November 30, 2012
The Victorian Government is drawing up plans for the future of Melbourne, and they’ve got quite a task ahead of them. Melbourne’s population is expected to increase by half, from the current 4.1 million. This means an extra two million residents in less than 40 years.
BY MICHAEL YARDNEY
This influx is sobering when you consider the amount of infrastructure required to support that many new inhabitants. Read more →
November 28, 2012
It has been a long time coming, but Australians are starting to shake off their pessimism when it comes to property and embrace a more cheery outlook. It’s about bloody time.
BY SHANNON MOLLOY
Doom and gloom is contagious, I swear. It’s like an airborne virus that sweeps across the population, turning perfectly healthy people into withering messes in one foul sweep.
November 27, 2012
With only a few auction weekends to go this year, the necessity for good negotiation becomes paramount. Even if clearance rates continue to come in at around 60 per cent, that’s 40 per cent of about 3,000 properties sitting on the market in the run up to Christmas.
BY IAN JAMES
Sellers will want to have their property sold before relaxing through the holiday hiatus period. It’s up to the selling agents to make this happen but too many agents are still massively overquoting sellers and underquoting prospective purchasers.
November 23, 2012
With property markets across Australia remaining flat or seeing falls over the past few years, many investors are probably wondering what their investments will be worth in 2013. There’s a more important question they should be asking.
BY MICHAEL YARDNEY
Every Monday, most investors look at the auction clearance results and each month check on median property values. While it’s not as bad as watching your shares fluctuate in value on a minute-by-minute basis, this short-term focus is unhealthy for investors.
November 21, 2012
I’ve just returned from a quick trip to China. The Great Wall was impressive, the overall friendliness of locals surprising and the cheap price of beer welcome, but the most remarkable thing was the pace of development.
BY SHANNON MOLLOY
As myself and 43 other tourists were shuffled between Beijing and Shanghai over the course of eight days, most of us were overwhelmed by the sight of hundreds of cranes dotting the skyline of each city we visited.
November 16, 2012
While 500 million people have moved from rural China into modern cities, a recent study by Richard Easterlin, a professor of economics at the University of Southern California and the author of ‘Happiness, Growth and the Life Cycle’ shows that there’s no evidence the Chinese people are, on average, any happier.
BY MICHAEL YARDNEY
If anything, according to an article in the New York Times, they’re less satisfied than in 1990, and the burden of decreasing satisfaction has fallen hardest on the bottom third of the population in wealth. Satisfaction among Chinese in even the upper third has risen only moderately.
November 14, 2012
There’s no right or wrong answer to the increasingly pertinent negative versus positive gearing question. What works for one investor may not work for the next. It all comes down to individual goals, tolerance to risk and ability to service debt.
BY JAMIE MOORE
The general and often controversial argument is that negatively geared properties typically achieve higher capital growth but lower yields, while positively geared properties usually experience lower capital growth but higher rent returns.
Read more →
November 12, 2012
Many will think I’m writing this article because I live in South Australia, but if you’re interested in buying property in an area where the government is lending a helping hand to investors – not just first homebuyers – this might be the state for you.
BY PETER KOULIZOS
To provide a boost to the construction industry, the SA Government recently introduced some incentives. They include a First Home Owners Grant of $15,000 for new homes, the elimination of stamp duty on new apartments built in some locations in or near the CBD (saving as much as $16,000) and the Housing Construction Grant (HCG) of $8500.
November 9, 2012
A new Victorian Government report predicts Melbourne will need an extra one million homes in the next 30 to 40 years as the population increases to more than six million.
BY MICHAEL YARDNEY
The Melbourne, let’s talk about the future report suggests an expanded central business district could add 220,000 new residents in the next three decades.
November 7, 2012
One minute it was an investor’s dream come true with massive capital growth and almost unbelievable capital growth. There was no end to housing demand and people, mostly miners or their employers, forked out $2000 a week for a modest fibro shack. Then, suddenly, it all seemed to stop.
BY SHANNON MOLLOY
In July, I wrote in API about the plight of investors in Moranbah who’d been riding the wave of extremely high demand and very low supply for a couple of years, only to find themselves high and dry without much warning.
