Hi,

In terms of legitimate charities, a good friend of mine works in the aid industry and made me aware of the following link:

http://www.acfid.asn.au/campaigns/asiaearthquake.htm#appeals

Regards,

Steve McKnight

**********
Remember that success comes from doing things differently.
**********

Hi,

I have removed the ability to post images (the tag) as a result of some questionable applications of the feature.

The tag still works for linking etc.

I may re-open the images once the forum policy has been updated.

Cheers,

Steve McKnight

**********
Remember that success comes from doing things…[Read more]

Hi,

Personally, I’ll be supporting Unicef and their endeavour to help those children disadvantaged by this terrible disaster.

There are many worthy causes, hwoever, Unicef only take 7% of the donation for admin. This is a more than reasonable amount.

Not wanting to sound heartless, but I’m a little cautious of the Australian Red Cross after…[Read more]

Hi,

I had lunch today with some people who have been to a one or two of my seminars now and who I have said would informally mentor them (they’ve demonstrated their commitment…).

As lunch finished I said to them that I would hold them accountable to what they said they wanted to achieve.

I suggest that meeting up with other like-minded people…[Read more]

Hi,

I’m sure there are a lot of ideas, but, at the risk of being a nay-sayer, who’s going to fund the $100,000+ needed to set up and staff this enterprise?

Sadly, problems will persist because it will be the minority (as it is now) who, not being interested in membership, would continue to give the industry a bad name with some questionable…[Read more]

Hi,

Michael may be many things to many people, but from my experience he is as far away from the evil face of wrapping as was the article in the SMH was accurate.

As for the VFA, in its current form it does seem to have run its course. I have remained at a distance, indeed passed over the presidency, due to a possible perceived lack of…[Read more]

Julia,

The words are based on a template, and as such, should you feel so strongly as to want to remove them for fear of then being incorrectly perceived as an endorsement, then that would be the best course of action.

I will also make it a point in the near furture to change the terms and conditions of the site to indicate that the ‘green…[Read more]

Hi,

Point taken… the idea is to balance advertising to recoup the cost of running the site with a non-invasive way of linking to products.

I’ll play around with the options in the new year and see if I can strike a more happy medium.

As for being unethical… the posts are not being edited, just certain words highlighted.

Regards,

Steve…[Read more]

Judanne,

The newsletter talks about no and low down deals.

You can change the numbers so that there is no deposit needed if that is what is negotiated with the vendor.

Having said that, Part Two (next month) outlines more about using external (ex-deal) OPM to bridge the gap.

Cheers,

Steve McKnight

**********
Remember that success comes from…[Read more]

Hi,

As promised, here is how the wrap figures are ‘crunched’:

Based on:

Purchase Price: $100,000
Deposit: $10,000
Vendor Finance: $90,000
Interest Rate: 9% per annum, or 0.001730769 per week
Term: 1300 weeks (25 years)
Payment at end of period
(solve for) PMT = $193.51

Loan Schedule:

These numbers are from a simple spreadsheet that solves for…[Read more]

Hi,

Thanks for your replies.

I agree that a chat room would be a good addition, and is certainly on the cards.

Also on the drawing board is a new design for the site, including additional content and other resources.

Of course, this will take some time – perhaps a few months – but be patient as it will happen.

Also, please keep the…[Read more]

Rob,

You raise some interesting points, some of which I had also considered… especially the part about refinancing the wrap loan.

Should the wrapper have provided those extra funds, I would suggest that they have left themselves open for abuse. However, being aware of the people behind the deal, I doubt this is the case.

The story as…[Read more]

Hi,

thats means you need to keep telling them, if you cant pay you LOSE your home even if you have paid up 99% of it. do you understand?, are u sure u wanna do this?, really?, u get the picture

I reject the idea put forward that someone who has paid 99% of a contract and misses a payment walks away with nothing. It is factually incorrect. If…[Read more]

Rob,

You don’t get around it. You have to work through the issue and disclose as needs be.

I feel there is only ambiguity in the contracts used by people who are not familar with the correct way to put a wrap deal together in a win-win way.

Cheers,

Steve McKnight

**********
Remember that success comes from doing things differently.
**********

Hi,

The research behind this article seems second-rate at best, including:

1. The journalist did not contact me.
2. He spelt my name incorrectly.
3. John Burley is not my mentor. He quotes from a book where the current edition no longer includes that comment, in fact, that comment has not been publsihed for several years. Despite this, the…[Read more]

Hi CrownOfGold,

Thanks for your post.

There are a few holes in your figures, but for the sake of discussion I’ve used some assumptions to flesh out my answer (see below).

First, let’s look from a cashflow perspective:

Rent: $42,000
Interest: $26,000
Body Corp etc.: $8,000
Management: $2,940
Other Expenses (10% of rent): $4,200
Overall:…[Read more]

Hi,

Okay… I’ve spent a few hours building a plausible yet conservative model to express the likely net cashflow that the Map group may have achieved based on:

* 80% finance at 7% (I/O for ease of calc)
* 7% of income in management fees
* 15% of income in other costs
(therefore total costs are 22% of income)

The net cashflow outcome based on…[Read more]

Hi,

I think Duritz has copped enough… he asked a simple question and some replies come across (I presume unintentionally) as semi-hostile.

In respect to Caravan parks… I don’t have any experience in that niche, but I’d be interested to know more from someone who does. Let’s do it under a new thread though please.

Cheers,

Steve…[Read more]

Hi Niki,

Thanks for your post!

Congrats on your success to date… 7 properties is a great effort, and hopefully you are now sitting on a large chunk of unrealsied capital gains.

I have a copuple of suggestions for you:

1. Make a plan

It seems to me that there may be an element of an ad hoc approach to your property investing. Has your…[Read more]

Hi,

My contribution is a little out of left field… I wouldn’t directly look for either, instead I’d look to build an investing system that identifies solutions to a range of problems.

Why limit yourself to one type when there are good opportunities in both?

The reason why I emphathise the need to have a system is, as Terry pointed out,…[Read more]