Property for Sale or Executive Rental?

Unique homes are often snapped up but, when the market is slow, even the best properties can feel out of reach for home hunters.

There are some homes in leafy Hertfordshire, listed by abcproperties.co.uk, that are very interesting. If you can afford over £1m, there is a 4-bedroomed house near Codicote but if your price is around £0.5m a spacious 2-bedoomed penthouse apartment may be your dream home. Or there are one-bedroomed apartments for under £0.25m, in Datchworth and Knebworth.

The most interesting of these properties is the penthouse apartment, a private apartment that takes the entire top floor of the east wing of the manor. Approached via a long driveway and surrounded by acres of parkland, the Manor has private parking as well as en-bloc garages. The solid entrance door leads to a vestibule with a second solid door that is accessed by key or, for visitors, a doorbell-comms system. Walking towards the communal conservatory with south facing terrace, the corridor splits towards the east or west wings.

In the east wing, there is a quiet area at the foot of the stairs, a single apartment on the first floor and the penthouse apartment on the second floor. There is an internal balcony with views through the large window onto parkland and countryside. Entering the apartment through the solid wooden door, there are storage areas, a utility room and a w.c. before the inner corridor offers a choice of drawing/dining room, fully fitted kitchen and two bedrooms, each with en-suite. 

Executive Rental

The Manor's proximity to rail connections into London makes it an ideal getaway for commuters as well as visitors temporarily contracted to UK offices in London, Stevenage, Hatfield, etc.. As such, corporate entities may wish to enter into a sale or rental agreement.

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Some photographs are below but full details can be found on the local agent's website. The agent is willing to negotiate on price or discuss rental options.

Astonbury Manor

When to Stop Working

I think I would have stopped working five years ago if it wasn't for some of the clients I've worked with for a very long time, who made my job interesting and very enjoyable. 

Some have now retired and some have passed the reins to the next generation. That's about where I am, too. I have taken the decision to semi-retire and some of my work has been passed to the next generation.

What usually happens is that, eventually, the current generation of clients will reduce in favour of new clients who require the different set of skills that a new generation brings.

The Time To Stop Working is...

    when it feels like work. 

Not having that income can be a problem. You may have paid off the mortgage and be receiving a private pension but a significant drop in personal income means lifestyle changes. And weaning yourself off the business merry-go-round is a tricky one, therefore a staged retirement plan might work for you.

Those who find lifestyle changes the most challenging are people who have been so wrapped up in their business lives that there was very little provision for anything else. Many of us travelled extensively (pre-covid) both for business and leisure, and may have a desire to continue - or not, with a 'been there, done that' attitude. For example, as a family, we stopped travelling by air during covid and haven't returned to it because our memories of rushing to airports just to wait around for hours have put us off. We've looked at travelling by train but it usually takes hours to reach our desired destinations, usually with frequent changes, and the prices are laughable. As people who like a quiet break away from noise and crowds, we resist the idea of cruises - a floating hotel in an all-inclusive resort. The last time we stayed in a resort-hotel was about 15 or 20 years ago and none of us liked it, so we've have usually opted for a quiet self-catering home in the countryside (Provence, Dordogne, Trossachs, Cumbria, Tuscany and so on - all driveable, albeit with one or two overnight hotel stops).

Unless you plan to travel for several months each year (in which case, downsizing your home seems sensible), you may need to find hobbies. These are wide-ranging: golf, bowls, art, reading, writing, gardening, voluntary work plus many other opportunities. Most of these activities can be solitary or involve a small group of people (popularly believed to be essential to delay deterioration of the brain, such as dementia). Perhaps your 'local' has a regular pub quiz?

One of our clients retired at 50, sold his house and bought a canal boat. Another retired to a warmer climate, as he had the advantage of being an EU citizen (this is where the Brexit outcome spoiled our plans). And we gained a client who, in his 60s, decided to use his retirement to become an author.

So, the question of when to stop working hinges on a number of different situations. If you want to stop and you are able to stop, just bite the bullet and do it. If you find that you need to continue in some form, try easing out, either by working mornings only (which I'm doing) or by dropping a set day to a four-day week, then a three-day week, etc. (which my co-director is planning to do). 

Please add your experience or suggestions via the comments (anonymously, if you prefer).

Refining your Business Niche

When the company was set up almost 35 years ago, the main offering to clients was a writing and design service, which we still offer but possibly not for much longer. Why? Our work in design has decreased as software has become more widely available and students are graduating from a number of related courses, enabling them to work independently if they are unable to secure employment.  

Declining standards of grammar means that our writing, proofing and editing work remain buoyant. However, we have noticed an impact from the number of businesses using Artificial Intelligence, recently, so this may eventually begin to decline.

In the past 25-30 years, website design has been the mainstay of our business but creating an 'all singing, all dancing' website with all its associated costs is proving difficult to offer good value. Added to this, large companies such as IONOS (who reach millions with their TV ads) and other companies who offer easy-peasy-DIY solutions with a low entry cost for their proprietary website creation tools, are taking money from small businesses who are struggling to budget and may also struggle to maintain their website, social media, etc..

We have therefore decided, going forward, to switch from creating corporate websites, too. So what are we offering?

• Wordpress blog set up, can be set up to emulate a website;
• Wordpress blog writing/posting;
• Writing, proof-reading, editing;
• Social media posts - LinkedIn page, Facebook page, Instagram, Twitter/X and more.

These are probably functions that you could undertake yourselves but may not enjoy doing them or you just don't have the time. We may be able to help small businesses, individuals, communities, non-profits and local charities in other ways, such as hand-holding and research - just ask. And our rates are probably the lowest you'll find.

Now that we have decided where to focus the business, we'll aim to update the website in the near future.

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P.S. I touched on the affordability of 'slowing down' in a post a year ago. There are several more related posts from 2019, too.

Flexibility is the Key to Business Survival

At the end of this year, The BPc will reach its 30th anniversary as a small business providing services to other small and medium businesses. We have a varied set of skills, some of which are uncommon in many companies. This has enabled us to offer consultancy or practial assistance across a range of technical, design, marketing and admin projects.

Current Services

Client demand is the key to the services we offer within our specialist skillset. Our most poplar contracts this year are for website design, website updates and social media management. As demands change, grow or fall, it provides an indication of significant changes within industries.

Since a few months prior to Brexit becoming a possibility, we have had no work from outside the UK. With the final day looming, we are not even contemplating accepting overseas clients.

Additional Future Services

Over the next few months, we plan to add more video-related services for clients. These tend to fall into two main categories: product showcase or demonstrations (which could be 'live' or animated or a series of stills) or informational presentations and 'vlogs'.

We have seen sparks of interest in video services.

We have filmed and edited product videos since 2012 for a small handful of clients and, for the past year or so, other clients have used our filming and editing services. We are looking to invest in a studio next year with appropriate equipment for filming in-house.

Problems can arise when DIY videos feature people who have a great face for radio or the perfect voice for silent film. Don't worry, there are experienced professionals available who can assist and do not cost a fortune (providing you don't want Beyoncé to spend half an hour extolling the virtues of the Hertfordshire pond life).

Popular Services from Previous Years
In 1990, the internet was unheard of by most small businesses in the UK. The BPc mostly focused on a range of marketing, digital design and branding projects plus - believe it or not - word processing and creating templates for company stationery. A small selection of business cards, brochures, catalogues, etc. is still kept in an archive somewhere.

By 1997/98. some smaller business required our services with their emails and, soon after, we began designing websites for them. In 2009-ish, we moved completely over to WordPress CMS website development that enable clients to update their own content.

Flexibility is Key

During the decades, we covered multiple services. When DIY software made it easy for unskilled people to create their own graphic designs, our work in that area dropped off. It usually came back a few months later as clients needed a professional clean-up but, meanwhile, we spent more time on website design.

Similarly, some small businesses try to save money by creating their own websites and, sometimes, this goes very well. However, clients generally don't pay enough attention to optimising websites for search engines - this is when they usually need services from The BPc. If website design work starts to drop, we focus on branding or social media clients.

We don't sit back. This is why we've been building towards a film studio and improved editing suite. There is more in the pipeline, too, further down the line.

Don't hesitate to contact us if you'd like our assistance. Our website lists our services - these have grown organically and website navigation could be easier, to be honest, so we're working on a new design in our spare time. Thanks for getting this far!

Building Website Traffic: Start-ups & Small Businesses

Following on from the post about affordable website options, there are various approaches to marketing your website. 

Sometimes grants are available for entrepreneurs to market products and services (check with your local Council or Chamber of Commerce). The grant will usually, in part, be payable to a marketing service. If there is no grant, how will you finance building your business and how do you prioritise?

If you reach the conclusion that building traffic to your website is the best way to go, your attention will turn to SEO (search engine optimisation for your website), advertising (e.g. with Google Ads) and, importantly, social media. (Usually, at this point, many people declare their dislike of sharing photographs of food, cats, selfies, etc.). It should be noted that social media for business purposes is approached more professionally. LinkedIn and Twitter are the top choices for B2B, Facebook for B2C.

Basic SEO should be part of your website development so choose a company or service that recognises this and, at the very least, provides you with the tools to continue producing great content.

Google Ads are extremely competitive and expensive. There are cheaper options, such as a short burst of Facebook Ads to boost your followers as you use social media to engage with them and direct traffic to your website. Find out more about using social media for business. The Google section covers three very useful topics.

You don't need a separate Google blog, though. Your website should have a blog or news section - be sure to update this regularly. If you can't do it every week or month, schedule it in for every two or three months and maybe tie it in with sending out newsletters. You don't even have to do it yourself, some good writers' fees are  from around £30-£40 per article and you could negotiate a multiple article fee.

Time / Money

The toughest part of all the above is finding resources, i.e. time or money. There is no single solution. The BPc will be able to work successfully with many small businesses and startup companies within minimal budgets. If you'd like to find out more, send a message.