Hi Carol, don’t know what your situation is. But I do know that by not having a sign, you are sacrificing some exposure to potential buyers.

Happy Investing

Hi there, you seem to be in a very good financial position from what you wrote, you should not have any problems borrowing money as you have plenty of equity in your properties as well as good savings. A few things you can do over the next few days that will cost you nothing:

1-Call an experienced broker so you can start exploring your borrowing capacity and options.

2- Leave your cheque book at home and start researching your market, see what sort of properties could give you income, talk to agents, local investors, etc, etc.

3 – Steve’s site and these forums are a great source of information on the “How To”, this will help you decide what strategy you want to use (renos, + CF or Vendor Finance)

4-  On a clean sheet of paper, write a plan, start from the end, what do you want to achieve, and most importantly why?. Then develop your plan from there. See, a plan will help you to stay focused and in track. Your plan should include easy steps you can take every day that will get you closer to your goal, things like, read Steve’s site, call local agent, call the broker, organise paperwork for loan, etc, etc.

One last thing, the property that you have rented for $200, rent seems a bit low, call the agent that is managing it and shoot the question, this again will cost you nothing and could improve your borrowing capacity.

Happy investing

This is an interesting issue, I had 3 properties outside Towoomba , Dalby to be specific, SEQ. I decided to sell not too long ago and take profit because when I bought them they had the “mythical” 10%-12% yield, however as they doubled up in price during the boom and rents sort of stayed the same, my yields were really 5% after a few years, so… Steve explains this better than me anyway.

Point is, when I decided to sell, it took about 4 months to sell two of them, the feedback from the agents was that buyers and locals in general were really negative about the draught. Lucky the properties were cash flowing nicely, good tenants in them, etc so I was not desperate to sell.

Happy Investing

Thanks Terry.

Ian, happy to help, I am in Dee Why/Cromer area.

Regards

Hi Mark, happy to help.

I can come see you in Parramatta, no probs.

Feel free to give me a call on 0434 396 441
Regards

Hi Jane, good on you, why not give it a shot, the boring job will be always there.

May I suggest you start by doing a plan, start from the end, what do you want to achieve, and most importantly why?. Then develop your plan from there. See, a plan will help you to stay focused and in track. Your plan should include a $$$ goal, so you will have to work out what type of properties and strategies will get you closer to that goal.

Get advice on how to analyse the numbers so you will start developing that “x-ray vision” so when you look at property you will know if it is going to get you closer to your goal or not…

Also, you will need finance, talk to and experienced finance broker and see how much you can borrow, this will cost you nothing.

Keep on reading the books, and maybe attend a seminar where you can get hands on experience on the “How To”. Steve has got very cool info on working the numbers, his latest book is awesome.

Wish you all the best

Happy investing

Hi Ming, by what you wrote, it seems you already know the answer, all the options you wrote would be great investment strategies, however which one will get you closer to your Goal?

Improving your cash flow in times of uncertainty is always a sure bet.

Happy Investing

Hi there, in my property analyst days I used both, the main difference between the two is that RP Data is working on what is called “Aggregated Data”.

Aggregated data is when the data provider starts collecting more than just the basic info, like 3 bedroom home, as opposed to 3 bedroom home, 2 garages, 650 sqm block, 1.5 bathrooms, 250 sqm of building, etc, etc.

In regards to the “quality” of the data, they are all the same, they all get the data from the same source.

It depends on what you are after, for example I like PDS (property Data Solutions) as it allows me to export the data to Excel and “crunch it” so I can find out more than just the median, etc. I can work out price points, price trends, volumes of sales, etc, etc.

Call tem and get a sales person to answer your questions, they have demo versions that you can play with.

Happy Investing

Hi there, this is what my wife and myself did. We bought IP’s, well, I started to get myself educated in investing, attending seminars reading books, etc and then bough a few IP, on an income of $40K, bought in regional centers , properties that were cash flow +. The banks were happy to lend to me because the more I bough the more income I had.

When they went up in price, I sold 2 of those, and put it as a deposit for our house, if we wouldn’t have done this, we would not have been able to afford where we live now. Yes, we were lucky to be in the market on the biggest boom in history…

This is a very personal question and you should do what your heart tells you. Home ownership is a great savings plan, and it is exempt from CGT (tax). In hindsight I would have bough my own home sooner, however investing in property first allowed us to live in  a “better” area, close to my beloved surf.

Some people say renting is better, etc, etc, however you have to make sure that the money you save in not paying a mortgage (normally, twice of what you would pay in rent for the same property), you do invest in appreciating assets, otherwise you will end up in square one, no House, no IP.

Remember it is not how much you make, is all about what you do with what you make. See, for me, when I was earning $40K, I had not debt, cero, nada… My accountant  back then told me that I was in better financial shape than most of his high income earners as they all had big pay cheques, however big mortgages, debt on the car, boat, toys, etc.

Follow your heart and you will always be right, also make sure you go see an advisor for the finer details.

All the best

Try talking to the owner and say, Mr Owner this is what is happening, I believe the property is overpriced, etc, etc, show him/her the Vals. Maybe you still have a chance to knock $25K off the purchase price. I do this a lot of the time when pest and building inspections come through; give it a go!
Happy Investing