Home loan advice required

To reply to 4. yes, in general brokers are good – although I guess you could get good ones and bad ones. I recently went through one from this forum (brahms, in Brisbane) and my brother went through aussie in Sydney – both were excellent.

I would always use a broker since they should have a wide range of lenders to draw on and you don’t pay any extra. I’ve had too many bad experiences with banks to deal directly.

Mick

Hi Andy,

I don’t think you will be able to get a rate lock-in for more than 3 months unfortunately. There is usually a fee of around $250 – $300. You will be able to get up to 95% of the property if it is an investment property provided that you meet serviceability. If you are going to live in the property you may be able to borrow up to 100% of the property value (again, provided you meet serviceability). I don’t know about Aussie Brokers either, but a good broker will certainly save you time and stress, and will probably find you a better deal than you would find yourself. I hope this helps.

Good luck,

Mortgageman

Hi again Andy,

I have a contact for a broker in the Sydney area. He won an award for salesperson of the year at the 2004 Australian Mortgage Awards which is like the logies for brokers !!
You wont get much better than him , would you like his contact details?

Rod

Hi Andy,

Not trying to rain on your parade but I question the long term wisdom of buying something for $500K with a limited deposit.

Having a debt of $450K+ in a single property puts you at some degree of risk should you find yourself without a tenant.

Just a different thought for you to consider.

Derek
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Property investment advice and researched property in quality locations available.

I’m sorry to hear of your predicament, and while I understand this is not the focus of your thread, I have a suggestion. If you really can walk away and lose only your 10%, get a good (not developer) valuer to check the unit over. If you would lose more than your 10% by going ahead with the purchase, you should seriously consider walking. Sure a 50k loss stings like hell, but you can move on and get on with your life. A larger loss coupled with a half million dollar ball-and-chain for the long term could have far more serious consequences.
Once again, you have my sympathy for your situation, but you really should get some professional legal & financial advice.
(Of course all this is my opinion only and should not be construed as serious financial advice[blink])

I would not trust the valuation of a real estate agent as far as I could poke it with a very long stick. If you can afford to repay half a million dollars over 25 years or so I imagine you can spare a couple of hundred dollars for advice that might save you a couple of hundred grand.

Woodsman,
While I am not overly familiar with Sydney either, I can’t imagine the situation would be fundamentally different to Melbourne where new build apartments are being valued (by qualified valuers) at 30%+ below purchase price.

You raise a good point which actually hasn’t been made explicit (or maybe I have been a bit slow to pick it up!)
If for example, the valuation is $400k and you can only borrow $380k (95%), then you would need to come up with another $70k plus costs (if I am right in assuming you have paid a $50k deposit on $500k). That then might pose a significant issue (?)