Where to Invest in property these days?

NickCarraway

Might sound crazy, but with house prices falling, and if you are in the fortunate position of having some money to invest, where in Ireland would you recommend buying a house? Obviously this would be for long term gains, not short-term.

I remember as a student in Galway, one landlady i had (unscrupulous old hag, penny pinched in every way possible except for a mouth full of gold teeth) owned between 5 and 8 houses in Galway. She and her husband bought them back in the 70's and 80's, barley fixed em up and were making a mint off them renting them to students. Even if they sold em today, they'd make out like bandits!

My bet is on Athenry, Co. Galway.
25 km from Galway, soon to be an important transport hub. Galway-Dublin and Limerick-Galway motorways will meet just outside town as will the Galway-Dublin trainline and the Western Rail Corridor. Heard rumours that a commuter rail service into Galway might be on the cards.

AARRRGH

Our economy is so screwed and will be screwed for many years. I would not invest in Irish property. In fact, I would not invest in property at all.

Consider buying shares. For nearly every company, including decent companies, they are very low at the moment.

uncanny

Irish property = toxic overpriced crap.

Long way to go yet. Around the end of 2010 it might be time to start sniffing around amoungst the wreckage.

jdivision

NickCarraway wrote: »

the Western Rail Corridor.

That won't be built. Ever.

uncanny

Heard rumours that a commuter rail service into Galway might be on the cards.

I heard rumours that the Winter Olympics are going to be held in Athenry in 2016. And Ryanair are going to start flying there soon.

Better get in quick folks.

Fighting Irish

lol this has to be a joke

RATM

A canny investor will always make money, even in a declining market.

OP if you are in property for the long term then I'd be looking at London. Because of the currency shift you are not only getting 12-15% off what it would have cost you 12 months ago but also prices are dropping there too.

A suburb like Mayfair or Knightsbridge, where there are plenty of Arabs will always hold its value in the long term.

If you can't afford there then look into the East End, specifically surburbs that are going to get a massive facelift in terms of infrastructure for the 2012 Olympics. Buy as near to a tube station as possible( or proposed one in the case of the new line ) and you can't go too far wrong.

I'd stay out of the Irish market for now but London, as one of the world's top 5 major cities, will always bounce back from a property correction.

uncanny

Yes, like Tokyo did :rolleyes:

mikemac

I'd say the Olympic angle has already been built into any prices you see in East London.

Much like every new property development remotely close to Dublins Luas lines had a massive pictures of the trams on the marketing brochures.
Even if the Luas was 30 minutes walk away!

EnoughSaid

uncanny wrote: »

I heard rumours that the Winter Olympics are going to be held in Athenry in 2016. And Ryanair are going to start flying there soon.

Better get in quick folks.

Are there any hills in the fields of Anthery (for the downhill)? Are the skis going to have in built wheels in case there is no snow?

Raskolnikov

With the collapse of Sterling, property in Northern Ireland has become 25% cheaper.

NickCarraway

jdivision wrote: »

That won't be built. Ever.

The Ennis to Athenry bit is currently being built.

uncanny wrote: »

I heard rumours that the Winter Olympics are going to be held in Athenry in 2016. And Ryanair are going to start flying there soon.

Better get in quick folks.

I sense sarcasm. Its not like I'm making stuff up to promote Athenry, like I'm the mayor of Athenry and, maybe, like, have a lot of my own money tied up in property around here and want to see their value rise or, say, the banks will come and repossess my house and kids, or something crazy like that. I mean, that just sounds mental. Come to Athenry and see the potential for yourself!!!!!!! Please.

uncanny

Yawn, just as dotcom stocks are so 1999, property is so 2006. The next 10 years of property returns will be as follows

A period of severe negative growth (deflation) followed by,
A period of zero growth (stagnation) followed by,
A period of anaemic growth (CPI inflation or less).

The only question is how long each of those periods will be over the 10 year period. We are currently in the severe deflation period and there is no telling where it will eventually bottom out, or how long that process will take. In my view there is a reasonable chance that property in Ireland will be cheaper in 2019 than it is in 2009, and as such it is a truly horrible investment prospect.

Next asset bubble please.

(edit/ as regards the humour, I was borrowing from a famous post by Auto320)

Money Shot

One bedroom apartements in Ongar are going cheap at the moment

20goto10

uncanny wrote: »

Yawn, just as dotcom stocks are so 1999, property is so 2006.

What, there's no money to be made in dot com business? There'll never be any money to be made in the property business? Nonsense. Even if the property crash lasts another 10-15 years there will still be money to be had. Already the drops are uneven. There's certain properties that will sell better, simply for the fact that they tick all the boxes. It all depends. The chances of finding a gem that will make you money long term have never been better. the only thing is you've a lot of sh!te to sift through to find it.

jmayo

20goto10 wrote: »

What, there's no money to be made in dot com business? There'll never be any money to be made in the property business? Nonsense. Even if the property crash lasts another 10-15 years there will still be money to be had. Already the drops are uneven. There's certain properties that will sell better, simply for the fact that they tick all the boxes. It all depends. The chances of finding a gem that will make you money long term have never been better. the only thing is you've a lot of sh!te to sift through to find it.

Why do I think you are an Estate Agent ?
Maybe it is the Estate Agent speak with terms like "tick all the boxes" and "finding a gem".

Why would you buy property today that could, and most likely will, be worth 20% less this time next year ?
Yeah good investment strategy.

johndaman66

EnoughSaid wrote: »

Are there any hills in the fields of Anthery

I wouldn't think so...as the song goes low lie the fields of Athenry...:)

bobbiw

with the guy who said buy london, london and new york are widely immune to long term price fixes as they are such hubs of industry.

Dublin is gone for a long time and so is the rest of Ireland. If you buy today you can guarantee that you will loose money over the next 4-5 year.

There is no way on earth that Ireland will boom again like it did in the past. there is no way there will be building on that scale again its completly gone.

In the 80s you could buy a decent house for 40k but thats because taxation was 60%+ and there were no jobs.

When there are no jobs the goverment has to find a way to pay social services and that has to come from people who are working.

Same cycle as a bubble but in reverse.

20goto10

jmayo wrote: »

Why do I think you are an Estate Agent ?
Maybe it is the Estate Agent speak with terms like "tick all the boxes" and "finding a gem".

Why would you buy property today that could, and most likely will, be worth 20% less this time next year ?
Yeah good investment strategy.

Ah here we go again with the estate agent sh!te. No I'm not an estate agent.

Why would you invest in something that will be worth less next year? Well I would do exactly that if I had a good idea that it was going to be worth a lot in 5-10 years time. I could always wait and get it cheaper next year, but then again I might not if its sold or taken off the market. Another reason would be if it has a high rental yield.

The days of 6 month and 1 year short term property investments are long dead and hopefully will never return. Long term is a different story.

Unless you're suggesting there will never be a recovery in which case you might as well be predicting the end of civilisation. :rolleyes:

AARRRGH

20goto10 wrote: »

Unless you're suggesting there will never be a recovery in which case you might as well be predicting the end of civilisation. :rolleyes:

The problem is you don't understand what has happened in Ireland over the past 10 years. If you did you wouldn't be using language like "recovery".

Ireland had a property bubble where housing prices were insanely overpriced. They are still insanely overpriced.

There cannot be a "recovery" unless we have another property bubble. And even then it would be a temporary recovery until that bubble burst.

Considering how screwed our economy is, there is no chance of there being another bubble for at least 10 years, but most intelligent people realise we will probably never have anything like the Celtic Tiger ever again, and as a result, there will never be a "recovery" to bubble prices.

In other words, there won't and can't be a recovery.

Denial is just as dangerous as the inability to understand.

20goto10

AARRRGH wrote: »

The problem is you don't understand what has happened in Ireland over the past 10 years. If you did you wouldn't be using language like "recovery".

Ireland had a property bubble where housing prices were insanely overpriced. They are still insanely overpriced.

There cannot be a "recovery" unless we have another property bubble. And even then it would be a temporary recovery until that bubble burst.

Considering how screwed our economy is, there is no chance of there being another bubble for at least 10 years, but most intelligent people realise we will probably never have anything like the Celtic Tiger ever again, and as a result, there will never be a "recovery" to bubble prices.

In other words, there won't and can't be a recovery.

Denial is just as dangerous as the inability to understand.

You're telling me I don't understand whats going on and in the same post you're talking as if recovery is a return to the boom times :rolleyes:

AARRRGH

20goto10 wrote: »

You're telling me I don't understand whats going on and in the same post you're talking as if recovery is a return to the boom times :rolleyes:

Yes.

Please tell me how we can have a price "recovery" without having another property bubble?

GeeNorm

AARRRGH wrote: »

In other words, there won't and can't be a recovery.

They say to buy at the point of maximum pessimism... could this be it?:)

20goto10

AARRRGH wrote: »

Yes.

Please tell me how we can have a price "recovery" without having another property bubble?

I'm not talking about prices recovering to 2006 levels. I'm talking about a system recovery which starts with FTBs returning to the market.

ntlbell

20goto10 wrote: »

I'm not talking about prices recovering to 2006 levels. I'm talking about a system recovery which starts with FTBs returning to the market.

but there is no indications or evidence that the "system recovery" is around the corner, all the evidence points to a continuation of plummeting property prices so what is the benefit of buying now?

rental market in free fall
1200-1500 job losses per day.
emigration is rampant
property massively over priced
complete lack of confidence in the banks

can you give us a few benefits of buying today?

20goto10

ntlbell wrote: »

but there is no indications or evidence that the "system recovery" is around the corner, all the evidence points to a continuation of plummeting property prices so what is the benefit of buying now?

rental market in free fall
1200-1500 job losses per day.
emigration is rampant
property massively over priced
complete lack of confidence in the banks

can you give us a few benefits of buying today?

I'm talking long term. Decline in rental market would definitely be a concern for the interim though. You'd need to really stress test that and again I'm talking about good property...something that is hard to come by but I don't think impossible.

AARRRGH

I think there might be long term value, but only if you hold off buying for perhaps four or five years.

ntlbell

20goto10 wrote: »

I'm talking long term. Decline in rental market would definitely be a concern for the interim though. You'd need to really stress test that and again I'm talking about good property...something that is hard to come by but I don't think impossible.

So what's the difference in not buying now saving and earning a good % yield on your cash (making money now) instead of losing 10-15% + interest charges per year and buying in a few years time.

you enter a rising property market after making money on your cash for the last few years, have much lower mortgage repayments have a much bigger down payment would this not equal a much bigger profit in the long run?

long term or not why not make money now instead of losing with a view to buying something later on down the road to make profit long term

whatever way you look at it losing money now doesn't make any sense and doesn't sound like a very good strategy

20goto10

ntlbell wrote: »

So what's the difference in not buying now saving and earning a good % yield on your cash (making money now) instead of losing 10-15% + interest charges per year and buying in a few years time.

you enter a rising property market after making money on your cash for the last few years, have much lower mortgage repayments have a much bigger down payment would this not equal a much bigger profit in the long run?

long term or not why not make money now instead of losing with a view to buying something later on down the road to make profit long term

whatever way you look at it losing money now doesn't make any sense and doesn't sound like a very good strategy

How exactly are you losing money? This is boom talk turned on its head! Nothing happens until you sell it. If it makes you feel any better don't keep revisiting the market value until you are ready to sell in 10-15 years time. the difference between now and waiting is the difference between getting a sweet property and not. But having said that, there'll be plenty more sweet properties to come. I suppose I never thought about it in that respect.

bobbiw

I personaly dont think property will rise in value in Ireland again.

i think the country will go bankrupt and will need to be fully absorbed into some european situation.

ireland is in a mess, and most people there are too uneducated to take care of that mess.

ntlbell

20goto10 wrote: »

How exactly are you losing money? This is boom talk turned on its head! Nothing happens until you sell it. If it makes you feel any better don't keep revisiting the market value until you are ready to sell in 10-15 years time. the difference between now and waiting is the difference between getting a sweet property and not. But having said that, there'll be plenty more sweet properties to come. I suppose I never thought about it in that respect.

in many spots.

First of all I'm paying interest on an overpriced asset.
secondly the rent's keep falling so I'd have to make up the difference.
thirdly there is a HUGE amount of rental properties and the number is growing at a drastic rate so I might have a much lower occupancy rate again I would have to make up the difference.

so my question is how do you benefit to buy now when down the road you can get the same property at a heavily discounted price and you actually make money with your cash today instead of putting it into a depreciating asset?

can you explain this?