are you planning to sell or not?  why bother going through the cost of splitting them if you are going to keep them all?  then you'd just have to start complying with annoying bodycorporate law.  council rates could increase as well…

where do you fit into the equation?  architect?

The more I think about your position, the more I think you'd really have your back to the wall if you purchased an IP right now.  Realistically, you'd have to buy with less than 20% deposit and therefore pay LMI (lenders mortgage insurance).  It'll also mean your monthly loan payment obligations will be quite high, between your PPOR and IP.  If I…[Read more]

$75k will cover the deposit and stamp duty on a property worth $300k.  If you are after a house, and are looking in the west, take a look at Laverton.  It's bang next to a zone 1 train station.  Also there is the suburbs of Geelong where demand is strong.  If you're after a unit, there will be more areas you can consider.

love the userid by the way.  dtrump hehehe

Hi IntrigueI think it is really important to remember that when you have an IP, you need a spare wad of cash in case you have to wait for a tenant, or worse, if you have a problem tenant that stops paying rent and it takes a while to get them out.  Any time you need to make an insurance claim for damages by the tenant will always leave you a l…[Read more]

If you are able to borrow against your home, you'd still have to keep the LVR (loan to value ratio) at 80%.  This would mean that you would be able to pull out around $33k for investment purposes.  This is assuming you could service the PPOR as well as an IP.  You said the balance of the offset account is $20k.  So is the balance of the home…[Read more]

Hi IntrigueWelcome!There will be an abundance of ideas … are you ok with sharing a few more details to help us understand your situation and criteria?  Here are some things that will help us help you:- How much cash you have in your bank account ready to invest with- Whether the property you plan to buy is going to have a tenant in it, or will…[Read more]

Hi Stuart,  Both Richard and Terry (who've posted above) are really knowledgeable in this area and handle this sort of thing regularly.  Why not save yourself a whole lot of grief and get one of them to be your broker?  That way you'd get it right  JacM

Hi Nicole – a great response from you in my opinion.  Very relevant and full of info specific to the area.  I'd imagine tgavin71 will be grateful

The extent of my knowledge of the Newcastle area is that a rental open for inspection draws quite a crowd.  There must be a bit of a shortage of rentals out that way.  However since you're focussed on development, the relevance of this is limited (though maybe you could sell off-the-plan to investors?)

I wouldn't be focussing quite so much on the fact that this money pit is in a great area – perhaps it is clouding your judgement.  Do the numbers first.  What is the pricetag of the property, and what is the estimated cost of repairing it to bring it up to a great standard.  And assume there will be a cost blowout.Let's say the pricetag is $1…[Read more]

I had this situation.  Consumer Affairs came and took a look and said we could chuck the lot.

How dare you think about leaving us!

Commonsense suggests that it would be copyright, but in the interests of accuracy:At the bottom of the realestate.com.au home page there is a link for "Legal" which takes you here;http://www.rs.realestate.com.au/cgi-bin/rsearch?a=v&t=res&id=13Under the heading "Copyright" it reads:"The subject matter on and accessible from our Websites and…[Read more]

Hi StuartWelcome!  There are some very knowledgeable people on here who will no doubt suggest things you haven't even thought of, including what structure to purchase the new home under.Just a gentle suggestion – your subject and post content are all in capitals which is considered the internet version of yelling, and it can offend some people.  T…[Read more]

Hi againIt is different in each council.  For eg, in the suburb I'm currently investing in, minimum block sizes after subdivision are 300m2.  Also there has to be minimum of 25m2 of private courtyard or backyard space for each dwelling, and a total of 40m2 of "open spaces" which can include driveways.If you buy a house and want to subdivide the b…[Read more]

ah yep

Awesome.  Sounds like you've got a good head on your shoulders there Hey is there any way you can use the first home buy grant to acquire your first property… live in it for 6 months, then move out and put tenants in it?  The extra cash from the grant will be really handy…

By the way, I noticed in the October edition of the Australian Property Investor magazine there's been a convenient change in NSW law.  If you have a granny flat in the backyard, you can now lease the main house to one tenant, and the granny flat to a completely separate tenant.  So if your backyard isn't big enough to subdivide, maybe it's big en…[Read more]