This article first appeared in the November 2023 issue of the NZ Property Investor Magazine and is reproduced here with the permission of the owner. Click here to subscribe to the NZ Property Investor Magazine direct or contact us to add the subscription to your APIA membership at a discounted rate.
Connections are the lifeblood of successful property investors. Be they real estate agents, property finders, or other investors, a strong network of those in the know can propel investors to great heights.
Shaun McGivern has used his network of friends, family, property association members and others around him to create an impressive portfolio. His strategies are innovative (sometimes daring), but he started small and has built up his portfolio over time. And he’s continuing to innovate and expand, creating wealth along the way.
McGivern comes from a family of investors. His parents and grandparents used buy-and-hold and renovation strategies to accumulate portfolios, his father has also dabbled in subdivision and working as a real estate agent.
Growing up in Mt Albert, McGivern excelled at cricket and rugby. But, as he explains, property investment was always on the radar. “I loved Monopoly,” he laughs.
His dad renovated houses and when he was old enough, “he put me on the end of a paintbrush”.
“I loved that process of transformation. How the room would change in front of me.”
World of Law
McGivern’s mum was a legal executive in a law firm that specialised in commercial and property law and he, too, was drawn to the world of law. So, after he left Auckland Grammar he moved to Dunedin and enrolled in a law degree at the University of Otago.
He moved back to Auckland after...
