10: The Inside Story Of Property Magazines and Valuations with Kieran Clair

Did you know with just two investment properties and one single renovation that you could put over a million dollars in the bank? It's true. And why stop there? Welcome to your Property Success podcast, the show that explores the practical steps to making your property investment dreams a reality. And now here's your host, a lady who used to think people with white roller skates and red wheels were rich. Jane Slacksmith.

It's true. As a child, you never know how they're going to determine what rich is. And for me, that was it.

Do you still think it?

Oh, I have to say, I do have a soft spot for boot roller skates with red wheels. So who do we have coming up today?

Kieran. Kieran Clare, editor of API magazine, valuer and all around good guy, all round.

Good guy and unfortunately ex editor of API magazine.

You hear all about that?

Yeah. Bit sad about that. But look, I've been following Kieran Kieran's writing for years as he was evaluable with Heron Todd White and wrote their newsletter for many years and obviously is editor and writer and editor at API magazine. Just a great guy to have a chat with. He's one of those people you just want to sit down, grab a coffee and just talk. Vomit, real estate all over the table. It's fabulous. So a great episode coming up with our special guest, Kieran cl. Hello, Kieran.

Hi, Jane. How are you?

I am wonderful. And yourself?

I'm doing very well. Very relaxed.

Well, you know, you have had an interesting journey in property and I know our listeners are going to learn a lot of things, but one of the things that most probably know you about now is, you know, your, your recent history in API magazine as editor. But you were a valuer for so many years. And I'm really interested in getting a bit of information, information on valuers. But how did you get into valuing properties?

Well, believe it or not, maybe this is a blessing for people with children. I almost got into teaching and I was that close. I was that close to becoming a teacher. And then this is in the heady days of the 80s. I graduated in 1986 from my school and my dad, who's always been in finance and property, had said to me, look, before you make your final decision, why don't you spend the day with a friend of mine who's recently hung a shingle as a valuer, operates out of his house. And I said, great. And I went out with this gentleman, Frank, and Frank took me for a drive for the day, which involved us going down to the Gold coast, having a cup of tea on someone's porch, going to a Porsche dealership and having a chat with a bloke driving past a few houses. He came home, did some forms, his wife typed them up on an impact typewriter, that's how long ago it was. And he built out like a thousand or something. Wow, terrific. This is outdoor accounting. Wonderful. Just the thing for me. And so I put my hand up and dive into it. Of course it's not all as simple as that, but that's probably the first thing that got me into it. And I guess when you think about valuation and if you're a property professional, the thing I've enjoyed most is it is a process whereby you get to go into somebody's home and for 20 minutes sort of become part of that place, the feel of the place. Because I think I have a bit of a romance for property. I like to go in and there are the hard numbers, et cetera, but you sort of get to have contact with people and the way they live. And I got to do that several times a day and I found that immensely enjoyable. I also liked the education. I liked talking to people and discussing what we did as valuers and how that process played out and why it was so important that this job gets done properly. So that was basically it for a good 20 odd years.

I think there's a lot of misconceptions about valuers out there. I mean, there is an education path you have to take as well, isn't it? It's not like you do just hang the shingle out and go, I'm open to go and check out your house.

It's far more complex than that. We, upon graduating school, get accepted in for a Bachelor of Business degree. So it's a three year DE with a major in real Property valuation and administration. Back in the heady days when I did it, we used to learn everything. So I did it at Queensland Agricultural College. I learned about horse husbandry as part of my valuation course, if you can believe it. I can still remember how to address saline soils out in the west. Not that I've ever had to, of course.

James, just in case. It's always a skill to have.

Yes, someone's been a bit liberal with the salt shaker. I know how to take care of it. Doing the three year degree, it was two years as a cadet on a wage that would put most people out of their house. It was really a terrible thing. But after those two years, you then have to sit for a registration board meeting where people would grill you on reports. And then also there's the professional body, the Australian Property Institute, which you have to pass all before you're allowed to start valuing houses. So it's a good minimum 5 year to 6 year process if you take that path. They've tried to expedite it a little bit more now because of course there's good demand for valuers and of course the skills are more specialised. You don't have to learn about horse husbandry anymore, you can just learn about houses in the city. And that's made things a little easier, I think.

The thing is, a lot of people just, especially when they get a low valuation, they sit back, oh, what would they know? They know nothing. They just turn up for five minutes and walk out the door. And I try to keep saying, oh no, there is actually an education process and there's always someone overlooking the reports, isn't there?

Well, it's an area that has basically seen increased scrutiny. It's part of the reason that I'm no longer in the profession and looked for something new, is that it's become a high volume, fast turnaround profession that requires heavily on technology. But it's still the art of valuation. And I don't mean that facetiously. The art of valuation is very much one of experience of walking into a home, removing the emotion from yourself and saying, okay, here's how we do the numbers. There is a romance to property and there is something about a home that you can feel when you walk into a great one. But really the ability to come up with a figure has to be based in a real science. And there is scrutiny, there is more scrutiny than ever now. And if you get it wrong, it can cost you big time. It doesn't just cost you lost fees, it can cost you, in some cases your registration or we're in a litigious society. So valuers have to make sure they do things right.

So that leads me to, I guess one of the things a lot of our listeners are interested in is and that's how can you assist the valuer in maybe returning the valuation that we want from the valuer?

Well, I guess what the valuers would say, what I would say, because I guess I'm still a valuer, I'm still registered. What the valuers would say is we would like homeowners or property owners to do a lot of research and be as realistic as possible about their property value. Now what I would say to you, and not many valuers would probably, well, maybe they would concede this, what I would say to you is that property value landing on the dollar every time is just not possible. I mean, you get 10 people in a room, they're all going to be thereabouts. When the property value comes in, you really end up working a little bit in ranges. Now, in a standard suburban house, a 5 to 6% variation of the middle figure, probably an acceptable range. If you're within 10% of the top and bottom value, then you'd say that's not a bad deal because markets do have emotion in them. So I think that it's important to recognise there is a variation. However, to answer your question, getting the value that you want involves you getting an education as well. Looking at the comparable sales. Now, the best thing you can do is to look at the sales, come to a reasonable opinion of value yourself, and then present the valuer with the idea that, I think it's worth this because I have these 3, 4, 5, 6 sales that I think are better or worse or similar. And this arms you with knowledge and science when you have the discussion, because the number of times I've heard the Kahn defence. Have you ever heard of that one? When you walk into a house and someone says it's worth 600 and you say it's worth 500, they go, can't, can't. It's not. That's not a very effective argument to evaluate.

And I guess that kind of tip about being aware of your comparables, you know, when you're preparing the valuation for the bank, I mean, as a mortgage broker, I know that you've got to have at least three within a certain period of time before the bank feels comfortable that this is a typical type of property. A lot of people, I don't think, realise that the importance of the comparables before the work that's done by the value, before they even walk in, to just to verify what's happening in the property.

That's right. And of course, as you quite rightly pointed out, you've got to have those three sales. There usually has to be one that's better, one that's worse and one that's similar. The valuer will have gone through multiple sales to reach those next three. And if they don't put those in reports now, the system is in place where the report could be bounced back to them and they can say, go and do better or explain why. And you probably have that experience with your clients where reports will be delayed because the valuer is trying to find sales and other evidence that comply with the criteria to make that valuation acceptable to the lender. And it's not always easy, not always easy to find, which is another reason to have those sales on hand. If you are talking to your valuer.

And even having recent sales that may not have settled, but I find giving the value of the details of this is a recent sale and this is the date and this is the, you know, the price and here's the name of the real estate agent you can verify it through kind of helps too sometimes, especially in a fast moving market.

Look, it absolutely does and I think that it's a little difficulty with those now in the. Some of the financiers and the process and I'm thinking of the valex process here, you'd be familiar with that, wouldn't you, where Valex won't accept those as a sale. I think they have to be in addition to completed finalised sales. However, they are excellent sales to have because they are very current. They can be proved independently with an agent, particularly if you can be lucky enough to supply the contract. You know, the best sales are the ones that you value yourself for the new contract. Absolutely no doubt about.

Do you want to take us through the Valex? I mean Valex has been something, Kieran, that has come about and one of these technology things that we see crop up. Do you want to explain that back end to people who aren't aware of what's been happening?

Yes, certainly. Now I've been out for a couple of years and these things move fast. But certainly the process was one where Valex was what was called an aggregator that became this entity that sat between the bank and the valuer. And so in the olden days, the banks used to have a panel of values they could choose from and the bank manager would directly instruct any valuer on that panel and they would have a direct communication about all the information needed to complete the valuation. Of course, post GFC in particular, we were looking for ways to try and insulate that relationship, or I should say that the industry started to look at ways to insulate that relationship. Sure, PI insurers were very keen to make sure that everything was always going to be above board. So valex was created now Valex as an aggregator. What happens is the bank will send the instructions to Valex and valex will have a panel of valuers they can send it to and they can send it randomly to any of those valuers to do the job. The valuer completes the valuation and uploads it to Valex and there is an assessor who sits in Valex and decides whether the valuation acceptable or not. Now they're going to look at the calibre of the sale. They even looked at things you could get a valuation bounced back. If you said that it was gas, but you didn't say whether it was bottled gas or piped gas, they would send it back to you and say, not good enough, give us the answer. So there was a lot of scrutiny in the valuations now and only those that met all the criteria of Valex would be passed back on. Now if you had enough properties bounced, sorry, enough reports bounced back to you, Valex would reduce the number of jobs you received as a firm. So, you know, there was no trying to meet that criteria. Those KPIs, as some people would call them, I guess became very important because it could cost business and create real difficulties and vice versa. If you could keep yourself up to, you know, 100% compliance, you would find yourself with probably more work. As other firms lost theirs, it became very competitive and a lot of hard work. I can see the value of it, Jane, but also one of those reasons that I got shy.

Moved on to greener pastures. You did mention the instructions from the bank. Now there is. Is it a myth or is it reality? Kieran, I put to you that banks instruct for fire sales when they sell, send the valuers out to do valuation. Good, that's busted. We can move on.

That was easy. Next question. Look, there is a case where the bank will say you must assume a four to six month sale period on the local market through a normal marketing program. You know, they want to know the figure. This is the other thing that sometimes is confusing for people. They want to know the figure. If you walked out the day of the inspection, the house was as is and it went to a local agent for a standard four to six month marketing program. What could we achieve as a sale? Now I've walked into houses where they've been renovating the kitchen and the bathroom and someone has said, look, ignore the bench tops not being there, sorry the tapware is not in place. You know, obviously it will be there at some stage, just move on. But of course the bank don't let us do that. The bank say, okay, you have to take that into account as part of your valuation. You know, is that going to be an issue for some buyers? For some it won't. For some it will. And so that sort of condition is accounted for. You don't get the opportunity to give the house a quick coat of paint and to Spray clean the outside walls or whatever's needed pre sale, you're looking at the house as is, where is on the day and what they could achieve.

It's interesting. I had a client purchase a property the week before Christmas and no finance. A buyer's agent was just high fived by all the real estate agents in the area going, wow, you really got a bug. And this is great. The client had been looking in this area for a long period of time. We got back after Christmas and the valuation came in 100,000 below. And we're sitting there, we were just beside ourselves with going, this is insane. There's no finance clause, it's all up. And I went back to the buyer's agent going, give me some comparables. And you know, this is. And she argued, well, there's subdivision potential. So hence, you know, there's that opportunity there as well as all these other things in their recent sales in the area. So a lot of people, I've got two questions here, but the subdivision potential, it kind of goes back to. There's no bench tops, but in the future you have to value it as is today without that, don't you?

Yes, you do. But this is yet another commercial reality that was starting to hit for valuers. You get negotiated very hard on fees. The volume of jobs you do for banks would require you get a reasonable fee, but you have to do a lot of work to make your profit margin. In any event, the bank would have a standard, or the financier could have a standard clause that says, look, you have to value this property as a single holding without development potential, because then that falls within the $180 fee that we've negotiated. You know, it's a standard residential house, et cetera, et cetera. As soon as complexities were entered into, a valuer is more than happy to do that. They can value subdivision potential, they can value potential for unit construction, any of those sorts of things, but the bank has to firstly, instruct it that way and secondly has to pay a reasonable fee to get it done. And now that's sometimes a bit of a difficulty for a valuer because you say, well, this is a half day job, we should be charging $500 for it. And then the financier will say, well, our Maintenance is a $200 valuation value as a single holding. So I imagine that that is something that can happen. So if you've got something with subdivision potential, not something with something a bit different, it may pay to instruct your bank to tell the value of that and to pay accordingly. Probably $300 best spent right there.

Absolutely. Compared to $100,000 less. Well in this instance I looked at the comparable sales and they really did bear the fact that it should have been a higher price regardless of subdivision potential. But I had to tell the client that within 10 years of being a mortgage broker I've only three times had a valuation overturned. And there was such because of that amount of work we just that goes in beforehand. And one was they missed an entire bedroom and compared against three bedroom houses when it was a four bedroom house. It was obvious oversight but in actual fact the valuer came back and did move up around about 85,000 in this instance. But it was one of the really and those comparable sales and being able to present those really was the I guess clincher that allowed that to happen.

Yeah, yeah. And look you've hit on something there. I wouldn't be so bold as to say valuers are infallible in all situations but certainly they have all the tools at their disposal and they have the independence that should give you confidence in their ability to assess value. As long as you know what criteria they're valuing under and who they're doing it for. All of those things need to be known. I mean I obviously I get quite worked up when, when a keyboard warrior or someone climbs on and says none of us know what they're talking about. They're always wrong without knowing the circumstances around what they've been asked to do and how they've been asked to do it. You know I just, I'm obviously championing them, I'm one myself but I think that their money very well spent if you aren't confident in what your property values are.

Yep, absolutely. Well, one of the things Kiran about you I've been a follower of yours for a long period of time before Australian Property Investor magazine because I loved the fact that you were writing the Heron Todd White newsletters for many, many years and your style of writing I just, I really enjoyed. But they had the ability of having thousands of valuers out there every day and I loved that kind of I guess the collation of the information that you had and you presented in those magazines or sorry in that you presented in the newsletter but the, the thing that I really enjoyed was that that challenge you put out to them at the beginning of every year about where are suburbs going to perform this year and then holding them accountable in previous years afterwards and saying okay so what did happen? So I'm really interested from that kind of Collation of the big picture of being able to talk to valuers in that network across Australia, what did you find that made good suburbs that led these predictions to come to full mount over the year of the. The best suburbs out there.

Yeah, look, it became an exercise and thanks too. I'm still in contact with htw, I still have friends there and I will pass on your thanks to them.

Absolutely.

I'll pass on their thanks to you for that. Because it was a document. The month in review was a document that I was immensely proud of when I was involved there. The fundamentals really became. It was no great mystery. The fundamentals were always important. If you were close to high population centres and capital cities, if you were within a commutable distance of the CBD or major employment hubs, if you found yourself with good transport options, and if you could buy a secondhand property, preferably a detached house on a decent sized block of land, you were tending to be in the most forgiving sector of the property markets In Australia. There was few cases where if you met those criteria that you didn't feel a bit better seven years down the track about what you paid. And I think that, you know, if I've learned anything, it's that messing with the fundamentals is fine and there's potential to do well, but don't be surprised that the risks also increase once you step outside those comfort zones of property. I think that in all the valuers around the country in HCW in February would take a very considered approach. They often went to tried and true market sectors, particularly if they felt their markets had potential to soften over the course of the 12 months. And certainly I would think far more often than not, their success rate of predicting how the markets would go was pretty good. They weren't analysing things down to, you know, percentage rates in terms of population growth or they weren't doing. Yeah, they weren't doing sort of a really high end analysis of that sort of data. It was more that they had so many valuers on the ground every day talking to agents doing the analysis that when they sat around the boardroom and said, what do we expect this year? There was someone who could sit there and say, detached houses in Capera are looking pretty good and pretty affordable at the moment comparison to Mitchelton and you can get a 1960s chamfer board for a very reasonable price and in 12 months time I see that as being good. That's a lot of data that is right at the fingertips that we were able to distill into that document.

And it's interesting you mentioned that because do valuers specialise in specific suburbs?

Absolutely. Particularly in the big firms. Now, I only ever worked for Heron Todd White, but I'm sure many of the major FIR is headed in this direction. When I left hcw, I think I was covering something in the order of about 12 suburbs in the southwestern area of Brisbane. And of course what would happen over the course of four months of doing that is you had fully inspected almost half the sales evidence you ended up using. And we're talking about, you know, a slow day would be, you know, four or five valuations and a hard day would be 12. So if you can extrapolate that, you got into a lot of property.

And I think that is one of those other myths that's out there, that is the valuer just turns up to the job and is not aware of what's going on. In actual fact, they probably know the real estate agent and every other agent that sold in the street and valued most of those properties as well at some stage.

Look, they probably have. And I think the nature, as we speak, the nature of the industry now is to do higher volume, turn it around faster, meet better criteria and that lends itself to being a specialist in a small patch so that you don't make mistakes. And, you know, that's just the way that the industry is surviving now, I think.

And I guess what a lot of us don't see as well is that valuers aren't just doing the sales they're doing. I don't know what's the percentage of refinances that the banks are instructing value is to do because there's so many more properties that have been inspected in a suburb than just the sales.

Yeah, you're absolutely right. No, I would think for, you know, probably for a day, if you imagine a five day week, for a day's worth of possibly sale valuations, you were doing, you were probably doing four days of refinance valuations. If I could express it in that sense. And sometimes, you know, a sale valuation would come with a refinance valuation attached to it because they already had another investment property.

Absolutely. Now I'm interested in this most forgiving sector that you mentioned, which is, you know, the house close to transport commutable to the cbd, you know, big block second sale, which is interesting, not the first sale, so not brand new properties. But you mentioned also that there's probably risks associated in going outside that sector. What are the sectors that you've seen in your career that have come up and the risks associated with them.

Well, look, if you're stepping away from those sorts of things, I think that you carry risks when you do go into plenty of new product that's maybe in areas where there's a high amount of land supply. Now I'm certainly not saying steer away from those. There's plenty of successful locations. Thinking in terms of where I am in Brisbane and you could probably name a few in Melbourne there, Jane. But if you were thinking of some of those master planned communities like North Lakes or Springfield around Brisbane where they've set up the infrastructure and made them work, I think that people have done okay out of new property in that sense. However, the people who buy into the initial stages of those projects are taking a little more gamble. They are taking a little more risk. Hey, is this going to work? Will the commercial hub be set up here? Will these things that are promised, are they going to eventuate? And of course if they don't, you may have bought into a dream that turns into a nightmare in that situation. So I think being careful with new product is a good thing. I think also being careful with new types of housing within those sectors is something that you have within those locations, something that you have to be careful about. I know that when I saw units going up in one of the major estates that was halfway between here and Ipswich, I was wandering through those and looking at the pricing thinking no one's going to buy these. Why would a local pay this money when they can have a block of land that's all theirs, no body corporate fee with a bigger house on it for about the same coin. And of course some of those units ended up being sold to investors down south for far too much money who.

Are still trying to rent them today.

Yeah, they're still. Well, you know, I know they're still trying to ring them today.

I mean, why is Queensland the hub of this pyramid selling scheme?

To us Southerners, we're trying our best.

They do say the weather's great. I think we get clouded by the weather when we look at property up there sometimes.

Well, look, and I've got to say, because we've actually had some really good market run. Sometimes, I'll use the term marketeers. Sometimes they've been saved by our property booms. 2003 and 2007 were good years up in Queensland. And I have had those situations where I valued something in 2005 and sort of warned the bank, you know, they're paying a little bit too much and then you come back and revalue it in 2008 and the owner must be air punching. They're going, oh, look, we made $50,000. But of course, what that southern owner, who's never visited the property, doesn't realise is if they'd spent the same money on a detached secondhand house, they'd have made $150,000. It all looks good until you actually run those numbers properly.

It's interesting. I've seen a couple of valuations come through where the valuer has been very specific and actually warned the owner going, do you realise this off the plan unit you're buying in Brisbane has a 10% marketing fee associated with it? This is not normal. There's been some really incredible insights that have been picked up for the potential purchaser from some of the valuation documents as well. So there's a lot of effort that goes into them.

Look, Jane, you remind me. One of the most frightening ones I saw is a small house and land package which was out in the sticks, well south of Callanvale in the southern area of Brisbane, where they had a very small escape that seemed a long way from nowhere. And when I had a look through the contract in the commission section, they were charging $30,000 for television advertising. So there's one house.

Nice.

So per house of land package, they were charging $30,000 for advertising. You know, that's just wrong. It's terribly wrong. Why is that going on? And it does our industry no good.

No, absolutely. Well, look, coming back to, you know, the suburbs and, and looking at the information that you've been able to collate from all these valuers as well when you were with Heron, Todd White, there's obviously, you know, to us there's pockets of potential within suburbs that do more than what the suburb does. What are the key characteristics of those sweet spots that come up?

Look, I always think that if you're within a five minute walk of your local neighbourhood hub, that's always going to be a winner. So if you want to have some really pleasant market analysis one Saturday morning, I'd suggest you go down, grab a coffee and then take the dog for a walk for five minutes and see how far you get. Staying within that five minute radius is always going to be a bit of a winner. Always shoot for a decent sized block of land wherever possible. I think, you know, wherever you see a bit of elevation and some views, you're going to pick up, you're going to pick up more potential than you would in those lower areas. And avoiding Those really secondary locations, main roads. We used to say in the valuation game you get one chance every seven years to sell a main road property. It's usually when the market's running hot. So avoiding the main roads and the railway is often a very important thing. So I think if you take, I know there's sort of broad criteria there but if you found a suburb you really love that you think has got great potential, I think that you're absolutely right. You shouldn't just say okay, buy anything. You've got to sit there and think about what are the attributes of this suburb that appeal. How can I be a part of that and make sure I'm paying less than median?

Yeah, that's always a good one. Negotiate, negotiate. Well, I mean just talking about those suburbs that do take off, we see suburbs take off, some of them have sustained growth and some don't. What are the characteristics of the suburban as a total that has that sustained growth rather than maybe what we've seen is the mining boom for instance, Mining tax.

Oh yeah, look, I think it's sticking close to those fundamentals again really sustained long term growth tends to be in your blue chip suburbs. And I'm not talking about always those prestige suburbs, I'm talking about those suburbs that are reasonable commuting distance from cbd. To pick a really great example, if you looked at Paddington up in Brisbane here, I know I'm Brisbane centric but I know this market intimately and I apologise. But if you look at an area like Paddington, it's in Brisbane here, it's five kilometres from the gpo, it's older stock housing, it has good demand from tenants, it has a great owner occupier, great place for owner occupiers, good facilities, all of those things have tended to. And you know, there's not much that's going to change about that sort of suburb. If you're buying into that suburb you can be reasonably confident that property values aren't going to retract in any great way over the long term. And realistically that's safe. Real estate investing, buying and holding on for the long term in great locations is always going to I think be a preference to try and pick the hot spot and ride the market hard. Those fast moving areas like your mining boom, whether it's driven by infrastructure or a one off increase in employment in an area that makes it suddenly come into the world of high demand as it is given, can be taken away fairly quickly. And that's where people tend to get into a Bit of strife, I think.

Well, that brings me to the, I guess the cycles that we've seen in the property market. You've been in the property market and commentated it and been part of it for so many years. You know, we kind of see that cycle doing that Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane kind of cycle and then gosh knows what happens to all the other states. Is that going to be what we're going to see in the future as the cycle's getting smaller? Have you got some thoughts on what happens to the property cycle?

Yeah, I actually, I'm wondering if it's not extending out a little bit. It wasn't so long ago that we were saying that every seven years there was a doubling in property prices. Well, I got a, I received a fairly quick education in that as soon as I joined the magazine and started looking more nationally at markets and looking at historical numbers in that sense. Because what tends, what seems to be happening of late is that markets tend to have a good couple of years and then track reasonably conservatively until something causes them to have a good couple of years again. And I would think that at an average 5 or 6% growth rate, which is probably fair enough for most big capital city markets, you're looking more at a 12 year doubling of property prices. And I know we talk about the affordability, we talk about all those factors and we were probably talking about those 10 years ago, but it certainly seems to me that that sort of monumental increase in value is stretching out just a little bit further at the moment. And you know, have you had this, Jane, if you had these conversations with people who were around in the 80s and 90s about the 18% interest rate?

Yeah, I think everyone brings that up at least every one out of three people.

That's right.

Back in my day.

Yeah, these kids have got it easy. There's certainly scope for a bit of fear around how high interest rates can go. I would like to believe that we have got a bit of a handle on that and there's a certain president that's just taken over in the US that may have some impact on those down the track. We'll see how, how it plays out. But you know, factoring in that we have got these very low interest rates and they have got room to move up, I guess people need to be a bit cautious about how market cycles are running and how long they are likely to be sustained at a fairly conservative rate as far as capital growth goes over the coming decade.

So change your head. Maybe.

It could be, there could be, but you know, terrific faith in the Australian property market as long as you buy those fundamentals we were talking about, as long as you buy smart, I still think it's an asset class that has been seen far more winners than losers really is.

So as a valuer, and hats off to your dad, saving you from the teaching career and showing you that valuers go and check out Porsches every now and then, what about your journey? Did you pick up some bargains or invest along the way?

I did, you know, you know, the smartest investment I made was asking my wife and Amy.

Now there's a quote that we're going to put down so you can send that straight to your wife and be forgiven for every anniversary. Forget going forward.

Look, I can't thank her enough. I did come from a property background. My dad was in finance and real estate. But you know, after 20, well it wasn't 20 years in the profession. I suppose I was a good 12 to 15 years in the profession. I still hadn't bought a property in my 30s and I'd ridden through that area of the 90s where nothing much happened and my father had tapped me on the shoulder and sort of said, why don't you buy an investment? I said why would I make. They don't make any money. Look, I'm valuing them and they've been flat since 1993. What am I doing? And then my wife, who also comes from a property family, her, her father's, she's now the fourth generation in a 75 year old local real estate agency working in Brisbane. She had the wherewithal in her 20s to start investing in property and when we finally, she actually became a valuer. Later on that's a whole different story. But when I met her she had a couple of properties underway and I think she was a little aghast that I got to this late stage in my 30s, this late stage in my 30s without actually having bought a property within two years of meeting her. I bought my first property, which is a really great unit in Auckland Flower for the princely sum of $140,000. It's never been vacant. It's probably worth 380 now. And it was all down to her saying, look, this is, you know, you talk about this all the time, take the step, let's get you somewhere that's conservative to your first investment. So you know, I've always been immensely proud that we've held onto that first investment and we've built a portfolio together now which is entirely buy and hold. It almost pains us to think about having to sell the property because we understand the potential of it over the long term.

Absolutely. And I guess as valuers you've seen what the market can do and just if you're following your own advice, I gather in your strategies in where you buy.

That's right. And also, once again, you must have had those conversations with people where they say, you know, I could have bought that for $200,000 back in 75, you know, and now it's worth 20, 20 million. You know, those conversations happen all the time where people say the one regret didn't start, two regrets didn't start early enough and sold too soon. It's usually two regrets.

I always hear that selling is one the of of the greatest regrets people have when they go back and check out the current value of a property they've sold.

That's right. That's exactly it. Buy, hold, stay for the long term and you'll thank yourself. It just seems to be how it works and I think it will do for many years to come.

And with your buy and hold strategy, are you renovating as well? Are you subdividing Granny flatting? Airbnb? You're adding some twists in there.

Now look, I have to say that there has occasionally been some emotion in our purchases as far as investing goes. And if there's something that not so much a regret, but certainly it's a big property market out there. If you look at all of Australia, but most actually all of our investment of late has been in Brisbane. I think the idea for, for us has always been to try and buy a detached house wherever possible and also try and find it as strategic or key. We recently purchased, our last investment was a property that was the house behind. Sorry, let me start that again. We bought a home in our dream suburb, in our dream street and then the property behind it came on the market and it solved a whole lot of problems. It was a great strategy for us. It was an easily rentable location. It was a great little property. But most of all for us, it offered us the opportunity to do drainage for the adjacent property. It allowed, when we go to do the renovations in the new build, it allows us access from the second street. So sometimes while that's outside the fundamentals, sometimes thinking very carefully about what advantages a property plays to you is a good thing. The other thing is that we've always had that checklist. We like to have a north facing backyard, a decent street frontage, potential to renovate. I just think that that is a really clever Thing, even if it's basic, just. Yeah, as I know part of the strategy there. But I agree with you. I think the ability to come in and just put in a little bit of, as they call it, sweat equity, just a little bit of work to help raise the rent or raise the property value, put you in good stead. And it might just be a coat of patent. But of course there is a percentage of the market who walks into those properties who can't see past the dust and grime. They can't see the potential. And if you can, and you know it's easy, you really can be on a winner. Straight up. Know the bones of the property, look for good bones. It's always the tip. Look for good bones.

And tell me, this new build that you're doing, is this a home new build, or are you actually going to be doing some development on the back of the property?

No, no, it'll be. This one is our. This is our forever home. We've sort of built the property portfolio up to a position where we're able to now look very seriously at the home that our two young children will call. Theirs will build their memories in. We have built one, the home that we live in currently. We did build, and this was built on a site of the first purchase my wife made in her 20s. So we had it for that long and then optimised it when the kids came along. Yeah, we just said this is the time. And of course, as good planning and good luck come together, we're in a great school district. You know, we've seen gentrification in this suburb and we've probably seen some really great capital growth here in the last few years. And it came down to her buying something affordable with those good fundamentals in place and hanging on for the long term.

Are you going to reveal that suburb to us?

Yeah, sure. We've already got our property here, so no rush. Everyone, come on over. Yeah, we're in Tarragondy, so we're sort of south of Salisbury in Tarragondy. And, you know, we fly under the radar. This is something that's always a bit interesting for us property nerds too. We fly under the radar a little bit because our postcode is shared with Dutton Park. Sorry, with Holland Park.

I should say Holland park now. I've heard of Holland Park. I haven't heard of the.

No, that's right. So what actually happens is a lot of the times when the statisticians start running their numbers in the property game, they attribute a lot of what's happening to Holland and we have an adjacent suburb, Tarragundy, which doesn't ping on the radar as they say, but we happen to be in a great school catchment in a really desirable position in this suburb that not many people have heard about. And it's kind of being discovered a little bit. And here I am telling you and the tens of thousands of people who.

Your property success podcast listeners will be happy forever now. They'll be watching this space.

Well look, have a look, look around for that sort of thing. You might find, you know, almost these bridesmaids suburbs that share postcodes might offer some potential for you as an investor. So, you know, just because you haven't heard of it, don't rule it out.

Yeah, absolutely. And any plans to buy in the future. Are you done?

I think no, no, look, I don't think we never.

Never say never, right?

No, I'm just going to say we're one of those couples who, who say okay, we're done now. And then we find a great investment and we suddenly start thinking about how the numbers will work and if we can be part of it. Look, I think that our future as people have built up a good portfolio and have good access to information in this industry, our future will definitely be one of small development, nothing too complex. I mean I'd love to do a construction at some stage but we'd make good profit out of Splittable and they can be bought reasonably economically as long as you do your numbers. Do your numbers. Everybody do your numbers and you can make. As long as you're not over greedy, you can make a reasonable profit out of those. I think there'll be a few of those and I can see us doing some renovators down the track as well. You know what my dream project would be though, James?

Tell me.

I would love and this is all heart and o head. I'd love to convert a warehouse. Ah yes, that would be magnificent.

Yep, that blank slate kind of industrial urban look.

Yeah, absolutely.

I'm with you.

I want a home. I could drive my car into the Landry.

Kieran, we need to talk. I designed this when I was 10 years old. It was a warehouse where you had a remote control opening that you drove your car into the basketball court that was downstairs because you had that really nice concrete surface basketball court going on and was it then you could go upstairs which was an open plan looking down. So we should chat.

I think we should. I think I can see Blacksmith and Claire designed future warehouses. You heard, I'll give you A tough feeling. I have no problem.

Oh no, I'm happy to be in the background. Hey now I want to just move on to your change of career. And still in property, right? And still in writing. Obviously you had a lot to do with that newsletter, but into Australian Property Investor magazine and becoming a journalist, you said that there had been some changes in the industry with Valex, etc. And you lost a little bit of that heart. But you still had the heart to stay in property. And did journalism allow you to do that?

Look, it really did. I'm actually a bit of a creative at heart. I like having the conversation and telling the stories and I loved, once again, I really loved the idea of educating people generally about the industry and property. So I did find myself. The reason I was involved with the Month in Review mail out was that I could see the great potential for talking to the general public and the great information we had. But the communication skills of your average valuer are probably, as in most professions are probably not fantastic. They tend to be numbers girls and guys and into analysis and getting on with it. Whereas I sort of felt like we had a lot to say and not too many people were saying it. So that's why I got into Month and Review. And then I found I really enjoyed it. I just loved writing was a great creative outlet. So I did some post grad study in journalism and then about four years ago, I've got good friends who are in the media. One of them actually worked for API originally. So I knew the magazine well. And about four years ago, then editor Enos Brody put a posting up for a 12 month contract and I'd been getting worn down by the valuation profession a little and I said to my wife, oh, API magazine is looking for a journal for 12 months. And she went, oh, that's interesting. And then two days later I went, they really are looking for a Geno for 2012 months. I think I could give it a go. And being the supportive person she is, she said, you should, you know, this would be a good thing for you. And so I found myself at. How old was I there? I guess I'm 40. I was in 45 at that stage. 44, 45 and myself jumping out of one career into one into a new one and loved it. It's. It was built for me. I was sorry I never did it earlier and obviously did okay at it.

Well, you became editor. You can't go up that path any further, can you really?

Well, no. And look, if there was one job I love more than journalists. It was probably editor, just that ability. And anyone who read the magazine and probably read, read the editor's note. One of the things I did love about the magazine is that we sort of were given this sort of unfettered approach to how we talked to the public. I mean, there was very few occasions where we were told what to say and where to say it from the owners. So if you ever, if you do have copies of it and you read my editor's note, I really am that enthusiastic about the idea of community in the property field and about people being safe and investing. So, you know, not only did I get to espouse my, my opinions every month in the front of the magazine, I also got to control stories and conversations and, you know, the rules weren't. The rules under my editorship were tell the whole story, give us the pros and cons. You know, look, don't, don't, don't gloss over. And to their credit, every freelancer or journalist we had adopted that. So I think it was a, I found it a wonderful outlet, a wonderful resource. And you felt like you were, you know, whether you read the magazine or not, at least we felt like we were at least putting some information out into the zeitgeist, that that was balanced, independent. We weren't told to use particular commentators or anything like that in the stories. And, you know, it was a place where I wanted to create safe investing for people.

I think, you know, I had the opportunity to work with yourself and many of the journos and always very probing questions. And we probably had interviews that went for a whole lot longer than the three or four sentences that made it into the articles. But we had that whole background. I really had that sense of the background. And as you said, you know, a lot of publishing does depend on advertising spend and almost fee for comment. And the independence of API was always one of those things where there wasn't a blow your own horn. It was about talking about true value that could add to the reading community. So it was very unique in that way, I felt.

Yeah, thanks for that. I mean, to some degree that is a little bit of its undoing when you think about it. There is a very lucrative business to be had in selling space for content. And it's hard to compete online. Online access for people to promote their own blogs, do things online, look, do podcasts, do their own newsletters, all terrific ways of getting information out. But people can of course get that information for free now. And there was a lucrative line in saying to people who are potential advertisers. I'm sure many of them would have happily paid $20,000 to get two pages in our magazine. They were knocked back because that wasn't how things were done. And it did get to a stage. You know, we did have a sponsored. We avoided sponsored content for as much as possible. But if it came to the point where, you know, you needed to get the advertising revenue in, then there might have been sponsored pages on there. But, you know, my rule, well, my argument was always, and it was always accepted, is that this needs to be patent. It needs to say sponsored. It needs to be obvious that this is an advert. An advert. That people aren't going to confuse this with a freelancer's or a journalist story.

Doing the pros and cons of the story rather than maybe one side. And I guess that, you know, you talk about so much information. I know when I started investing, you know, we were pulling out the mel ways trying to get to the property where we're going to go to now. Everything is Google Maps. Actually, my car now talks to me and tells me where to go. So, you know, it's just, it's insane. But there is so much information and, you know, maybe is there a future for printed magazines, do you think? And also how do people find the right information? How can they actually work out who's. Who's giving that independent information to them?

You know, I think the key thing would always be, I think there is some sort of future for printed magazines. It's just not as lucrative as it used to be. And it seems that the idea is, you know, in these specialist niche areas like API operated the way that API operated, there is certainly the ability for it to, to be viable. But it probably needs, it probably needs to rethink itself because not so many years ago it was the only show in town. And so, you know, that's a very profitable business. But the evolution has been so fast and so quick into online, it's hard to keep up. Sometimes the head spins. Look, I think the key is to find out who's writing the article and what their angle might be. Now, I won't diminish. You know, we used to have commentators in our magazine. We would see commentary from all sorts of people and as you said, Jane would see commentary from you. And I think there is plenty of good information out there, but I think that readers need to also seek out those articles and commentaries that involve multiple sources. And I love a story with dissent. You know, there should be a little bit of if it's all rainbows and lollipops, then I'm asking questions straight away.

If it sounds too good to be true.

Yeah, exactly. If John Smith. I don't think there's a John Smith out there. So I think I'm okay. John Smith Marketers and Buyers Agency is putting out a great big story about how wonderful this summer beyond the black stump is. But you know, you know that there's going to probably got a hand in selling property in that location if they haven't got a little bit of dissent and a little bit of reasoned argument as to why you should or shouldn't buy. You know, and you'd see this, Jane, the key is sometimes even the key is also what suits the buyer. I mean, not every property suits every buyer. So to make that broad assumption that everyone should get a piece of this area is just quite plainly wrong.

Yeah, everyone's buying criteria is different, isn't it?

That's exactly right. So take it with a grain of salt. If you're trying to consume. There's a lot of information, a lot of it is good, but some of it's dangerous. So look for good well reasoned arguments and see if that investment is going to suit you.

I have to say I was pretty excited about the article that we discussed and you were to going to publish for the January 2017. One day we're writing an article, the next day we weren't.

Yes, that's right. I mean we were actually having the discussion and on the 30th of November walked in and the owner took me aside and basically said look, I have to announce we're going to, I have to close the doors this afternoon basically, you know, come the 1st of December we were all out of work. Now the process, it's gone into liquidation. Now it's being advertised for sale. The assets are being advertised for sale and I think there is value in those assets. The process has to play out. And you know, once again to the owner's credit, he tried to keep editorial away from advertising and there wasn't a great deal of pressure on me as editor to compromise our guidelines to either appease advertisers or to, you know, there was no pressure to compromise my guidelines. And as I said, that might have been a bit of the undoing of it because. But look, there'll be, I'm certain with it there'll be more. I guess the key to that is that I don't have intimate knowledge of what was happening behind the scenes as part of the running of the magazine, you know, costs and income and outgoing, et cetera, and more of that's going to come to hand. But it was certainly a very sudden thing. And as you know, Jane, you were going to be on the COVID in what was going to be one of my most magnificent designs.

I was very excited when you said, I want a photo of you looking left and right and up and down. I said, I thought about it. I'm like, just don't make me Jan.

You were one of two who picked it right away. I had nine of you lined up and actually you were the first one to come back to me and say, don't make me, Jan. Oh, she's worked it out. I was trying to be so. I was just trying to be so.

I had visualized, I had this visual of being able to have one of those kind of holograms covers where you actually moved it a little bit and everyone's head moved as well. So I had, I had great plans. So when you rang me the next day and went, there's no article, there's no cover, I was like, oh, no magazine.

I know the Brady. I don't know if we had to get a copyright from the Brady Bunch for it, but I was probably going to plough on regardless.

Could have been that final throw.

I was very pleased. I had a good friend of ours, Peter Kalizos, he said in the first set of photos, and I've still got those, I'm going to show them to Peter one day because they are quite hilarious. He's done a fantastic job. He would have made a great.

Greg, don't send them to him, send them to me and I'll post them up on his page. Go. Hey Pete, look what I found. The article that we were was around, that cover was predictions for 2017 and I was pretty excited about sharing mine. But I was really keen to hear what others thought too. You tell me, what kind of big changes are you seeing in the property market in the next year and three years?

Look, I can give you my opinion because I never got to read the story. Believe it or not, the submission hadn't come in by the time I was told to pack my briefcase. So look, I mean, you know the other thing that's happened too, Jane, since the magazine clients, I've taken a bit of time which has given me a certain clarity to stand outside of the day to day micro operation of the property market and have a think about it in a big picture sense. I think there are some risks over the next 12 months as far as Interest rates go and interest rate movements. There's going to be a percentage of people who aren't factoring into that borrowing. And you probably have more insight than me on that given what you do. But to that extent I still have an insatiable faith in Australian property that is well researched and well bought. I think people have been stung enough from things like the mining boom that they can at least be a little bit cautious about where they buy. I'm not saying regionals aren't a good place to buy, but maybe we're looking for more multi industry towns where there's a broader employment base. I think that Sydney has certainly had a very hot run and it's starting to temper a little bit. But it is our international city. So you've got to think that if you're buying the right sort of property there once again for the long term and meeting the fundamentals, you're going to be okay. I'm Brisbane boy born and bred as you mentioned, have picked up in the last 45 minutes or so and I have a lot of faith in the Brisbane market. There is no doubt about it. We tend to be a really forgiving market for people who buy appropriately. We're not built out. It's not a case that. It's not a case that anything's going backwards in a great hurry. Like to see a bit more employment. I think that's when you were talking about the affordability wave, that move from Sydney to Melbourne to Brisbane that often happens. The really strong movements in Brisbane have always come with high interstate migration numbers and that high interstate migration tends to come with employment. Now we haven't seen those sorts of numbers as we did back in 07 and 03. It doesn't look like that's going to happen again in 2017 where we're going to see big employers and large numbers migration. But I would put to you that there isn't any cause for great concern about Brisbane. So if you are a long term investor, I would think that Brisbane is as safe a market as any to get into and certainly a very affordable market to be in. Perth is maybe a different animal.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, you know, I'm just thinking off the top of my head here but I reckon there'd be a bit of interest if we jumped online and threw open the lines one day to people who want to hear a bit more about Brisbane suburbs. I'm sure you could give a bit of insight into quite a few of them. Having valued most of them, I can imagine nipping there so if you're up to it, I reckon we'd do that. We'll go straight to the source.

You might have picked up any chance to talk open mic? Absolutely.

I thought it was Jane. Have a chat. It's Jane and Kieran. Have a chat.

If I can be of any assistance, I will be there.

Now, tell me, API magazine, I'm really interested before we finish up, just getting some ideas, some understanding about what you learned during that period of time. And I'm really keen. What did you find over those years of when you're editor but also journo and being instructed as stories that were to be written, what were people most interested in? What were the things that really rocked people's boats?

I think that it was a diverse readership, so the things that people were most interested in. I mean, people always really liked the hotspot sort of calls. I didn't mind the idea of trying to pick areas that had potential to growth and we used to cover that in state stories. But once again, I always thought it was important to try and provide pro and con that whether it was being driven by changes in town plan, gentrification, whatever it might be, to really drill down into those things and get knowledgeable. There was a lot of interest. I'm going to say one of the biggest selling styles of stories was always the strategy approach for becoming, you know, retire on $100,000 a year. How do I get there now? While that makes for a good headline and certainly a very salable cover, the key was always to make sure you spoke to a good diversity of property commentators. I believe you were actually in the last we did of those, Jane, and you know, try and map out, help people, map out a strategy and a headspace for achieving goals long term, how to set a goal and have a plan to get there. I think that most investors were keen to hear about that. We had a lot of interest from first time investors and sometimes investors who bought one property and couldn't graduate into the second. So we tried to gear a lot of stories around those as well. How to kick off the real basics. And then at the other end of the spectrum, we had a lot of people who were saying, you know, I've actually got five investment properties and I'm thinking about doing commercial or having a go at small development or having a go at renovation as part of it. So we tended to make sure that we tried to address some element of that in every magazine as well. When you look back at it, the things I've learned, property is a broad Church. There are a lot of people who like to invest in property and some start early, some start late, but most of them are pretty passionate about the industry. And I just think the key is making sure they're well informed, they stay safe, they look long term. And you know what, you're going to be ahead of the game at the end of the day because there's. Because when you look at the percentage of people who invest, you know, in property over multiple, have multiple properties, there isn't that many compared to the Australian population. So if you're into property, you're part of it. It's a broad church, but it's probably got fewer participants than you think.

I found it surprising that there was like 14,000 that had over seven properties. I'm like, how could I only be one of 14,000 people? Like, everyone's talking about property and you know, that is that, as you said, it's hard to graduate sometimes from that first, or even thinking about buying your first property to actually, you know, putting the pedal down and pedal to the metal and making it happen, isn't it?

Yeah, no, that's absolutely right. I mean, if we all turned up to a grand final, that'd be a pretty poor turnout, wouldn't it? Was it 14,000? No, look, and I think that we had a lot of correspondence from people in the investment community, which was about, I've got the first one, I've hit my roadblock. How do I get part of it? Part of it was psychology and part of it was finance and part of it was identifying the next place to invest. And all of those make for great stories in the magazine.

So tell me your most memorable article. What's the one that you're most proud of or one that actually struck you the most?

I loved the young gang stories that we used to do, the 20 somethings. The criteria, they had to be in their 20s and they had to have a minimum of three properties. Now, I ran across one young bloke called, called Tristan von Sierakowski. You can see how he struck me because I remember his name.

I was going to say, I'm not going to ask you to spell it.

No, I couldn't do it for you. But Tristan, I always remember Tristan. Tristan was one of those guys who had been dealt some fairly hard knocks early on, to the point that he was effectively a foster kid. And his foster mum had this one work ethic that was just extraordinary. I remember Tristan saying to me, you know, she was, she was in her. I think she was in her late 80s and she was still working the farm every day. And she'd managed to instill in this guy who could have just gone so far off the rails. I mean, he had all the potentials of not being with us. And, you know, the work ethic of this guy was extraordinary. He worked two jobs and days, night shift for a couple of years to get his first deposit and then got the property and then started planning the next one. Now looking at Tristan, not so far, not so long ago, he was actually either our last cover story or a second last cover story. He's now a property valuer with Heron Todd White actually as a television.

Oh my gosh, there you go.

And he's building a portfolio. Oh look, he's building a portfolio that will make anyone proud. And that was one of those stories where, you know, I did the interview and the other thing that struck me about Trist is he's very humble about what he'd achieved. He'd achieved something that many of us might have failed at. He'd pulled himself up by the bootstraps and taken himself forward. And he was a real, he was exemplary of what good investment is all about. You know, hard yards, good analysis, go forward, trust yourself. And he's got such a bright future. I can't wait to read about him in BW at some stage.

Oh, fabulous. I might have to track him down. We might have to get him on this call.

Yeah.

So I guess, you know, that kind of brings us to, you know, looking forward. Are you feeling that it is, you know, you talk about the long term and the long term play and as long as you play safe, you know, and, and look to the research and understand your investment. Are you positive about the market going forward?

Yeah, I am generally positive about what real estate can do going forward. I mean, there can be seismic events, as you well know. Things can happen that none of us can foresee and it can be dangerous. But really as a long term investment, there has been fewer safe investments. Even if it's just a matter of enforced saving for people, it creates a regime where they have to pay off a home, they have to put money away and they have to think about their future. So with that in the back pocket and realising that we all need somewhere to live, I remain bullish about property. And maybe 2017 isn't going to be the most sterling year, maybe 18, maybe 19, but there is going to be a time when you will look back in 10 years time, 10 or 12 years time after making a purchase and go, gee, I'm Glad I did that. I really am. I just think that that's how it works with Australian property.

Well, I have to say we're pretty happy that your dad pushed you down the valuation way and your wife picked you up and took you into investing and you could take all that learning and share it with with us through API magazine. One that's missed but may be back, who knows. And I think you've added so much value to the community, the property investing community. So I really appreciate you sharing that journey with us, not just today on the podcast but also over the years because it's been one that I've really enjoyed watching.

Thanks Shane. You've always been a great supporter of what I was trying to do and I certainly appreciate that too. And plenty more to come. I've got my eye out there. I'm going to stick around. So I look forward to talking more with our community. I think it's very exciting times ahead.

Thanks, Kieran.

Thanks James.

How cool is Kieran, right?

He is.

He's such a good guy and someone who has spent his whole career in property. Like, you know, from that first maybe, I think, well, it was a little.

Bit later starting than we thought on the actual investing side of things.

Exactly.

He has spent a long time in property.

Yeah.

I love the idea that you go on a career day with someone valuer, they turn up at a Porsche place and you know, have a look around and all of a sudden you're like, yeah, this is the career for me. I think the reality is there's a lot more hard work. But, but I mean he reckons that he's probably his best investment is his investment in his wife and all her knowledge and family's knowledge of real estate and what she brought to the table and gave him a bit of a push along to get into real estate.

Yeah. But he's certainly made up for lost time.

Absolutely. And you know, he's got that buy and hold long term strategy which you know, we've seen so many people every episode, doesn't it? It's just like those people who go and do, you know, what did Kiran said at one stage something about, you know, people are promising rainbows and lollipops. It's like don't believe them, don't trust them. But so often we see people fall for that. So you know, that kind of, you know, buy a good property in a good area and you know, hold it for the long term and all the research and obviously someone, a valuer like himself, he's got all that research at fingers tips.

So he's gone through so many properties, but you just think going through 12 properties, it just must become second nature.

Absolutely.

What it will be and what's affecting that value in the suburbs. So they have such a good feel for it.

And I think the other thing is, you know, if we are looking into a suburb, we look at a suburb, we might see, you know, 15, 20 sales a month. But what really struck me was he was saying that four out of every five valuations are for refinance purposes.

Yeah.

So in actual fact, you know, if you times the number by, you know, well, you know, four of what you're seeing in sales, at least, you know, that's how many properties in the suburb valuers are looking at every month. So, you know, when they turn up and they've only got three comparable sales, the reality is they're probably being through another 12 properties in that same period of time. So they actually do have a large scope of knowledge of a specific suburbs that they look after. So, you know, that in itself, you know, I know. And you know that that whole concept of the fire sale and the banks, you know, saying value it as if it's going to be sold tomorrow, it was a myth. Value it as if it's going to be sold in the next six months or six months sale process. And even that little tip around the subdivision.

Yeah, that was an excellent tip. And have you seen that before? So you can actually. So what he was saying is the value gets paid a set fee and that's the parameters they work to and working outside those to do a valuation for a subdivision. Yes, the valuer can do that, but not just on the standard.

And I think that involves getting to the mortgage broker, getting in the process from the very beginning and understanding what that property is all about and what the potential is. So most brokers wouldn't really have a conversation around the, oh, there's subdivision potential or what do you want to do with the property in the future or the zoning is going to change or all those kind of concepts, it's around the, you know, finance to fit the moment at the moment. So the fact that, you know, when you're talking to your broker and you're clear on what your, your future use for a property is and if it does include subdivision and zoning and you are seeing maybe inflated or larger prices or indication that there's just being the movement, so those comparable sales haven't come through yet, that could be associated with, you know, a rezoning, new infrastructure, announcements and subdivision potentials, et cetera. If you think that the property is worth a bit more because of that opportunity, but it's not reflected in the immediate past sale data, then have that conversation, your broker let them know and you have to step outside the normal valuation process the banks undertake. And that normal process is you put your own application in and they order a valuation. You may get the opportunity as a broker to upload supporting data so the valuer can have a look at it. But they're doing that 180 to $200 valuation. They're not doing the 550 to $600 valuation. That doesn't take an hour, it takes half a day. They have to go out, they have to look at what the potential rezoning subdivision opportunity is, what could be the cost benefit for that and what could be the extra value could be added to it. And, you know, so you. So you need to have that up front because as soon as the bank gets a valuation on their books, that valuation, getting that overturned or changed for whatever reason is just too hard. So you really have to get in early and make that happen. And.

Yeah, and to that point, we also talked about what we can do as punters to put the best case forward to the valuer. And he was surprisingly receptive to that, wasn't he? It wasn't, you know, stay out of it. You know, you don't know what you talking about. Don't come to me with comparable sales. But he said, if you're realistic about the comparable sales you put together and you've got inferior properties and superior properties, certainly they'll take it on board and in fact, it'll probably save them a bit of work and you might work in your favor. So we'll continue to do that.

Absolutely.

I was going to say for people, Jane, we've actually got a valuer document and if you'd be okay, I can stick it in the show notes of the episode. Okay, now this is a document you can actually present, you know, of it, obviously, you fill it in yourself with your properties and it's in a separate couple of different categories. So you've got the inferior, the comparable and the superior properties. And then you submit that to your valuer. And that might be for. Well, what are a couple of ways you could use that.

First of all, give it to your mortgage broker and make sure they upload it so it goes in with the valuation request. The other thing is you can make yourself the contact for the valuer, so you meet the valuer there on site. And give it to them. Or if you're a real estate agent is going to be the contact for the valuer, give it to the real estate agent and ask them to present it to them. So you know, just get it in their hands is the important thing, before they've done three quarters of the work and decided on what the valuation of the property is.

Yeah, that's right. Better to get in early. You can find that@yourpropertysuccess.com EP and the number 10. So EP and the number 10.

Yeah, that's great. But you know what I love about Kim and Story is that it all comes down to doing a lot of research and you know, what did he say? He's got an insatiable faith in well researched and well bought Australian property.

You know, so well researched and well bought being the important bit there.

Yeah, exactly. So you know, someone who he not only had, you know, all of those years as a valuer and then a commentator for the valuers in the Heron Todd White newsletter, which just always enjoyed reading those and the fact that they've got thousands of valuations going on every month. And that newsletter allows you to clate that information from all those valuers all around the country.

Yeah, amazing resource.

Yeah.

Great.

And just, I mean if you've got no time to read a 30 page document on valuations and what's going on in the market, just go to the back and have a look at those clocks and see where the market is because it's just a great little snapshot of what's happening.

And then he moved into the API stuff and gee, with sad, aren't we?

Oh my gosh. I think hearts broke around Australia when we heard that Australian problem.

Where were you when you heard that API dined?

Yeah, I know. I mean, you know I, I was, I was talking to Kieran with the big plans obviously and you know, we, we. I was pretty excited about this big Brady Bunch cover. Yeah, that didn't come to pass and you know, it's just, it's been, you know, it's added so much value to the property investor landscape, all the information and the stories.

And he's a great editor too. There are great stories.

Yeah, absolutely. And you know, Kieran is obviously a great resource and you know, I look forward to chatting to him again and seeing where his next career step takes him because I'm sure he will maintain his journalistic skills in the property.

Yeah, absolutely fabulous.

That means it's time for Suburbs against the Clock.

Yes, it's that time Again, where you get the chance to test your suburb knowledge while the entire nation holds its breath. Ladies and gentlemen, it's time to play Suburbs against the Clock. The rules are simple to play. All you have to do is answer a question about 10 suburbs in the city of your choice. Within 20 seconds, the lucky winner of Suburbs against the Clock will win one year's free access to your property Success club. Your property Success Club is an in depth monthly masterclass which gives you the practical tools needed to grow your portfolio yourself without having to spend a fortune on expensive seminars or even leaving your own home. So who do we have standing by to play Suburbs against the Clock?

Am I connected?

Yeah, you are.

Oh, finally got it.

Hey, I can see you really good.

How are you?

I can see you.

How are you both?

Good.

Very well, thank you.

I'm really excited.

Well, you got on. So tell us, you know, whereabouts are you based?

Sydney.

Fabulous. So, and tell us, have you are an investor or a renovator, whereabouts are you are in your. Your property journey?

Well, I'm just starting. Like, I have not, not done anything yet, but I listen to your podcast every day and I'm probably in the saving mode at this stage, so I haven't done anything, but I'm really keen to start something very soon with the knowledge, I should say.

Fabulous. Oh, well, that's great. Well, I'm so glad you're enjoying the podcast. We have a lot of fun putting them together, don't we?

Loving it. I always sit down with pen and paper and make notes and listen to everything that you say and pause and go back and. Yeah, it's been fabulous. Thank you.

Oh, I'm so glad you're enjoying it. Well, Yuna, you are going to be playing for Sydney, I guess.

Yes, I am quite nervous.

So you're playing for Sydney now, Yuna, you're familiar with the rules. 10 suburbs in 20 seconds.

Yes, I am just hoping I can get at least more than five.

Okay, so, you know, our question for you is name 10 Sydney suburbs that are harbourfront.

Milton Point, Wynyard, Town Hall, North Sydney, Wollstonecraft.

Ten seconds ago.

Five more. Balmain.

Yes.

I mean, oh God, I counted six.

And I don't think Wynyard is technically on the harbour either. I thought you were going for train stations there for a moment. Oh, Yuna, unfortunately I can't even push it up to 10 for you, but I'd like to send you one of my books. So if you could put your address into the chat box here, I'm going to get you a book because we want to give you as much information as possible to get you to that first investment property. Very kind of you and please keep. Thank you. Keep listening to the podcast.

I will. Thank you so much, Jane.

All the best.

Thanks, Jenna. See ya.

Bye.

Thank you.

Have a lovely day.

Bye.

And if you'd like to test your suburb knowledge in the greatest suburb quiz.

In Australia, maybe the only suburb quiz in Australia, or you have an idea for a question that we could ask. We're always looking for new ideas. I think we're running out of of them.

Yeah, just contact supportourpropertysuccess.com and use the subject line Suburbs against the Clock.

Well, John, that's it for today. A huge thank you to our fabulous guest, Kieran Clare, who really shone a lot of information onto the valuation process and the property market. And if you would like instant access to the transcript, plus get access to some free training, we're going to throw in that valuation template.

Yes.

Then go to the Show Notes and have a look at the link. Yourpropertysuccess.com ep 10. That's Yourpropertysuccess.com the letter E for Echo, P for Papa, and the number 10. So make sure you head over to that website and download the Show Notes, all the details and that special bonus. And that's it for today. And I look forward to talking to you next time.

Ladies and gentlemen, it's important for you to understand that you need to take care in applying what you've heard on this podcast to your own personal circumstances. Everyone's situation is different and while we go to great length to ensure that everything we share is accurate, the information in today's podcast was based on personal experiences and opinions and is not intended to be specific to your circumstances. We are not real estate agents, financial planners, lawyers or accountants and are not liable for any loss, damage or misunderstanding caused by reliance on any information provided or inferred. We highly recommend you seek out the services of a professional or mentor to help chart your own path to property success.