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When buying something, whether a car, a household appliance, or a piece of clothing, new is generally better. A new item means better quality, more reliable, and will last longer. Does the same logic translate to property?

When buying a home, you have a lot of options to choose from – from a brand new build to an older property. There are some strong reasons to buy a new house: see the top 10 reasons below.

1. It’s Brand New

It may seem obvious, but this is a top reason to buy a new home: it’s completely new! You’ll have the advantage of being the first people to live in it if you are buying for yourself. If buying as an investment, rental tenants also favor new homes. More modern homes are also generally better for the environment and with better features.

2. Maintenance Costs Are Lower

Brand new properties are usually cheaper to maintain. Because they are equipped with new appliances, these are less likely to break down either. They are also generally more energy efficient compared to older homes, you will save money on your power bills too!

3. Government Concessions and Incentives

The Australian Government offers more concessions and incentives to those buying  a new home, so you will be able to enjoy things like the home owner’s grant and stamp duty concessions. These will depend on the state, but you could end up with savings of thousands of dollar on your purchase in buy a new property. For example, you may be around $10,000 better off through the first home owner’s grant by buying something new. Check you r state’s government website for the exact figures.

4. Greater Choice and Flexibility

When you buy a new house, you may be able to purchase off the plan. This means that you’ll have a wide range of properties to choose between, letting you choose the best properties first. You may even be able to choose specific details to suit your tastes, such as colour scheme and to upgrade to premium appliances.

5. You’ll Have More Time

Buying a new property off the plan usually involves a longer settlement time, because a property normally takes between one and two years to build. This gives you more time to save up for a deposit and more time before you need to start making mortgage repayments. You may even find that your new property has grown in value by the settlement date, giving you an instant growth in equity.

6. Tax Offsets

New properties have much greater depreciation savings in the first year which means you can reduce your taxable income. You can claim both building depreciation and depreciation on internal fittings and features and immediately write off some costs. Maximum tax deductions are around 2.5% over 40 years, adding up to significant savings on tax.

7. Capital Gains

New properties represent better capital gains, because you lock in the price of the property at the moment you buy off the plan. From there, if your property goes up in value you won’t need to pay any more. With strong growth in the housing market, it is not uncommon for this growth to be significant, up to around $100,000! You can then leverage this capital growth to buy another property and continue building your real estate portfolio.

8. Better Security

Thanks to developments in home security, new homes tend to be safer. New houses are more likely to have things like intercom and key card access for entry to the building or car park, as well as to access the lifts. This is not only better for your or your tenant’s security, but means a smaller insurance bill.

9. Better Rental Returns

Because tenants prefer new homes, you will not only attract better quality tenants, but you’ll be able to charge much higher rent. These kind of tenants are also more like to stay long-term, meaning less turnover in tenants, which in turn translates into fewer vacancies and better rental returns.

10. Statutory Protections

In Australia, builders are required to take out home warranty insurance on new builds which protects the buyer if there are any major building defects. Additionally, because all fixtures and appliances are new, many of these will be covered under manufacturer’s warranties and so your on-going costs will be minimized.

Are you feeling the weight of a large debt? This could be a home mortgage, a person loan, credit card debit or a combination of several debts.

If you are consistently struggling to make repayments, this can have knock-on effects for all other aspects of your life. These 10 tips for debt elimination strategies will help you to free you from your debt as soon as possible.

1. Rapid Pay Off or “Debt Avalanche”

If you have two or more debts to pay off, one good technique can be to select one and pay this off as quickly as possible, before addressing your other debts. This is called a rapid pay off or “debt avalanche”. The advantage of this approach is that you will eliminate this first debt as soon as possible, meaning that you will no longer be paying interest or fees on that debt. Once the first debt is paid off, you can turn your attention to other debts and apply the same technique.

Carefully budget your income and expenditure and put all available money towards your debt avalanche. If you receive any extra cash, put this toward the debt also.

In order to choose which debt you will pay first through rapid pay off, here is a simple 6 step process to use the ‘debt avalanche’ technique:

1) List out all your debts: who is owed and for what.

2) Include how much is owed for each debt and the total balance.

3) Record the minimum monthly repayments on each.

4) Take the amount owed on each debt and divide this by the minimum monthly repayment.

5) List the interest rate on each debt.

6) Decide which debt to pay off first. The debt which has the lowest number from this calculation will be the one which is most greatly impacting your cash flow in the short term, and so the one which you want to pay off first through your debt avalanche. This will generally by the debt with the highest interest rates, but not always.

2. Debt Consolidation

Consolidating your debts together can be a great way to reduce interest and fees, and will save you money in the long run while you pay off your debts. In practice, debt consolidation means taking out a bigger loan and paying off your smaller loans. Usually, it is best practice to increase the amount of the one of your debts which has the lowest interest rate and lowest monthly repayments, which is most often your home loan.

Once you have increased your home loan and used this amount to pay off smaller, higher interest debts with higher monthly repayments your debt will all be under one loan with a single, lower monthly repayment. You will also be accruing less interest in total each month, meaning more of your repayments are going toward paying off the principle of the loan rather than simply paying interest.

To increase your home loan you can either refinance your mortgage with your current lender, or seek refinancing with another institution. Other things to keep in mind when refinancing are to try to find an option where you make fortnightly rather than monthly repayments, and that the bank or mortgage lender makes calculations on your loan daily rather than monthly – both these things can represent significant savings. And, of course, make sure that you are meeting your repayments and do not let small debts accumulate again!

3.  Line-of-credit

Another strategy you could use to consolidate and ultimately eliminate your debt is through a line-of-credit loan, though this is a somewhat aggressive and even risky strategy. Under a line-of-credit loan, you use your house as security against a large loan from a bank or financial institution, who will offer you a more favorable interest rate compared to a credit card or personal loan, because they have your house as a guarantee. This way, the interest rate will be approximately the same as a home loan, so this can be a good alternative to refinancing your mortgage should that not be a viable option.

In a line-of-credit loan, also known as a “revolving line of credit”, the lender will usually lend up to 80% of the value of your house and as you be able to access extra money (“credit”) as you need it, up to the maximum amount of credit allowed. This means even as you pay down your debt, you can draw extra credit if you need it. The bank will calculate interest on a daily basis based on your loan balance. Therefore, the lower you keep the balance overall even if you need to occasionally borrow more to meet expenses, the less interest you will pay overall.

4. Draw Passive Income from Equity

If you have a large asset like a house, whatever percentage of this you own outright is equity which you have. You can therefore use this equity to buy further assets which generate a positive cash flow overall, after the costs of loans have been considered. These are known as “higher income yielding assets” and generate extra income which you can then use to pay down your debts.

This can be any kind of investment, but you need to do careful research to make sure that this investment will definitely deliver a positive cash flow overall. Additionally, you need to consider the time and effort necessary to manage this investment and whether that is justified by the income it generates.

5. When All Else Fails

If your financial situation is too severe, or has progressed too far beyond these debt consolidation strategies, the next steps may be more around making arrangements with your creditors to manage your debt rather than simply looking to reduce it over time. These next strategies are the “last resort” techniques which should be applied when all else fails.

6. Informal Agreement

Your creditors may also agree to enter an informal agreement or informal arrangement to give you a little more time. This agreement is non-legally binding but your creditors allow you extra time to pay your debt before they proceed with legal action. Creditors will usually agree to this in specific circumstances, including genuine financial hardship, and generally all of your creditors will need to agree or otherwise it may jeopardize the overall agreement.

7. Debt Agreement

You may be able to come to an agreement with your creditors which will make your debt more manageable, for example through changing or delaying the amounts of regular repayments. These agreements are legally binding to all parties and may involve you putting up some kind of guarantee, for example an arrangement where the creditor will be allowed to seize your house if repayments are not made.

These kinds of agreements have very specific criteria, so careful investigation is needed. For example, you cannot set up a debt agreement if you have previously been bankrupt. It is also worth noting that a debt agreement may affect your credit rating, and failure to follow through on the agreement (as in make the agreed repayments) can officially make you bankrupt.

8. Part IX and X Arrangements

Part IX and Part X arrangements are an alternative to bankruptcy, although these are only an option if all creditors agree (or at least a majority of creditors holding 75% of the dollar value of your debts). The advantage of Part IX and X arrangements is that you may still be able to keep some of your assets and even continue to operate your business.

Under these arrangements, a proposal is drawn up and accepted by a majority of creditors, with an administrator appointed to manage the arrangement. Under Part X this must be a registered trustee. In Part IX, the administration may be a friend or associate, but there is a limit on your assets and debts.

9. Bankruptcy

Bankruptcy is certainly something which should only be considered as a last resort, and has many long-term impacts. Once all alternatives have been investigated and exhausted, however, bankruptcy may be your only remaining option. Bankruptcy can occur either voluntary (that is if you declare yourself bankrupt), or through a creditor or creditors’ action.

Once you have been declared bankrupt, any remaining unsecured creditors are no longer able to take action against you in order to satisfy their debt, though they may lodge claims in the bankruptcy. However, you will then be considered bankrupt for at least 3 years, and in some cases 5 or 8 years. During this time you will be limited in terms of what assets you can own, and your credit rating will be severely damaged. You are also still liable to pay Government debts, legal fines, on-going expenses such as utilities bills and maintenance payments.

10. How To Prevent Crippling Debt

Rather than resorting to bankruptcy or Part IX or X measures, it is much better to avoid uncontrollable of crippling financial debt in the first place. Seeking advice from a financial advisor on debt management and debt elimination as early as possible, even at the time of taking out the loan, will help to do this. A financial advisor will also be able to help you decide which of the strategies mentioned here are best for your personal situation. Above all, the best thing you can do is address your debt opening and directly, rather than ignoring it or avoiding the issue.

1. What do you want?

There are two significant categories of property strategies: growth producing a strategy and income generating strategy.

You can use either of the strategies depending on what you are after and what you want to gain from your property investments. There is only, but a thin line between growth properties and income properties, mainly because purchasing a property can earn you both an extraordinary growth and an enormous income.

There are many strategies that property investors can use. The most important thing is to understand how each plan works, their advantages and disadvantages, the one that is ideal for you and the one that supports your goals and the direction you are moving to.

You should note that there are no specific rules to this; there is no right or wrong way to make property investments. It all boils down to your present, where you see yourself tomorrow and the time, effort, and risk you are willing to take before you achieve your aim.

Property is one of the best rewarding investment strategies. Even when you seem to make a wrong investment decision, if you still hang on for a while, you will hardly lose your money. Ensure that any decision you are making as regards property investments fit into your portfolio, and it will not expose you to high risk.

2. Getting yourself informed

“Knowledge,” they say, “is power.” You won’t be exposed to many risks when you educate yourself. If you know much about a topic irrespective of the field, industry, or sector, you have low chances of facing threats in that area. When you get yourself informed about things that have to do with real estate and its management, you are less likely to be faced with risks such as a property not being zoned for immediate use, being stuck with GST bills or even a bad lease.

With more knowledge, you have more confidence at your disposal. It confers on you, not just the ability to ask more questions but also to ask the appropriate questions. In that way, you get the required answers that would help you make wise decisions.

3. Analysis of portfolio

Nothing much seems to be said about this aspect of investing yet, and it is an important one. It doesn’t matter the sort of deal you come across, if it isn’t suitable for your portfolio, then it is not the right one for you. This doesn’t mean it is not the right one for another person either.

As you gain more knowledge and become more proficient in property investment, you get to a certain level where you have developed your investment intuitions to the point that you can take investment decisions taking into consideration what best suits your personality, your timeframe, your goals, your financial level and then the personal commitment you have towards possessing wealth.

4. Getting started and knowing your starting point

Most Australians address the issue of money management before they even start investing. The most crucial money management skills people need to learn are record keeping, budgeting, and also keeping account of the inflow and outflow of your money.

You should take note of your assets and liabilities and know your financial capability. What do you gain on a monthly, bi-weekly, and weekly basis? What exactly does your income look like? You should know all that. This still boils down to record keeping. With record keeping, you would be able to give a more accurate assessment of your financial status.

5. The concept of ‘good debt’ and ‘bad debt.’

Good debts are usually tax deductible as they are acquired to buy assets that generate more income than the asset itself costs. It is the debt between you and the structures you purchased; you are both the banker and the borrower. This is the right way of protecting your assets as your structure will get paid before any other potential litigant or a creditor that is not secured.

Bad debt, just like its name sounds is the sort of debt that leaves your poor. With this sort of debt, you get to pay huge interests e.g., the store card debt and the credit card debt. It would help if you had these debts eliminated as soon as you can.

6. What is the purchasing power of your money?

To attain success, you have to ask yourself the appropriate questions. The question, “how much can your money buy?” is an excellent place to start. It would be best if you always had in mind that in property investments, your starting capital should be able to cover your deposits (from 5% to 30%, ideally 20%) and the property cost (that includes the price of forming the structure, legal fees, stamp duty). It should also cover the cost of whatever it is you want to do on that property to achieve your desired purpose for purchasing it in the first place e.g., loss of extending and renovating it.

If you understand this, you are one step ahead of being a successful investor as this will go a long way to determine how much you can afford to pay for a property and also where you need to search for the property within this price range.

7. How far are you willing to go to get the right deal?

Price should be the first factor you should consider when investing. The next element in line to that is how far you are willing to go to get exactly what fits your price range. If you do not have the right answer to this, then, it is high time you have a rethink on your strategy, motivation, and determination. Sometimes you might have to drive a long distance to get a deal. Some are willing to do everything necessary to start up their property investment. A family purchased a $79,000 property after six hours drive. With this investment, they were able to buy their PPR and are now into multi-million dollar deals. How far are you willing to go?

8. What is your timeline for sale?

When choosing the strategy to use for your property investment, time is a factor that should not be overlooked. You should know that some plans would require more labor and input from you. Hence, if you do not have much time at your disposal, you need to go for a strategy that won’t take much of your time or require much input from you.

9. Make investments that would help strengthen your weakness

As an investor, you should already know your weak points so that the next property deal you would be striking would be one that reinforces your investment weaknesses.

Lets’ take, for instance, you have equity that has low serviceability, you would need a deal that focuses more on cash flow. This is to help increase your income and thus, serviceability from the angle of the bank. This implies that banks will favour you more when you come seeking for a loan for your next property.

In the other hand, if your investment is already on high cash flow like a business but low on equity then your next deal should be geared at one that gains ownership or value so that when you want to take a loan from the bank for your next sale. You will have enough security to cover up for it.

10. Do a review of where you started when you purchase/sell a property

Your financial status changes with each property you buy or sell. This means that each time you have a new starting point hence, the need for you to make a new assessment of what next your portfolio needs, your original price point, your new timeframe and every other detail we pointed out above. This is an ongoing project for you, and you need to make adjustments continuously; it makes it more fun.

As you move towards financial security, whether through investing in property or other methods, it becomes increasing important to seek financial advice. Having regular, professional advice about your finances is essential, and for this reason it is important to hire a great accountant. Here are our top 10 tips for questions to ask your accountant.

1. Are you electronic or paper-based? Some accountants prefer to work electronically, through emails and online or virtual documents, whereas others deal in physical paperwork. Depending on your preference, you’ll want to find someone who works the same way you do.
2. Do you have your own investment properties? Accountants who have their own investment properties have an intimate personal knowledge of the deductions, risks and advantages of investing in property. They don’t need to own their own property to have this knowledge, of course, but it certainly helps.
3. How big is your accountancy practice? What is your role? There is not necessarily a right or wrong answer to this, as it is largely personal preference. You may prefer to work with a bigger firm and the resources that involves, or you could look for a sole practitioner or a smaller firm where your accountant is the partner, so you will receive personal service and attention. Either way, you should find this out in advance to make the right decision.
4. What services does your practice offer? The scope and breadth of services accountants offer can vary widely, so this will depend on what you’re looking for. You may only need assistance with your end of year tax return, or may want year-round advice and consultations.
5. Do I like this person? This of course is a question for yourself rather than your accountant, but it is an important one. Your relationship with your accountant is important, so you need to make sure you click with them on a personal level. Likewise, they need to have a thorough understanding of your business, goals and vision in order to give you the best advice.
6. How do you charge for your services? Accountants may charge an hourly rate, or they may charge on the basis of the tasks to be completed. Usually the latter is the better option from the client’s perspective.
7. Do you regularly undertake professional training? Because relevant laws and regulations are constantly changing, you should look for an accountant who keeps their knowledge up to date through regularly attending courses and seminars.
8. What are the scope of your services? Some accountants will purely focus on subjects relevant to tax, whereas others can give you advice on a range of issues from insurance, wills and even budgeting.You may or may not want this, but it’s good to find out.
9. Can you help with a Self Managed Super Fund? If you are looking to invest in a property with a SMSF, or may wish to in the future, you should check whether the accountant can help you with this (or if they agree it is a good idea).
10. What licenses to you have? Check what degree and subsequent qualifications they have, such as a CPA or similar. You can also verify this online at www.tpb.gov.au.