Empower Blog Property & Financial Investment

How much Money can you borrow?

So how much money can I borrow? It's a question we all ask ourselves from time to time and it's a good question to ask and from a Lender's point of view it's a question around serviceability. So when they're talking about serviceability they're actually saying that here's the household income coming in, here's the expenditure that we've got associa...

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The Impact of the Federal Budget on your retirement

In recent articles in this series, we have discussed the state of incomes of older Australians compared to other developed nations, and concluded that we fare very poorly in such a comparison. In this article, we take a look at the proposals contained in the May 2014 Federal Budget and how they may impact on the wealth and lifestyle of older Austra...

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Future Population Growth Has Meaning for Some Property Investment Locations

Population growth is not the ‘panacea’ for all things property investment certainly not in spotting the next property investment locations. In fact, it’s often used by many property investment spruikers as the way to get unsuspecting Mum and Dad investors excited enough to hook into a lemon location, and ultimately a lemon investment. However...

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Metro versus Regional

There s no single path to successful property investing, Investors often have to make decisions that have no right or wrong answer. Strategies, purchases, timing and opinions differ from investor to investor, and indeed expert to expert. In the June 2014 Issue of Smart Property Investment Magazine (SPI), our team goes head to head and present thei...

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Risky Business

Having an unregulated property investment industry presents some very real dangers and something needs to be done about it. In the May 2014 Issue of Smart Property Investment Magazine, Ben Kingsley, chairman of Property Investment Professionals Of Australia (PIPA) writes about the risky business in Australia's property industry and the difference ...

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RBA Rate Decision – June 2014

Today the Reserve Bank met and kept interest rates on hold for another month. It's amazing what can happen after a federal budget and more importantly, an austere federal budget. We're actually seeing what I said in my last video from last month is that this budget is an important budget. And it's an important budget in terms of momentum in the ec...

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Wealth Secrets

Occasionally, we would have some spare lump of money that just sitting idly in the bank account. Although they might be generating some steady interest rates but there are always other options and investments where you can put the money to a better use.  In the third Wealth Secrets issue of Money Magazine, Bryce Holdaway was interviewed on what he...

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Sky Business Channel, Your Money Your Call (May 2014)

In the 5th of May session of SKY Business Channel, Your Money Your Call, Ben Kingsley joins Margaret Lomas and Ian Rodriguez from Bishop Collins to discuss about different aspects of property across Australia. This time, they answered a number of emails and calls from viewers and some of the topics are: The increasing dwelling value across most ...

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What Properties are considered Risky by Banks?

I think the answer to this question is having an understanding of what properties the bank would be comfortable letting you have lenders mortgage insurance on, and that's a scenario where if you borrow more than 80% of the purchase price, so 85% - 95% of the purchase price, the bank will actually give you lenders mortgage insurance (LMI). There ar...

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The era of entitlement IS OVER – What can be done?

Joe Hockey delivered the nation’s 2014 Federal Budget last Tuesday. He was true to his word about it being a tough budget and based on the changes they want to push through the senate and bring into law, it certainly didn’t miss any of us, as their catch cry stated “we are all in this together”. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it agai...

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Are One Bedroom Apartments still the Poor Cousins?

Ask a baby Boomer what they think the great Australian dream looks like and chances are they will say a detached house on a quarter acre block surrounded by a garden with a BBQ and a hills hoist. Ask the same question to a Gen Y and they are likely to say an apartment in the suburb where their café culture lifestyle is… usually the inner city su...

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How to Move past Investment Property One?

Let's face it. Growing your property portfolio is not an easy feat. There are a number of hoops you must jump through and you need to have nerves of steel to deal with unexpected issues arising from your investments. Yet there are many ordinary investors who are creating extraordinary wealth through property. So why are so many investors getting st...

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In the Hot Seat | Bryce Holdaway

Co-host of Foxtel series Location Location Location Australia and Director of Empower Wealth, Bryce Holdaway reflects on his property investment journey to date. He was interviewed by API Magazine (Australian Property Investor) and answered five common questions regarding Property Investment. One of the question that was asked is "What's the best ...

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