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Showing posts from July, 2013

SELECTING A PROPERTY MANAGER

How to avoid the worst and select the best When it comes to investing in real estate, the greatest fear after buying the wrong property is selecting the wrong agent to manage the property. Many investors have found that it is better and safer to actually self-manage their property. However, this is not always a practical solution for investors and therefore finding the right agent is imperative. The success of an investment property is largely dependent on the property manager. The market conditions may rise whilst you own the property, but if the tenants are constantly in arrears and flee with rent owing whilst the condition of the property deteriorates due to neglect, the success of the investment will be diminished. A pleasant gain is turned into a painful lesson. To select the right property manager for your asset, it's important to work toward a set criteria. Salesperson vs Property Manager Selling a service and managing a property are completely different skill sets. It

Everything Is Negotiable!

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        Negotiation skills are essential for success in real estate Incredibly, almost unbelievably – most real estate sales people have never studied negotiation. Research shows us that less than 5% of real estate sales people have read a book on negotiation.  This is disgraceful! Throughout the world, home sellers are losing millions of dollars due to the lack of skill in the crucial role of negotiation. We believe it’s unethical to be an estate agent and not make every effort to become a skilled negotiator.  If an agent sells a property for anything less than the buyer could have, would have or should have paid then the agent has failed the client.  Negotiation is a part of day to day life, politics, world issues, at work, with our kids etc. Anyone selling a property can put an advertisement on the internet or arrange a sign board to attract buyers, but the area most people struggle with is the negotiation. Unless your agent can display superior negotiation skills t

Shoestring savings to home ownership

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First home buyer aspirants often save for a home without knowing how much deposit they actually need. Learn how you can cash in your chips for your first home. How much deposit do I need to buy my first home? As a rule of thumb, you’ll need at least a 10% of the purchase price of your future home as a deposit to qualify for a 95%  Loan to Value Ratio  loan. This allows for the often overlooked upfront costs of  Lenders Mortgage Insurance , a once-off payment which allows you to borrow more than 80%, and stamp duty, a state government tax on property purchases, to be capitalised on to the principal of your loan.    On a house price of $300,000, a minimum deposit to get by is $30,000. There are two exceptions to this, firstly as QLD, NT and WA don’t have stamp duty, which reduces upfront costs. Secondly, everywhere but QLD and NSW have first home buyer grants for established properties, which provide a handy deposit cash injection to the budding first home buyer. If by a