Hi Chappy,Would be interested to know what the selling agents were thinking, perhaps they had you tagged as not a serious buyer for whatever reason? Then their actions might make more sense whilst being very unprofessional still. No matter how you slice it there are always two sides Be careful of any advice suggesting you might try and cut the…[Read more]

Good advice so far, getting on realestate.com.au is close to essential.Also.. don't underestimate the power of a good sign stuck in the front lawn, very powerful.

Depending on what you want to achieve there are some good resources around about how to approach things. If you want sensitive information from an agent just open a friendly dialogue about whatever, how the Knights are playing, how the market is going, if they are that kind of talker which is often the case; you won't need to ask to get plenty of…[Read more]

Catalyst wrote:
In NSW it's based on land value as at 31st December each year.Land tax is the reason people tend to diversify in different states once they get close to the threshold of one state.

Land tax is one of the key reasons interstate investors look to buy in Brisbane, there is a strong incentive from the federal government to invest…[Read more]

I have a home built during the great depression not far from my house. The house was relocated from Mt Morgan to Brisbane timber by timber and rebuilt, looks in very good nick today. No indication of the maintenance or renovation costs along the way though. It's about to be sliced and diced to fit another house on the block, which is the key…[Read more]

I'm personally quite partial to brick houses on nice blocks of land <200m from a train station that need a cosmetic reno and will not cost too much too hold. Units are nice as well, one I bought for 89k in 2001 I sold for 257k in 2007, can't say that wasn't an uplifting experience for me Back in the late 70's my parents had the choice of buying a…[Read more]

Low income areas like high income areas have good and bad patches, good and bad streets and good and bad neighbours, which can be worked out quite easily by thorough research. We are fortunate in Australia that with our capital cities almost all areas tend to get better over the long run, or at least don't turn into no go zones, nothing yet like…[Read more]

This answer would seem to fit under a heading of 'feasibility study' for a development.One positive is the yield numbers mentioned will be worked out on the final valuation? So presumably if you are creating equity with a build then your yield on total spend will be higher.Basic stuff but it likely can't be said too many times, invert, work…[Read more]

Parraboy one quick way to do a bit of benchmarking is to compare your houses with houses in the area you have bought, use the free ABS, Residex data for houses and compare growth with these numbers to your individual properties. If you aren't adding value to your houses then that's really all you can achieve, you check your areas are performing…[Read more]

Qlds007 wrote:
Sure it is a typing error by Terry but CGT is calculated on the Contract date (of course depending in which State you are in this could be the Exchange date) so just need to watch that.One way of eliminating CGT is never never sell. Appreciate it sounds silly but it does work.CheersYours in Finance

Pushing CGT into a low income…[Read more]

Likely it will make for some interesting viewing for those wanting to munch some popcorn and enjoy the banter, never much time to go beyond the superficial with such events.I will read a quick summary from their own sites after the event So much energy expended trying to prove a prediction of the future and so little spent on working towards…[Read more]

Ryan,On a more upbeat note I can provide the following.Unfortunately there's no +ve cashflow in residential in any area I would be interested in buying in my patch of the woods at the moment, though I regularly see investors create either neutral or +ve yields. This involves significant value add though, of which there are plenty of excellent…[Read more]

Nice work Scotts, enjoyed reading your post, top use of visuals as well

Being an expert or accomplished at anything is not a requirement to become a published author. Also being a published author in Australia is hardly going to make you wealthy, or even pay you a decent wage in most cases, rather it's a ticket to the much more lucrative seminar circuit and such ideas. If you take away the business income from being…[Read more]

I will talk up my area since nobody else is stepping in for Brisbane and SEQ The question is general so in reply I will pose the following general thought question. There has been a divide in the performance of the greater Brisbane area (including the growth corridors to the coasts and Ipswich). In broad brush strokes the higher quality areas have…[Read more]

Not crossing the properties is obviously a big issue to consider as has been mentioned already.Otherwise take some time to think about your investment goals and where you would like to end up. It's a bit corny for sure but 'no wind is favourable to the man who does not know to which port he is sailing' as someone smart once said

The latest HTW month in review newsletter has some excellent snapshots of reduced values.Link to May 2011 HTW newsletterI don't see any compelling value, though I'm sure there are individual gems to be picked up, the flood could have been contained or averted with the benefit of hindsight, so you imagine that future events might be better, they…[Read more]

Especially since you are doing this as well as full time employment, also turning over relatively quickly with time improvements no doubt on the next project, I see the real pros do incredible transformations in under a week sometimes.

I'm surprised by the amount of enquiry I recieve from the Middle East as well, mainly Dubai. Main locations are still Singapore and Hong Kong.

There have been local impacts with Brisbane and reduced prices and higher rents, on a city level I suspect the impact has been quite limited, working out exactly how much of the slow market is due to the flooding is only an estimate though.Rest of the year.. It's an educated guess I always say, though if forced to guess I would look at the…[Read more]