Flint

Flint has grown into one of Australia's most awarded mortgage broking firms, recognised for our commitment to excellence and innovation.  In FY26, Flint will settle over $2bn in residential mortgages, making it Australia's largest independent brokerage, with offices across Australia, serving clients worldwide.

Our accolades include:
🏆 Best Broker in Australia x 5
🏆 Australian Broker of the Year x 3
🏆 Leading Finance Brokerage - 2024
🏆 Best New Brokerage - 2024 

With a 98%+ loan approval rate and over a decade of experience, Flint continues to empower Australians on their path to homeownership and financial growth.

Managing Director

Australian Property Talk

APT is one of Australia's most downloaded property podcasts, with over 10,000 subscribers and 1million+ yearly downloads.  

We discuss all things Economics, Property & Lending and provide a fresh take on Aussie Real Estate.

Co-hosted:
- Adi Chanda, Founder of Alaya Property 
- Curtis Stewart, CEO of FlintInvest

https://www.youtube.com/@AusPropertyRedom

Youtuber | Australian Property Talk

FlintInvest

Confidence Finance is now FlintInvest! 

I created Confidence Finance in 2015 with the aim of educating Aussies about home lending & delivering outstanding customer experiences. Since then, we have become one of Australia's most awarded mortgage brokering companies.  

We are home loan experts. Understanding how property finance works is our specialty. We partners with professionals to help you save time & money.  Our approach is to educate our clients through the home buying journey.  In short, we partner with you to achieve your financial goals.

Among other awards, we have been recognised as one of Australia's TOP 100 Mortgage Brokers 7 times (2017-2024).

Founder

The Federal Treasury

> international lending policy with the IMF
> domestic tax policy 
> corporate governance reform

Economist

Graduate at Ernst & Young.
Audit & Advisory

Advisor

The Broker for Homebuyers and Property Investors | 🏆 5 x Top 100 Mortgage Broker in Australia

Here's why LinkedIn Professionals choose us for their home lending needs:

🌟 We've been recognised by #MPAMagazine as one of Australia's Top 100 Brokers, 7 years running! Want to work with someone who's been at the top 0.1% for half a decade? Thats us.  

🎯 They leverage our property market experience.  Together, my team have been on the full property journey - starting as first home buyers, purchasing investment properties and growing a real estate portfolio. 

🧠 As Ex-Treasury Economists, we are not sleek sales-people servicing you.  We are highly skilled professionals who've mastered our crart over nearly a decade @ Flint Invest.

📚 We have a team dedicated to constantly reviewing all of clients loans.  No prompts, no requests - we do it all behind the scenes, free of charge.  Did you know banks discount to new customers more than old ones?  We make sure our customers remain on the lowest interest rates possible by regularly conducting loan reviews.  

💸 They don't get charged by us - we get paid by the lender and disclose all commissions upfront.  They have choice of over 50 lenders, and access to hundreds of products in one place.

🏠  Our market leading research saves you time and money.  For example, in October 2021, we advised all our clients that fixed rates were about to rise.  Over the next 6 months, they doubled in price.  This research saved our clients tens of thousands of dollars over the life of their loan.

Book a time to chat with us here --> https://calendly.com/redom/15min

You can learn more about Confidence Finance here --> www.confidencefinance.com.au

Alternatively, I can be contacted on:
•	Phone: 0489943079
•	Email: info@flintgroup.au

Available to connect anytime - please do not hesitate to reach out to me, i'm always open to growing my professional network and connecting with like-minded individuals.

Redom Syed - Mortgage Broker

One week ago today… the most special night, with the most special person.

Moments like this teach me, real success begins at home.

Because of her, I’m sharper. Clearer. Stronger. More focused.

That energy spills into everything we do.

It shapes the culture we’re building. It fuels the 100+ people I have the privilege to lead.

It creates performance loops that start long before the workday begins.

Getting ‘home’ right has been the key to getting work right.

Redom Syed

Co-Founder Flint Group | Building the Future of Mortgages | 2025 FBAA Broker of The Year

I never had the luxury of being normal.

You see, my family got ripped apart financially when I was a teenager.

I made it my mission to fix it.

Now, with Sydney house prices the way they are, you can’t fix something like that quickly unless you do it differently.

Here’s what I did differently 👇

1. Had the courage to quit the beaten path.

At 24, I walked away from my dream job i spent 10 years chasing to start a business.

Most people thought i was an idiot.  

2. Refused to stop until I was near the best at it.

Because being “good” has never been acceptable to me.

3. Shared openly. Always.

People call it generous — it’s not. 

I do it for me. Sharing gets me closer to my mission, so I do it.

4.  Invested early, reinvested big, and went hard when it was boom time.

Tip: we’re about to enter boom time again. Go big when you can.

5. Used pain as fuel.

Most people run from it. 

I live it, breathe it, own it.

Pain and love are the two most powerful emotions I know. 

I do what I do out of love for my family, and the pain of the past keeps me moving when I can’t be bothered.

6. Followed purpose.

Helping others make better money decisions. Always.

You don't get to outlier results by being normal.

You do it by doing what others won't.

Breaking: Commonwealth Bank just sent shockwaves through the investor lending market.

From tomorrow, CBA will only allow new trust lending for active CBA customers, everyone else is cut off.

This move comes less than 24 hours after Australian Prudential Regulation Authority publicly warned that it is “closely monitoring any build-up of domestic vulnerabilities, particularly in the housing market.”

It was only two weeks ago Macquarie Group made a similar move, blocking all trust lending.

These changes are reflective of a very targeted lending regulator, making a surgical, targeted change...zeroing in on the riskiest pockets of lending.

So why is trust lending viewed as risky?

It's the way they’re used:

Here’s the issue in a nutshell:

→ Under current lending rules, a 3% assessment buffers apply to ANY mortgage debts.  This is designed to protect borrowers and the system, ensuring everyone can afford their mortgages in any rate environment.

 → When utilising trusts, property investors can get creative and find ways to ensure that any existing debts inside that trust often aren’t stressed tested at all.

 → When obtaining a loan in a new trust, the bank checks whether the borrower is meeting repayments today in any 'existing trusts', not whether they can survive a stress-tested environment.

 → Borrowers can thereby 'recycle' trusts here, opening a new one when they are tapped out, and find ways to circumnavigate the 3% mortgage stress test on their existing trust.

 →  The risk here is investor borrowers are not adequately 'stress tested' and can push themselves too far. 

In a market where 40% of all loans are going to investors, and a material chunk of those are running through company/trust structures, you can see why Commonwealth Bank & Macquarie Group moved quickly.

And here’s how it impacts you:

Relying on lending strategies that use trusts to expand your borrowing power?

For the many  investors who rely on trust structures to build multi-property portfolios…your lending playbook just changed overnight.

My life changed when I got better at communicating.

For years, I wasn’t good or clear.

So I studied. 

Spent hours in front of the camera, auditing my own work. Took every course I could find (thanks Vinh Giang!)

Now?

I speak off script. Tell stories. And actually connect.

Here are my 3 biggest lessons to speak better 👇

1. Play. 🎭 

Forget looking & sounding like an old school CEO.  I speak more like the dad I am to my girls, it’s way more entertaining (and real).

2. Slow down. 🐢 

Most of the time, I’m talking about something I know well, but my audience doesn’t. Give them time to catch up.

3. Be vulnerable.❤️

People don’t remember your facts, they remember how you made them feel. I use my emotional range to share how i feel.  It helps connect. 

My lesson?

Get better at communicating.  Going from invisible to being seen can change your life quickly.

You’ve got to be a little crazy to change the game.

Reasonable won't cut it.

This year’s been about building. 

Next year? 

It’s about turning these foundations into results.

My note to my partners this week was simple:

“Be so unreasonable that everyone thinks we're nuts”

So here's what’s coming from me in 2026:
▶️ 250 long-form YouTube videos
▶️ 100 Podcast episodes with Curtis Stewart & Adi Chanda
💥 300+ LinkedIn posts

All while growing Flint to hit some crazy targets.

Because the world doesn’t reward reasonable.

It rewards those crazy enough to think they can do it… and then actually take unreasonable actions to achieve it.

I finally snapped… in the most dad way possible.

When you put yourself out there, you cop all kinds of nonsense.

99.9% of the time I let it go.

But this one? 

Just straight-up unacceptable racism.

So I went full dad-discipline mode: firm voice, eye contact, podcast mic on.

No dessert. No bedtime story. Straight to reflection time.

These 6 content rules will generate me $10mill+ in revenue in 2026.

Copy them 👇

1. I don’t bother selling.
(So you never feel like you’re being sold to)

2. I don’t care what you think.
(Like me. Don’t like me. I’ll still like me… and that’s all that matters here)

3. I absolutely LOVE what I’m talking about.
(I’ve literally turned my podcast into time with my two best mates)

4. I never script.
(Yawn...people want realness, not GPT scripts read out)

5. I always play.
(Because i like to have fun)

6. I study the best
(Every-night i'm watching others who do it well, trying to get a tiny bit better)

Because the second you start creating from love instead of fear, everything changes.

That’s when people actually start listening.

Here are 5 things I love every week (and 1 thing that drives me nuts).

1. Coming in on Mondays and seeing my teams faces.  Instant smile. 

2. My Tuesday night chats with Adi Chanda, we live in different cities and I get an hour with a friend

3. 7-8pm dancing daily with my girls. My rhythm is questionable, but my confidence is elite. 💃

4. The podcast room.  It’s supposed to be serious, but really I’m just hanging with my mates. 

5. Friday nights with my wife.  We’re both building our careers and juggling two little kids. Fridays are for us, we slow down and just talk. 

Oh…

And one thing I hate…cutting my one gray hair that keeps coming back everytime i shoot content 

(If anyone’s cracked the code, please help 🙃)

No alternative text description for this image

Last fortnight, 6 out of my 7 posts hit 10,000+ impressions.

And the secret wasn’t a growth hack or algorithm trick. 

I stopped using GPT…

And I just wrote like me.

(Turns out writing like a weirdo is the secret to breaking the content game)

My biggest business lesson in 10 years

Experiment first.  Then focus all energy on what actually works.

When you find it, go all in.

For me, two years ago, I started a small podcast.

Today, 80% of my new business comes directly from that podcast and YouTube channel.

I've had over 1300 clicks into my sales team diary in the last 9 months alone.

So my next move?

From Monday, the three people sitting next to me won’t be brokers.

They’ll be:
 🎥 a full-time videographer
 ✍️ a full-time copywriter
 📱 a full-time social media manager

Because when you find the thing that moves the needle…

You triple down, not dabble.

Great leaders don’t rely on one style. 

They switch gears fast.

When I first stepped into this gig, the situation called for unity…bringing everyone together and creating one direction.

So i went about sharing stories, presenting visions with the aim of drawing connection with us, and where we are heading. 

Some days, it calls for strength: setting standards, drawing lines, making it clear what’s acceptable and what isn’t.

And sometimes, it’s none of that.

It’s simply being present. Listening. Showing I care.

Leadership isn’t about being one fixed version of yourself.

It’s knowing which version the moment needs.

My take out?

Intelligence isn’t about knowing things…

(ChatGPT has your back here)

It’s about being adaptable…reading the room and adjusting quickly.

"Surround yourself with people who inspire you"

Every leadership book says the same message

So i did...

This year, i jumped out of my comfort zone and partnered with Christian Stevens to grow Flint. 

Today my days are spent with one of Australia's best ever mortgage brokers. 

12 months later, i'm winning the very awards his been filling his trophy cabinet with for years.

Co-incidence?  I think not.

Thank you partner.

Co-Founder Flint Group | Building the Future of Mortgages | Ex-Treasury Economist | 2025 Broker of The Year

Building Australia’s First $10B+ Brokerage! We’re Looking for Great People to Join the Flint Journey. Be Part of Something Bigger 🚀

The best part about being in business is seeing others win.

Massive congratulations to Redom Syed - one of the most genuine people you’ll ever meet - for taking out both Australian Finance Broker of the Year and NSW Finance Broker of the Year on Friday night at the national FBAA awards!! 

You can’t fake that smile.
We’re all so proud of you mate.

A well-deserved recognition for someone who continues to lift the standard for our entire industry 👏🏼

Execution > Planning. 99% of the time.

Most of us build mental barriers around the things we want to do.

“I’m too busy.”
“It’s not for me.”
“I’ll start tomorrow.”

What you’re really saying is: “I don’t want to get uncomfortable.”

Last year, I’d spend days preparing, thinking, planning… just to film one YouTube video.

And I still flopped. Over and over.

Embarrassing, low ROI, zero impact.

Now?

I can film three videos in 90 minutes. Minimal prep. 10x the views. And it fills our sales team’s diary for a week.

Thinking about doing what I wanted achieved nothing.

(Just like reading 12 self-help books and taking no action..)

The lesson?

Stop thinking.

Start doing.

My favourite part of the job?

Playing coach

Getting into the weeds of what it takes to thrive as a broker, sharing everything I know and trying to level others up.

Lately I’ve been flying city to city, working with our team, getting them uncomfortbale in front of the cam.

The lessons:
- tell stories that make people feel
- share who you are, not what you know 
- just do it. Embrace discomfort…confidence will come 

Oddly enough…being ‘cringe’ for years and years is the lesson I’m sharing.

Embrace the cringe…the sound of your own voice…the weirdness of putting yourself out there

(Or in my case, the annoying gray hair that refuses to go away!)

Eventually you go from being the person being laughed at…to the person teaching others how to do it.

APRA acted like the schoolyard bully today.

Shout, scream.  Try to scare.

But actually…

Do nothing.

Today’s announcement is just that.

From Feb 2026, banks can only issue 20% of all new loans where debt is >6× the applicant’s income.

Well…

In the middle of the biggest investment lending boom in nearly a decade

We are at 10%

HALF the cap. 🧢 

My full take 

BREAKING: APRA’s New Lending Cap Targets Property Investors
https://lnkd.in/gQTeEV9v

Open video: BREAKING: APRA’s New Lending Cap Targets Property Investors on youtu.be

BREAKING: APRA’s New Lending Cap Targets Property Investors

The power of brand saved us $50,000 last month

And it happened in the most unexpected way, through our podcast.

Adi Chanda and I did a shout out for staff on our podcast

Within 72 hours, 30+ emails/DMs landed in our inbox.

The quality was insane.

No cookie cutter CVs and boring cover letters.

They knew who we were.

They were well researched, knew property like wizards, and had watched us for months

One guy we hired sent us the best loom I’d ever seen. 

Some were willing to change their whole lives and chase their passion in property

Others just wanted to be around us 

💡 Our marketing efforts isn’t just for clients.  It’s our best recruiter too.

Am I taking enough risk for my business to survive in 5 years time?

This question circled my brain this evening after attending an AI event hosted by Lendi Group, where they shared their journey building with AI.  

Here’s what I learned:

- the pace of change is rapid, but we are still very early on in our change journey 

- take more risk, experiment, and fail very quickly

- ask yourself when building with AI: what can you do today with AI that wasn’t possible yesterday. 

- don’t use AI for AIs sake, there’s plenty of automation and technology pre AI that remains and will remain incredibly valuable.

There’s not many events I leave with more questions than answers…and I think that was exactly the point.

To challenge our beliefs, to inspire new ways of thinking.

Thank you David Hyman for the invitation.

9 months ago, I met a broker who completely changed how I think about leadership

Today, that same broker launching his own office

When I first met Ben Robinson, he was already one of the sharpest operators I’d met.

But what he’s achieved since is next level:
💥 Nearly tripled his monthly lodgements 
📈 Built one of LinkedIn’s most visible mortgage brands
👥 Assembled a high-performing team of brokers, BDMs, analysts, and processors

And he’s done it all with passion, curiosity, and relentless drive.

Now, he’s taking the next big leap, leading FlintNewcastle.

It’s a huge milestone, and one he’s absolutely earned.

👉 If you’re in Newcastle and want to see what real client-first broking looks like, reach out to Ben about growing your career with Flint.

Big news today from Newcastle!! 

After more than 12 months of planning, we have officially opened the doors to our brand-new Flint office right in the heart of Newcastle. 

Newcastle is Australia's largest city outside the major capitals and has always been a place full of energy, growth and genuine people who get things done. Now, we get to be part of that - helping locals, business owners, and investors make smarter moves with the right finance behind them.

Our new space is led by Ben Robinson - one of the country’s best brokers and a close friend of mine. He’s joined by an incredible team including Matt Hollinworth, Anthony Toth, Lauren Franzmann and Bree Atkinson - with two more experienced brokers confirmed to join early next year. We have also built out a dedicated internal team of 15 specialists across complex credit, loan processing, post-settlement and compliance to support the new office. 

If you're a hungry broker based in Newcastle or the surrounding area, we are looking to expand to more than 10 brokers in the next few months, with an annual office settlement target of $1B+ by next year. 

💥 #FlintNewcastle - now open!
https://lnkd.in/gSgaYQXX

Open article: Flint opens Newcastle office by brokerdaily.au

CBA’s lending change explained in 10 minutes 

Property investors are now being targeted with surgical precision…the riskiest areas of lending are being picked apart.

Why?

Investor lending is flying at 2017 levels…

2017 was also the last time APRA intervened in lending policies targeting investors too. 

https://lnkd.in/gZYy859n

Open video: Breaking: Property Investors Are Being Targeted in Lending Crackdown on youtu.be

Breaking: Property Investors Are Being Targeted in Lending Crackdown

Alaya Property

Founder & Principal Buyer's Agent

A free weekly newsletter talking about property investing, savvy money habits and personal development hacks.

Writer

BALI ADOPTION REHABILITATION CENTRE

I’m working alongside my partner to bring more engagement to the social media posts for BARC in an effort to bring more awareness to their mission to save and rehabilitate unwanted dogs on the streets of Bali.

Our work involves:
• regularly posting of creative content
• establishing partnerships with other organizations to bring more awareness to animal welfare in Bali
• managing the donor list and ensuring our fundraisers are successful

Social Media Business Strategist

Telstra

In my role as a Senior Product Manager, I was responsible for finding solutions to very complex problems in the SMS & Mobile industry. Leveraging data was a critical aspect of my role where I developed strategies for billion-dollar companies, with the sole purpose of delivering high-impact outcomes for customers.
Key skills I developed included:
Data Analytics: I made strategic decisions grounded in deep market insights while extracting information from complex data sets (think excel sheets with 100s of tabs).


Complex Problem Solving: The world of SMS & MMS is complex both in its technical nature and in its commercial nature. As the product manager responsible for multi-billion companies, I spearheaded product strategies that were focused on improving user experiences (think reducing scam as an example) and maximizing ROI.


Strategic Planning: I drove long-term roadmaps and portfolio management, ensuring that projects aligned with broader business goals while addressing emerging market trends, which is hard to do with limited budgets and skyhigh expectations from leadership teams. Yet I managed.

Senior Mobile Product Manager

Self-employed

Currently tutoring 8 students (primary and secondary)
Effectively communicating topics to students
Providing constructive feedback to improve student performance

Teacher

Hologo World Inc

Head Of Operations

Billabong High International School, Maldives

I’m an experienced educator currently working in BHIS as a Maths teacher. I’m also actively developing digital content for Hologo and Teaching Tube. We’re currently developing an education product to help schools become more efficient and allow students to learn in dynamic and engaging ways.

Educator and Content Developer

Senior Product Manager - Fixed Products

First rotation - Business Analyst and Project Management
Second rotation - NBN Capacity Planner
Third rotation - Assistant Product Manager

Graduate

Are you worried about buying the wrong property?

Not sure which market is best? Or if you're overpaying?

Worse yet…ever feel like every so-called "expert" is just trying to flog you some nonsense?

If you’ve been nodding along, then I'm glad we're on the same page.

Hey, I’m Adi.

I run Alaya Property, a buyer’s agency that helps investors make data-backed property purchases - without getting railroaded.

You see, I learned long ago that the property market is stacked against everyday investors in Australia.

→ Sales agents work for the seller, not you.

→ Shiny new builds often come with hidden kickbacks.

→ Many investors buy based on hype, not fundamentals, and then it becomes "property doesn't work".

That doesn't make any sense, considering most of the wealthy have gotten that way through property. Don’t you wonder how they did it?

The usual result? Overpriced, underperforming properties that set you back instead of setting you up.

That’s where Alaya Property comes in.

What we do:

We help investors buy smart - so they won’t be relying on the pension later.

→ We deep-dive into market trends, numbers, and long-term fundamentals, because really this is what drives prices.

→ We find underpriced properties with serious potential (not just what’s easy to sell).

→ We negotiate for you so you walk away with equity from day one

And we don’t do it alone.

We’ve got an economist on the team tracking macro trends, spotting suburb shifts before the rest of the industry catches on.

My team is also growing so we have more people on the ground.

This is the exact approach I used to build a $5M portfolio for myself - one that lets my partner & me live a life where we no longer have to worry about money.

We can help you get there too.

Want to find out if we can help you specifically? Here you go.

https://tidycal.com/3e8n2l3/30mins-discovery-call

Adi Chanda

I made *gasps in Indian* $18k in Q1FY24.

Fast forward a year - the same quarter paid off ~60% of my parents’ mortgage.

When they had one, of course - they think they’re so cool with their “we’re debt free” nonsense.

The whole “overnight success” thing is a bit silly, innit?

Because, you see, my little pepito - not a lot happens for a long time, painful period.

Then everything does “all at once” and then people start calling you lucky.

You are lucky in a way - because you're one of the very few who didn't give up before the “all at once” part showed up.

I'll help you build the kind of property portfolio that keeps the pension out of your retirement plans.

Sadly, I had to do my first firing at Alaya Property 🥺

Here are 4 lessons I learned the hard way - so maybe you don’t have to.

1 - Seniority doesn’t equal competency.

I brought them in as our first “senior” hire. I thought experience would solve everything.

But what I actually needed wasn’t seniority - it was depth of thinking and the ability to problem-solve.

You can’t fake that, and you sure as hell can’t teach it. You either have it or you don’t.

2 - Hope is not a management strategy.

Miguel and I ran weekly 1:1s.

We had a Slack channel called “objectives” where we literally documented what needed to change.

We restructured tasks and even paid ridiculous amounts to external contractors to lighten their load.

Every week, it was the same line - “This isn’t me. I don’t know what’s happening".

But I kept telling myself to give it more time because I liked them (they also loved dogs which didn't help).

I felt so much shame in being the person who gave up on someone.

But the hits kept coming - wrong names in contracts, pissed off agents, annoyed conveyancers, poor client feedback - even needing 3 separate refunds to clients.

I just kept praying to all the gods it would somehow turn around.

3 - The “it’s all my fault” mindset is silly on these occasions.

My friend, Haley, wrote recently about how she used to take pride in thinking everything was her fault.

I felt like she was yelling directly at me 🥹

I kept telling myself their underperformance was a reflection of our leadership.

So Miguel and I doubled down - more coaching, more patience, more optimism that time would fix things.

When in reality, no amount of training was going to fix a fundamental mismatch.

4 - Avoidance disguised as kindness hurts people.

My final straw was when team members started calling to say THEY were copping flak from agents, property managers and even B&P inspectors 🫠 

I realised (FINALLY) that my inaction wasn’t actually empathy - it was selfishness pretending to be empathy.

My amigo, Ryan Toppin, said something recently that lives rent free in my head now - “keeping someone who isn’t thriving is actually really unfair to them”.

It chips away at their confidence and sense of belonging every single day.

The whole thing has been humbling as hell for me.

It was an awful feeling finally making the decision, but 4 weeks on, seeing the team thrive again - I wish I’d had the courage to do it months earlier.

If you’re stuck in a similar limbo - torn between accountability and compassion - I get you.

But I think you already know the answer, my friend.

I'm hella bullish on the Brizzy market.

And you 100% need to be too, my guy.

First, let’s deal with the elephant in the room.

(And shut up it’s not me, I’m carrying a bit of winter weight okay. I said - shut up.)

→ Brisbane has gone through monumental price growth in the past few years.

So naturally, the sentiment is “ahh but but it can’t go up anymore because it’s already gone up”.

I feel like there’s a “that’s what she said joke in there somewhere” but I’m unfortunately too mature to know where.

Anywhos.

As someone well versed in primary school level economics, I know one thing is for certain:

Low supply + high demand = to the moon

And boy does Brizzy have some astonishingly low supply.

Add to that 

→ the migration data

→ the 100m freestyle in a few years

→ ridic infrastructure spend

→ and the fact that you can still buy a house for less than a car space in Sydney.

You start to see why it makes all kinds of sense.

As a company that buys dozens of properties a month through dedicated buyer’s agents, even WE are finding it to be a tall order.

Because houses are literally selling in less than 6 hours.

It’s absurd.

So yes, I’m confident that Brisbane has a lot of room to move and will go through a second wind effect, where prices will continue to surge due to the ridiculous pressure on the market.

If anyone disagrees with that, I would love to hear your reasoning.

If it’s a sound reason, I’ll immediately change my mind and start my next post with “I'm hella bearish on the Brizzy market”.

That’s thought leadership after all.

To the small biz owner still doing every single thing.

Come here amigo, let me whisper something into your earholes.

“Did you know otters hold hands while they sleep so they don’t float away from each other?” 🥹

Anywhos, our agency finalized 15 deals in the past 2 weeks.

That’s ~1.5 per business day - not bad for a saucy little small biz.

The flex here isn’t the volume.

It’s that we did it pretty comfortably - no one working 17-hour days or stress-eating through 2 bags of chips and a Tony’s chocolate bar.

Lots of business owners talk about systems & processes being the backbone of their business.

But I’ve learned via dozens of conversations that very few actually put these into place.

So for the folks who are still grinding things out every day - never stopping long enough to actually understand their business - you’re doing yourself (and your clients) a massive disservice.

Before you kick me in my naughty parts, let me explain my why:

→ Because when your systems are broken, people become the patch. That’s a recipe for disaster because burnout becomes a real concern.

→ Because when you’re always reacting, it becomes hard to be creative. And creativity i.e. the mental capacity to think creatively about problems is what actually moves your business forward.

→ Because if your business only works when you’re in the trenches, what you actually have is just a very stressful job with (maybe) nicer branding.

A few months ago we started rebuilding almost everything at Alaya Property.

Not just the exterior stuff, but also all the messy stuff that no one but us sees.

We worked on automating our internal workflows, restructuring the way we approached client comms, and built groundbreaking support roles.

The result of all of that?

We’re no longer playing whack-a-mole and have started doing what we do best at scale - finding, negotiating and securing incredible deals.

It’s wild how calm things feel now - and how much faster we move because of it.

Clients are kept better informed, the team’s days are lighter and there’s genuine joy in the day to day.

Pretty big achievement for a company that’s undergoing dramatic changes / uncomfortable growth.

This is what sustainable scaling looks like.

I think, anyway.

PS - playing with this doggo was my only saving grace in April ‘24, when I was feeling more stress than my tiny body had ever felt.

PPS - how excellent are doggos for stress relief though?

Don't correct me if I'm wrong.

But I think most of us aren’t scared to fail - we’re scared to look like an idiot.

My guy, looking stupid is a fundamental part of - nay, a rite of passage, in the investor’s journey.

You’re going to have people that:

→ don’t understand the decisions you’re making and will criticize you for it.

You’ll feel stupid as a result.

→ will project their fears onto you because their past decisions led to unhappy results.

You’ll feel stupid as a result.

→ judge you because you’re making decisions for the betterment of yours and your family’s future.

You’ll feel stupid as a result.

This is why so many of us get stuck in the same old place year after year, because we let the noise of our environment become in charge of our lives.

The ONLY way to get past this is to build what I like to call a “cone of stfu energy” around you.

Only listen to the people who have done the very thing you want to do and block out the noise from everyone else.

Then take all that knowledge and put it to work.

Do that for 6 months in a row, and tell me your life isn’t fundamentally different.

PS - This is me clapping for myself for being such a visionary, while my team looked on - bored & angry. Leadership!

This was my first “data report” for clients 19 months ago.

If you’ve ever looked at your “early work” and cringed into your soul - me too, my friend, me too 🥹 

Coming across this last night brought a very cliche / very important reminder:

→ Every single one of us has to start somewhere.

Fast forward to today and I have a whole team behind this, where we produce a dozen different reports every month.

What used to take me staying up all night, now happens seamlessly on a weekly basis.

Now, I love me a lesson, so here’s one to hold onto.

Everyone wants Chapter 7 of someone’s story.

But unfortunately you don’t get to skip the messy part. 

You just have to stick around long enough for that terrible cringe feeling to turn into a beautiful craft.

My guy, Seb, is keeellinggg itttt.

Casually winning offers whilst competing with 50+ others 😌

He’s managed to pull off what I can only describe as a miracle.

If you’ve been following the Melbourne market, you’ll know all about Pakeham.

We’ve been buying there for 9 months and dear god, is it absolutely frenetic there at the moment.

But somehow, Seb managed to buy a house for…$655,000 in October of 2025 lol

Here’s how I think he did it:

→ He speaks French. I would sell someone my house on the cheap if they spoke French. Because rawrrrrr.

→ He played mind games with the agent and vendor and bamboozled them into handing over the keys.

→ Did I mention he speaks French? Rawwrrrr. 

I don’t mean to be Bollywood dramatic, but I can’t express just how ludicrous that number actually is.

To buy something with a 6 in front is purely silliness.

It takes exceptional people skills, deep local market knowledge and the ability to work under insane pressure when there are 50+ others circling the thing you want.

As a result, this client is going to wake up in 12 months’ time and realise that he’s sitting on AT LEAST $100,000 of equity:

→ He can use this to buy another property, without using any of his own cash.

→ He can start a business, and look at boosting his take-home dineros.

Or a host of other things that his financial planner + accountant advise him on.

I can confidently say that his life has fundamentally changed from this moment onwards.

That’s kind of what the right first investment does for you.

It opens doors you couldn’t even see before.

Man I love this shit.

Oh and Seb, my man, you’re one of MY best investments this year 🙂

You know what no one ever tells you?

That leadership is sort of like finding yourself nude in public, and oh boy is it cold out.

I’m trying my best not to let my insecurities drive my decision making.

This article by Jason Andrew (big fan btw) captures perfectly what I’m desperately trying to do - let go of control and build a legacy of leaders who will carry the Alaya torch forward.

For quite a few months, and even now on occasion, I find myself fixing shit because it’s “just easier”.

➝ I find it difficult to not provide a solution when there’s “an obvious fix” swimming around in my head.

➝ I find it hard to just sit in the discomfort of "empowering to find a solution”, and trust that the team will figure it out - sometimes better than I ever could.

Although a 100x better than it used to be, I still find myself making low-level decisions which will rarely move the needle forward.

The irony of my inability to let go is that we’ve likely stagnated in many parts of the business because I’m the neck of the bottle.

Why?

Because I’m scared.

This is hands down the most I’ve ever cared about something. 

Every client, every team member, every person even loosely connected to us is someone I find myself thinking a lot about.

You mix that kind of overbearing care with a neurotic control freak nature, and you find yourself with a business equivalent of a molotov cocktail.

In rare moments, I’m absolutely convinced that no one else could possibly care as much as I do. 

So I “just jump in real quick”.

The article talks about being stuck in the middle of the pyramid - doing work that feels productive, but in reality all it's doing is keeping me from doing the real work - building leaders, not fixing problems.

If I had to be even more honest with myself, I think I know the deeper issue.

It’s trust.

I know I trust my team. I let them make client decisions without ever getting involved. 

But I’m not sure I fully trust myself yet.

➝ Trusting that I can help them grow into the kind of leaders I know they can be.

➝ Trusting that I can step back without everything falling apart.

A lot of days (I think), I nail it.

Other days, I still find myself stuck in the middle, just like this article said.

Jason - great article, my good sir. 

Please try not to yell at me through the screen next time.

This stuff is hard ok 🥹

Open article: The business owner pyramid: Why most founders are stuck in the middle by smartcompany.com.au

The business owner pyramid: Why most founders are stuck in the middle

Only ~16% of properties made it to clients 🥹

Translation = we rejected 5 out of 6 because they were mierda.

Property, unfortunately, is very much a numbers game.

As a company, we get literally 100 of properties across the country sent to us by dozens of agents.

127 to be exact for this fortnight.

After a thorough due diligence and CMA (where you compare house prices) process, that number drops to a measly 20.

Wahhhhh 😩

So in effect, we spend FAR more time rejecting properties (107 of them) than actually doing anything meaningful with them.

There's just so much shite out there in the market, my friends.

There are properties:

→ on main roads or near major arterials - big no no.

→ on train lines / near power lines / schools (because kids are annoying) - bigger no no.

→ near graveyards - I’m not superstitious, but I also wouldn’t want to live near graves. It’s kinda creepy.

We painstakingly go through 35 of these checks - every single time, habibi.

It’s a lot of effort, but it’s also the reason our clients pay us to do the deed for them - it's shit, painstaking work.

Because a lot of the time, it’s not just about chasing some big magical capital growth win - it’s also about avoiding a big mistake.

If I had to boil it all down to a single quippy line - our job is the quiet, unsexy discipline of saying no 5 times, so the client can rest easy with numero 6.

If you’re doing this on your own, I wish you good luck, my friend. 

You’ll need patience, data, and the grit to walk away when every brother & sister is shouting “deal of the year”.

taplio

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The Battle

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