Hi!

I'm experimenting with a new more skimmable format, in the hopes it'll spark a conversation or an interesting idea.

Let me know what you think!

🤑 Investing

Making admin less painful

I wrote last month about how I wished I could hire someone as my "personal financial controller" and manage all my investments for me. In the meantime, I've been using AI to close the gap a little.

Every April I fill my ISA and SIPP, then rebalance my investments: cutting back on the winners and topping up the laggards to bring everything back to target.

Between my wife and I there are five separate accounts to wrangle, and it's a bloody pain.

This year I decided to make it less painful by getting AI to help. I fed it a CSV of our holdings and asked it to:

• Show me nice pie charts comparing current vs target allocations
• Calculate the trades needed to bring it back into balance
• Spit out a simple buy/sell list for each account

It’s not perfect (some quirks, like investments that are only available in one account, still need manual fixes) but it's a massive step up from trying to juggle everything manually.

Cheating the quiz

I had to open a new brokerage account recently, which meant taking one of those multiple-choice “prove you know what risks you're taking” quizzes.

While I do know what I'm doing, I didn't want to waste brainpower proving it. So rather than slog through the quiz, I pasted the whole thing into ChatGPT and asked for the correct answers. Thirty seconds later, full marks.

Take that, compliance departments!

☯️ Life

Barcelona, again

For the second year in a row, we worked from Barcelona for a few weeks over the Easter holidays.

I'm not wild about central Barcelona (way over-touristed, even in April) but the slightly-further-out Poblenou neighbourhood is spectacular. It reminds me of Williamsburg ten years ago: family-friendly, a nice mix of "cool" and authentic, and an industrial vibe. Yet unlike Brooklyn, as an added bonus it's a few blocks from the beach.

It also felt (unlike central Barcelona) extremely safe. I'd never really noticed the constant low-grade anxiety in London about having your phone nicked or being flattened by a Deliveroo driver on a mission... but I really noticed it when it wasn't there anymore.

And speaking of quality of life, I reckon living costs are conservatively 30% cheaper than the London equivalent. And nothing felt like a compromise because it has WeWork, modern gyms and everything else I care about.

Our current plan is to go back for a few months next year – simultaneously killing the multiple birds of missing the worst of the UK weather and doing a little "world schooling" experiment with the kids.

Life without a deadline

People think writing a book is cool. But you know what's really cool? Not writing a book.

I've spent the last few years in a non-stop cycle of writing, promoting, updating and reissuing, then writing and promoting again. It became such a part of life that I stopped thinking of it as being particularly hard work, but bloody hell – now it's been taken away, the extra time and lack of pressure is wonderful.

In the past I've always defaulted to "right, what's next?" as soon as something wraps up – so consciously choosing to do nothing feels like personal growth.

I’m sure I’ll dive back into something again eventually – but I'm not in any rush.

View from the 30th floor of the Gloriés Tower in Barcelona. For the second year in a row, we're working from here for a few weeks over the Easter holidays.

💼 Business

Time to hire

Over the last couple of years, I’ve been in a good content groove at Property Hub – writing a weekly newsletter and column, recording podcasts, filming videos. Simple, direct, under my own steam.

But as the business keeps growing (£100m+ transactions annually, team of 30+), it’s time for it to evolve beyond being "The Rob & Rob show". The "personal brand" angle is a great place to start, but we’ve been slow to let Property Hub become its own thing – partly fear of breaking what’s working, partly discomfort giving up control

So when we started the process of hiring a full-time content creator to take on some of the load of being the public face (webinars, YouTube etc), I was hesitant. My nightmare vision was of being dragged back into management, and away from what I'm actually good at.

But the further through the process we go, the more excited I get. Letting go of some of the day-to-day will (excuse the therapy-speak) create space – and for the business, it can only positive to have an injection of new energy and the removal of me as a bottleneck.

We're hiring for a bunch of other roles too, all hybrid – so if you know anyone near Manchester who'd be a fit, send them here.

🧑‍💻 Tech

Becoming a hacker

I like to use a VPN whenever I’m not at home, but banks (and others) are getting wise to the big commercial VPN providers and increasingly block their IP addresses.

Result: I'd have to turn off the VPN to log into my bank… then inevitably forget to turn it back on again afterwards.

So I asked ChatGPT how to set up my own VPN using a VPS: a private server that routes traffic through a clean, unflagged IP address. Thirty minutes later, I was up and running. It costs $3 a month, and it works perfectly.

(And the best bit: setting it up involved typing commands into a terminal window, which still makes me feel like a hacker from a 90s action movie.)

AI really is the ultimate gift to tinkerers like me: knocking up a quick browser extension, writing a Python script for something... it's all so easy, and so much fun.

Strong recommendation for "Brasil! Brasil! The Birth Of Modernism" at the Royal Academy, if art is your kind of thing.

💪 Fitness

Running, maybe?

I’ve been super consistent in the gym lately, working on strength and size - and I’m now at my heaviest ever, in a good way.

Then, I entered the lottery for the Royal Parks half marathon in October, assuming I'd never get a spot... but I did.

Now I’m torn. Part of me wants to take it seriously, use it as an excuse to build back some proper cardio conditioning.

But a large part of me can't be arsed – and would rather just trot around, enjoy the atmosphere, and not turn it into another project.

Will I continue with the personal growth of letting things be easy sometimes? I wouldn't bank on it. Maybe I'll just hit the leg press so hard it makes running impossible.

👋 Over to you!

That’s it for this month.

The whole point of this newsletter is to stay connected to friends, meet new ones, and throw some ideas into the world to see what sticks.

So if anything here sparks a thought - or you just fancy a catch-up - hit reply!

I’d love to hear what you’re building, thinking about, or trying to figure out right now.

Speak soon,

Rob

p.s. You can also follow me on Twitter, LinkedIn or Instagram.