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Hi, my name's Sandy and this is our six-bed hotel. This used to be an old jail. It's 400 years old.
Been on the academy for about a year now. Yeah, wouldn't have the hotel without the academy. Let's show you around. This place is called Dolgellau and been coming here for 5 years and I've been looking at this hotel ever since I've been coming here thinking how beautiful it is. The hotel had been on the market for some time for 550,000 pounds. It sold and he bought it in January. He opened the doors in April and he closed the doors in June. I remember Samuel talking about motivated sellers. So, I thought he's got to be motivated. Why has he bought it and he's closed the doors after a few months. The proposition I put to him was I'm a cash buyer. I can make this happen very quickly. At that time, we probably had about 50,000 pounds. So, I wasn't really a cash buyer at all. But, what I'd learned on Samuel's training, you can say you're a cash buyer because I was able to get my hands on cash through bridging. I made him an offer a lot less than he was originally asking. He just shook my hand and said, "Well, you might as well take the keys now."
This is our bar. It's a very busy cocktail bar. It's a place where they come and they dress up, which is really nice. I just think people like having something different in town. To be honest, I feel like I've been hit on the head because I've never worked so hard in my life. We've gone from me, my husband and my daughter pulling pints behind the bar to now letting the rooms, running a cocktail bar and we've now got 14 members of staff. It's crazy and I think there's more to come.
So, this used to be an old jail. This was the cells down here. The cells were apparently dreadful. Really, really appalling conditions, freezing cold. So, down here is the restaurant. We use this space for lots of things like these cows that you can see here. I do arts and we do a paint and sip. This is our latest thing. We're going to be doing um cinema in the cellar. Um So, the plan is to do supper and cinema because it's a very small town, they don't have a cinema, so we just thought that would be a really nice thing to do. The feedback from the locals has been really, really lovely. They've been so supportive. If I share something on Facebook, they share it. People come in and they've just said, you know, you've really brought something to the town and they love all the activities we're doing. It's got a bit of a community feel here now. When we took this place over here, everything you see in here was already here. It would have cost a fortune for us to do all this ourselves. It's just saved us so much money.
A local historian dropped this off, but this is a a picture of the old cells. This is where it tells you all about how this was the old Dolgellau jail. My neighbor said her grandparents used to own this place and she said grandmother used to keep the cellar like a a shed, really, and she used to send the children down and say, "Can you go and get something from the cellar?" And they were so scared, they hated going down there.
I joined the academy March 2025. And on the first day of the academy, this lady came up to me and said, "Hi, I messaged you on Samuel's socials." And we got chatting. We not even gone into the room for the training. And she said, "What do you do?" And I said, "Well, I've got a little cottage in Wales and we let it as a holiday let." And she said, "Is there any chance, you know, can can you find me a cottage?" I actually managed to find her a cottage already a holiday let. It was off market. By the time I met her in the next break, the deal was done. And um, she paid me £2,500. Hadn't even started the training when that conversation happened.
This room is called Cadair, which is named after the famous mountain. There's a lovely view out here. One thing I was really upset about was these beams, 400 years old, and they painted them white. I've actually brought them back. This is actually a hack. People think they've been stripped, but it's actually a paint job. Looks like oak beams again. This is Mordec. This is classed as one of our suites. We charge around 160 to 180 a night for this room. It was in really good condition. Most of the furniture in here we've inherited. I've just really changed like finishing touches. When we took it on there was on here the welcome tray there was like plastic containers which for a boutique hotel didn't look that good. So, I've changed it now to crystal glasses, China cups with the Welsh touch, coffee machine, vinyls, record and just little touches like the sheep. Even things like that, I see people coming in taking photographs of the sheep toilet roll holders in there which is crazy.
Talk about take a lot on in one go when we took the hotel on. I wanted to set myself a challenge. I wanted to see if I could actually get a holiday let on a rent to rent. So, I approached a friend of mine who lived in Portugal. I said, "You've got a flat in Liverpool, haven't you?" And he said, "Yeah." I said, "Well, I've got a proposition for you. How about I rent it off you and when you come home I'll let you stay in your apartment." And then he called me and he said, "Let's do it." So, got a lovely apartment in Liverpool paying a rent of 1,200 and that includes all the bills. Currently letting that for about 3,600 a month. I can honestly say that's one of our best properties and it's constant, it never stops, it's not seasonal.
This room is called Ereri and you've got a street view which is really nice. Tiny little bathroom which looks like a cupboard but it's actually very functional. Most of the bookings come through booking.com and Airbnb. We use a channel manager called Guest which is really useful because it can get quite confusing when you're in and out of different channels. This is the only room that wasn't done. It was just a shell and to get into this room you used to go through this door here. So, it didn't really have an en suite. We've put a door in here, new floor, new everything.
Everything you see in here is brand new. So, now the final room. This is Merion. I just love the beams and everything in here. This room typically would be 160 to 180 and I do think it's a very, very popular room. Then there's a walk-in shower and this was just like this when we took it over so we've not had to do anything to this. I don't think I'd have taken a wreck on but I would have been up for a challenge. I can't believe for the price we paid we already got a lot of equity in it because we bought it massively, you know, undervalued. Straight away we've made our money back and more. When I was joining the academy I said to my husband it's 12,000 pounds and he nearly fell off his chair when I mentioned that. I said honestly I think I'm going to fly if I join the academy and then I made him watch some of Samuel's winners on a Wednesday and YouTube videos and he started saying to me, "Do you know what? I think you need to do this." Signed up and I have had my money back over and over again. I would never own this hotel without the stuff I learned. So I'd say it's very, very crucial. I walk up this road so many times in the day. I just can't believe that we actually own this building. I mean just look at it. You know, the mountains behind it. It's just so impressive and I can't believe it's actually ours.
This is our cottage. It's called Lease Bodol. As you'll see we've got a pink door and do all our cottages. Hence the Instagram behind the pink door. So this is the first cottage we bought. We paid 118,000 pounds for this cottage. We've recently had it valued at 200,000 so we knew that property was definitely the right thing to get into. If you'd like to follow me I can take you to see some of our other properties which are just a few minutes walk away from here.
So this is our first holiday let and you should be able to spot our cottage from the door. So this is two bedrooms. So we've just added lots of little features like the sheep, lots of little Welsh touches, Welsh tea towels and things like that. Just trying to give it a real cottagey feel. Everybody gets a welcome hamper when they come here. We've even got little treats for the dogs as well. You have to go the extra mile. This This very much family bookings. When we send them out the welcome pack, we say that we own the hotel, come and say hi, uh come and have a drink with us, come and have a meal with us, and we're looking to offer a discount for people who stay here as well. Bunk beds for the children, which they seem to love. And in here, it's quite a decent size bedroom, actually. I actually bought it off market because my neighbor, I mentioned to him that I was a property investor, he put me forward to a chap who was selling this. So, I bought it below market value and off market, and we had bookings straight away. The mortgage is £450 a month. In the high season, that can bring in £3,000 plus per month. From my house to here, it's less than a minute. It's really convenient to have the properties all in one area because I can use the same cleaner, I've got the same handyman. It definitely pays to have more than one in the area. The hotel's definitely changed my life. I've never worked so hard in my life. I took early retirement when I was 52, 53, and here I am 60 taking on a hotel. But, property, I think, does change your life because it's an opportunity to earn a lot of money, more money than people earn in in a year, you know, you can make from one property.
After buying our first cottage, we sort of got the bug, and this came on the market, and we knew we had to have it. So, put an offer in below what the asking price was, and the offer was accepted. This is probably my favorite cottage. It's just everything about it is just chocolate box. We bought it just before Christmas, and 1 week later, we had our first guests in. So, it was like a 60-minute makeover. The mortgage is £700 a month. In the high season, we can let that out for anything from 2,500 to 3,500 per month. Didn't have anything major to do other than furnish it. Bedroom with two single beds. This is really cute, and it's got a great view to the sea. It's just a few minutes away from the beach, this property. And then, this is the main bedroom. I think for me, after having the cottages and having the hotel, I've got to say running the cottages is a lot easier. I mean, I've not been here for ages. My cleaner comes and she takes care of everything. My advice would be, you need to really think about if you're taking on a hotel. I don't think I'd think twice about taking on holiday lets as long as they're in the right place.
I actually think the academy's too cheap. I don't think £12,000 is enough. For for what you get, it's like unbelievable. I've actually rejoined without question. As soon as I met him, I saw how entrepreneurial he is. I just can't thank him enough. It's the best thing I've ever done and I'm not going to stop now. I'm 60 and I can't believe the stuff I'm doing now at my age. You know, I'm really not going to stop. I'm going to carry on buying properties. Wouldn't have been able to do it without the help of Samuel, so can't thank him enough.