Well, findaflame.com can wait: I am now concentrating my get rich quick efforts in another direction: property (real estate) development. I am attempting to convert my house into three flats. It depends in part on my being able to get planning permission from the local authority, as planning permission is necessary should I wish to sell the house, and even raise further mortgages on the new flats. If I just want to rent them out, it isn't necessary, but I don't want to reduce my options at this stage, and anyway, I don't think renting them out would be profitable as I would have to live in one of the flats. Three flats would probably cover my expenses, but two probably won't.

So, what is the plan, and how does it stack up financially? That is, how exactly do I plan to get rich like this? I bought the house four or five years ago, with the idea of renting out 5 rooms and living in the rest. I have done that, and it has been just about profitable overall, but the tenants haven't kept the place nice and it needs refurbishing at the very least. I bought it using a credit card since although I had a good job, I had no savings. I have never been able to build up any capital, but my credit has usually been good - not always, but usually. :-) In this country, if your credit goes bad, it stays bad for six years, so you can recover from problems eventually. Anyway, I paid £6,000 deposit, but secured a 'cashback' mortgage, so once I moved in, I got £5,000 back, so my net capital input was £1,000. The house was worth about £130,000 but because the market was slumping a bit and the developer-owner wanted out, I got it for £106,000. It has 4 rooms and a bathroom upstairs, an L-shaped living-room and another room downstairs, a downstairs shower room and a large kitchen-diner, also downstairs. In fact, it behaves like Dr Who's Tardis: it looks small on the outside, but just seems to go on and on inside.

Due to my usual money-handling incompetence (or whatever it is), I have remortgaged it twice to extract cash to cover my debts, and currently have a mortgage of £205,000. I have recently had it valued at £240,000 and was going to sell it for £230,000, but have decided against that as, basically, there was hardly any profit in it: I would not get enough money out to be able to do anything other than get a job. And I don't want a job. I have pretty much had enough of the rat race, thank you very much. Instead, the plan is to try and add value to the property, and then (probably) sell it.

Upstairs will be converted into a two-bedroom self-contained flat. Downstairs will be converted into a two-bedroom self-contained flat as well, and (using the kitchen-diner) an additional one-bedroom flat. In this area, at current prices, the new value should stack up to a minimum of £130,000 for the upstairs flat, £140,000 for the downstairs 2-bed flat, and £95,000 for the studio: at least £365,000 in total, and possibly more, if I can get good valuations and prices don't collapse too quickly (the market is weak once more). I plan to get good valuations by making sure the work done is top quality, with no cheapskate corner-cutting anywhere. I plan to pay for it... with credit cards. I have been using them for years, paying them off, getting credit limit increases every time I do, and asking for increases every now and then just for luck and now I have a truly ridiculous total credit limit of £60,000 or more, split over half a dozen cards or so. With interest-free balance-transfer offers and some careful juggling, I can borrow much of this money at quite low interest. I only need it for a few months, anyway (I hope). The conversion should cost around £50,000 to £60,000, although I also have my living expenses to add to that: it is going to be close, but I will manage somehow (one of my favourite quotes is from Dickens, "I have every confidence that something will turn up.").

Planning permission is the most likely obstacle to this plan, as they might not allow it, although according to my architect it should be allowable. Plan B is for two three-bedroom flats, but I don't know quite how that would be possible given the building's layout. Values would be about £155,000 + £175,000 = £340,000, if it is possible at all. Plan C is Plan A but renting the flats out and the heck with selling it, but as I mentioned above, that is a dodgy option, profit-wise (after four years I would be able to sell it even without planning permission as I can then claim 'established use' but with the market weak I might not want to wait four years before bailing out and converting a declining asset into cash). Most likely, Plan A with some minor changes will be allowed, but the planning authority have been on strike and haven't even seen the place yet. The strike is now over, but a month has been wasted - another mortgage payment and more down the drain. Plus, all but one of the tenants has moved out now, so there is no more free money from them to supplement my non-income.

The builders arrived for the first time last Monday, 25th August and ripped out skirting boards in three of the rooms upstairs, and removed furniture to a room downstairs. I was unable to sell much of this old stuff with classified ads, so in the end I sold the lot to a second-hand shop for £50. It is all going to have to be replaced anyway, but it seems a shame to me that three perfectly good beds, wardrobes, etc., etc., become practically worthless in such a short time. But then again, you can buy new beds for £50-£100 each so why furnish a new place with old stuff? First impressions will count for a lot when the valuer comes to call. The builders also began work in the upstairs bathroom: it needs ripping out and re-doing from scratch as it had got extremely manky (young male tenants live like bears).

A plumber was shown around the other day, to see what he had to do to provide new heating and water supplies for the new flats, and the builders are back today, ripping out more stuff upstairs.

Strategy: builders? Why not DIY? Well, I am lazy and know nothing about DIY anyway. Best left to the experts, I think. They are quick and professional (they come highly recommended and I have seen their work, which is good). I am using a friend of mine with experience of all this as a project manager at £2,000 per flat. Delegation. That's the strategy. Maybe I will learn something in the process too, but I can't count on that if I'm not supervising it myself, can I? What about the next project? Well, I will deal with that when I have to. Something will turn up...