don’t have Google ads on the website as I find them a bit creepy and distracting. I do have some affiliate links for specific products and services that I think are useful and high quality. If you buy something after clicking on an affiliate link, you’ll be supporting the website as I’ll receive a small commission.
Another way of supporting the website is to make a small contribution towards the running costs of this website via my Buy Me a Coffee page. 😊
*****
I hope you enjoy the blog!
Thank you.
Suzanne
PropertyHub September 2022 feature article
