Thank you all for your great help!

Terry – you have helped me in the past on the forums, and will definately give you a buzz if I need a lawyer!

Cheers

Hi Benny,

From a price perspective it is pretty good. Its in innner Brisbane about 2km from the CBD (Bowen Hills, Fortitude Valley area).

Body corp is on par with the area at roughly $1,200 per qtr. Rates are also normal at roughly $300 per qtr.

Its close to the extensive development at the RNA showgrounds so hoping the property will increase in value along with the development.

Cheers

Kurt

Good idea Wilko. I suppose the reason to revalue would provide the opportunity to tap into the freshly generated equity to buy more property and also provide justification to charge more to tenants?

Bit of a "how long is a piece of string question" here but for the investors out there that renovate and then revalue, what return are people generally seeing? Eg if you buy for $300k, spend $30k doing it up, are you finding the place now worth 340, 350, 360 or even higher????

Thanks you all!

Great advice!

Thanks for the great comments all.

It looks like the general consensus in definitely for old.

Richard – it would be greatly appreciated if you could email the API article ([email protected])

A question I now have for all of you is this (which has stemmed from Steve's book I am reading):

Assuming I buy an older unit, would you suggest

1) renovating before tenants move in as this way I could charge more rent and benefit from Depreciation on the reno's earlier. This however means that if I keep the place for ten years or so and then sell, the reno's will already be outdated when I sell and therefore won't be able to sell for as much.

2) Don't renovate and therefore don't get as much rent. I renovate however just before selling in ten years time and therefore sell a modern place that is fitted out cosmetically in the style of ten years time.

Thanks again all!

Kurt

Hi All,

Firstly I would like to say thank you for all your replies (even if a few of them provided some bad/realistic news). I really appreciate all your opinions and your knowledge sharing is great!

Regarding my PPR, it's in Eatons Hill QLD. When we first bought it, lifestyle had more of a preference than location. We had just come from the UK so we were sick of living in a bedroom closet! On further investigation of Eatons Hill in magazines and on the web, it does seem that it has had not great appreciation in the last year or so (slightly negative on average). Having said that however, we have spent money on the place and our house is actually in one of the nicest streets in the suburb with great elevated views (our neighbours house two doors is worth over a million).

I have been in contact with my mortgage broker and he suggested we get an application in to see what the valuation will come in at. If as you say Benny the valuation above it comes in at $560k +, we are in a different ball park. 

Another strategy I am thinking of is going in with my Dad or someone to buy the Investment Property using a cash deposit rather than use the equity in my PPR. That way I can still climb a rung up the ladder, and provide some more time for my PPR to hopefully appreciate in value. I can then look at using this equity to get a third place in a year or so.

I will come back to this post once I have a valuation number.

By the way, does anyone have an opinion on Decpetion Bay as a buy and hold property?? Low value now, but close to the ocean and other developing suburbs like Redcliffe and Woody Point?

Thanks again all!

Thanks for the swift reply Jamie. 

Basically I am just taking what I owe the bank ($505k) from what I paid for the property $540k. 

Is this the wrong way to look at things?

Cheers