Nicholas (or ‘Nick’) started his long career in Leamington Spa, straight from school in the late 1970s, before working in Coventry and then Birmingham, where he qualified as a chartered surveyor and specialised in West Midlands’ industrial and warehousing property.

Nick moved ‘down’ to Banbury in the mid-late 1980s to capitalise on the newly arriving M40 Motorway, running the commercial department of a large regional firm – where he also met his wife Judith. Staying for over 20 years in Oxfordshire, Nick later set up his own consultancy practice specialising in development work for supermarkets and convenience stores.

Nick has acquired several of the country’s largest supermarket stores, and his firm was retained by national retailers to jointly develop specialist local centres. Nick also went on to specialise in building doctors’ surgeries. He was also director of a development company.

Nick is married to Judith Milton, herself, a well-known and experienced Cotswolds buying agent who has worked in the region for 30 years. ‘Every day my wife goes off to look at the most beautiful houses you can possibly imagine, and I go off to look at factories, shops and warehouses, but I love them all’ he says.

In 2007 Nick and Judith moved to the Gers department of southwest France, from where they continued their work in the UK, frequently travelling between Bergerac and Southampton airports. Since 2019 they have lived between their mid-week cottage in South Warwickshire and their pretty house on the West Herefordshire-Welsh border. ‘Whilst we love the Cotswolds as it is today, our refuge near Presteigne, reminds us of the deeply rural countryside we first found in the Cotswolds 40 years ago’ he says.

When he is not busy working hard in his garden or refurbishing some property, somewhere, Nick is probably to be found watching rugby or walking in the countryside with Judith and their cocker spaniel, Hettie.

Nick works as a valuation surveyor for specialist financing companies and is retained as a consultant to Hayman-Joyce, bringing a wealth of commercial property experience to the local Cotswolds market, overseeing the revival and expansion of the commercial department.