Tip 1 Think like the tenant

This is the key to a good residential investment property.
The first thing you need to work out is ‘what type of tenant do I want?’

Where do they work? what do they like to do? is it for a family/couple or single person?

Once these have been answered you can then source the areas best to suit these clients.

This might sound weird to some of you, or discrimination to others, but if you are small family, you want your children going to the best schools, which can mean there is a geographic limit to the areas you can live as the public schools have catchment area where they accepts children form only these areas.

In the most recent news  there has been a mini boom in the catchment areas of good schools. So if your target market is for a family this is key information.

Good public transport to the main working areas is also a key factor for all properties. I find as a real estate agent that the areas with the better public transport are the ones that are generally easier to rent to clients and ones with good infrastructure such a shops. ( we will go into this further in another tip)

This idea of thinking from the tenants perspective is I find the best way to filter out unsuitable properties.

investor tips 1 think like a tenant