How to stay grounded in a fast-building property market
如何在飞速发展的房地产市场中稳定着路
With widespread expectations that property prices are set to boom, the premise is that this is a great time to lock in historically low interest rates and buy a home, apartment or investment property.
But the risk is that unprepared and gullible investors will get burnt in hot markets, where predicted five-year growth in the -territories ranges from 2 per cent to 6 per cent, and popular Sydney harbour properties cost 12 times as much as properties offering strong growth potential in Brisbane.
Shopping around the nation’s property markets results in a bewildering range of properties, prices and returns.
RP Data, in conjunction with AFR Weekend, can help those shopping around to refine their search for a deal in their local postcodes, or further afield, with an online buyer’s guide at www.myrp.com.au/springbuyersguide.
Savills Australia benchmarks the data by setting out what it considers to be some of the brightest opportunities in the nation’s states and territories based on capital growth, income yield and prospects over the next five years.
Three industry veterans, who between them have more than 100 years of experience in Australian real estate over four booms and crashes, say they can reduce the complexity with some folksy wisdom and their nose for making money.
Barry Plant, a property auctioneer for about 45 years, compares these market conditions to the late 1990s, when low interest rates, rising demand and stable political -conditions combined to produce more than a decade of sustained growth.
Plant divides potential buyers into those wanting to climb the housing ladder and move into a more prestigious suburb, and investors whose risk appetite ranges from poor to voracious.
A director of Barry Plant group, Plant says this is a “perfect, perfect, perfect” time for owner-occupiers in Melbourne, Sydney and other capital cities to move to a better suburb because high-end house prices have “yet to roar and when they do there is normally plenty of upside”.
OUTER SUBURBS RIPE FOR DEVELOPMENT
Plant’s best long-term tip for those with an entrepreneurial bent is to shop around the post-World War II estates in the outer suburbs of the capital cities where streets of weatherboard houses occupy generous blocks of land, typically 650 square metres.
“The old golden rule was a property’s value was one-third land and two-third house,” he says. “The houses on many of these blocks are now not worth a cold pie.”
Rent for a few years and apply to the local council for a planning permit to build two town houses on the block, which can be sold with the same property or developed with the owner selling one and renting the other, he says.
Greg Hocking, a director of Greg Hocking Real Estate and a Melbourne real estate veteran, recommends buyers get familiar with an area’s development and rental potential, zoning issues and changing demographics, particularly inner suburbs considered candidates for the next wave of gentrification. |