Arvind was caught up in the emotion, just like millions of England supporters at the time. The prize was suddenly within touching distance. Was I predicting England would lose its next match? Not at all. I was simply recognising a behavioural pattern that has repeated itself for decades.

Whether it's football supporters chanting 'Football's Coming Home', stock market investors saying 'This time it's different', or house sellers believing 'Next month will be better', people tend to repeat the same behaviours when emotion takes over.

Successful investors don't make money because they can predict the future. They make money because they recognise recurring patterns before most people do.

That brings us to today's property market.

During phase 4 of the market cycle (recession), the patterns of motivated sellers can become surprisingly predictable, but in a different way to the previous growth or stable phases.

For the purposes of this football analogy, you the creative property investor are the footballer with the iconic in-demand skills during the down-market cycle. Because of that, you remain completely detached from the frenzy of others around you.

Rule #1: Don't chase the market, let the market chase you.

Maintain your marketing strategy and continue connecting—and reconnecting—with sellers whose properties have been on the market for an extended period. Nothing matures a seller's motivation more than time, combined with frustration, disappointment and repeated setbacks, all of which are part and parcel of a difficult market.

Just like clubs bidding for the star footballer, your investor competitors are all playing the same game—competing on price. You aren't. You're playing a completely different game.

Don't ask yourself, 'Can I buy the house?' By default, in a more balanced or upward phase of the market cycle, then property investing will default back to buying the house outright. But today's market is different! To do a creative strategy and control the property, as opposed to buying it, I must calmly make the assessment, 'Which behavioural pattern am I looking at?'

Rule #2: Time is the primary motivator.

This is no different to a footballer transfer that seems to drag on all summer long, and then by magic it gets concluded on deadline day. The price and terms are all thrashed out, and often the reason for the final decision is only revealed afterwards. But you, the guru investor, are unearthing the exact pain points in advance to wrap a custom-made solution around the seller's problems.

You will discover, for example, that those sellers that purchased in recent years will be more financially exposed and open to your creative solutions as the house value and mortgage debt get closer together. This too will become apparent in your pattern recognition and assessment.

The footballing agents above were mostly negotiating in the same way. It happens in all walks of life, and it's no different with your fellow property investor cash buyers. But our prize footballing star has a much bigger personal incentive. Legacy, recognition, trophies, success, etc are all on his checklist, potentially even above remuneration.

Rule #3: Selling the house is not the problem.

Sellers will tell you otherwise, like:

• 'the buyer changed his mind'
• 'we've had viewings, but little interest'
• the chain broke down', or,
• 'other houses in the area have been dropping their price', etc.

The root problem comes from the real problem behind what the sale was going to solve!

In past newsletters and video commentaries, we have looked at the market cycle and its four phases, the economy, interest rates, and so on. This is different! This is about recognising how humans respond in given circumstances.

If England supporters had only acknowledged that chanting, 'Football's Coming Home' was by the law of averages the 'kiss of death' to England's chances, maybe they would avoid putting this curse on the team. Don't you do the same with your pattern recognition with sellers!

With the training modules in the We Buy Houses Learning School, you will discover just how important and complimentary are the people skills needed and recognising how to draw out the real problems behind the house sale itself.

Here is just one example of recognising a human behavioural pattern with a divorcing couple at war with each other, but wanting full market price on the sale of their house. I only ever spoke to the husband who was open to a creative approach. Despite my better judgement from past experience, I insisted on speaking to his wife just to prove my point.

Note: Never attempt a creative deal where the decision-makers are fundamentally opposed to one another.

Next, here is another case of sellers also wanting full price for their house, but in their case, 'we can wait' and are 'not in a hurry' to sell until 'we get our price'. 

Note: Time motivates everyone, despite what people say. (The nearby neighbours also dropped their price, so they are back to where they started) 

Finally, while my newsletters and videos are directly from my own thoughts, I do make use of ChatGPT to arrange my ideas in the most impactful way to get my message over to you.

I found this observation from my automated 'business partner' to be insightful, even to me. I thought I would share it with you to close off.

Note: We all have our own perspectives and patterns, and sometimes an outside view helps us spot what we've missed.

Yes, ChatGPT was right!

I don't want you to blindly memorise scripts and sound like everyone else. I want you to learn how to think. We teach pattern recognition, so you can think independently in any market.