I know.

Orlando, FL Market Trends

If you can sell now and get 15k more than you paid I'd grab that with both hands and run as fast as I could. 

The following is a chart of major AU contractors. Note the shear plunge in activity as of 2013

Worst hit are coal and iron ore oriented names but the rest are not exactly in great health.

One partner of a insolvency advisory in Australia described what was happening in the Hunter Valley and Bowen Basin, both major coal mining areas as “a nuclear winter setting in”. Not a lot of room for interpretation there. Word is that if you want to finance “yellow goods” – ie, things like bulldozers and massive trucks then you generally will not get much love from Australian banks who have seen this show before

Resources are yesterdays story. Resource driven regions and towns are now more than likely to see corrections back to the trend line. A safe bet for a young guy like yourself is to keep your money on the sidelines in a term deposit while this thing sorts itself out. 

Rain on a roof creates drumming sending sound waves away from the surface. The foils do nothing to reflect this noise. When a sound wave hits the gib board ceiling surface it too resonates and passes the noise into the room. Putting something between the metal roof and internal ceiling will absorb some of the sound energy. Anything with air in it is usually a good sound insulator. Anticon would probably do the job ok as would ordinary glass batts. The foil skins add little if any functionality other than reflecting infrared and providing a moisture barrier.

If the body corp is going to replace the roof then you might want to suggest the possibility of isolating the colorbond from the roof frame. This can kill a lot of sound energy. A bit like putting your hand on a drum skin. It kills the vibration needed to propel the sound wave. Rubber strips along purlins suffice.

Three qualities determine the volume of noise generated by metal roofs. Pitch. Most Australian roofs are pitched under 30deg and the flatter the more noisier they'll be. Guage of the metal or thickness. Over the years gauges have decreased due to cost. Cheaper roof prices can be a function of gauge. The lighter the gauge the noisier they can be although it tends to be higher pitched. Purlin spacing can determine sound frequency. The wider apart the purlin the deeper the sound. Lower frequencies have more energy so can travel further and through denser material.

Is that somehow different to "SM has indicated on numerous occasions he believes the FL res prop market has seen its best days"

The Texas market is driven by attractive business conditions compared to other states. Real business growth underpins Texas' economy and buffers it against downturns. Having gas and oil helps considerably. It's comparison is West Australia. Florida on the other hand is struggling to get off the floor and its economy remains vulnerable to further shocks. Hot money is driving FL's market because it is perceived as being cheap bargain basement stuff. When the hot money stops there's nothing to support prices. Poof bubble burst and we're likely to be back to square one.

And nothing's changed. A speculative bubble driven market vulnerable to downturns.

The history lesson is fascinating I'm sure but what or how do you play the FL market going forward 3, 5, 10 years?

What is going on??? Petty land disputes?? How does that advance our knowledge of FL??

There's lotsa smart people here Nigel although not all are proactive in exposing the real facts. I like to test those assumptions people often put forward as accurate depictions of markets or who suggest reasons for investing with little supporting evidence.

You have equal opportunity to expose your knowledge but somehow seem reluctant to do so.

You're a regular here I thought you would have known. SM has indicated on numerous occasions he believes the FL res prop market has seen its best days and is pumping commercial as an alternative now. 

I agree on the first disagree on the second.

Here's where we stand. You're the positive guy pumping FL for all its worth. I'm the Devils advocate. The negative guy. 

In every market there are forces that drive it either up or down. Normally these forces co-exist and one has ascendency over the other. Industry players out of self interested tend to spruik the positives and ignore or gloss over the negatives. When we're in particularly challenging times industry individuals have difficulty countering negative sentiment because they either can't find sufficient positives to support their position, lack the skill to devise market counter strategies in difficult markets and/or have limited understanding of broader economic drivers and how they might impact 3, 5, 10 year time lines.

Nigel there are 2 of you one of me. You have local knowledge and experience and many years in the game. It should be easy for you guys to outgun little ol' me. 

Jay Hinrichs has a model and a strategy to mitigate risk in his US markets. What do you guys have? 

In govt's latest round of budget cuts they've just trimmed $2.5B nationally from Uni's. They're being asked to make a 2% budget cut. That goes with a $3.5B education cut at the end of last year.

University budget cuts to slash research jobs

Multi-billion dollar university budget hit the biggest since 1990s

I'm unsure how that affects Wollongong Uni specifically but the funding pressure is all negative meaning a contracting environment for some time. Unless Uni's can attract corporate and or private funding for research they'll find it difficult if not impossible to maintain their current local economic impact. The more relevant component of Uni activity locally is foreign student numbers. Over all numbers have fallen due to racial  and foreign economic issues. It's a mixed bag. Some Uni's do alright others struggle. Again international economic pressures will make lifting student numbers difficult with a high dollar. I only see it becoming more difficult for foreign students over the next few years.

I don't see any economic drivers that will improve the Illawara's prospects for at least the next decade. It's not impossible but it will be a difficult region to grow an investment property for some time.

Nigel and Rob here's your problem in a nutshell. If I discuss the US market with say Kyler, Emma, Jay, Alex and a few others I get a detailed, justified and evidentially supported response. These guys know their markets intimately, have business models that make practical sense and admit the risks inherent in the markets they're exposed to. They offer complete service backed investing strategies with risk mitigation. They provide detailed reasoning and a rationale for what they do.

The best I can hope for from you guys is; go have a look, read the local papers and get a good investment team (and yes we know who you mean).

The difference between them and you is that they honestly elaborate on the problems and risks and offer solutions. You guys just spruik the market and gloss over everything. 

No potential investor needs to go and have a look. Before embarking on that expense it's common sense to do as much DD from this end first. There's nothing in that preliminary DD that leads me to believe that the US market for an international investor is a good long term bet. Quite the contrary in fact. Going there won't change my opinion. Changing my opinion requires someone to provide counter strategies that could mitigate those problems and convince me that they are workable. You two haven't even come close to showing me the path to riches in the US market at this point. In fact if I was to go with you guys I fear my money and I would soon part company.