Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]


Reply
The deadly formula of bad property investment advice; Australians are fed so much misinformation
Topic Started: 4 Sep 2014, 10:35 PM (455 Views)
Admin
Member Avatar
Administrator

Quote:
 
The deadly formula of bad investment advice

Terry Ryder, 3 September 2014

So many people have bad experiences with property investment. It happens, I believe, because Australians are fed so much misinformation.

Here’s the deadly formula that leads people to buy in the wrong place at the wrong time:

- Writers on real estate who know little about real estate.
- Media outlets which do little more than re-cycle press releases.
- Researchers who don’t clean up the statistical absurdities spat out of their computers.

Mix those ingredients together and it’s a recipe likely to poison, rather than nourish, the finances of anyone who reads the resulting article and acts on the “advice”.

Here’s a stunning example published this week by a real estate magazine. The magazine took some figures from a research organisation that tends to be careless about its data in its haste to generate profile and it came up with this headline: ‘10 scorching hot suburbs for cash flow hunters’.

Top of its list was a town in Tasmania called Queenstown. If there’s a more depressing town in Australia or a more depressed property market, please tell me about it. The town resembles the film set for a western movie, with tumbleweeds in the main street.

The median house price ($70,000) says a lot. It’s 12% lower that it was a year ago. It’s lower than it was three years ago. Hell, it’s even lower than it was five years ago, having dropped an average of 3% per year since 2009. The typical house on the market takes nine months to sell.

Remember, a national magazine has placed this town at the top of its list of “cash flow hotspots”, even though the vacancy rate is 15% so the chances of achieving any cash flow at all are near zero.

But wait, there’s more.

The top 10 list of scorching hot suburbs recommended to investors also includes Kambalda in Western Australia. This is a godforsaken mining town in a “semi-arid environment” 600 kilometres east of Perth, split into two town sites 4 kilometres apart. The median price is $150,000, after a 19% decline in the past 12 months. Prices have fallen at an average rate of 6.5% per year over the past five years. If you have a house to sell there, expect to wait eight months.

And if you’re expecting scorching hot cash flow, the vacancy rate of 20% might present a problem.

Keep in mind that the magazine said all of its top 10 scorching hot suburbs were places “where rental yields are strong despite the solid growth in property prices”.

Another of the suburbs listed among the top 10 is described as “Maluwa Bay” in New South Wales. I’ve searched but cannot find a place with that name.

There is a Malua Bay, a small town on the South Coast of NSW where the average house takes almost a year to sell and where the long-term capital growth rate is zero. Sorry, that’s not fair – it’s 0.1%, which is the average annual growth in prices over the past 10 years.

That’s so scorching hot I can feel the heat all the way up here in Queensland.

The magazine lists the median weekly rent in this place as $925 per week, but that is a statistical error commonly made by the research source used by the magazine – whereby they list the holiday rental rate, rather than the rental rate for permanent tenants, and come up with a median yield which assumes properties are occupied by tourists 52 weeks of the year, which of course they are not.

The median weekly rent for Malua Bay is actually $350 per week and anyway buying there would be seriously into negatively geared territory. So, no cash flow there, either.

I could go on, but you get the picture. This is the worst kind of misinformation, presented by a national magazine as credible advice to property investors.

God help anyone who bases an investment decision on this disgraceful piece of non-journalism.

Read more: http://www.propertyobserver.com.au/forward-planning/investment-strategy/35306-the-deadly-formula-of-bad-investment-advice.html
Follow OzPropertyForum on Twitter | Like APF on Facebook | Circle APF on Google+
Profile "REPLY WITH QUOTE" Go to top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
« Previous Topic · Australian Property Forum · Next Topic »
Reply



Australian Property Forum is an economics and finance forum dedicated to discussion of Australian and global real estate markets and macroeconomics, including house prices, housing affordability, and the likelihood of a property crash. Is there an Australian housing bubble? Will house prices crash, boom or stagnate? Is the Australian property market a pyramid scheme or Ponzi scheme? Can house prices really rise forever? These are the questions we address on Australian Property Forum, the premier real estate site for property bears, bulls, investors, and speculators. Members may also discuss matters related to finance, modern monetary theory (MMT), debt deflation, cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin Ethereum and Ripple, property investing, landlords, tenants, debt consolidation, reverse home equity loans, the housing shortage, negative gearing, capital gains tax, land tax and macro prudential regulation.

Forum Rules: The main forum may be used to discuss property, politics, economics and finance, precious metals, crypto currency, debt management, generational divides, climate change, sustainability, alternative energy, environmental topics, human rights or social justice issues, and other topics on a case by case basis. Topics unsuitable for the main forum may be discussed in the lounge. You agree you won't use this forum to post material that is illegal, private, defamatory, pornographic, excessively abusive or profane, threatening, or invasive of another forum member's privacy. Don't post NSFW content. Racist or ethnic slurs and homophobic comments aren't tolerated. Accusing forum members of serious crimes is not permitted. Accusations, attacks, abuse or threats, litigious or otherwise, directed against the forum or forum administrators aren't tolerated and will result in immediate suspension of your account for a number of days depending on the severity of the attack. No spamming or advertising in the main forum. Spamming includes repeating the same message over and over again within a short period of time. Don't post ALL CAPS thread titles. The Advertising and Promotion Subforum may be used to promote your Australian property related business or service. Active members of the forum who contribute regularly to main forum discussions may also include a link to their product or service in their signature block. Members are limited to one actively posting account each. A secondary account may be used solely for the purpose of maintaining a blog as long as that account no longer posts in threads. Any member who believes another member has violated these rules may report the offending post using the report button.

Australian Property Forum complies with ASIC Regulatory Guide 162 regarding Internet Discussion Sites. Australian Property Forum is not a provider of financial advice. Australian Property Forum does not in any way endorse the views and opinions of its members, nor does it vouch for for the accuracy or authenticity of their posts. It is not permitted for any Australian Property Forum member to post in the role of a licensed financial advisor or to post as the representative of a financial advisor. It is not permitted for Australian Property Forum members to ask for or offer specific buy, sell or hold recommendations on particular stocks, as a response to a request of this nature may be considered the provision of financial advice.

Views expressed on this forum are not representative of the forum owners. The forum owners are not liable or responsible for comments posted. Information posted does not constitute financial or legal advice. The forum owners accept no liability for information posted, nor for consequences of actions taken on the basis of that information. By visiting or using this forum, members and guests agree to be bound by the Zetaboards Terms of Use.

This site may contain copyright material (i.e. attributed snippets from online news reports), the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such content is posted to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democratic, scientific, and social justice issues. This constitutes 'fair use' of such copyright material as provided for in section 107 of US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed for research and educational purposes only. If you wish to use this material for purposes that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. Such material is credited to the true owner or licensee. We will remove from the forum any such material upon the request of the owners of the copyright of said material, as we claim no credit for such material.

For more information go to Limitations on Exclusive Rights: Fair Use

Privacy Policy: Australian Property Forum uses third party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our site. These third party advertising companies may collect and use information about your visits to Australian Property Forum as well as other web sites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here: Google Advertising Privacy FAQ

Australian Property Forum is hosted by Zetaboards. Please refer also to the Zetaboards Privacy Policy