I would never use a partnership as it is very dangerous. Always use a company for business because of the limited liability – you could use two companies in partnership if need be or one company with half the shares owned each. Watch out for being director as this is risky and also watch out with control – who owns the majority of the shares will have legal control, but whoever controls the bank account/money will have the real control.

I would suggest using a company and paying yourselfs a small wage. Then each of you can also receive bonuses based on your own work. You could do this as employees or sub cotnractors to the company. Ideally you would want to divert as much of your income/profit into your own discretionary trust (he can do the same) to make it more tax effective.

You could have your shares of the company owned by a discretionary trust or a unit trust with units owned by a discretionary trust. Units are more easily transferred than shares and ASIC doesn't have to be notified.

an 'escape clause' is generally only valid until the contracts are exchanged. Without an unconditional contract is is unlikely that a vendor would go to the trouble of preparing for settlement.

If you have a new buyer then you wouldn't need finance as you would not actually settle – but this is extremely dangerous. It is also extremely hard to arrange a simultaneous settlement.

That is probably the most common way. The other way is to gift cash to the trust.

But consider the asset protection side of things too.

either!

I think it wouldn't matter. If you are able to claim your interest on the LOC now, then in future you should be able to claim it the same even if the main loan is PI. You will just be borrowing to pay down one loan

1. yes
2. no

Yes, this is how I would do it. As long as the two trusts are separate then it should be fairly safe. Best to have separate trustees.
There is a possibility of clawback, but that would depend on the circumstances.

Options are excellent for anything increasing in value. If you secure an option then you may be able to assign the option to someone else and avoid settlement altogether. If you sign a normal contract to purchase land then you will have required to settle, momentarily even if you onsell it – but you would have no need for finance etc – this should still be considered as if the new purchaser doesn't settle you may have to.

yeah, i can't really see any point – except maybe keeping your name off title records?

If you use one bank then they have control over both properties. If something goes wrong they may keep money from the sale of the first property to reduce the loan on the second – even if the loans are not cross collateralised. They will also know intimate details about your situation. Spreading the loans helps compartmentalise your secrets!