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"having said that" aaarrggghhhh!! Doesn't anyone say "however" anymore, or "on the other hand"? Having said that (hang on, I'm important, change that to "that said") no offence! tomd

MJK In my imaginary idea, property in outer areas could be regulated in terms of price growth by government supply, but this wouldn't keep all house price growth down to 2% - prices would still rise by greater amounts in the more popular areas, so investors would still do ok, just not as well...

Thanks for your replies Les and others. As it turned out, we compromised - we bought the place we wanted and were able to keep the rentals. So we owe plenty and probably won't be able to buy any more rentals for a while. Our house isn't waterfront and we wanted to move because there were...

Regarding the question of how housing can be made more affordable; this could conceivably be done by governments (if they wanted to) ensuring enough houses are built so that prices in the outer suburbs rise by no more than say 2% per year on average. Governments could build/finance enough...

With impeccible timing, we bought 2 rental properties in outer Brisbane at the peak of the boom in 2003. Even so, they seem to have gone up a little further in value since. Now we think we would really like to buy a place near the waterfront for about 700k. But to do this we would have to...

I suppose we can't easily dismiss the opinions of the likes of Richardson and Salt, but lots of retired people do live in large houses. I've thought of retiring to a unit which would be good for views and being handy to beach/facilities, but I think I would still like to live in a house with a...

Thanks for your reply Michael Yes, it may be cosmetic, at least while the angle iron is sound, which it should be for a number of years. I've noticed a lot of concrete balconies around lately which don't seem to be held up by anything other than posts and whatever reinforcing they have...

Hello We have a high set house built in the 1970s with a concrete balcony supported by steel posts and what seems to be thin ridged steel sheeting underneath. There is a fair bit of rust along edges of angle iron which sits above the posts and holds the outer edge of the sheeting. Worse than...

Sunstone Could you (or someone else reading) explain what is wrong with the Dalby deal. I'm probably showing my inexperience but it sounds fairly good. The yield would be close to 10% if vacancies aren't too bad. Perhaps such a block could be built new in Dalby for less than $495k...

Even if you're not more learned.

One option regarding flooding in Brisbane is to simply ring the council and ask if a particular property was flooded during the 1974 floods. These floods were the worst Brisbane has had as far as I know; at least we haven't had one as bad since. The council will tell you for no charge whether...

From memory, Jan Somers last book didn't say much about land tax or about trusts. Land tax would have been less of an issue a few years ago. Trusts may now be more relevant because of land tax? I wondered if a few of the more learned forumites might speculate (in brief perhaps) on what might...

Thanks for your replies 007 and WillG. I did really mean I would like to own as well as live in a more valuable house! I suppose it's best to be patient. As you're suggesting, if we find ourselves in 10 years time with 6 IPs that are close to cost neutral, we could afford to rent a better...

This might have come up in the forums before somewhere, but I once read that if the world's population was divided up into groups/families of 4 and each group was given a quarter of an acre, the world's population would fit into Queensland with enough room left over for Victoria and Tasmania as...

I am in my late 30s and only last year bought first 2 IPs in Brisbane for around $250 000 each, at which time PPOR was worth about $300 000. At some stage I would like to live in a house worth say $600 000 in last year's prices. I've worked out a few figures with my basic software (kids...

Penalty for late payment Last year I bought 2 IPs at once. I went through a mortgage broker and we decided to change from our PPOR bank to another one. The result was that we had to pay penalty interest of about $1400 because of delayed settlement. About 7 days before settlement we got the...

A few weeks ago there was an article in The Australian by economics writer Alan Wood, where he discussed what I think was called the asset price meltdown hypothesis. Basically, the theory goes that at some stage in the future there will be lots of baby boomers selling assets to fund...

I heard federal labour politician Lindsay Tanner on the radio this morning. He was quoting a bumper sticker he saw: "The best things in life ... aren't things"

I've used Peter Weddell, big add in yellow pages. He, um ... greatly dislikes ... real estate agents which is probably not a bad thing in a building inspector. He's not cheap, about $430 for a single house, but his report got me out of buying the first house we were going to buy in...

Thanks Brenda My places are on the ground so termite protection probably more important. Thanks Mikhaila Yes, I'm being conservative. You should see me drive! Yes, I have only bought the places recently so have had a few "welcome costs" to deal with. The $1250 is an estimate for...