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You’ve found the property which you would like to buy as an investment. Your accountant tells you to buy it in one name for tax purposes. Your financial adviser tells you to buy it in the names of all purchasers to equally assign the assets. Your lawyer suggests joint tenancy to make it easier if you die! But with so many options, how can you know what will be the best for you both now, and in the future?

It may seem a simple task, but deciding exactly how to buy your investment property to ensure it’s tax effectiveness today and in the future is perhaps one of the most important jobs you’ll ever have, and one which requires thought and planning. Where you’re the sole purchaser, there is little to think about, but where more than one purchaser is involved, it’s vital the structure is right at the outset. Once purchased, there is little room for alteration and any small change after settlement can be very costly…

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FEWER than 20 per cent of Australia’s baby boomers have adequate superannuation and private insurance cover to fund their health care in retirement, a new study finds. The study by Fujitsu Consulting paints a bleak picture about the healthcare system’s ability to handle ageing baby boomers. It found nearly 60 per cent of the 6000 people surveyed did not have private health insurance and many did not know how they would pay for medical care in their old age.

Many thought they would get by in retirement with the help of government or inheritance, director Martin North said. “There are about 5.6 million people between 45 and 65 years of age and less than a million of those have a secure future in terms of their superannuation and their health funding,” Mr North told ABC radio. “I think it’s pretty concerning for many baby boomers.”

Nearly 90 per cent of those surveyed were less confident today than they were a year ago about the outcome of their superannuation.

Source: AAP

You may have unanswered questions about specific areas of property investing; such as…

• Managing a Property Portfolio
• Negotiating Rental Agreements
• The Impact Of Interest Rate Rises
• How The Current Economic Climate May Affect Property Values
• Unlocking equity for retirement
• Property hot spots for high capital growth
• Cash flow – Expenses & tax
• Rental returns
• and so on

Each week we prepare valuable information that we make available in our newsletters; which is why we want to hear from you. Over the coming weeks, our team will compile and group all the questions we receive back from our valued readers and clients. We will use your questions and ammunition for future news articles and blogs; especially those questions that are most popular. We will also take onboard your questions when doing the final preparation for our upcoming Melbourne-based Board Room Briefing in a couple of weeks.

So if you have a question that you would like us to address, simply click here to add a blog comment with your question (or email it to us if that’s easier)

Please post your questions now!

Happy Investing,

Nick Lockhart

PS: The theme for our Boardroom Briefing in Melbourne (on the evening of Tuesday 19th August) will be: “Global Slowdown, The Credit Crisis and Property in 2008″. This event is open to the first 18 registrations only (NB: at the time of writing this there are just 11 places remaining). If you would like to attend this event or request to be notified of any upcoming Boardroom Briefing event(s) in your city please let us know: Melbourne Registration / Request For Other City

By Darren Baker-West (Senior Partner: GFM Accountants)

Whether to choose an investment property that will deliver a higher capital gain or better rental return is a difficult decision for many investors and would-be-investors alike. However, equally as important is the selection of whom or what entity should be nominated on title as purchaser of the property.

I see many clients who have spoken to their ‘mates’ who advise them that the family trust structure should be the only purchaser of property. Given that everyone’s circumstances are different, there are a number of questions that should first be asked before any decision of ownership is made.

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A friend of mine, who sadly passed away almost nine years ago, was apt to warn me never to own an investment property. Geoff (not his real name) had sadly endured a bad experience with ‘the tenant from hell’. Let me explain…

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Those of you who are regular Friday afternoon Newsletter & Blog readers will recall our announcement of our upcoming Melbourne Property Briefing; “Where Is Property Positioned In The Economy Right Now?”

The location and time has now been confirmed:

Date & Time:

Tuesday 19th August
7:00pm for a 7:15pm start
Concludes approx 9:15pm

Address:
Level 1
330 Keilor Rd
Niddrie
VIC, 3042

Contact Details (of venue):
Ph: (03) 9374 2422

Click on the map to go straight to the Google Map to get directions.

If you would like to attend this event or one like it in your city, click here for more information.

For starters, prepare for official interest rate cuts now. The Reserve Bank wants to cut next week. It will cut next month.

This is dramatically at odds with market expectations and the economentariat’s perceptions – which even after yesterday were only tentatively projecting a rate cut late in the year, with some commentators still locked into the mindset of “predicting” no further rate increases. The broad dimensions of the shift are captured in the statistics issued yesterday.

The growth in consumer spending – and credit approvals – have slowed to a walk. While the basic trade numbers have moved sharply and sustainably into the black, as the commodity boom has at last kicked in. Now the first part will receive the greatest attention. It explains the coming rate cut – cuts – and will spark criticism of the RBA for strangling the economy. Inevitably, irresistibly, the March rate increase will be castigated as “one too far”. Indeed, the “usual suspects” will be claiming all the increases were too far.
The second shift is just as significant. It means we could be heading for a current account deficit in the 2008-09 year as low as $30 billion. That would be half the $60bn predicted by Treasury in the Budget in May. It would also compare with an annualised deficit approaching $80bn as recently as the March quarter, the latest for official figures.

Such a fall comes just in the nick of time, so to speak – reducing our reliance on global financial markets when they are under such great stress and turmoil.

The retail sales and credit figures round off a series of important data on the state of the economy and put the big picture beyond all doubt. The growth rate for retail sales had been slowing from month-to-month since the middle of last year. In real terms it was barely positive in the March quarter and turned negative in the June quarter. Throw in housing finance and building approvals hitting (at least) decade-long lows; and the RBA has clearly achieved its objective of slowing consumer and related demand.

Source: Herald Sun

IT’S official, the Reserve Bank has gone too far with its relentless run of interest rate rises, with economists now calling for urgent rate cuts to save the country from full-blown recession. Grim economic data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics yesterday had our leading economists fearing the worst, with some claiming a retail recession has already arrived.

The data showed sales for the first half of 2008 had experienced the biggest slumped since records began almost 30 years ago. Morgan Stanley economist Gerard Minack said sales had fallen so dramatically it was placing thousands of jobs at risk.

“It can only be a matter of time before retailers – the largest single employer in the country – start to fire their workers,” he said.

The ABS figures show consumers, battered by interest rates, soaring fuel and food prices and rapidly rising rents, have dramatically reined in their spending in almost every category.

AMP Capital chief economist Shane Oliver urged the bank to drop rates immediately to ease the consumer pain and steer the economy out of recession.

“The RBA went too far with its rate hikes. Nobody wants to see retail spending falling as quickly as this,” he said.

Source:  -Daily Telegraph