Your 12 Buying Criteria

Reaching your Pot of Gold

THE FOLLOWING Buying Criteria are ranked in what most investors consider to be their relative importance.

Tenant Calibre & Lease Term

These two criteria alone could prove to be most important in achieving your Investment Objectives. What you’ll look for is a strong corporate (or government) tenant, with a minimum of a five-year lease term.

With that in place, you’re well on your way to making a successful investment. [Read more…]

Your 8 Investment Objectives

Commercial Buildings

WITH THE Commercial property market now starting to gain some momentum, it might be worthwhile reviewing your current Investment Objectives — simply to ensure they align with your underlying investment strategy.

In formulating that strategy, you may choose to vary the specific order of importance for the following set of Objectives. [Read more…]

More Good News for
Industrial Property

Industrial Sector
The Industrial sector was probably the one most harshly affected by the global financial crisis.

Nobody wanted to expand — being prepared to operate in cramped premises, until a clear picture of economic growth emerged.

However, there has been a growing and now, strong tenant demand reported within the main east-coast cities. [Read more…]

Your Common Property Terms (N-Z)

HERE IS the final segment of your Common Property Terms. It contains definitions for most of the remaining aspects of property you’re likely to come across.

And as you can see, they cover from …

N to Z [Read more…]

Your Common Property Terms (D-M)

FOR EASY reference, I thought the simplest way would be to split these Common Property Terms up into three alphabetic sections.

And so, you can now sift through this next section from …

D to M [Read more…]

Your Common Property Terms (A-C)


AS YOU can appreciate, I quite regularly get asked to explain what the various property terminology actually means.

Therefore, I thought it might be worthwhile to provide you with your own point of reference, over the next couple of weeks.

And I’ll do that by giving you various definitions starting with those items ranging from “A to C”.

That way, you will be able to quickly find the answer — whenever you are unsure about any property jargon being thrown around, by people who may be simply trying to show off.

What you’ll find here are practical definitions, intended for the every-day Investor.

A to C [Read more…]

The Spectre of
Rising Interest Rates

Interest rates still to rise
The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) is not seeing the Australian flood disasters as having a prolonged effect upon the national economy.

It certainly expects the March quarter GDP to decline by 0.5%. But it is then projecting a 4.25% surge, over the remainder of this year. [Read more…]

Retail Reality

Wallet Workout
As this graph shows, there has been a strong long-term relationship between unemployment and retail vacancies.

And were you to base your Investment decisions on this measure alone, you could be forgiven for assuming there will be a healthy couple of years ahead of the retail sector as a whole.
[Read more…]

CBD Offices in Demand

Full-floors becoming scarce.

Within CBDs around Australia, the number of whole Office floors available to tenants is falling rapidly.

In the last post, you heard about the general decline in Office vacancy is within the capital cities.

But here, you’re looking at a situation where large corporate tenants will find it increasingly difficult to secure whole floors within quality buildings — according to Savills Research.

While Sydney still has a greater number of full floors available, these should quickly be taken up with increased activity from the finance and insurance sectors.

Bottom Line: This will put upwards pressure on Office rentals around Australia; and underpin good growth prospects for Commercial landlords, over the next 3 to 4 years.

Retail Property Facing Challenges

Retail challenges.


Having weathered the recent rate increases, consumer confidence seems to have risen just a measly 0.3% during November — according to the latest Westpac/Melbourne Institute consumer sentiment index.

Households still appear to prefer paying down debt, rather than spending — with Australia’s saving level hovering around a record 10.5% of its disposable income.
[Read more…]

Office Leasing the Stand-out Performer

OfficeTake-up
Office leasing activity picked up in most capital cities around Australia, over the past year. In some instances, quite significantly.

And with the supply side basically “on hold”, you should soon start to see this translate into some solid rental increases.
[Read more…]