jsando,

Not sure I completely understand your question- the bit about the tenants advertising with a number- where did you find the ad? in a newspaper saying “wanted to rent- house” or something? Anyhoo, if I’ve read your Q wrongly, the answer will reflect that

Not all prospective tenants will go to a real estate, I guess. In the time that I rented, I never found a house through a RE. I would hear that a house was coming up for rent via friends or other tenants. I cannot remember, in the 6 years I rented before I got my current rental accommodation, approaching a RE for a house. Having said that, I still became a leaseholder of every place I’ve lived in.

A lot of people will make private ads if they have specific needs. They might be moving to a place for work or something, and just advertise for a house to establish themselves before they get there. There’s heaps of those types of ads “Need house in September” type of thing.

If you feel concerned, or you feel that you might not have the skills to do the property management work, just get a tenant through a RE. Or, you can locate these tenants through their ad, and then get a RE to manage it for you. It’s cheap to get a PM, saves a lot of hassle, and in my opinion, they rank up there as number 2 in making the whole RE game successful (Number one is the tenant, of course!)

I doubt private advertisers are necessarily scammers. If dodgy folks wanted to live somewhere and avoid being checked out, they can just move into a shared household via the thousands of ads all over accommodation boards at uni’s, or on poles all over major cities, or in shared accomm ads in newspapers.

The blacklist will only exist for people who have held leases or had their nameas on it jointly. There would be thousands of people who have rented and yet never taken the responsibility of a lease. They might just move into room of a a place, cause their ruinous destruction, and then move on

Get a PM, I reckon )

kay henry

Yep, 200k for PS plus residence… sounds like the kind of price of a bypass place. steve, check out plans for the town. Think about places like bookham- tiny little place on the princes highway that got a bypass, everything closed down- including the servo/mixed business. Now it’s lucky to get a “stop revive survive” event at the local town hall on major public holidays. I am sure you can get 10% pozz geared places there too…

kay henry

yack,

Yeah, DWMC surprised me in a big way. I expected it to be another of those yawny teen mainstream films, but it’s got so much going for it. That Chinese takeout mind games scene is sooo good! and some of the fetish gear in the film- oh yum I didn’t watch it in its entirely last time, but when I started watching it, I couldn’t remove myself from it.

Some old films I love:

The longest trailer. lucille ball and dessie arnaz – fuuuuuunny!

Guess who’s coming to dinner. Poitier’s fabulous and Hepburn and Tracy so coy

Whatever happened to baby jane? Joan crawford at her psycho best, and bette davis tumbling down the stairs. Riveting stuff I read a review about it and it said it was “the film that launched a thousand drag queens”. hehe.

kay henry

Dom,

Sounds like what you’re speaking of is more like mezzanine financing- whereby private investors fund the building of the building. To my knowledge, the returns can be high risk and around 12% or less return and lower risk.

I am not sure developers take on little people and say “come and buy this property off-off the plan, and you can have it for 100k less than the off-the-plan people.” What I do think is that if you park your money with them, you might be able to use some of that return to buy one of the props, so it *seems* cheaper.

I remember a few books and courses around about the secrets of getting in with developers and getting cheap properties, but the books and courses fizzled, as the dangers of mezzanine financing became known to the community.

I just don’t know how developers would make money if they found people on the streets and let them buy IP’s for basement rates.

I also remember when the word about town was “OTP” and the rhetoric is that they were cheaper than when the apartments were built… but I reckon that big myth has been exploded. Look at any development now. Say onbe in sydney- a 200-unit apartment block starting at 330k OTP. As soon as the block is built (and they go up super quick these days), the built ones are still 330k. Any CG made on OTP’s was because of market rise, I reckon- not OTP “discount”.

kay henry

Terry,

As a matter of interest, what happened that this woman can’t hold her properties anymore?

I ask this, not because I see $$$$ in my eyes due to someone else’s misfortune [hmm] but because I think it might be interesting for the forum to understand how sometimes, it can all go wrong.

We’re all happy to discuss our great CG’s, and how super-rich we are due to the RE boom… but obviously, the boom and having coastal properties, has not been enough to save this woman’s financial situation.

Did she lose her job and was unable to get another? Have significant health problems and be unable to finance? Was she over-committed? Did someone rip her off?

I know you’re gonna protect her privacy and not play into the “blood on the streets” stuff that sometimes we see on here, but I am wondering why she has to give up what she’s probably strived so hard to get?

kay henry

Mad…

I don’t think there’s be any investor on here that hasn’t had to fork out money for repairs etc. Anyone that pretends property isn’t high maintenace- to some level- is, I reckon, not being quite.. erm.. truthful

Some of the expenses you’ve mentioned would, I’d have thought, been fixed up by the Body Corporate.

I see property investing, as just that- reuiring my “investment”. I think of it as a small business in a way- there are outgoings, and sometimes, you don’t make a profit, because you have big expenses. I don’t see property as just adding value all the time. It’s not just about adding an aircon, raising the rent, and profiting. Pure maintenance raises no profit, and is essential to keeping our properties tenantable- but it gives us nothing back often. If we had a small business, we’d have to buy equipment, fix stuff- sure it’s all tax deductible, but for every buck we spend, we only get back 50 cents, so it’s not all profit.

I think having property is expensive. Some people say it is as easy as pie [baaa] but I would be very surprised if there’s not a heap of people out there who, like you, spend a lot of money sometimes, and who face some months of the year where it all seems like spending is all we do.

I found property to be super worthwhile when CG was a big factor. But when it is in a flatter peroid, my game now, is just to be patient, and go slowly, and not expect bucketloads of cash every week. Slow and steady

Not sure any of this is terribly positive, but just letting you know that I know how ya feel For me, I don’t care- I don’t have the instant millionaire mentality, so I’m pretty realistic.

kay henry

Yes bennido, I have read her books. My first two RE books were Somers and Bell. I liked the idea of paying off property ASAP. I still do (although I’d never live as austerely as she did). I think one can pay off property if it is really cheap, but for the more exxy properties… well, you just can’t pay it off as quickly as a 50k property. But I found her books were a good starting point for me, absolutely. I also like her plain use of English- onya Anita, if you’re on here! [smiling]

kay henry

jseses,

Here’s a new weblink for a search engine:

http://justlisted.com.au/

It’s by the Sensis Group (white and yellow pages and they also have the Trading Post online). Currently, justlisted only covers sydney and regions, but soon it will go national.

I find properties online. If I ring a RE and inquire about a property online, that might lead me to hear about another property that has “just been listed”. Many people on here travel to find places not advertised on the net, but for me, it’s satisfactory to find props online

kay henry

I think Steve is trying to gazump, on this occasion.

kay henry

K&R,

You wrote:

“We phoned our bank and we were told that he had miscalculated the fees…”

Surely, your bank coud spot you a loan for another 2k to assist you, given that it was not your own error? 2K is a pretty small amount. Seems extraordinary that they wouldn;t just add this to the loan.

kay henry