You know how the saying goes:
Give a man a fish, and he’ll eat for a day.
Teach a man to fish, and you’ll be lucky if you ever see him again.
I’ve also always wondered what out proverb-pouting forefathers thought would happen if you gave a woman a fish.
Give a woman a fish and she’ll feed a family of six with enough left over for the kids lunches tomorrow.
Ok, I’m mucking around. Of course you all know the saying.
Teach a man to fish and he’ll eat for a lifetime.
There is a profound truth to this. It’s a creed that I’ve tried to live by, and that drives my work here with the ILoveRealEstate community.
Of course I could find a property for you to invest in. I could figure out what your financial circumstances required, and I could find a property that matched those needs exactly.
But I won’t.
For starters, I don’t want to be seen to be one of those flukey-spruikers, who claim to be selling you independent advice and coaching, but are actually just fronts for developers – only too happy to offload their second-rate stock from somewhere out the back of going-nowheresville on to you.
They want you to get into property. Their property.
I want to put as much distance between me and them as possible.
I’m also a little bit greedy. If I do the research and find a really good deal, I might just be tempted to load it into my own portfolio. You deserve better than Dymphna’s hand-me-downs. 😉
But the main reason I’m not just going to go out and find you properties is that it just doesn’t do you any favours. My passion is to help people make money through real estate, but really when you break it down, it’s about helping people achieve financial freedom.
And if you can’t take stock of you own financial situation for yourself – if you can’t decide what you portfolio needs right now, then you’re not really free.
And if you can’t structure your own affairs so your assets (and your arse!) are covered – if you can’t do that for yourself, then you’re not really free.
And if you can’t research properties – crunch the numbers and run feasibility studies and all that – if you can’t do that for yourself, then you’re not really free either.
And if you can’t do all that by yourself by the time you’re done with me, then I haven’t really helped you at all.
I’m not going to be doing this forever. I’ve still got a fire in my belly now, but who knows what will happen. The old voice box could give out any minute. (God knows I’ve given it a thrashing!)
But I care a lot about my legacy. I really want to leave the world in better shape than when I found it. So I can’t tell you how much satisfaction I get out of seeing someone take control of their own lives – grab their financial futures by the horns and take charge. When I see that I know I’ve made a real difference.
And then when I see those people take what they’ve learnt, and share it with others. When I see them taking the time to help others with their real estate journeys, then I know we’re changing the world.
That really gets me pumped.
Anyway, the reason I’m telling you this is that I’m getting more and more questions these days about trying to read the market.
“What’s going on with the market right now? How long will it last? Is it a bubble? Are all the cities at the same point in the cycle? Where are interest rates going?”
It goes on.
It’s not surprising. These are very interesting times for the property market – for the Australian and global economy in general really. The global financial crisis rewrote all the rules. No one’s really sure where we stand any more.
A lot of the relationships that shaped the past don’t seem to be that relevant any more. But then again, some things never change.
So I could tell you what I reckon the answers to all these things are. (Booming. A good few years yet. Nope. No, big differences. Nowhere, maybe down.) But how much good does that do you?
It might help you out with the current cycle. But what about the next one? Or the one after that?
So I’ve decided I’m going to try and help you see the market the way I see it – pass on some market analysis tips.
This is going to require us to dip a bit into the mysterious world of economics. That might seem daunting, but trust me, it’s not so bad.
Economics goes out of its way to make itself inaccessible. Fancy language – obscure charts and theories. But really most of it (and the bits you want to know) is just common sense.
(Some of it is actually interesting…)
So I might try work a bit more of that flavour into these blogs.
I’ll still try lay out some useful investing tips, and share some of the insights I’ve had trying to build success habits into my life – all that stuff.
But I’ll just try work a bit of economics and market analysis in there as well.
So have a think about it. Ever had any burning questions about how the property market works or how to read the cycle?
…or what ever other subject you would like me to do a deep dive on.
Jot it down below in the comments section and I’ll do my best to answer.
Just a note, keep it general in nature… I can’t really go in to great length if your questions are relating to your specific circumstances.
Remember, it’s fishes for everybody!