Apparently Devonport and Burnie have a bit of a rental shortage at present which is strange considering the majority of purchases have been made by mainland investors in the past year.

Has seen heavy buying activity from interstate with many real estate agents having standard orders to buy anything within certain price ranges. Several interstate investors have purchased up to 30 properties each, driving a buying frenzy.

If you can buy in that price range and get a reasonable return well done, although 130pw rental sounds high for a unit unless freestanding in a v.g area with garage and private outdoor area.

I’d check with some locals as they are on the ground so to speak.

Not to offend anyone but Gagebrook is considered by locals to be a really bad area. It is a good price considering how things have taken off, but you need to balance that against the fact that only people already in that area will want to live there.

Why don’t you contact some of the central Hobart agents and ask their opinion of the area and its prospects?

PB

I must agree that taxes are far too high. This is one of the most highly taxed nations on earth. Imagine if Americans paid 48.5 cents in the dollar on incomes above approx 35,000USD (rough equivalent to 62,500AUD.

Combined with CGT and stamp duty, there is a strong disincentive to invest or get a better job to ear more money.

Perhaps we need an accountant to ‘go over’ the governments books and restructure their portfolio[]

Try http://www.abs.gov.au

They have most of this info, particularly census data.

Burnie and Devonport are white hot at present. Rental demand high, rental property numbers low. It is mainly northern suburbs of the major cities that have the cheapies – a lot of housing commission areas.

I invest with a partner and on my own. We have around 20 IP’s now – the rent on each place covers all H/L repayments. We don’t have any -ve geared IP’s until you start doing depreciation and travel at tax time.

BTW we have purchased 90% of these in the last 9 months.

They can find out. Usually checking credit history shows up finance enquiries by institutions, and if you pay the cerdit card by transfer, chq or bpay it shows up in bank statements that they check for good conduct.

Best to perhaps have the card in anothers name or just come clean up front – they don’t like being misled.

I guess its all relative. I moved from Tas to Sydney and even though I earn a fair bit more than I did, the lifestyle hasn’t really changed that much.

I’m not unhappy with what I earn but I guess more is always good, particularly when you go to one wage when having children.

I’d check some of the more common internet sites like http://www.realestate.com.au or http://www.domain.com.au to give you an idea of what you can get in Melbourne for around $300k. You should get more than 1 bedroom with luck.