Hear from one of our designers talking on a podcast with Altitude Marketing Ltd, well done Laura Dalton smashed it!

Episode 15 of the Business on a Beanbag Podcast with the wonderfully quirky Laura Dalton is now live on all major platforms!

Talking all things interior design, business journeys and lessons learnt, this is an awesome episode. Honest, we’re not being bias!

Spotify:
https://lnkd.in/eab_FS-C

Apple Podcasts:
https://lnkd.in/eUEQ5Yit

If you’re driving down Oxford St in Leicester you may see our new sign up by the office!

The office stands proud on the corner of Oxford Street and York Road in the city centre 📍

We are extremely excited about the acquisition of this office and can’t wait to see what 2023 has in store for our Leicester branch 🍊

As part of our continued supported of the @leicesterbridge, we were happy to drop off some more donations to their Your Store project in Loughbrough over the Christmas break!

#don8theloc8mefoundation #livewithus

With some new faces Morwenna Matcham recently joining as landlord growth manager & Saskia Rodriguez as our Hybrid Property Manager with the help of Melissa as Property Administrator Landlords with student properties in Manchester 📍 Nottingham 📍 Leicester 📍 Liverpool 📍 Bristol 📍 Birmingham 📍 Get in touch! We want you 🍊🧡 #property #team #growth #studenthousing #studentaccommodation #landlord #landlordsuk #houses #students

The Leeds office makeover is starting to take shape!

After taking over our newest office in Leeds, we deiced to give it a bit more loc8me style!

We are almost halfway thought a full refurb, and we are excited to show off this new space very soon!

Our quarterly managers’ meeting held at our head office in Loughborough!

Today’s topics

– Marketing
– Lettings
– Utilities
– Summer changeover

Some great feedback will be taken away from today, it’s the perfect time to work on new stratergies and feedback on the last 3 months.

Excited to present you with one of loc8me’s most recent projects

James Etty is taking this 3 Bed Mid Terraced House located in the golden triangle of Loughborough, one of the most sought after student locations to a 4 Bedroom House with all en suites!

Rent pre refurb £13,572 per annum
Rent post refurb £24,960 per annum 💸
With a refurb cost of approximately £120,000 🛠

Attached on our next post are some progress pictures that have been taken along the way, we cannot wait to share the finished product with you 😍

As the loc8me foundation has grown over the last year, we have looked to partner with local charities and causes with a track record of making a difference. One of these charities is The Bridge, an East Midlands based charity working with the local community to deliver a number of specialist housing-related advice, support, and assistance services and accommodation options to homeless and vulnerably housed people across Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland.

Their vision of “Resilient, compassionate communities where individuals thrive in safe and secure homes.” resonated with us and led us to approach the charity to form a partnership. We are now looking to provide as much support as possible alongside pledging a percentage of all funds raised.

Some more about The Bridge – https://www.thebridge-eastmidlands.org.uk/about-us

32 teams, 256 players, 68 games!

After a 7 hour day, our first loc8me cup was a success! Similar to a Hollywood film, the Pfizer Chiefs were almost knocked out in the group stages if not for a last-minute goal to secure their place in the knockout stages. They then incredibly went on to win is all in an instance penalty shootout.

Thanks to the 256 players and the support of our sponsors, we raised a whopping £1280 for the loc8me foundation, and we are excited to use this money to help local charities and causes that we support.

We could not stand by and watch the tragedy occurring to the people of Ukraine. Therefore, we will be providing free accommodation to Ukrainian refugees arriving in the UK via Airbnb.org.

We are asking YOU to help us by donating what you can!

We’re now accepting donations of the following items:

• Thermal blankets
• Sleeping bags – new
• Personal hygiene products
• Toothbrushes
• Toothpaste
• Wet wipes
• Sanitary products
• Dressings
• Bandages
• Turnstiles/tourniquets
• Flashlights with batteries
• Instant food (soups/noodle pots)
• Energy bars
• Instant oats

You can drop said items off at any of the loc8me offices, and we’ll deliver all donations to the closest Ukrainian collection point.

WANT TO BE A PART OF OUR COMMUNITY? 🌎

Are you a local business to any of the cities we operate in? 📍

We provide our tenants with an excellent service and many perks when living with us

Offering discounts by partnering with local businesses in the retail, hospitality, and entertainment industry.

Want more info?

Drop us an email! Check out our promotional video of the businesses we work alongside in Loughborough!

In the last three months, we have worked closely with a company called Kiko on building the most user-friendly lettings software system there has ever been! We were introduced to kiko earlier in the year and were already blown away with their ideas and how far they had come.

They were not yet set up to work alongside the student side of property letting but, had already expressed they were fully onboard with us helping them to build the best software that worked for our agency and hopefully other student letting companies around the UK.

We instantly felt like kiko had very similar values to loc8me, whereby customer satisfaction is always our top priority. Our mission is to provide a seamless and effortless experience for all customers using our services. Kiko have allowed us a great opportunity in working with them to be able to deliver this nationwide to all our different offices.

We decided to break down the integration of kiko into 3 different phases. We are currently ready to implement phase 1 into the company which we are all very excited about. This will introduce property advertising, a new way of booking viewings from the tenant’s side, as well as making offers and drawing up of tenancy contracts.

Val and his team have been great to work with so far, we cannot wait for you all to see the finished product in the coming year and look forward to showcasing our new platform to all new and exciting clients.

Group offices come together to raise over £4,000 in the first event for the new Charitable Foundation

Following almost 18 months of enforced separation, a team of 11 hardy souls from Loc8me offices around the country came together to raise money for amazing charities by conquering the infamous Yorkshire Three Peaks Challenge.

The two chosen charities are close to the hearts of everyone within Loc8me and beyond. The COVID pandemic has had a huge impact on the nation’s mental wellbeing and as the national charity assisting those looking for help with their mental health, MIND felt like an obvious choice to support. Team Loc8me also wanted to help out those closer to their head office home in Loughborough, and Wishes4Kids is a Leicestershire-based charity that provides once-in-a-lifetime experiences for terminally ill children.

As a national company, with a number of offices that had worked for so long under lockdown restrictions, the Loc8me team wanted to create an event that all sites could join together to participate in. It was also decided that this challenging team event should represent a beginning for the company and mark the creation of a Loc8me Foundation that will raise much-needed funds for chosen charities, across a number of events, each year.

For many of the team, the Yorkshire Three Peaks Challenge was already a ‘Bucket List’ event. This spectacular part of the country is also a fantastic location for staff from the Midlands, London, the North West and the East Coast to come together. The aim of this test is to complete the three peaks of Pen-y-Ghent, Whernside and Ingleborough in under 12 hours. A team of 11 walkers took it on and blessed with glorious summer weather, completed the challenge with half an hour to spare – and a mightily impressive collection of blisters and tan lines!

Leader of Team Loc8me, Dillian Dattani, said: “We are proud to have completed this tough challenge in aid of two fantastic causes. We have all been blown away by the support and generous donations we have received from friends, family, business colleagues, tenants and landlords. The lockdowns have been tough on everybody, mentally and physically, and we chose an event that would challenge us and really us to pull together and be motivated us as a team. It was a great experience and as a company, we look forward to The Loc8me Foundation growing into something of which we can all be proud.”

FOR IMAGES AND FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT JAMES BIDDLE AT LOC8ME

Email: [email protected]

The link to the Loc8me Yorkshire Peaks Fundraising page is:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/loc8me-Yorkshire-peaks-challenge?member=8426694&sharetype=teams&utm_campaign=p_na+share-sheet&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_source=customer

Really excited this month to give you a little update from our Leicester & Nottingham Area Manager, Fern Tebbutt, on her journey over the last 12 months:

As a company loc8me was ready to start expanding even further, having already worked for the company since 2015 I was already aware of all the process and how everything worked.

Leicester & Nottingham came along at the right time for me, towards the end of August 2020 I wasn’t working for Loc8me and hadn’t been since the previous November. I felt that I needed to explore other industries and venture out, as property at the time was all I had learnt since leaving school. I had been furloughed since the start of April and at the time the role was put forward I was in very uncertain circumstances in my current position of work, so it only felt right that it happened at that point in time.

 I was really excited to re-join the team after taking a break from the company. It made me fully aware that this is what I love to do and what I am passionate about and I’m very grateful since returning for the massive amount of support that i’ve received in my new role from the directors. Property and Loc8me is my passion without a doubt and being part of such a great team makes being at work such a dream.

The last 6/7 months have been a great learning curve for me, and have also made me realise how much I do already know. However one of my weaker points would be property management, having never been involved with that side of the business this was always going to be the case. I do feel as if I’ve taken it on with an open mind and learnt a hell of a lot along the way.. (and still learning day to day)!

Learning about each city has been really eye opening, not only having to figure my way around but understanding about how the market works for both cities and the right locations for all 4 of the Universities across both Leicester & Nottingham.

It’s great to see how far Leicester has come, with already a portfolio of 170 bedrooms. Leicester has such a diverse student community from art, design and fashion students to doctors and nurses who are part of one of the largest teaching trusts in the UK. Leicester is home to 3 different university hospital trust sites including the general, infirmary and glenfield, the city is also recognised as one of the most affordable university destinations nationwide.

Nottingham itself has so much potential with over 70,000 students attending both universities each year the demand for off student accommodation is ever growing. With a thriving city centre and widespread transport options, it gives students more reason to live off campus. Loc8me’s brand fits in very well with the lifestyle Nottingham has to offer to the students.

My main aim for 22/23 academic year will be to ensure we are accredited by each of the universities as one of the leading off campus accommodation agencies, this gives great security for tenants who sign up with us as well as landlords we work with.

We are still looking for new landlords to join and get on board if you have any questions or queries regarding each of the university cities, please do not hesitate to get in touch. Each of the cities have great opportunities available, so even if you are not yet a landlord within these communities we can make that possible.

I look forward to hopefully completing my ARLA Level 3 within the next year which will take my career to the next level and I am extremely excited to see where Loc8me Leicester & Nottingham are in the market within the next five to six years.

James is our longest reigning member of staff, we thought it would be great to tell his story with a timeline of his roles!

James joined the company in July 2013, starting as a placement student whilst attending Loughborough University. His first year with Loc8me was spent on basic accounting tasks, rent chasing and a bit of lettings here and there.

During his final year he was employed on a part time basis around his course and was then offered a permanent position as Accounts Manager following his graduation. For any student knowing you’ve secured a full time job after your university days is a huge weight off your shoulders. Having already employed two previous placement students at loc8me, James was thrilled to be part of such an up and coming agent.

In 2015 James took on the integration of opening our Hull and Lincoln offices and setting up the teams in these offices before returning to Loughborough to continue with the Accounts Manager role.

The following year James began to develop the refurbishment side of Loc8me, the main focus was to upgrade and develop properties on the portfolio in order to achieve the highest rents possible for our landlords at the time. In 2017 we decided to grow our Loughborough teams and introduce the property manager roles which at the time was James’ main focus.

After working along side the property managers for a few years and still managing the companies finances, he then took a couple of years away from the day to day running of Loc8me to work with the founder Raffaele Russo. This was to develop a landlord knowledge side of the business and to give him the opportunity to start his own BTL portfolio. James now successfully owns 3 student properties managed and let by Loc8me.

In July 2020 he was appointed as a Director, leading operations across the company in multiple cities. Between now and then he has spent a lot of time working with a large fund growing the portfolio across the UK.

We look forward to seeing was the next few years brings for the company!

We have recently completed a refurbishment in Loughborough called Arigato. This 5 bed student HMO is now one of the most desirable student property available in Loughborough. The thoughts and concept below are in the words of our interior designer, Laura Dalton.

“I did some research into minimalistic spaces and came across Japandi, a hybrid trend that combines aspects of Scandinavian design with Japanese style.

Despite the geographic distance between Japan and Scandinavia they have a lot in common when it comes to design. Both have calm and harmonious styles, value functionality, simplicity and a love for natural materials. Once I’d done my research and felt I had enough knowledge of the creative combination to put together a mood board I started thinking about elements of nature, contrasting materials and a space I felt really took into consideration the user demographic and how they would interact with the design of the space.

What came next was my journey of realising my design, project management and trying to source all the goods during a pandemic… oh what fun! Adaptability became my middle name as I struggled to source items that would be delivered on time for deadlines… but that’s all part of the design process.

I decided it was a good idea to compliment the minimalistic interior with sleek and beautiful lighting. I went for flush lighting in the hallway in a linear formation to provide those simple but functional elements of Japandi. In contrast I used paper lanterns as a nod to Japanese design styles but by placing multiple lanterns in one area created a warm orb of light which felt like a light installation. In order to enhance the natural light in the rooms I decided to keep all the walls in a light simple colour pallet, opting for a stone colour. This allowed natural light to be filtered through the space in the daytime and was a key element in my design. The furniture I kept simple and minimalistic using bamboo, and oak. The low height beds I sourced from a local company are the punch of black to the neutrally toned space. The artwork I used was produced by me after I spent some time researching Japanese calligraphy and brush stroke art forms. 

My brief is always to have 3 memorable features so I set my mind on what I could bring to a space that would leave people impressed and want to take a snap for good old Instagram!

Whilst Arigato is a host to a lot of my ideas, of which I’m incredibly proud, a few in particular stand out to me. The window seat in the front bedroom is one of them, situated on a low window the window seat made functional use of an otherwise lost space, now it is a warm inviting seating area waiting for future residents to enjoy the evening sun regardless of whether they’re revising or unwinding with friends. Another element of the design was a sumptuous bathroom suite with a walk-in shower, large stone tiles and black bathroom fittings, it had such an edge with the black, but the natural colours of the tiles and walls really represented the Scandinavian colour pallet. Similar to this was another stand out for me, the salt stone sink fitted in the kitchen, this breaks up the clean simple lines of the work top it’s such a feature and a sink you won’t easily come across or forget, teamed with the horizontal wood grain of the handless cupboards this is a kitchen that dreams are made of.

One of the crowning jewels of this project is the gorgeous terrace, walking out onto a tiled area that then flows into a grassed space with modern garden furniture extending the Japandi theme outside of the apartment. The space is versatile and will work to benefit all the needs of the future residents, from morning coffee and yoga, to alfresco lunches and late night get togethers.

As a creative designer of spaces that are for young adults it was my aim to offer up a new level of student accommodation, one that encapsulates the future of HMOs and one that students can thrive in.”

I’m sure you’ll agree from the photos below that Laura has done a fantastic job and we are delighted to be offering this to our student portfolio.