Well I believe I have provided everything to the bank so they are happy now to continue, at least they seem so for the moment anyway.

I do not really understand how one piece of paper saying how much I have earned in my current job signed by my payroll officer means more than all the payslips also signed by my payroll officer? But anyway it is…[Read more]

Just an update –

Still awaiting finance to be approved…sigh.

Bank is requesting a credit report to be provided, I tried to send them one from Veda (seem to be one of only 3 companies in Australia that provide credit reports) but it did not suit their needs. They basically want proof of 3 trade lines where I have maintained good credit for the…[Read more]

To answer your questions regarding borrowing funds in Australia to purchase property in the US, I had 2 main reasons for choosing not to do this – 

* Interest rates are a lot lower in the US and I wanted to take advantage of this, with me being able to get an interest rate of 3.75% that is a lot more beneficial then in Australia where I do not…[Read more]

As Richard said, be wary of the low lying areas, a lot of undesirable people living in certain parts. Want to make sure you steer clear of them. 

You can try these people – http://www.ifindproperty.co.nz/

Maree Tassell is her name, I have not previously dealt with her but enlisted to her newsletter when I was looking at investing in NZ, seems to send out some good deals every now and then. Has contacts over there which would be very useful as well.

If you do end up dealing with her, would…[Read more]

It is obvious now the banks were ridiculously greedy in 2006-2008 with outrageous loans to people who could obviously not afford them. But what they have done now is just taken a massive backwards step and have now just become too conservative it is no doubt hurting their own hip pocket. Last time I checked a bank makes a bit of money out of…[Read more]

Sigh….I thought I had all my forms sent off and everything was going well, then this morning I received a letter from Capital Bank with about 12 more requests from me, more things I have to provide. A lot of it really makes no sense – 

* Please provide proof of funds in your Commonwealth Bank account for closing…..even though I have more than…[Read more]

It seems that a lot of economists are predicting a downfall, but there are still some out there predicting that it will just keep going on it's merry way. Who is right and who is wrong? I guess only time will tell…..

As for supply and demand, well it may be simplistic it still holds true, the Australian government can control supply by only…[Read more]

Definitely recommend getting rid of the debt first, I know it may put off your RE dreams off for a bit, but no point adding a lot more debt to what you already have. Financial stress is not something you want to put onto yourself if you can help it. 

Finally able to meet up with a Notary Public and have the final form "Notarized", difficult to find one seeing as I spend most of my time out in Rural QLD where I work. But I was able to duck into Toowoomba and meet up with a great bloke who did the job for me, and then I was able to scan and email it through to my US Agent and she was able to…[Read more]

Hi Tom,

As others have said, University is a personal choice, definitely not essential. I know in my university degree (civil engineering) I did not learn too much about how to be a good engineer, I learnt everything as soon as I stepped into the workforce, in the end I feel like the only reason I did the course to get a piece of paper which…[Read more]

Just to keep it updated – 

I have submitted all of my loan documents except one (approximately 20 documents all together), the only one I have left to submit is a US Agent Authorization form, it seems like a useless form, it states 

"As my authorized US Agent in the United States. This appointment includes but is not limited to acting as a…[Read more]

Only cost be about $300 to set up both of my LLC ($600 total), may have gone the budget version but they still do what I need to do so cannot complain.

As for US Bank Accounts I have had a lot of bad luck, I was able to get a bank account set up with BB&T Bank remotely (without even visiting the country) but they closed the account about a week…[Read more]

Well hopefully now that I have the loan documents it should all be completed very quickly and smoothly. Our initial closing date we just said anticipated closing to be in a month (which was mid February) so we just aimed for that, looks like we are slightly ahead of target there so that is good news. Still a little way to go yet.

There is one…[Read more]

When we had to get documents notarized we found a guy in Sydney who was very willing to help us out, wasn't cheap (about $50 per document I believe) but he was very helpful and a pleasure to deal with.

Just to update on the proceedings, I have now received the Loan Documents from Capital Bank, seems to be a never ending list of documents to sign!…[Read more]

I agree with the earlier posts, you really need to take into consideration all the costs associated with maintaining a property to calculate numbers effectively, such as rates, strata, utilities etc to be able to calculate yield.

But as was said before, yield is just a number, it does not mean much and you can manipulate numbers very easily to…[Read more]

Interesting situation, I would try and borrow as little as possible because a few dollars between friends can quickly turn friendship into enemies, that is the last thing you want. 

Care to explain how this exactly works, like if they give you enough money for the deposit, are you going to be able to save up enough money in a couple of months to…[Read more]

I remember with my first property we had to chase down a notary public to sign the documents. It was quite a hassle because a Notary Public over there is the equivalent of a Justice of the Peace, so they are really easy to find over there but very difficult to find over in Australia. Not so much difficult but expensive, I remember we had to pay…[Read more]

The finance will be with Capital Bank, same bank I have my bank accounts with over there so that has made things run a bit smoother. Also the loan will be in my LLC's name as oppose to my own.

Yes I was surprised to see loans at such low values, but I talked to a mortgage broker when I was last over there and he said they would generally go as…[Read more]

You are definitely right, there is an opportunity here to make some money and I am looking to take advantage of that. Someone has to make the money so may as well keep it in the family if possible?

As for taking longer to sell due to renovations, she wants to sell the property around March next year, and I am looking to have the renovations…[Read more]