A sad but common story. The issue is always the same however – that people put their money into investments that they don’t necessarily fully understand, or neglect to look completely into as they’re sold on the returns they’re quoted.

I’d say it was more an issue with the broker/banker than solicitor – price adjustments are quite normal and generally don’t go down this path.

Same as Richard, we have clients all over Australia, US, UK, Europe, Asia etc.

Haven’t had any penguins from Antarctica yet – but we’ll keep an eye out. :)

So long as you have a sufficient deposit and meeting serviceability, it’s not that hard at all if the right lenders are used – one of our clients were just approved for their first homes at age 62 & 60 respectively. Have a chat with a broker who can have an indepth looking into your situation and advise of the options available to you.

Or alternatively, buy, renovate, retain and buy again with equity gain. $0 CGT attributed.

Flipping is a great way to make money for the State government, real estate agents, conveyancers – but not so much the person doing the flipping.

I very much doubt the tenants would even notice the type of HWS used.

A couple years ago I got a call from one of my property managers saying the tenant had organised an electrician to fix their hot water service as it had stopped working and they’d let me know how much the bill was. I was quick to say I would not be paying the bill. Why?

It was a gas hot water service.

Pilot light had blown out – quick fix.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 5 months ago by  Corey Batt.

Welcome to the forum Benny.

Great question and always a double edged sword – fundamentally they can both work to your advantage. A PPOR for initial purchase can be used as a future equity base to make future purchases while you try to erode your debt as quickly as possible and increase your equity (renovations?).

The alternative if you can rent for significantly cheaper than the cost of ownership is to buy multiple investments before buying the PPOR – quite a few clients have significant investment portfolio and rent in their desired areas for a fraction of the cost of ownership.

Best of luck!

Commercial generally has significantly higher yields than resi, but that’s just due to the higher purchasing constraints meaning the prices aren’t as diluted.

If you had pure cash to place on purchasing property then yes- you might well just go for commercial to maximise your return potential. But realistically most people grow their portfolio incrementally and have minimal deposits/need significant CG to keep the wheels turning.

I generally find that most commercial investors start out with residential and then transition to commercial when their portfolio gives them a springboard to get into the new market – not too many go directly into commercial from day 1.

Quite a simple process – be careful to work on your end vals on those sub 300sqm blocks, the market doesn’t take to them as nicely. Sometimes a smaller 2 splitter will result in a higher return on investment as the block size will be above norm at 400sqm+ for a new build and your construction will be cheaper per sqm due to less narrow width requirements.

End of to end you can get it off the ground in 6 months after dealing with council, demo and getting infrastrucure together. From there another 6 months will generally see your constructions completed + all ancillary works finished off.

Just remember that just because Onkaparinga council allows it now, councils do change their rules frequently. There’s been quite a few cases where people have planned to development in x years, only to have the council up the minimum requirements leaving them with a property which can’t be developed at all.

Generally you’re lucky to see a 80% return on capital spent on the GF – they certainly aren’t a capital growth tool.

Be very careful to as I’ve seen a number of approved granny flats valued as too low spec to be considered a seperate dwelling so have been attributed as a $0 value add and any rental income ignored for loan servicing purposes in the future.