Has anyone ever used Residex?

Hi Komari

Jules1 is correct. Residex won’t tell you where to invest. Their reports are based solely on statistics, ie historical data, so they don’t/can’t take into consideration things such as proposed new infrastructure, or the potential loss of income for an area etc etc, but we have found their reports to be quite useful in conjunction with our own research into areas, so the cost has been worth it. There are a variety of reports for different purposes so you should look at their website to see if any are relevant to you. I’m sure you could find all the info yourself from other sources, but I wouldn’t know where to start, and the time you would spend searching could be better utilised doing other due diligence (IMHO).

Wake

Yep, invested in some residex data when purchasing my first investment property.

There’s a lot of info floating around both for free and for a price, and you’ll find that it at time contradicts. Different data companies collate their info in different ways – which explains the differences.

I think Australian Property Monitors only analyse auction results. Seeing as only about 20% of property is sold at auction, this is limited.

Residex actually compares each sold property (regardless of auction, private, etc) with the price they last sold for, and divides the number of years etc to determine the growth rate. Personally I believe that this is a much more acurate way to determine growth, because it irons out different trends in home sizes etc (ie. going by the more generalised data – if a whole heap of studio units were built in the suburb you are studying, suddenly the medium unit price would drop because prior to this most units were three bedroom). In a nutshell, Residex compares like with like.

Though nothing is perfect – it can’t take into consideration whether the property has had value added since it last sold (renovated).

They do have a “top 100 prediction” list you can buy for either metropolitan or rural areas in the state of your choice. As Wake mentioned, this is primarily determined by the trends they see in their statistics – and is certainly no substitute for due diligence.

Depending on which reports you buy, they do include analysis of data – not ONLY stats. These guys have been studying the trends for years, and like all good statisticians they try to explain why things have happened and predict where it may lead. They may not go down to each and every council to check plans, but they do consider political, taxation and inflation factors – and in the case of well known infrastructure (such as new motorways etc) they read the papers like the rest of us.

Listening to the guy who set up Residex at the recent Sydney property/investment show – he said his recommendation for Sydney was to pick the growing satellite city/suburbs such as Hornsby etc that currently haven’t had much in the way of units built, but will probably follow the trend as set by Parrammatta, Chatswood etc. Very much recommends the “buy in high density areas with guarenteed population growth” mindset.