Grant Bovey, best known as the husband of television presenter Anthea Turner, had a slightly unusual problem when he approached banks for start-up funding for Imagine Homes, the buy-to-let property company that he built from scratch in 2003.
“Three of the banks couldn’t care less about the business. They just wanted to know about my charity boxing match with Ricky Gervais [screened on BBC Two's celebrity boxing programme, The Fight, in 2002].
“They clearly had no intention of lending me any money – they just thought it would be entertaining to spend an hour chatting to me.”
Bovey eventually secured around £12m in debt financing from HBOS – the sixth bank he spoke to – and put up £1m of his own cash.
He used the funds to buy 22 apartments in a development called Kew Riverside – which he sold just eight weeks later.
Four years on, Imagine Homes is now worth a whopping £200m and Bovey is planning on floating the business on the London Stock Exchange.
Bovey has the following advice for other entrepreneurs: “You have to be honest with your bank – they hate surprises.
“Don’t make your business plan too optimistic because it will only bite you in the bum as the months unfold. Just be honest.
"Win their respect, win their trust, and if it’s a good, solid idea then there’s an even chance they might back you.”
Read the full interview with Grant Bovey – and his gruesome defeat by Ricky Gervais – in the November edition of Real Business magazine.