Stop Being the Bottleneck: How Outsourcing Accelerated His Real Estate Growth

Charlie Panayi (00:00)
It is a true statement. if you look at the last month, for example, I’ve done more in that month than in terms of real estate purchases and business purchases in one four week period than I did in the seven month period. So yeah, as soon as I’ve offloaded the work that really I shouldn’t be touching, I got uninvolved in a lot of charity-related work I was doing and just focused on the

ones I’m most passionate about. I’ve done as much in four weeks as I did in seven months. So yeah, quite a significant change.

Joseph Crooms (02:03)
Hey, welcome everyone. Welcome to Investor Fuel Real Estate Pros Podcast. I’m your host, Joseph Crooms. Today I’m joined by someone I’ve been looking forward to chatting with. His name is Charlie. I’m gonna let Charlie say his last name. He will get the opportunity to do that better than me. I don’t want to mess it up, but he is a very unique young man.

doing some very promising things, looking more to get not only act to acquisition more businesses, but move into real estate and to expand his real estate experience. So hey Charlie, say hello to everyone.

Charlie Panayi (02:38)
Hello, thanks for having me as well, Joseph. And it’s Panayi, by the way. Greeks call it Pan-Ai-E, English-speaking Panayi. Yeah, that’s good.

Joseph Crooms (02:45)
Did I say it okay, Panayi?

Thank you. I think our listeners are really going to take something away from how you’re approaching this new acquisition of businesses, but how you are connecting it to real estate to buy more property. Also, congratulations on your being involved here in the Americas and hope we can help you with that as well. So let’s dive right in, okay? Okay, so first of all, for people who may not be familiar with your world

Charlie Panayi (03:09)
Yeah, let’s go for it.

Joseph Crooms (03:14)
Give us the short version of how you describe your business today. what’s your main focus today, and what markets are you operating?

Charlie Panayi (03:22)
So what’s my main focus core? So I’m very much maybe more of an investor sort of acquisition person. So I have maybe three legs to my business now. I’ve always been a real estate person. That was where I started. That’s how I made my money. As time has gone on, I’ve done pretty well in business. So my portfolio sort of split probably in terms of asset value, mostly real estate.

terms of cash flow businesses and then I also do a lot of philanthropy work so I sit on the board of two one very large charity the hospice and melanoma skin cancer charity as well so yeah three legs so most of its real estate and then then we’ve got the business acquisitions and then charity

Joseph Crooms (04:08)
You mentioned your book that you wrote, call was the number one seller you said in America.

Charlie Panayi (04:14)
Exactly,

“Excuses Will Kill You”, yeah.

Joseph Crooms (04:17)
how has that book helped you in revenue, relationships and was your book sorta what caused you to look into combining your real estate and your business, connecting more?

Charlie Panayi (05:18)
So the honest answer about the book was every time I spoke on a stage, whether that being in America or other parts of the world, they always asked me for a book and I never had one. So I started to think I don’t want a biography because to be honest, I’m still quite young and I’m not sure that’s so I went back and looked and I’ve mentored a lot of people over the years. I’ve mentored businesses, structured businesses, structured portfolios of property. And I thought, what?

to what I always come across. that’s why I called it *Excuses Will Kill You* because the most common thing I’ve come across is excuses. Why someone hasn’t done something, why it’s someone else’s fault someone hasn’t done, you know, there’s a whole shebang of these excuses. That’s where the book comes. So in terms of network, it’s actually only very recently been launched and it got best seller in the first week, three times on Amazon in America.

So, well, internationally, technically, but I can see where the purchases come from. Most of them were America. 88%. So, yeah, what it’s done is it’s been a bit of a backlog since the book’s been launched because obviously then you get lots of people reach out to you and things like that. So, actually, what I realized is I’ve done a lot of this from a very young age. I never really took excuses. It’s always on me, whether that’s personal life.

personal struggles or whether it was in business or real estate. It was always, I didn’t, I’ve never been one to make excuses. Sometimes that can make me hard to be around. If you are someone that likes to feel sorry for yourself and makes, make excuses, I can struggle with that mindset. So that’s where the book come from, Joseph.

Joseph Crooms (06:54)
Thank you so much, Charlie. Which one you were you more actively involved in first? Was it the real estate or the business?

Charlie Panayi (07:01)
Real estate, so I bought my first, I was actually a landlord before I was 18. I wasn’t legally allowed to purchase until I was 18. So I bought my first property as I turned 18. And then I just was just pulling on real estate. Now I did work, was an account director of a very large European company. That’s where I earned money to buy real estate from a very young age. And I was just very aggressive in the real estate world.

you how do I buy more how do I buy it was all about how I buy not about selling

Joseph Crooms (07:33)
you

more into the commercial or residential or both?

Charlie Panayi (07:37)
At the start it was purely residential. As time went on it changed a bit and a bit of a mixed bag now so I done commercial to residential, residential to commercial. The building I’m sat in is just a commercial unit I rent to one of my companies. So yeah, today a bit of a mixture. At the start it was probably until the age of 24, was

just residential.

Joseph Crooms (08:05)
Hm. You talked about that you were the cause of your bottlenecking.

Charlie Panayi (08:10)
Yes, sir.

Joseph Crooms (08:11)
Explain to us how that hurt you and what you’ve learned from it.

Charlie Panayi (08:16)
So yeah, I always thought I was pretty good at it, to be fair, about not being the bottleneck. But what I realized at start of this year, I looked back at the year prior and I always liked to look at how I do. I don’t really work along those New Year target nonsense. For me, I’m always moving forward. But I still set yearly sort of what’s the percentages, revenue, so forth. And I really didn’t perform to what I expect in 2025.

So then I had a hard look at, well, what am I doing wrong then? And what I realized is, I just took on way too much work. And I kept saying, yes, I’m very passionate and I love purpose driven things and I love charity work. So I realized I just took on too much and three PAs later, I have genuinely filled up three PAs in full-time work. I realized I was doing way too much work and I wasn’t doing anything I was good at.

really. I was, but not to my optimum focus as such. So yeah, my growth in 2025 is actually my worst year, percentage-wise, since I’ve been a teenager. And that was actually because I was the bottleneck, and I just didn’t realize.

Joseph Crooms (09:28)
So you realized it in 2025 and

Charlie Panayi (09:31)
I that in January 2026, December/January, I sort of looked back and thought, wow, I’ve not delivered.

Joseph Crooms (09:37)
So what has benefited since you’ve come to this knowledge on how many more properties have you acquired or because you’re able to focus more, or is that a true statement?

Charlie Panayi (09:48)
It is a true statement. if you look at the last month, for example, I’ve done more in that month than in terms of real estate purchases and business purchases in one four week period than I did in the seven month period. So yeah, as soon as I’ve offloaded the work that really I shouldn’t be touching, I got uninvolved in a lot of charity-related work I was doing and just focused on the

ones I’m most passionate about. I’ve done as much in four weeks as I did in seven months. So yeah, quite a significant change.

Joseph Crooms (10:54)
Charlie, how do you balance both of them? How do you balance the business and also the real estate? And how much are you doing on probably on a month basis? What’s your volume?

Charlie Panayi (11:06)
So in terms of how do I manage it? think real estate is far more involved for me. don’t know, in terms of knowledge for real estate, I think to be really good at it and know your stuff, there’s quite a lot of depth. So it tends to take more of my time. So very low end deal, let’s say a 70,000 pounds deal in real estate can take as much of my time as a half a million pound deal.

in business. what I’ve done is on my business acquisition side, I don’t ever work in them. I only buy companies I don’t have to work in. So I’m just purely there from a strategic point of view. So that’s how I managed to balance it because I think if they entailed the same amount of workload, I just wouldn’t be able to. So for example, in terms of business acquisitions, I’ve just tied up

£2.2 million worth in the last week. To do that in property, real estate, then that could take me a year or could take me a month. know, it just really doesn’t. There’s no like, I find in real estate, it’s my passion. That’s my favorite thing to do. But it’s not as, it’s far more time cumbersome. So in terms of real estate acquisitions, I don’t, I couldn’t tell you an average value because it can

completely different.

Joseph Crooms (12:14)
used pounds. Can you convert that into h would that would be equivalent to American dollars?

Charlie Panayi (12:20)
Let’s have a look. don’t actually, do you know what? I don’t tend to look. was in, I just said to you before we come on, I was just in Vegas and I don’t want to know what I spent there so I didn’t look.

Joseph Crooms (12:30)
That won’t be a question, Charlie.

Charlie Panayi (12:31)
So yeah, don’t want to know. Let’s see. So that’s $2 million is, what is that? $2.6 million apparently. $2.6 million. So yeah, it can fluctuate, but business acquisitions take far less of my time.

Joseph Crooms (12:47)
Gotcha. So, what’s been keeping your machine running smoothly besides the fact that you s got it stopped being the bottleneck, what things have you been doing that’s really keeping your both machines running smoothly and the bookkeeping as well.

Charlie Panayi (13:02)
Yeah, bookkeeping. So to be honest, it’s mostly outsourcing. And I don’t necessarily mean all outsourcing to individual companies. So I’ve got an in-person assistant and then two virtual assistants. And the virtual assistants are phenomenal. In terms of business acquisitions, what would take me months to find a few options, they’re finding in a week.

And the same in the real estate. So actually I found my virtual assistants have been unbelievable. And then in terms of CRMs, so I’ve invested a lot, I wouldn’t say money, but a lot of time and money into outsourcing in the last four years. And thinking, right, okay, rather than me spend all my time finding that real estate property and negotiating and all that nonsense, I’ve been quite open to using sources.

Yes, I might have to pay them $5,000 or $10,000. They all differ. But the amount of time it saves me, I’d rather just pay the $5,000. You put someone on my lap, and we move forward. So I’ve done a lot of outsourcing in the last few years. And I think that’s been a real game changer than trying to keep all these Excel sheets and this and that. So yeah, lot of time and money has gone into it.

about sourcing.

Joseph Crooms (14:19)
Thank you. Now, every operator has I know has a moment when things just get real. Maybe a deal that went sideways or a time they had to pivot fast. Do you mind sharing one of those moments if you can remember to us?

Charlie Panayi (15:14)
So in real estate, I think every conversion I’ve done, you have a moment, everyone, where you’re like, why am I doing this? Because we always try and plan best as we can to what could happen when we pull that wall back or when we do this. So to be honest, I don’t even treat that as anything unusual anymore. I expect that I’m going to regret doing that project.

But then when you finish it, you’re like, wow, I want to do that again. Look at the money I’ve made. Look at the transformation. So to be honest, that’s very common. I think the hardest one I had to pivot is actually when my sister died. It was about six years ago. And I was very heavy in work. as you probably got the gist, I’m very passionate about the stuff I do. And that hit me like a ton of bricks. So was more of a personal thing I had to change because I just didn’t even want to leave my bed.

She was only 26 years old, so it was very abrupt. So actually, I had to really pivot because I realized I didn’t have the capacity to do what I was doing. I didn’t want to. I didn’t mentally have the capacity, and I didn’t want to. So my pivot there was more onto people. I had a really good team, and I think I didn’t always trust them as well as I could have.

But that made me trust them because I used my team that are very close to me and let them take all of my responsibility. And actually what I realized was they were really bloody good. So coming back to the bottleneck scenario I had this year, I should have already known because I knew the team was so good. I could have just found another team member that was like the ones I’ve got. So yeah, that was the hardest pivot I had to make. And I had to make it relatively quick because

I was managing a lot of money and trust is everything in our game, isn’t it?

Joseph Crooms (17:01)
okay, so that’s the kind of stuff people talk about, but don’t talk about enough. And honestly, what separates the folks who are dabbling into these things the ones who stay in for the long term? Let me ask this. What was what are you focused on solving or scaling now and what’s the real goal for you next?

Charlie Panayi (17:21)
So I have a project where I want to build a portfolio for my son. He’s only five. I already achieved, I don’t mean this in a weird way, but I achieved what my dreams were by the age of 21. Since 21, it’s very much been, what can I change? How can I do real change? However, that’s in the charity space. So what I really wanna try and do, and I’m trying to do, we’re in talks of it, so.

I have to be careful of what I say, but I want to do a project where this little village, where I can make it a proper community based thing. The problem we get in England, and I don’t mind saying this, the government have no idea how to deliver what they say. And they don’t ever deliver what’s needed. So I’ve got an opportunity where I, not a huge project, we’re talking 50-ish properties, but I can actually.

hopefully redevelop this community and make it a proper community space, proper affordable living. That’s my real thing I want to do. And on the real estate stuff, I have another goal on the business acquisition where I’m trying to change the law around skin cancer. But in terms of real estate, that’s what I want to do next is I’m going to make a load of money from it. Let’s be real. But I want to make money and do it the right way.

Joseph Crooms (18:34)
That’s huge. that’s big. Especially when you’ve already have some both things in place and plus you’re not bottlenecking anymore, so you’re out of the you’re out of your way. The next either c yeah. The next move can either compound things or create chaos depending on how you play, especially with these this new venture and I can tell that you were being cautious on how you word things and then skate. so now

I know a lot of people listening are either early in their journey or looking to level up. And I think they’ll benefit from hearing this. When it comes to building relationships, Charlie, and growing your network, what’s the biggest difference for you? What’s made the biggest difference for you?

Charlie Panayi (19:14)
So if I look back at my career, all of my success is actually because of my network. If I think back to the opportunities I’ve been given, the rooms I’ve been put in, it has been because of my network. So I think people talk a lot about networking, but I think firstly they don’t understand really what it is. And then they just dip in and out. So let’s say they’ve had a really good year or a really good deal.

They sort of don’t bother. yeah, I’ve done it. You know, do it again. And then they turn back up again in a year’s time. But I think for me, networking is about consistency. And I’ve always shown up. And I don’t care if it’s into a small business owner’s room or a boardroom where all OBEs, MBEs, billionaires. You know, for me, I show up consistently in different types of rooms, depending on what I’m trying to achieve. And I don’t ever really work on

Can I get it today? So a lot of people want to be mentored of how to make money, a million pounds in a day, in a year, whatever nonsense, they’re sold online or for some property gurus on Instagram. The reality is it takes a bit of time and consistency. So for me, yeah, it’s just, it’s that consistent networking and every, although I believe in making your own luck, every good thing I’ve done in my life has been through my network. So, and sometimes you don’t even realize, I’ll give you a really quick story. was, was the executive director of the world’s biggest sailing event company long time ago now, probably nearly 15 years ago. That come because I went and sat on a table on a boat next to some guy because there’s nowhere else to sit. And we started chatting and then turns out he owned that company. Six months later, I thought I want to work in the sailing world because

I can earn load of tax-free money to buy real estate. So I thought, oh, I remember that. I rang him and he said, you know what? Since we met you that day, we always wanted you to work for us. Would you work for us? I was like, there we go. It’s a really quick version about networking. So I just think it’s about consistency and forgetting about this. I meet too many that come up to me and tell me this is what I want. Now, it’s good to say, be clear about what you’re wanting for being there. But I think the best thing is to actually ask them about them.

You know, if I saw you in a room, Joseph, I’m just going to ask you what you do and why you do what you do. I’m only going to tell you what I do if you ask, because I want to learn and put all of these things in my little toolbox. That sounds a bit harsh, but I’m going to use in the future because let’s say I can open up a door for you and I do that, then you’ll return that favor if you ever can. I don’t do it with expectation. I gave someone a TED talk six, seven years ago.

I could have done that TED talk, but my sister just died and it was six years ago and I wasn’t in right space. So I didn’t give that guy that TED talk because I wanted anything in return from him. But I also am aware that to be fair, I’ve over called the guy. I gave him his bucket list opportunity that you don’t always get, do you? So yeah, I think that’s my key about networking is consistency and showing up even when you’re doing well.

Joseph Crooms (22:10)
Well

this has been so enjoyable. you can’t fake it. You can’t fake relationships and you’re not a fake person. you’re truly an enlightened person.

Charlie Panayi (22:20)
This sounds like a damn good networking.

When I hear someone talking about someone else, I do have to call them out. I can’t help it. And I’m like, look, we’re all in the same boat. We all want to get somewhere. Got nothing good to say. Don’t say it at all.

Joseph Crooms (22:34)
Well, you know what, but you know, when you recognize someone, you give compliments where compliments are due and I’ve this has been so enjoyable. all right, before we wrap up, if someone wants to reach out to you, Charlie, connect with you, maybe collaborate or learn more about what you’re doing, what’s the best way to for them to reach out to you?

Charlie Panayi (22:52)
Yeah, so I’m open to any types of conversations. Like I said, I don’t know where they go. The best way to reach out to me is, to be fair, probably on my Instagram, which is @charlie_panayi, or you can email me, which is, or go to my website and reach out through there, which is charliepanayi.com. That’ll be the quickest way to get a response from me, because Instagram, my guys are on it, so they just tell me straight away.

Joseph Crooms (23:16)
Say one more time, Charlie, just to make sure you may sometimes somebody might have been fumbling trying to get some paper. So one more time.

Charlie Panayi (23:22)
@charlie_panayi is my Instagram handle and then my website is charliepanayi.com. They’re the best ways to reach me.

Joseph Crooms (23:30)
Charlie Panayi, well listen, I appreciate your time, your story, your transparency, and it comes to your honesty. We need more people in spaces are doing the right way. Thanks for being here. And for those of you tuning in, if you got no, let me rephrase that. I know you got some value from this conversation. Make sure you subscribe. We got more conversations coming with operators, just like Charlie.

who are out there building real businesses. We’ll see you all at the next episode. Charlie, tell everyone goodbye.

Charlie Panayi (24:01)
Thank you very much, goodbye everyone.

Joseph Crooms (24:02)
Yep. So thank you all for joining Investor Fuel Real Estate Pros Podcast. We’re signing off.