When looking to buy property, how do you know it’s a good price and how do you avoid being ripped off?
In the past I had asked the same question and it was always answered in the same, seemingly intelligent but not that helpful, kind of way; “Do your research”.
But what does “do your research” mean? I mean what exactly are you expected to research?
Well here are some tips that, if followed correctly, will mean you will never be fooled into buying overpriced property and that will give you the ability to spot a bargain a mile away.
Know What You Want:
Smart investors always know what they are looking for with precise accuracy and strict criteria.
How do you work this out? Well for starters you should know your budget. Find out your borrowing capacity before you start looking for your investment property. Get together details of your income, your assets, liabilities and expenses and go and see a financier, they may want to know what you’re borrowing for, but just tell them you’re still looking and you just want a pre-approval to find out your borrowing capacity.
Once you know how much you can spend you can set a limit, there is no use looking at property well above your budget. Set a limit 10 to 20% above your budget to allow for the fact that many real estate agents will over value a property to secure a listing from the vendor and then “condition” the vendor to accept lower offers over time (now that’s a different story altogether, keep and eye out for a post about agents tricks coming soon).
Now you have set a limit on price, it’s time to define all the other criteria. Such as:
• Suburb
• Type (house, unit, villa, apartment)
• Construction (brick, timber, fibro)
• Land size
• Bedrooms
• Bathrooms
• Garage
Specify as many things as you can. Ok I know, there are specific things that are expected to be considered better investments than others, eg brick versus fibro and 3 bedrooms versus 2 or 1, and even some suburbs versus others, but the idea here is to be specific within your budget, if it’s your first investment property and you can only afford a 2 bedroom unit or a 2 bedroom fibro house that’s fine, just decide, what is it going to be, A 2 bedroom unit or a 2 bedroom house?
Why Be So Specific?
Ok the key is, if you chose one type of property and one type only, anything you look at will be accurately comparable to everything else you choose to look at. What I mean to say is, if you look at a 2 bedroom apartment one day and a 3 bedroom brick house in another suburb the next, there is no possible way you are going to be able to compare the prices of those two properties, and therefore you will be no closer to knowing if either of them were priced well or not. On the other hand if you look at two 3 bedroom houses in the same suburb, on roughly the same sized, flat corner block of land and they both have 1 bathroom and a single lock up garage but one is 15k cheaper, than your ears are going to prick up and you will instantly recognize the variation in value. Am I right?
Don’t Stop There…
Right, now you have the concept, don’t just rush out and buy the 2nd house you see just because it was 15k cheaper than the other. Remember, this is “research”. What you’ll want to do next is find as many properties that fit your criteria as possible.
Tip: Did you know property websites like www.domain.com.au and www.realestate.com.au have a function where you can set your criteria and have only properties that fit your criteria emailed to you automatically?
At this point you want to call the agents and book in to view as many properties as you can as soon as you can. I’m talking 10, 20 ,30, 40 properties all that fit the criteria. Hang on a minute, are you telling me to spend all weekend every weekend for the next 3 or 4 weeks scanning my emails looking at properties and talking to agents?? Well, no. you don’t have to do any of this, I’m just suggesting that if you were to do this “research” its possible to save up to 10 to 20% off your next investment property and have up to 40% instant equity and maybe save as much as $10,000 to $40,000. Let me ask you this, how long did it take you to earn your last $40,000??
So, when you go to view the property, take a clipboard / notepad with you. Take heaps of notes.
• What’s its condition?
• How are the carpets?
• Dose it have air conditioning?
• What’s the buildings age?
• Is it on a main road?
• Is it under power lines?
Tip: Open houses are great, they are advertised in advance, often with the name of the agent and what time they are on. This helps you save time by being able to plan your day. You can even ring the agent in advance and ask questions saving you more time on site and even eliminating unsuitable properties.
Keep a small file on each suitable property to refer back to. You can usually select “Print Brochure” from the website where the property is advertised and put this with all your notes.
The Big Brother Trick
You can cheat a little too.
Tip: did you know that there are websites that can give you past sales data on recently sold properties? Sites like www.domain.com.au will provide you with recent sales prices and the date of sale of properties in your search area for a small fee.
Collect as many past sales details of recently sold properties in your selected area as possible. How far back you go is up to you, it all depends on the market at the time. If the market has been fairly stable then you could consider sales from up to 6 to 12 months ago, but just keep in mind things may have changed in value a little since then. It’s a good idea to take a drive around and have a look at the properties that you have past sales data on and once again take a note pad and even a camera to collect more details on the property and keep it all in your little file for each property.
Tip: you can get a quick idea of the property, including a view of the property from the street and its location using www.googlemaps.com simply enter the address in the search bar. This could save you time going to check out properties that have obviously had major renovations or redevelopment since their last sale and therefore are no longer comparable.
Now that you have looked at a large number of COMPARABLE properties you should go back over all the property files that you have been compiling, consider any of the variations between them and start to gauge the true value of the property you are looking for. By now you should have a very good handle on what represents good value and I would be surprised if you didn’t know a lot more about the particular type of property that fits into your criteria than any real estate agent you speak to.
If you do your research properly, you will become the guru of property value in your particular niche and you will know when it’s a good price, be able to spot a bargain a mile away and you will never be fooled into buying an overpriced property.
For more investment property & wealth creation strategies, feel free to order our FREE e-book and FREE DVD available at www.EducationForWealth.com
Happy Researching
Lance Jenkins
Education For Wealth
www.EducationForWealth.com
