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PROPERTY UPDATE BY DEAN LETFUS

Well tax changes seem to be the order of the day and I am getting constant requests for my opinion. Because the final outcome is so uncertain it is difficult to have an informed opinion on specifics, however I did want to talk to what I perceive as the important thing for us as investors.

Firstly any tax increases will ultimately find their outlet in increased rents.  Like any business as your costs increase they inevitably get passed on to the final consumer. So we don’t need to panic over tax changes in the long term. They will ultimately hurt those least able to afford it, tenants.

Secondly it is unlikely that any legislation will be made retrospective, so providing we get our portfolios built or restructured now we actually won’t feel the impact of any changes to our detriment. We may have a short term reduction in cashflow but this will be more than made up by increased rents.

And lastly any changes are going to take a while to get drafted and introduced so we have time to buy up or sell down depending on our current situation.

Make no mistake, I think a lot of the suggested law changes are ridiculous, unfair and terribly thought out, but at the end of the day it needn’t affect us if we get things right now.  On top of the recession making investing now a really good idea, to have these tax changes in the wind simply makes it even more opportunistic to build our portfolios as quickly as possible, structured to weather the initial storms and really benefit from the enormous upside that will follow.

Fortunately we can look overseas to where similar experiments have occurred and without exception the investors have won out in the long run because house values always recover eventually and the yields go through the roof in an environment where property is being penalized tax wise!!

FINANCE UPDATE BY KRIS PEDERSEN

Kris Pedersen Finance Strategist

There has been massive changes in the last couple of years for investors with funding getting tight because of the Global Financial Crisis and both the Real Estate and Finance industries getting regulated. This has meant that the playing field is very different to what it was a couple of years ago.  In fact I have never sen such a changeable  time in my industry.

However change brings opportunity and I have been working on some exciting new financing options which take the power away from traditional lenders and give you more ability to move forward.

In fact some of the products we have developed will make trading and portfolio building easy again even if things stay tight with credit markets.

I’ll be discussing these in detail AND allowing you to access these solutions at the NZ Property Guru’s launch event in Christchurch and Auckland.

Grab your tickets HERE and we’ll see you at the event!
Please come and say hello at the event, I’ll be the guy carrying the big bags of money around 

MINDSET SCIENCE BY DEAN LETFUS

It has been said that good is often the enemy of the best. I found myself talking about this at one of my courses recently and was reminded of it recently when watching Bill Wilson on Shine TV.
Bill was talking about this issue from a Christian perspective but it is so relevant for all of us to understand.

You see whenever we are fighting a battle that isn’t ours, or pursuing a dream that isn’t ours, we lose.

In a Christian context if the enemy can get us fighting any battle except the one God wants us to fight, then we are spending energy uselessly and being kept away from God’s best.

As investors if we get sidetracked into pursuing things that we are not good at, if we focus on aspects of our business that we are not well equipped for, then we will be ineffective and ultimately fail.

You see we are surrounded by plenty of “good” ideas, but are they “God” ideas, are they the best.

I daily get emails from people asking me if they should attend our events?  I think to myself, how can I possibly answer that.  Do you need to learn great systems to help you invest more?  Does your mindset need tweaking?  Do you have issues of fear of failure, fear of debt or low self esteem to conquer? Do you want to succeed badly enough to take the info I may provide and use it?  How do I know?

Similarly I have had countless offers to get involved in all kinds of business ventures. I automatically say no to them all now, because I know the best use of my time and energy is property investing and education. I know that this is the best thing for me, I feel like I was born to do it.  I know that God has called me into it as part of changing the nation of Fiji.

Getting involved in a fast cashflow business is probably great, it is a good idea, but it would keep me from the best idea, more property investing.

I know many of you get discouraged by your lack of progress and think that you need to try something new or different.

That may be true.  But it may also be true that you need to stop focusing on the little battles, stop beating yourself up over things that aren’t so important and focus on the things that are really important.

I got an email today from someone saying that there are no good deals on the Shore at the moment.

“Nonsense” I said.

” You can find no good deals on the Shore because you keep telling yourself and me that there are no good deals.”

So this person is effectively preparing for battle and waving the white flag of surrender at the same time, whilst wearing the enemy’s uniform. If the enemy doesn’t get her then her self talk, friendly fire, will!!

I find I am constantly tempted to spend time on things that are not good for me or constructive. One of the sad truths I have had to come to terms with recently is that as you get known to be successful, you get an exponential amount of bovine eschatology coming your way as well. I hear all kinds of things about me and get all manner of nonsense emails from people that would really get me down if I A: believed them and B: dwelt on them.

So decide for you what is really important. Which battles do you need to prepare for? Which challenges have actually got your name on them? Don’t get side tracked. On the weekend I was talking about this in the context of goals. Know where you are going and you give yourself a fighting chance of getting there. A pilot once told me that a plane is not heading directly towards it’s destination for most of the flight. 90% of the time it is correcting itself. But the target is clearly defined and locked in, and that pulls the nose back on track over and over again.