Yesterday I described to your newsletter too, Michael, and I think it’s wonderful information. [^] Thanks.[]

Thank you Melbear, I will put this book on my xmas list and see if Santa likes me…[]

I remember these rates, we were paying off our PPOR and were very happy with our fixed rate of 13%!
Never again, I hope!

Thanx Mel, well explained!
SO I guess this arrangement has to be drawn up properly by a solicitor. Will that solicitor also work out and help decide the exact monthly payments you gotta make to the vendor? Sorry if I sound dopey, but I never really ‘got’ what vendor finance really meant, so this is new to me.[]
Appreciate your patience [^]
Celivia

To add to our superannuation and have more security in the future. To avoid having to live like a pauper.[xx(]

Hi Mel, I just ‘discovered’ this oldish post. I am wondering what you mean by:
“Get the vendor to ‘leave some money in’ the deal. You then borrow the rest.”
I haven’t heard of this yet, but would love to find out how this works, sounds interesting.
Cheers, Celivia

If everything mentioned above fails and you decide you don’t want to manage the property yourself, some PMs offer a service in helping you changing over from your old PM to them.
Just ask around if they offer this service.

They can draft a letter on your behalf to the agent, all you need to do is sign the letter and the new PM will take it from…[Read more]

Thanks Bill for your warning.
Annaw I requested the info just out of curiousity, but it might just be holiday appartments that they’re selling, I’m not sure. Anyway I’m not into holiday units, I find it a bit risky. They do claim, however, that they are cashflow positive but I suspect you need to rely on high depreciation from furniture etc to…[Read more]

My neighbours’ place.
My neighbours bought it a year ago for $227K. We were thinking of buying it but the rental yield was low so we decided not to.

Only just a year later it was sold again, for $290K. In just one year we could have ‘made’ $63K- a nice amount of equity to take out for a deposit on another property! []
Plus we could have…[Read more]

Lyrical I like Margaret Lomas too. Have you looked on her website? I noticed that she has a lot of these aged pensioners units for sale, but they are really hard to finance- I have tried to buy a unit like that because it sounded good. I guess most people must be paying those straight out of their LOC or have them secured against another property,…[Read more]

Thanks for comments on the dishwasher question.
Has any of you installed paytv like foxtv when tenant requested this, and how much extra rent did you charge for this?

Hi Malpatti, I just went through a few policies just like you did and had a few quotes done over the phone. I decided to go with CGU because they were cheaper and covered the same things as the others did (building and contents, rental default, malicious damage etc). I think which ever insurance you’ll choose, there are always stories about them…[Read more]

Thanks Westan, interesting, I’ll give them a ring.

How do you find out about ex-housing commission houses that are for sale? I actually haven’t seen any advertised.

I said it in anoher post and I will say it again, I have used Simon’s advice (from Mortgage Hunter) and found him very helpful and honest. He’s not in my area but we faxed a lot, used emails and his replies were always prompt.
He found us a great loan with the best rates around and I would take him up on his offer for you to ring him. You can be…[Read more]

Fudge I like your clever spreadsheet very much. I tried to copy/paste your formula for the stampduty but it said it is protected or something.
Is there a way to change the interest rates as well?
Regards and thanks again for the sheet.

That’s very bad Anastasia, just so unethical of the Agent to mislead people.
I once read in one of Jenman’s books (can’t remember which one) that if you MUST buy at an auction, that it would be wise to write to the vendors to tell them that you are interested in placing a bid, but that you want to know whether the pricerange the real estate agent…[Read more]

Because we’ve only just started to invest (bought one property) I am not using any specific property software (yet), but I’ve made a spreadsheet using Microsoft excell. One sheet for our LOC, one for all property income and outgoings, one for petty cash etc.
I wonder what it exactly is what you can do with specific property software that you…[Read more]

Thanks MJK, I keep it in mind.

Hi PeterM, yes we had a pestinspeciton done, but I’m not sure how frequently you should have them done. Once a year? Anyway, these devises work indefinitely I believe or until they’ve been eaten LOL.
On the other hand, a pestinpsector also looks for other pests, borers etc and these devices ONLY detect termites. So I’m just trying to find out if…[Read more]