About us
We are North East property traders with more than thirty years of investment and trading behind us — and we are the third generation of our family to do it. Grandfather, father, son.
Who we are
This is not a business someone started last year after a weekend course. Property has been the family trade for three generations, and the thirty years of buying, trading and letting that sit behind this site were spent with our own money at risk, not somebody else's.
That matters for a straightforward reason: we look at every property the way we would look at one we were buying ourselves. The questions are the same. What will it really let for? What has the seller not mentioned? What will it need spending on before a tenant moves in?
Our research is reviewed by a colleague who holds a BSc (Hons) in Estate Management and has over twenty years in the buy-to-let industry. Everything we publish has been looked at by someone who knows what they are looking at.
Where we are
We are based in the North East of England, and it is the market we know best — where the yields are strongest relative to purchase prices, and where we have spent decades learning which streets work and which do not.
Our reach is not limited to it. Our connections in the residential investment market extend throughout the British Isles, and we source wherever the numbers justify it. The areas we are actively working are listed on the Areas page.
Who we know
Thirty years in one industry builds a contact book. Ours includes established links with:
- estate agents and letting agents
- auction houses
- builders and developers
- surveyors
- other property traders and trading companies
- housing associations
- local councils
That network is why we hear about things early, and why we can usually find out quickly whether a property has a history worth knowing about before you commit to it. It also means opportunities reach us that are never widely advertised.
Why we do this
We have invested through the rises and the falls. Through the crash, through the recovery, through the interest rate cycles, and through more changes to the rules for landlords than we care to count. Governments come and go, and each arrives with its own view of what the private rented sector ought to look like.
What thirty years of sitting through all that teaches you is that residential property rewards patience and punishes optimism. The people who did well were rarely the ones who found the cheapest house. They were the ones who understood what they were buying, budgeted honestly, and were not in a hurry.
That is the kind of deal we look for, and it is why our figures are conservative rather than flattering. Anyone can make a yield look impressive by choosing a generous rent estimate. We would rather show you a real number and keep you as a customer.
What that means for what you see here
Experience is easy to claim, so here is what it actually translates into:
- Rents estimated properly. From local rental data for that specific property type, size and number of bedrooms — not a broad postcode average, which is how most inflated yields on sourcing sites happen.
- Prices benchmarked. Against Land Registry sold prices for comparable properties nearby, and against the local average price per square foot.
- Auction listings flagged and held back. A guide price is a marketing figure, not a price you can buy at. A yield calculated from one is a return you could never achieve, and we will not publish it.
- Availability re-checked daily. If a property goes under offer or its price changes, it comes off the site automatically rather than wasting your time.
- One buyer per deal. The moment a property sells it is removed. You are not one of fifty people being emailed the same address.
What we won't do
- We won't quote a yield without showing you its basis. Every figure here assumes a cash purchase with no void periods and excludes costs — stated plainly on every page rather than buried in the small print.
- We won't pretend our report is a survey. It is a written assessment based on the listing and the figures, and we tell you to commission your own survey because you should.
- We won't take a fee from the seller or the agent. Our only income is the finder's fee you pay, so we have no reason to talk up a property we don't believe in.
Company details
This site is operated by Mike Massey Limited, trading as The Property Sourcer, a company registered in England and Wales, company number 17414254, registered at 4 St Thomas Street, Sunderland SR1 1NW.