Hi DHCP

Been there done that never again!!
The tenants totally trashed the house to the point I was out of pocket $10k after insurance etc. was fighting the insurance co over every thing and after 2.5years have given up and moved on. I've put it down to a learning experience.

I don't intend to put you off however i suggest that you get your insurances, landlords, building and specifically contents as most insurance company's offer this as a secondary but don't tell you things like carpets are contents, up to date. Also get a good Property manager or screen your tenants extremely well. It took me nearly 6 weeks full time to fix the damages to a liveable state again (all done after hours and weekends) so after the whole scenario was execeptionally depressed and unmotivated to do anything else – eventually we ended selling the house after about 18 months.
My wife was in tears for nearly a week after discovering all the damage to the house that we had spent so much time renovating for ourselves.

Take care and do all your due diligences

Te
I completely understand your position being another self employed person as well. The only thing i can suggest is get a good accountant, try to improve your cashflow and save every cent you can.

In my opinion only  the uncertainty of mortgages is going to severely slow to stop lending in Australia. The introduction of this new legislation is going to cripple many hard working self employed people because they do not match the criteria of being in a "good credit position".  I myself work all year turn over approx 100k a year – but because most of this money is made between Sept to April the banks don't like my serviceability. However the money i make over the summer months carries myself over the winter months and i usually end up living of a credit card at the end of august/september before we start to make our money and repay all our debts to start stockpiliing our savings to start all over again. How is someone like myself supposed to find money for investing – well we approached a bank and a financial plamming expert and the basis of their reports consisted of was to earn more money than you spend. like we didn't know this originally.

Sorry to hijack your post but does any financial people (Richard, TerryW etc) have an opinion on this. I had spoken to ANZ to look at borrowing to invest in an IP – but basically got told that most of the "borderline deals" would get refered to business banking for approvals and unless you have a lot of equity it would look like the deal would fall over.

JacM – surprised by your comment as CBA would not approve any loans but ANZ did!

Hi Wayne,

I did stumble across a package called Smart Draw. it does do basic floor plans etc. I actually designed an office fitout on this programme as a guide for the client in about 3 hours after downloading it that day. it does come as a free trial, with full usage, but after 7 days you need to purchase the programme. It costs about aus $250 after conversion from US dollars.  the only draw backs to this programme i found in the trial version was if you wanted to print or email the plan you had sample from Smartdraw printed over the plan but you could work around that.
website is http://www.smartdraw.com.

This is not a recommendation, try the free trial to see if it suits your needs.

Cheers
Steve

Garry,
Sorry to sound Richards bell, but on this forum there have been a lot of first time posters with glowing reports on what this company is like or what this other company is marvellous. I can't speak for Richard on his understanding or knowledge of this company but i think he, along with many others including myself dont approve of these timewasters posts here.
have a look at https://www.propertyinvesting.com/forums/community/opinionated/4324800 and understand why Richard bites at all first timers and look at all posts with regards to an organisation and gauranteed there is always a first time poster with a glowing report in the first 4-5 posts. i recall one where the first timer posted within 45 seconds to the question. Sounds a little bit biased.

Cheers
Airstrike

Hi Wayne,

if you are adding a stud wall i am pretty sure you don't need council approval. I am in perth and i put my own stud wall in my house. I think that if you are removing structural walls your are required to get coucil approval but if you are replaceing what was an exisiting wall you don't.

I definately would suggest contacting your local coucil regarding this though.

Let us know how you get on as i am curious on the legality of my own wall, and would be a good idea if clients ask regarding this as well, i do ceiling fixing / suspension ceilings and stud wall frames so if you need any help message me.

Cheers

Where are you located? have you tried contacting some of the smaller niche builders and one man teams as these guys are always trying to source good help. Being able to only work weekends may cause a few issues with some of them and also council issues (i cant work before 7 am or after 4 pm on sat and not at all on sundays.)

Good luck with a great idea at trying to advance yourself and get some valuable hands on experience.

Azalia,

This EMF company sound a little bit like Wealth Guardians. My parents were looking at something similar to this which i advised them not to get into. They source the property, sell it to the investor on the cheap (read expensive) and then split whatever profits if you sell 60/40 favouring themselves. the investor pays to keep the property including all payments on loans rates etc and they get the sell fee, 60% of the pofits and they take first option to repurchase the house to then onsell the whole deal again.

my only suggestion is do your own diligence regarding any company or person offering you a deal!

What was the CCorp course like? I've read a few conflicting stories regarding CCorp and Carly Crutchfield

Cheers
Airstrike

Firstly the rule is a rule. Rules can be broken and bended to suit what requirement you need. Just because it doesn't fit Steve's 1% rule now, what about future redevelopment potential, annual rent increases etc where the rule might fit.
I understand exactly where you are coming from that some of Steve's rules dont always apply, but look outside the square and you will be surprised what you might be able to negotiate.

I live in Perth and at one point I lived some 200 metres from a train line and we never noticed the trains until around 10pm or so. these are ambient noises which get amplified later on at night.
If you did redevelope the block look at extra insulation on the back units for sound proofing and many builders would/should suggest good building designs to limit this sound as well.