In his new position, Rod wants to increase exposure for LendInvest, taking it beyond what he sees as its current position in the scope of a small yet persistent base of brokers.

“There's a relatively thin slice of brokers out of the entire market that use us, but the ones that do, use us prolifically,” said Rod.

“Sometimes I think that LendInvest could be the best-kept secret in specialist finance. People know of us but maybe don't necessarily know what we do.”

In his new role, Rod is looking to “widen the slice” of brokers, while simultaneously getting the word out to networks and clubs about what the company is capable of.

This is alongside LendInvest looking to grow its residential offering, improve processes with its broker portal, and utilise AVMs.

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As well as a wide range of career experiences — including selling Spanish homes, as well as cars, and owning a grocery store — Rod has built up a keen knowledge of the Scottish property market, and believed there was not enough understanding of it: “I don't understand why it's not understood, because I would argue it's a much simpler process up here.

“I would also argue that the Scottish buying system is considerably better. The home report system is a no-brainer: it's just so much easier as you don't have multiple valuations carried out.”

He claimed that aspects such as supplement taxes — which have been in place in Scotland for much longer than in England — had led to developers needing to adapt and become entrepreneurial.

“Canny investors have had to search out deals that they possibly otherwise wouldn't have looked at, and they've also had to evolve the way that they're doing things. We get a lot of investors that are looking at non-traditional BTL properties such as holiday or HMO.”

At a time when national-level macroeconomic factors have done little to instil confidence, Rod saw one of his tasks as showing would-be developers that the opportunities were still out there.

“Fortune favours the brave. If it's not going to be today, when are you going to do it?

“The UK used to be known as a nation of shopkeepers. How great would it be if we were known as a nation of property developers?”