Too much information has long been a feature of the property investing landscape, but opinions often hide agendas or even incompetence
Too much information has long been a feature of the property investing landscape, but opinions often hide agendas or even incompetence
As an astute property investor, I am constantly searching for new information that will keep me ahead of the investing game. Knowledge is king. However, it is vital to receive information in a contextualised format. Otherwise, all you get are sweeping generalisations that do not give you specifi c information you can use to make sound investment decisions.
The tabloids are probably the best at offering comment without qualification. They always go for the sensationalist angle – either property is booming like there’s no tomorrow, or it’s about to fall off a very high cliff. Moderate and sustainable price growth apparently does not sell newspapers, so balanced reporting is replaced by exaggeration and wild conjecture.
Not all newspaper journalists have direct experience in investing, so their comments are second-hand in nature, and likely to be embellished with their own ‘artistic flair’, depending on what they are hoping to achieve with the article.
The ‘Brisbane market’ seems to be a soft target for anyone who wants to share an unqualified opinion on property.
For example, we are told that the Brisbane market is flooded with apartments; that it should be avoided at all costs. For me, good information is very specific, so in order to qualify this statement we need to ask lots of detailed questions. Supply and demand is usually localised, so Brisbane, as well as anywhere else, can be both oversupplied and undersupplied at the same time, depending on where you are looking. So exactly where is this ‘oversupply’? Windsor? Greenslopes? Auchenflower?
The reality is that there certainly was an uplift in building approvals and sales from 2013 to 2015 in the Brisbane inner-city ring. However, since dwelling approvals peaked in late 2014, numbers have declined dramatically. Given a two-year time lag between inception and completion, settlements in 2019 will reduce to a trickle, just as the population is increasing faster than any other capital city in Australia. I have been investing in Brisbane for almost 20 years now and I am certainly not going to miss out on some excellent investment opportunities because some freelance journo thinks it’s a bad idea. And despite the so-called oversupply, rental yields have really held up extremely well for those who have purchased well-researched and well-located properties in Brisbane’s inner ring.
Summary
There is far too much bad information out there – unqualified, non-specific and designed to scare you. When I got started, my first task was to find some experienced property experts who already had achieved the results that I was aspiring to, so that I could follow their lead. Now, 20 years later, things have come full circle and investors come to me for help and guidance. If you want to create wealth through property, my advice would be to seek someone out who has already achieved the results you want, and are truly worth listening to.
OUR EXPERT
Ian Hosking-Richards is a successful investor who started out with no assets on a mere $35k salary. He now has a portfolio of over 50 properties worth more than $20m and is a multi-award-winning real estate agent
NEED HELP WITH YOUR PORTFOLIO?
Ian is passionate about helping others realise their goals through investing in property, and can be contacted at Ph. 1300 850 038 rocketpropertygroup.com.au
This article first appeared in MPA's sister publication Your Investment Property
