Empower Blog Property & Financial Investment

RBA Rates Decision – April 2010

Today the RBA announced it would increase interest rates a further 25 basis point to move the cash rate to 4.25%.  They are trying to take the heat out of the booming housing market, as a threat of a bubble is forming due to the historical low rates implemented during the GFC.   Yet our quick recovery out of the GFC to avoid recession has seen t...

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Property Prices – Where to from here?

Those of us in the Melbourne and Sydney markets are seeing property values grow at an astonishing rate. So much so that at a very near point in time, they may be overvalued. I know the first question that’s coming to mind—”when will this be?” As those of you looking to get into the markets are thinking, I’ll just wait until the right t...

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Negotiation Tactics in a ‘Sellers’ Market – Part Two

3. Establish recent sales to justify your offer Recent sales of comparative properties can help in getting the estate agent to help support your price offer, but you must compare apples with apples, don’t compare weatherboard with Brick or vastly different land size blocks etc.   4.  Start with a long term settlement When you put your...

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Showing the Way…

The most rewarding part of our job is helping our clients create wealth for financial independence through residential property.  I’d like to introduce you to one such client. Renee, (name changed for privacy reasons) is in her early thirties, working as a professional woman.  Since I have been working with her over the past 4 years, she has...

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Don’t Sell the Golden Egg Layer

Real estate agents across the land are complaining they don’t have enough stock to meet buyer demand at the moment. This limited supply is having a positive effect on property values growing quicker than usual. Agents are out there saying they have 10 buyers for every listing they get, especially in the established suburbs. So agents are going...

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Mistakes Borrowers Make

With finance the flavour of this month’s newsletter I thought I’d pen a list of borrower’s mistakes. This list is not specific to investors or owner occupiers; they are basic mistakes or assumptions that lead to mistakes that all borrowers can make..... So lets take a look at them (in no particular order) Going straight to their current B...

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Banks Pigeon Hole Their Customers

From my years working in the advertising industry, our Bank clients have always tried to draw a picture of who their target market client is.  You’d be surprised to know that it generally meant that many people were ‘Pigeon Holed’ into the same group and that there wasn’t enough distinctive information that could tell people apart. Have...

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RBA Rates Decision – March 2010

Today the RBA announced an increase in the cash rate of 0.25% to bring the cash rate to 4%.  This is the first increase in 2010 and follows three consecutive increases in late 2009.  The RBA decided to increase the rate based on positive economic news within the Australian economy, led mainly by the improvement in the level of unemployment. Th...

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Negotiation Tactics in a ‘Sellers’ Market – Part One

It’s an understatement to say that the residential property market is ‘hot’, as values in almost all major locations are up on this time last year. Sydney, Melbourne and Perth are leading the charge, as supply is outstripped by demand from a growing population. In real estate terms, we are currently in a sellers market, whereby in most loc...

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Rental Yield Outlook Positive

2009 saw many first home buyers take advantage of the additional government stimulus schemes on offer to buy their first home and get out of the rental market. This impacted in less demand for this sector of the market. However this decline was offset against the overall population growth in the major cities centre's around the country. BIS Shrapn...

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Pressure on Housing—Long term

Last week the government released their third Inter generational Report forecast. It is forecasting the population to grow from current levels of 22 million people to 35.9 million by 2050.  An increase of 13.9 million people with the level of older Australians increasing as wills the average age they will be living too.  This means a double wh...

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Cash flow and Provisioning Critical

I am on record pretty much every week, talking about how property investing is a long term play and why would you sell if property values continue to grow and also provide immediate and on-going income via rent payable by tenants. Yet one of the barriers of entry for some to invest in property is the fear of borrowing money (debt) associated with ...

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RBA Rates Decision – February 2010

The RBA announced an increase in the cash rate from 3.75% to 4.00% today.  This is the fourth consecutive increase in rates (given the RBA doesn’t meet in January).  The cash rate has now moved up 1.00% from a low of 3.00% back in April last year. Most forecasters are expecting the cash rate to increase by another 0.75% by the end of the yea...

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