The Wilsons - 875 buy to let property empire

sheslookinhot

I haven't read more than first page, but I wonder what teaching was being carried out as they started and managed their property empire.

I am glad my child was not in their class.

Have parents of children who failed their exams any grounds for complaint ?

PasturesNew

Even if made bankrupt, they will still have two hefty teachers' pensions to live on. They won't be touched.

Had their cake AND get to eat it.

Gorgeous_George

They will be moving their mortgages to new low rate fixed term deals. That'll buy then another five years or so.

If they can keep the occupancy levels high, they'll do ok.

Are they good LLs? That is the important question.

GG

_bankrupted

RDB wrote: »

Just wondered if anyone has up to date info?

I am dying to see what will happen in the end for the Wilsons.......

I had never heard of the Wilson's until a couple of weeks ago when reading this board. There has been a lot of interesting calculations done about their worth (:rotfl:) with LTV quoted and people trying to understand their current position.

I think you can look at this much much simpler from common sense and logic.

To go from being modest school teachers to owning 200, 500 or 900 (?) properties in a period of 15 or so years has all being built on debt. The income received from lettings will have essentially equated to the interest payment over those 15 years.

There has not been a profit element that has generated wealth for them enabling them to fund deposits. Renting verses mortgage interest costs have to some degree always about equated, since if it's disproportionate one way or the other, either renting or buying collapses.

That leaves the simple fact that all of their properties have been exclusively funded from re-mortgaging their earlier acquisitions. The sheer number of purchases I think says that all of their properties are mortgaged at 90% and higher.

Their reputation will have earned them favourable deals with the banks in terms of interest rates and very high LTV.

They were bankrupt the instant the market turned, it's now a question of whether the 30 million debt today (20% of 900*£170,000) will double when we hit the bottom.

PasturesNew

Gorgeous_George wrote: »

Are they good LLs? That is the important question.

GG

Allegedly, no. Allegedly they've been taken to court in the past.

I'll see if I can substantiate that with links.

PasturesNew

Didn't have to go far. Brit provided a link back in July on this very thread to a Watchdog programme featuring the Wilsons when they failed to return a deposit.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=12921769&postcount=13

From that link: "Some tenants of Fergus and Judith Wilson have had trouble getting their deposits back, and have been charged large sums of money in 'landlord's charges'. Watchdog investigates."

The link to the show doesn't work any more. But Brit (well done) copied/pasted it at the time into the posting I have linked to above.

martinman3

PasturesNew wrote: »

Even if made bankrupt, they will still have two hefty teachers' pensions to live on. They won't be touched.

Had their cake AND get to eat it.

From link in a previous post http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=15130709&postcount=446

The two former maths teachers have amassed their wealth over a relatively short period, Judith investing her teacher’s pension fund in their first semi-detached house.

She may have taken one of them already as cash to start their business.:eek:

PasturesNew

martinman3 wrote: »

From link in a previous post http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=15130709&postcount=446

She may have taken one of them already as cash to start their business.:eek:

I didn't think you could do that. I don't know much about pensions, but I thought people could take 25% if they wanted.

Even so, one teacher's pension is more than the median salary for most people.

I hope they end up in a rented flat!

martinman3

PasturesNew wrote: »

I didn't think you could do that. I don't know much about pensions, but I thought people could take 25% if they wanted.

Even so, one teacher's pension is more than the median salary for most people.

I hope they end up in a rented flat!

I think you are correct.

However, there used to be a dodgy way to get all of your pension. It involves a company putting you on its payroll for a minimal period. They can then transfer your pension fund from your previous employer to them and they then give you its value in cash less their cut of course. I believe this was made unlawful.

GDB2222

martinman3 wrote: »

I think you are correct.

However, there used to be a dodgy way to get all of your pension. It involves a company putting you on its payroll for a minimal period. They can then transfer your pension fund from your previous employer to them and they then give you its value in cash less their cut of course. I believe this was made unlawful.

This was always unlawful, or at least it had disastrous tax consequences. There was also the risk that these guys simply did not to pay anything at all out.