Construction

Just recently, I got into drinking dandelion coffee. I know, I’m weird, but you should see me on real coffee !!! Not good. Not nice.

So here I am with a dandy coffee and laptop, and today’s theme is construction.

Renovating 3 houses in a row, including a subdivision each time, has in many ways been a lot simpler than organizing the construction of a very small, very energy efficient house on our block of land.

It seems that even just getting permits to plan and build have been fraught with small and big lessons of how to deal with those desk- people, who continually change faces, and therefore criteria to actually get signed off.

How about the planner, who I paid good money to in order to submit our plans but who failed to make sure that council acknowledged the fact that he submitted them. Six weeks later, when I asked him how the application is proceeding I find out that they have been sitting in reception at the planning department because they wanted one extra bit of paper: proof of title- which is also ridiculous, because they had just issued it!

After that, because of staff issues it took council from May to the very end of October to give permission to plan the building.

(to be fair, one mistake I had made was to ‘forget’ that the land surveyor had said in the beginning that because of an overlay, I would have to have another planning application to the application to subdivide, if I didn’t include the plan of the dwelling initially.)

Next the building permit.

Says one building surveyor: it’s all good, we’ll send you out the permit in the mail after I satisfied lists and lists of documents they needed—next thing you know –he’s left the office that he’s worked in for many years and in his footsteps is some dude who needs more and more information, proof and utter detailed nonsense to actually let me build a structure that’s been built hundreds of times before!

Just today I had to make the building company understand, that I won’t get a building permit if they don’t give me engineering drawings. But they only give them out normally if the initial 25% construction deposit has been paid- which I can only pay once the contract is in place-which they haven’t sent me because I don’t’ have a building permit! AHHHHH…

There are a lot of chicken and egg situations in the building and construction sector.

And you are probably going to ask me: Why isn’t the building company doing the permit? Apparently they are not a registered building company, – and that’s why I had to become an owner-builder. Another 13 different documents and fees to pay.

Even after all this, I’m still confident that once we get the paper work sorted, we will end up with a good product- cost effective and energy efficient- which was my main concern.

Am I going to use the same construction company in our next construction?

Ask me in 6 months. Or could be 6 years. Contingency plan.

Subdivision Heaven

Hi,

Might as well keep on telling the rest of the story 🙂

Thank you for those who actually visited my blog, I feel honoured. Of course I welcome any feed back or questions .

About our new project- 10 000 sqm with a 3 bed house and massive storage shed :

Plans to subdivide into 3 lots as a Stage 1 are being assessed by council as we speak. We are going to sell the existing house with a minor renovation and also sell one of the building blocks (500 sqm) . We are keeping the shed and about 9000 sqm.

Stage 2 may never happen, as sewerage connections could amount to over $100 000 and take more than 12 months, because of the discontinued railway track, which is in between our back block and the sewer point. Of course none of that is a surprise to us -we had all that checked out before we signed up to buy it. That’s called DUE DILIGENCE ! Stage 1 however makes enough profit to warrant the purchase ! (over $60 000 plus mortgage free shed and 9000 sqm)

The house and large land next door is for sale, and if we bought it, we could share/halve subdivision costs for Stage 2 – and that would make it even more attractive. We have not yet decided on that.

That would mean we could have up to 10 blocks for sale, given that we want to keep up the good old country tradition of quarter acre blocks.  (The start of an eco village???) The road, which would be the access to all those blocks, would have to be upgraded at our cost, to cope with the increased traffic.

So far, we have planted over 40  fruit trees and many more other trees, put extensive vegie gardens and also ornamentals in. The big paddock was deep ripped, using a Yeoman’s plough to counteract the compacting of the soil by horses from the previous owner. That was ONE way of renovating the land. A soil test revealed that it was suitable for extensive cropping, especially fruit and nut varieties after applying the right amount of gypsum.

We are only 5 mins walk away from a  primary school, post office, shop and pub, and sports facilities. What a great place to live! Blocks will sell like hot cakes ! Orders taken now 🙂

Systems

Definition by thefreedictionary.com

8. An organized and coordinated method; a procedure.

I am yet to create a system in my investing strategies.

Moving around from one town to the other doesn’t help with getting a list of reliable tradies, or shopping for stock. Every town has a slightly different demographic, too, and so to produce a result that suits the market, it has to be specific to the town you’re selling or investing in. You get to know people at the planning department at council, your local hardware shop, the real estate agents etc.Doing different types of deals every time is also a great way to slow things down.( with different types I mean doing a reno and subdivision on a 50 ‘s house, then a bigger subdivision and reno on a 80’s house, then a period home….)

To create a strategy that really works, and is simple to repeat  one needs to have ‘relationships’ with all people involved.

It’s all about creating a pattern that can be followed almost blindly -so you don’t have to re invent the wheel every time!

I’ll elaborate some other time .

 

Rumpelstiltskin

Another day in the life of ME.

Today, I went back the last project to clean up some more stuff in Lot 2, which we have a sales contract for.

Settlement  for Lots 1 , 2 and 3 will happen in about 2 -3 weeks, and I have cleared all the rubbish out, made a pile of burnable materials and put a match to it ! Then I did a little dance around it (after making sure no neighbours were peeking) and I was all happy and looking forward to having won the Queen’s first baby ! (Here, you have to know the story of Rumpel….it’s a Grimm’s Fairytale I believe)

Well , actually , I was happy about having been to the Bank and finding out that my cash situation will be rather positive, once settlement happens!

It really does mean that I will become a full time property Queen and I can’t tell you how I have longed for it !!! Although it still feels about 35%  unbelievable, the rest of me is all ready for it and beaming ! 🙂   (:

I want to say a very big thank you to my Mentors Adrian and Fiona , Steve and the crew from property investing, Dean and Elise and the guys at Rookie. It has taken me  over 10 years (although only 2.5 years since taking action) to grow and develop into who I am today, and I have had some amazing help along the way. I’m writing this with tears welling up, tears of joy and accomplishment.

I just hope I can give some back, too….

Speaking of which, I also went to see my EX partner, and dragged him into a real estate agency to sign up to renting his little cottage out- as the repayments were eating away his nest-egg and it’s not a good time to sell right now. He will be signing up tomorrow. JOY !!!

So here I am at the end of a very big day and I’m excited and full of wonder and fulfillment- the way I have changed my life from a very poor single mum to a developer is proof to a powerful truth:

What you focus on will happen!

(So, what are you focusing on?)

Hail and Sunshine

The news today : My favourite handyman  Doug didn’t get the job he applied for !!! So that means, he’ll be here instead, working with me to transform this tired old house into a pretty one. I said to him that he doesn’t really need to apply for a job because he already has one ! By the time we have finished renovations here, we will be building. Then we will have bought another place to renovate. There could be years of work here! I also told him that he should tell me what jobs he doesn’t want to do- I will get someone else to do them. I think that made him happy !!!

It’s very important to keep your tradies happy ! (I should try that sometime with my family)

Today, Doug and I finished the insulation in the roof. We needed one more bag of insulation wool to complete the job- and guess who dropped in? Maureen, my good friend who has everything imaginable in her storage sheds. So I got a bag of her for $30 and laid it out in the ceiling.

We also tried to solve the problem of the leaking roof. But to no avail. Every time a rain shower, or hail, or driving rain hit the valley in the old roof, it leaked into the hallway again. There’s a big bucket under the area now. As you can see below, the roof is probably the very worst thing about this house. Very rusty. But I think it’s actually sexy. Don’t you?

Tomorrow, we will perform surgery on the steps out the back door- very steep and with a narrow step platform. The plan is to extend the platform.

We will also make the railings prettier and safer. Sanding and painting later in the season, when it’s not so wet.

This is me signing off now…. bye. Feel free to comment !

Motivation

I thought I might mention that magical word.

It’s a great motivator when you think that in 2.5 years you could be, like me, living of investing in property full time ! And it’s not even a full time job, if you don’t want it to be- so you’re not replacing one slavery ( the slavery of working for the MAN) with another (the enslaving of oneself by oneself).

Yes, I am proud to say that I could afford to drop my other business as soon as our next property settlement happens (only weeks away)!!!!! It’s a wonderful feeling and I got to tell someone in the supermarket today that I’m about to be FREE.

Not that I don’t love my other job, I just don’t like the business… I’ll explain in a later post.

To think that I can choose when to work and how long for and that the only deadlines I have are the ones I set myself is just heavenly.

Not only that, I’m actually on the brink of making some serious money ! Or if I want to, I can just potter and do one per year or so, and laugh all the way home. There’s always about $50 000 to make on a property, and I can easily live on that. And give heaps to charity. And have holidays.

I like to think that abundance happens, and like everything, we have to let it. I have worked very hard trying to change my “poverty consciousness”, which was , as I see it now, just a reaction to my parents. I felt as a child that money and social standing (in the village life) was more important to my parents than people.  Don’t get me wrong, I think they did the best they could and felt that providing us kids with more material security than necessary was the right thing to do. So I took a long time to understand that money wasn’t the evil, heartless thing some people make it out to be- when they have experienced people close to them being too focused on financing life rather than living it- but that money is just a means and we can choose to use it to do good things or not so good things.
And also don’t get me wrong- I’m not blaming my parents for not having time for me or always trying to buy me clothes when I wanted some love- that is in the past and I have only myself to blame for not learning the lessons faster here: Whatever you focus on is what happens. And bringing up children in extreme poverty but with lots of love is still not a balanced way of living. And a butterfly is not a recovering caterpillar.

So my motivation has changed and grown over the years. I started off just wanting to change the fact that I could never afford anything and therefore kept myself from dreaming or thinking BIG (as if I was not worth anything). Then I wanted to create wealth to move it from the first world to the third (feeling guilty for having a better life than many). After that I lost hope for a while, because by then, I had done a lot of financial education in the property section, but could not get started on my dreams( for many reasons).

Now, I feel that I must look after myself first and create myself a home that I haven’t had for almost forever. (I must have moved house 20+ times in the last 20 years). Because I’m worth it and because I’m not going to get ‘drunk’ on having too much money and wasting it. In the meantime, I’m already giving to charity, and when I have given myself enough back for all the hard work, I will do even more charity. One of my huge motivators is to provide energy efficient, cheap to run homes with beautiful edible gardens all around for people to rent and enjoy. Because I’ve never had that good fortune myself, I want to give that to others.

I’m almost there 🙂

The Joy of living in the rubble…

17 th August 2012

Now that I’ve started blogging, the internet gets cut off.

Well, since I’ve been in this house ( three weeks), which by the way I really don’t mind too much-it’s actually the best house we’ve bought so far in regards to smell, how dirty it is, and how inconvenient- I have had at some stage no water (because of a large water leak in a pipe), no electricity ( because of works done by power company) and therefore no hot water ( it’s gas but needs electricity to run) and have almost run out of fire wood at one time.

The first few months living in my renovators are usually very uncomfortable, but this here is actually quite suitable for me. I basically live in the kitchen and lounge room part, as it is simply too cold to heat the un-insulated rooms, of which there are 5. There is a very warm fire going 24 hours a day and I can even cook on it.

Having said that, I promised myself that I would never again live in a renovator. It puts a lot of strain on the family- but as my son is practically moved out and my partner’s children are with their mother until December, and my partner is overseas, the only person it puts strain on is ME. And I’m actually  loving it. The floorboards are great for having three dogs living inside in the middle of a very cold and wet winter in central Victoria.

It is an old weatherboard house, about 100 years old, the sub-floor is very sound with beautiful floorboards almost all throughout. Lots of period features including lining board ceilings and walls, original doors and handles (although some are in need of…something) original windows and 3 open fireplaces plus another chimney for the wood heater. The kitchen and bathroom will need updating, but I will leave some original features, including claw foot bath tub, and possibly the lino in the kitchen.

Here’s a word of warning for all you first time investors :

Don’t buy an old house, unless like this one, the foundations have been updated, and there are no other major costs like new wiring, plumbing, or roofing. With old houses, you have to be very lucky to get a partly restored house like this in the main part of a popular town, with enough back yard to subdivide and build on. With access from the parallel street- so you don’t have to have a drive way through the side of the front house.

To make any money from a renovation, you should not spend more than 10% of the purchase price, or you are very unlikely to even get your money back.

You also should have enough money in the deal so that you don’t have to do all the painting, tiling, insulating, cleaning, repairing and everything else. After about 3 houses, even I will get the message.

Of course, keep doing the thing that you love doing. But only if you are as good as the professionals. Otherwise there’s no point really.

Who Am I?

Hello,

I am a 40 something, female  Property Investor, wanting to share some stories and lessons learned the easy and the hard way.