Transcription
Hi, my name is Shannon. I have been on the academy for 18 months. I have built a 6 million pound service accommodation portfolio within the last 12.
I was suicidal at one point. It was quite bad back then. I just thought, "I can't let them know how actually mentally unwell I am because they'll just take me away from my daughter." I don't think anyone could understand it until you've been through it. But the academy, I'll always say, saved my life.
So, anyone who's from Kirby will know this park behind me. I used to walk through it pretty much every single day and I used to hang around on the skateboards. Last time I sat on these ramps, obviously my mom was very ill. So, um, with having stage three breast cancer and stuff. So, I used to just survive day-to-day. I suppose I always just thought, "This is where my kids are going to play," and that would be it.
I grew up in a little town called Kirby, which, it no one really's heard of it. It's on the outskirts of Liverpool. So, um, it's not a well-known town. Everyone knows everyone. It's a very, very small place. I used to get the bus to university there.
So, this property is a two-bedroom, two-bath property in L3 again in Liverpool. Um, this actually is an R-to-N property. This is a property that we manage for an investor and the landlord of this property likes everything, um, to be very high-end and very, um, quality. So, um, we have different bedding, different cushions, certain tea bags, all that kind of stuff. So, we do manage your property. We'll ask you kind of your preferences on stuff like that. Um, not just ours.
The clientele that we usually get in here are people visiting from abroad. Um, so people that are coming to like arenas and to see shows. It's mainly couples or like two couples that stay in here. So, we still target this to tourists, but we also get some business people as well. So, yeah.
So, then we've got the living room. Um, I do like the decorations and the decor in this property. I think it's really, um, it is really nice. So, Sara knew a landlord who was looking for property management within the Liverpool area. And obviously, Sara's area is Chester and I do Liverpool. So, she introduced me to that landlord and we managed to get a deal together. We've been doing business now after around 4 months and the previous management company was making a, in fact, negative profit. Um, she was making no money at all, having to put money out of her own pocket every month to pay the rent, pay the bills. And we had this for 4 weeks and we made her £1,800. So she was absolutely ecstatic. Um, so from that, she's now recommended us to other people.
The past few months that we've had this for, it's, it's consistently made the investor quite good profit. We've had bookings for this right the way through summer already and we're charging around £250 a night for this property. So, as I say, it's really high-spec. Um, it's well looked after. So, we can charge that premium, premium amount.
So, we are now in Wiston, which is a town just outside of Liverpool and where we've got a few, um, service accommodation properties. So, this block behind me here, it's a block of six. So there's two bungalows and then four two-bedroomed flats behind me as well. Was all built from the grounds upon this bit of land by a landlord that we work with. My brother knew her from renting previous properties and we just asked everyone who had properties and she had this. Um, so we've been managing this now for about a year. We pay £1,000 per month per apartment, all bills included. Um, and each apartment or bungalow make around £700 profit a month. So, it's not as good as Liverpool City Centre, but it makes a good little profit.
But, we can't go in at the minute, which is a shame because there's guests in there. I did try and block it off, but I had a booking, so we can't go in. The other reason why we can't go in is because, um, about 2 weeks ago, the police decided to bang down one of my doors and arrest guests unlawfully because they had the wrong house. So what happened was, I got a phone call in the morning from my brother who got a phone call from the landlord about the police had come through the front door, took the guests out of bed, put them, um, on the floor, arrested them, and then realized they weren't the people they were looking for and they got the wrong house. So I'm now waiting for compensation and money for a new front door to get it sorted. So it wasn't my guest. There's no illegal activity here. It was all a misunderstanding.
How would you feel if we come to video you and do a little interview on for the the podcast? You're not, you're on camera.
Come on.
I don't want to. I'll be deadly honest. I can't.
Say what?
You can ring agent and ask for company letters, but you can't do a little video.
Yeah.
Going to go over there.
You're being filmed now.
I like.
This is Adam, me older brother, and we've been working together now for a year and a half, something like that. And and what is it like working as a family?
Yeah, it's easy.
It's easy. Yeah.
Well, well, it is and it isn't, but we have different strengths and weaknesses.
Yeah. The skill set we bring with each other is different. And it just works, isn't it? I'm more hands-on and problem-solving and getting stuff done. Um, and she's more admin side of stuff, paperwork, contracts, and stuff like that. I can pick up the phone, I can speak to people. Rejection doesn't bother me. the more doors you knock on, someone's bound to open.
You'll be consistent every single day and you, we say, don't we? We're not getting nowhere. We're not getting nowhere. And then one day, we get a phone call or an opportunity and we go, "Oh my god."
Well, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I didn't know. Didn't know you could get into property the way we have. I bought a house cheap and done a back-to-brick re-furb on it.
And then Shannon went, "Oh, you're doing a re-furb." And I went, "What's a re-furb?" You couldn't have asked for a better sister and business partner because she pulls me up where I slack.
My mindset, even though we got the same mindset, it is slightly different because of the academy and being in them rooms constantly all the time, whereas I'm your room. Do you know what I mean? Um, but we have talked about potentially getting on the academy, haven't you? So, that's something hopefully we'll be able to do.
Anyone from Kirby or Liverpool would understand when I say no one's expected to leave. Like, you you're born here, you have kids here, you live here forever. That's the way Kirby is. No one gets out. I moved out because the mindset around here isn't entrepreneurial. It's not, "How do we make things better?" It's just that's just the way it is.
But I think if I didn't suffer with me mental health as bad as it did, I wouldn't have got out because I think you've got to have something that makes you click to go, "Right, this is enough's enough now. I need to do something to change." And I think having my daughter and trying to go back to nursing was the thing that made my brain click because I couldn't do both. My brain just wouldn't let me be a full-time nurse manager and a full-time mom because the two were too demanding. And I think that's when I had me mental breakdown.
I was suicidal at one point. It was, um, it was quite bad. Um, I was under the mental health team. I was getting threatened with being sectioned and stuff. And back then I just thought, "I can't let them know how actually mentally unwell I am because they'll just take me away from me daughter." And that's not what I wanted.
As a nurse, I've looked after many, many people. I'm a trauma nurse by background, so I've looked after many of people who have tried to kill themselves or have been successful in killing themselves. We'd always say, "How do they actually do, like, how do people go through with actually trying to harm themselves?" I don't think anyone can understand it until you've been through it. When you actually decide that is it and you want to end your life, you're not scared of wanting to end your life. You're not scared of it might hurt or it might not work. That's all you're kind of at peace with it.
There's a lot of people out there that do do it and they don't have anyone to talk to, but the academy, I'll always say, saved my life.
When I come out with my story about mental health, so many people like came to me and said that they felt the same. So it was a shock to me to be like, "If I can help at least one person." Yeah. I'm just living proof that you can change, like, your whole life around and you don't have to be stuck in one place.
Postnatal depression happens to a lot of women, not just me. Um, so yeah, if anyone is struggling, just obviously you can always speak to me, my Instagram, Samuel Social, whatever is always there. But, you know, you've got all the academy mentors as well. Um, and everyone on the academy. So, you've just got to speak to someone and as soon as you start speaking, it gets better instantly cuz you're recognizing that it's not okay to feel like that. It's the minute that you stop talking about it is the minute that you start accepting that it's okay to feel like that. And you can't do that because then it will take over. That's all I've got to say on the matter.
I was still struggling with postnatal depression. So, I wasn't on Instagram. I wasn't networking. and I wasn't going to any inner circles. It was purely word of mouth. Um, I didn't have the energy to be going and speaking to people. So my brother just rang every single person we knew personally and asked if anyone's got properties. Um, and within 4 weeks, we got 17, 17 properties. Um, and it just went from there really.
Being able to making the decision to move out to Kirby, make the money that we do make now and not have to work 12-hour shifts as a nurse is very, very surreal. Before Christmas, we would make about 20 to 30,000 a month. We sat down and decided what our goals were going to be for 2026 because we wanted to scale. And within this month alone, we've made just under £40,000 dealing. So for January, you're probably looking at about 57ish maybe, which is crazy because my whole year salary as a nurse was like 50. And that's before tax, working 12-hour shifts, having to put my daughter in nursery to be able to go to work. And now that's not the case.
I'm probably proud of myself, I suppose, for like the first time ever. I'm not fully healed from mental health and I don't think I ever will be. Some people who do still me think that you can just become successful and it's not as easy as that. But with the academy, you can get the people to help you do that, which is obviously what I've done. I am really proud of myself. Yeah, I am. And I do think I've absolutely smashed it. Yeah. And I'm only just getting started as well. Yeah.
Ah. Do you know what though? I'll never forget the time when you came to the academy dinner.
Uh, 2025.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I was like, "Who wants to come on stage, man? Say what's up." And we had about 30, 40 people came on stage.
Yeah.
And then you got the mic.
Mhm.
I can't remember how you started. I think you just said, "You know, I've been working as a nurse."
Yeah.
And people were just, I need to listen to this. And you could hear a pin drop in the room.
Yeah. And then you shared what you've done and how much success you've had in property. And since that moment, there must have been so many other people on the academy that have gone on to become financially free that have messaged me. Actually, Shannon's story made a massive impact.
Oh, that's lovely.
I want to say the impact that you've had on others that might be suffering with mental health issues, working crazy hours as a nurse. It's huge.
And I do get a lot of messages as well from people who've just joined saying, "I've heard your story and are you able to help me? I'm a mom and I'm struggling." And that's what obviously.
Are you going to be a leader at the academy families?
I am the leader for the north. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Been on the academy nearly 2 years this year and I've worked so hard and you always, like, this is the first time I've been on the ACPM and on the high flyers. So having to spend that one-on-one time with him is invaluable really. I've seen him on stage that many times, sat on the front row. Being close to him now and seeing the impact he has on other people is just, yeah, it's amazing.