Property deal sourcers and small portfolio investors / The problem
Hundreds of listings. Two of them are real.
Saturday morning, portal open, coffee going cold. You are scrolling because the deal that pays this month is buried somewhere in hundreds of listings, and the only way to find it is to look at all of them. By the time you have pulled rent comps for the four that looked promising, it is Sunday night and two are already under offer.
Property deal sourcers and small portfolio investors / What we found
The shortlist was shorter than anyone wanted to admit
Mapping how the numbers actually got made surfaced two things nobody wanted to hear. The same house was appearing three times under three different agents, so a shortlist of six was really two. And gross yield, the number everyone quotes, dies quietly on service charge: flats that looked stronger than houses on gross came out worse on net. The honest count was smaller and the ranking was upside down.
Property deal sourcers and small portfolio investors / What we built
The morning starts at the offer, not the search
The scan runs before you are awake, across five towns, and what lands is not a list of listings. It is a short set of properties with the bid already worked out: what to offer, what that offer actually nets after charges and running costs, and how far the seller's situation lets you push. Duplicates, retirement flats, shared ownership and cash-only stock never reach you.
Property deal sourcers and small portfolio investors / What changed
The best thing it found was the wrong town
It runs every morning on live listings. On the scan behind this, 127 confirmed properties across five towns, 83 of them still clearing 7 per cent net once the recommended offer, service charge and running costs come off, with no duplicate address anywhere. The most valuable output was not a deal though. It was proof that the town being worked hardest ranked third of five. No fee has been earned through it yet.
83 of 127Confirmed properties across five towns that still clear 7 per cent net once the recommended offer, service charge and running costs are taken off.
Property deal sourcers and small portfolio investors / Whose it was
A two-person sourcing venture, still deciding
Built for a part-time property sourcing venture in the East of England. Two people, aiming at one or two sourced deals a month. The proof was built and given away free, the engine has been running daily on live listings since July, and two ways to pay for the full build sit on the table. Neither has been signed. Nothing has completed through it.
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All fourteen stories · MAX.AI · 2026