Magazine, New Brighton

The demand thesis

Before a single property was viewed, the research was complete. New Brighton sits at the tip of the Wirral peninsula, twenty-five minutes from Liverpool city centre. The demand case rested on four distinct engines: coastal leisure from a regional catchment of more than five million people within an hour; year-round demand from over forty licensed wedding venues across Wirral; the Liverpool City Region events calendar, including the Grand National, the Open Championship and Liverpool FC home matchdays; and visiting friends and relatives from the surrounding commuter belt.

What the research did not have was a local proof point. There were no established short-stay operators to benchmark against, no cluster of comparable five-bedroom listings, and no local hotel rate data specific enough to anchor a projection.

The decision rested on the method: the size of the visitor economy, the structure of the demand drivers, the compression calendar and the specification that would reach it. If we built it, they would come.

Finding the property

A property-monitoring tool tracked New Brighton against the brief. A five-bedroom house had been on the market for some time, viewings had dried up, and the reasons were obvious on inspection: years of neglect and hoarding that most buyers could not see past.

For a buyer working from a demand-led brief, condition is a renovation programme, not a reason to walk away. An opening offer of £155,000 against an asking price of £170,000 was declined, and £157,000 was accepted in July 2023. A house that cannot sell at £170,000 and has stopped attracting viewings is not a £170,000 house. The distress was in the property, and that was the opportunity.

The works

Conveyancing completed in October 2023. It ran long enough that the original contractor moved on, so new trades were found and works began in January 2024.

The renovation went back to the bricks: walls stripped to exposed brick where it added character, the ground floor replanned for guest flow and fire safety, an extra bathroom created on the top floor and a WC added under the stairs. A five-bedroom house with one bathroom became one with bathrooms to match its beds. Works finished at the end of April 2024, and Magazine opened on Airbnb at the start of May.

Capital position

A £157,000 purchase and £100,000 of works now stand at a current open market value of £330,000. The lender's post-refurbishment valuation was £290,000, which reflects how conservative buy-to-let valuations are.

Magazine presented like a show home: not staged cheaply or blandly, but with character and considered detail throughout. That quality commands a valuation premium as a matter of course.

The purchase was bridged, then refinanced onto a buy-to-let mortgage with permission to let on a short-stay basis, interest-only and fixed. As with Arkles, the lower rate was worth more than a higher valuation.

Trading performance

Magazine opened in May 2024, and 2025 was its first full trading year. Every home we run is an Airbnb Guest Favourite.

AirDNA's forecast for Magazine's address and specification is £36,200 a year, based on 58% occupancy at an average daily rate of £170. That forecast is the average operator in a market that, when we bought, had no local comparables at all. In 2025 Magazine delivered £83,534, 2.31 times the forecast.

Figures rounded to the nearest pound. AirDNA forecast: £36,200 (58% at £170).

The return

Against the total all-in capital of £287,248, 2025 profit after all costs, including the mortgage, was £39,971, or 13.9%.

The capital position adds what the trading return alone cannot show: a property worth £330,000 in the open market. At that value it supports a sale or remortgage on its own terms. The short-stay income is the upside the research identified. The property fundamentals are the floor.