Robs' Tail
Reply: 1.1.1.1.1.1.1.1.1.1.1.1
From: Robert Forward
Okie dokie...
It's my turn I guess. Thanks to those that have asked.
It's a matter of where to start for me. I left school at the end of grade 10, and when I was 15, cause I wanted to get out into the world of "work". I had a few goals for my working career of which I achieved all of them by the dates I wanted to. But how things have changed since those days.
I had a very nasty spending habit during my youth, I was always in debt, be it credit card, personal loans, car loans etc etc. All bad debt, ouch. But I always earn lots of money, it was simply the more I earned the more I spent. How the banks loved me, whenever they offered an increase in my credit card limit I accepted gleefully.
In 1992, when I was 19 I put an offer in for my first property (as I was able to finally save a few dollars) in Madjimba Beach (spelling??) on the Sunshine Coast. I was going to purchase this property in partnership with a relative and I was to live in one room and rent the other one out to help pay the mortgage. Unfortunately the deal fell though due to a CRA report on the relatives side, so we couldn't get a loan.
After this occurred I fell back into my spending ways for a few more years, I was single and enjoyed my life. As a chef I travelled and worked in many places, starting from Brisbane, Townsville, Ayres Rock Resort, Sunshine Coast, Day Dream Island, Airlie Beach, Sydney then back to Brisbane the the UK and a cruise boat that sailed from Amsterdam down the Rhine River onto the Danube River and I got off in Budapest.
It was when I returned to Brisbane I meet up with my beautiful partner, some of you know here as Tracey, others as Ms Flip (she is giggling over my shoulder as I type this, hehe). This was mid 1996 when we met, 6 months later we decided we were going to the UK to backpack and travel for a few years.
We saved the dollars, I got my British passport and we were off by March 1997. Did a few years travelling and living in London. In a two year period we visited over 30 countries and learn how to negotiate after travelling through Turkey, Egypt, India and then South East Asia. The best experience from the two years of travel was standing on Anzac Cove for dawn service on the 25th of April 1998.
Whilst in London, I realised that property was still a great way to invest. This was before the massive prices rises in the London property market that has occurred since. Our landlord held in his portfolio over 200 properties. He had his own tradesmen that he employed and had standard colours, carpets and fittings that are in every property they control. I learn quickly that if you are going to do it seriously you need set standards throughout your properties. This makes maintenance so much easier. I was very close to buying a property in Walthamstow of London for 45 000 STG and rented for 180STG per week, my dilemma though was if I was going to buy this property (which meant I was going to stay and live in the UK permanently) I was going to loose Tracey, who had to return to Australia as her work visa was only for 2 years. Yes I could have married Tracey but yeah, these things happen and I returned home with Tracey.
May of 1999 we return from living and travelling everywhere with $3000 in the pocket. We landed at 6am at Sydney airport and had a place to live by 10am that morning. Bought a bomb of a car to get around that weekend and started looking for jobs that Monday. We both landed very good paying jobs within weeks and had all this extra money just sitting there.
By December 1999 we had contracted our first property plus had purchased into numerous Blue Chip shares. This was our start.
The next property was early 2000, and we haven't looked back since with regular purchases. Our first one was negatively geared, we didn't know of any other way to invest then (isn't naivety bliss). But the rest of our properties have been neutral to positively geared since then, I not an advocate of negative gearing, as some would know via my posts.
We met Nivia, via the Somersoft forum way back in late 1999 when I first started posting on this forum. Nivia organised a Cashflow Game day in Canberra that a lot of us older posters that also attended would remember. These would be Gee Cee, Les and numerous others.
This first get together formed some very great friendships and I found a mentor (and it wasn't the forum). The forum opened my eyes to what you really could do with property investing.
These days, we are selling out of our trading properties and cashing up, and that first property is just about gone too (should settle on that in a few weeks time). I still keep a very close eye on the property markets that I invest in, but, have now stretched myself into other ventures. I now am continually creating business plans and ventures for future investing. Yes I am still in the Rat Race, but when you have a job like mine it makes it just a bit harder to leave the rat race (not every job can you get over 4 hours sleep at and get paid for it, shhh don't tell my boss). Though I am looking down the barrel of getting out of it as I type this post.
What does the future hold for me, well, the sky is not the limit, my limit is somewhere beyond that. I'll be looking at more business orientated investments and property will become my basis. When I say this I say it as meaning I will always hold property it will simply be like my "managed funds". A nice secure investment that keeps churning an income into my pocket. My properties will keep me from going bust if any of the other ventures go belly up. In essence property will be my foundation of which I will build upon.
So, though it's a damned long post there is so much more I could have put into it. You'll also notice I didn't use figures etc. Sorry, but I do hold some things as being private, hope you understand.
Cheers,
Robert
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