POBH Ep 02
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[00:00:00] Welcome to Property and Other Bad Habits, the podcast where we share our obsessive love of all things real estate, overly deals for fun and talk profits, renovations, and real life case studies. If you love a good floor plan, a strong yield, and the occasional reality check, then you are in the right place.
So let's get into it.
Greetings, fabulous people. I am going to be speaking today about a topic that seems relatively straightforward to some and a big question mark to others, and that is, what do I look at when I go to an open home? And I'm not talking from a buyer's agent set of eyes necessarily. This is something that people ask me when they go on their own.
They might be using our virtual buyer agent service, and they'll say. Okay, I'm gonna go take a look at these properties on the weekend, but what should I look out for? And my answers, it differs slightly depending on what the client's needs are because some of my clients are looking for something they can add value to, or [00:01:00] perhaps they are a young family, so they really need an ease of flow that suits mom and dad with a short hallway distance away from, a younger child.
So their needs are gonna be different to the renovator who wants to come in and. Rip everything up and start all over again, but still be able to ensure they've got a nice fat profit at the other end of the scale. So this, the answers here will ebb and flow a little bit, but the fundamentals when you go to an open home, really, and it, and again, it is sometimes a little bit difficult 'cause some open homes are really busy.
If you can get in at a quieter time, perhaps be there, be one of the first there. It does help. It definitely helps when you're not shuffling past people in a hallway. And I've been to open homes where there's been over a hundred people in the property itself, which makes, even looking at where the bathtub is quite difficult.
So even more difficult if you're trying to assess what the sound is if it's, near a main road, you wanna know, am I gonna hear this at night? It could be that you're not [00:02:00] being able to get a true sense of lighting in the property because there's just too many people mingling around.
So if you can, when you can try and get into a property when it's at its best, and that could be just yourself and the agent. Unfortunately, in certain markets, that is not always possible. So let's really take into consideration here. The property that you are visiting, you already can see what it offers online.
You can all do so much research before you even get the keys and jump in your car to go to that open home. You know how many bedrooms you've got. You really should take a good look at a floor plan to see and understand what the flow is, depending on what your needs are. Also, as an investor.
Does the property make sense for who your tenants are gonna be? You really should know who wants to rent in the area you are buying in. Are you catering to student community? Are you ca catering to, double income professionals? Or perhaps it's a bit of a downsizer market, so you need to be aware of who is going to want to move into this property.
If you're an investor, you, let's just assume that you are looking at this as [00:03:00] your family home. There's so much more at stake here. You're an emotional buyer. This is the property. You're gonna have a coffee and every morning. You're gonna entertain family here. Christmases, you are gonna sit in that bathtub at some point, very likely anyway.
You wanna make sure the layout and the flow makes sense unless you've got deeper pockets and your intention is to add value. Really working with a property that already has a really good flow to it. So you're not looking at big structural outlays in the future. Is a blessing if it can be done as well.
Or perhaps it is a small adjustment to one part of the property to let a lot of light into it. But light is also very important. Depending on where it is and how it, and what surrounds it. Like trees, are there trees outside? Are they encroaching? Does it feel dark? But why is it dark if it's a matter of it.
A large tree that needs to have a, a haircut with an arborist, then that's a blessing in itself because yes, there's a cost attributed to that, but it's also an opportunity for you as an owner [00:04:00] to harvest it as well. Where does the sun rise? Where does it set? How's that gonna impact your morning?
Is the sun gonna be beaming in? Is it gonna be really hot as you sit there and watch TV at the evening? Still in summer? Is it gonna be freezing cold in winter? So start to really have a, an understanding of the aspects that your property does. Does face and livability, you know, you've gotta live in this property, so it's not even just the house itself you're looking at.
You wanna make sure the street. Is nice. It's not too overwhelming with cars. Again, if it's a really busy open home, it's possibly overwhelmed with cars because of that. But is it arterial road? Is it easier to pass through? Is it one car at a time? Everyone gives way to each other. Road, is there rules at the end of the street?
Some areas might have that, before 10:00 AM you can't turn right. If you can't turn right, then how else do you get that direction? Do you need to go onto a dog hind leg and turn around and do this and do that, and it's gonna take you five, add five more minutes to your drive every morning to get to work.
So these sorts of [00:05:00] factors you don't always consider on a Saturday when you're looking at a property. So think about it from a livability point of view. If you do have kids to factor in, if they're only little now, but the school is, obviously on the agenda, where is the local school? How are they getting to that local school?
Perhaps they're not quite yet at high school, but eventually they will, unfortunately. Very quickly become teenagers. The reality is as they get older, they're gonna be getting public transport. So you wanna make sure that those roads and access to buses or trains is easy and it's safe for them as well.
Little children grow very quickly and you also wanna make sure that property is relatively future-proofed. You might have, five teenagers at some points, taking up a lot of space in your media area. And it's just not built for, five adults. You wanna look at structural clues, are there cracks, visible cracks?
Is there a slope to the floor? You can really get a strong sense of a property, especially if it's a certain age, looking at the floor the way you can see. You can see what, you can [00:06:00] actually see a flaw when it's actually it is starting to slope. So it's, you could take a marble with you if you wanna see it and see that run down as well.
It's quite astonishing. And some properties, even though they're beautiful and they seem to have a lot of character, you've really gotta seriously consider your stage of life and whether it is something that you've got the capacity to sink your teeth into a project because. There's a reason a lot of homes are called Money pits as well.
Don't take the styling of the property into consideration at all, and I know. Some people are very visual. I've got a dear friend of mine who she would go to open homes and say, I don't wanna buy this house. Just on the point that it wasn't presented very nicely. Now, the reality is the styling the existing furniture, perhaps it's got tenants in there.
If you are buying that to move into it, everything but the house is yours, sorry, the house. But everything else goes, so don't worry about that. Don't worry if their furniture's daggy or there's like really funky artwork on the walls. On the flip side, [00:07:00] if it's beautiful and it's being staged by Cocoa Republic and it's bougie and lovely and everything's white.
Don't get swept up by that because sometimes you can be so thrown by the that's the artist styling, right? That's a podcast for another day. You can get so swept up with that. You're not actually looking at the true structure and the bones of a property, and that's why styling is so bloody fantastic.
It is. Really, it is Makeup for the house. Kitchens and bathrooms, like really look at them. Some of them can look really good, but if you actually start to actually look at the tiles, check the tiles inside the the shower recess as well. Look for cracks. Look for mold that still exists. People still sell houses.
They haven't actually really properly cleaned it. The grout might need replacing. Obviously, you're gonna do a pest and billing report, and I really suggest that you don't ever skip that step because. The problems. There could be many, but they're very minor. It could be a little bit here and a little bit there, or there's not many issues, but the one that you do have could set you [00:08:00] back $30,000.
So it's really important that you do get. A person building report and you speak to the inspector, not just read it, speak to the inspector about that report as well. Take into consideration storage. Does the property have built-ins? If it doesn't, is it easy enough to have built-ins installed? And will that then encroach on the footprint of the flooring?
Yeah. Wanna look? Yeah, just if there's linen cupboards. Make sure you factor things like this in, is there a, is there an adequate space for a laundry depending on how you live your life? I was with a client the other day and she's a really, loves her cooking. And in her mind, the pantry was just insignificant.
It just wasn't big enough for the way she cooks, the way she entertains. And that was a turning point for her to not wanna go ahead with that property just on the basis of the, even though it did have a good big walk-in pantry, it just wasn't ticking the boxes, and there was no way that she could modify that or put in additional cabinets to make it work for her as well.
Look at PowerPoints. All of these [00:09:00] things that can be done. Of course, these things can be added afterwards as well, but if you are looking at a room and you go, oh, this is gonna be great for my home office, consider that it may not. Be well equipped with your PowerPoints as well for the needs that you've got, if possible, taking any noise in the house.
And also externally, neighbors overhead planes, trains, traffic that you might be able to hear. If there's a school nearby, you may not hear it on the weekends, but the, you'll hear school bells and things like that as well. So just be mindful of that. There's plenty of streets. Plenty of streets where there's parking limited outside, or it could be a clear way.
It might only be two hours. So if you're a big entertainer, you've got family over regular. You've got a factor in it. They may only be able to park for two hours at a time as well. And does that property then, do they provide you with a parking sticker or a, some sort of card to go on the dashboard for your now for your visitors to use?
So things like that obviously do come into play, but you've gotta understand the bigger picture because [00:10:00] it is gonna be an impact on the way you live your life as well. Also just take into consideration any developments nearby so people forget to jump onto council website and have a look. You can have a look at all the development applications in the, in an area.
So if you were to put the address that you are looking in and then take it back to look at the map of the area, you'll. S scattered around people who've actually lodged das. And you can see then, especially if it's close to your home, what that is. And it could be that somebody's doing an internal work to their property or they're adding a pool.
What you wanna be mindful of is anything more significant where you might find that you're gonna have. A three story block of units across the road, in which case that will impact not only, parking on the street, but just the noise of living through a couple of years worth of construction as well across the road.
So the appeal of that property might diminish if you're aware of what's going on locally as well. For most free saving houses, of course, strata is most likely not a factor, but if you're looking [00:11:00] to buy into a townhouse or an apartment. The overall building condition needs to be something that you drink in when you walk into that property.
Now, how does it feel when you walk in? Is it clean? Is it maintained? Is do your, the other people living in the complex, are they just dumping their bikes and prams at the bottom of the stairs and walking up, or is it orderly? You get a really good sense of a property if you go out to the car park and look around as well.
How has the bin area maintained? Again, ease of access. If you're looking at a car space you've been allocated or the is allocated to that property, take a really good look at it and just think about it in terms of how you get in and out of that. Is it a put your ear in to get out of the property space?
Is there enough turning circle? Is your car too high? I've actually had this with a client once before. They've got a really high vehicle. They fell in love with the property and we just couldn't make it work quite simply because of the vehicle they drive was just, it just would never fit in the underground car park.
So that has to be a factor unless you wanna buy a new car. [00:12:00] It's yeah, look, some of these things, they might seem like it's an o, don't make it an oversight. They're quite big. It's you. You wanna be made like concerned about major structural red flags. But you've gotta think about the long-term appeal as well.
But natural light smells, people forget to check out. Just the area for odor I know it sounds crazy, but you can definitely smell when it's, near a main road. It could be fuel, it could be there's a factory nearby if the wind blows in a certain way on a certain day. So all of those things, you can pick it up very quickly.
Sometimes that smell could be damp if you're underneath the house. If you're in a lower level of a house, perhaps that's not ventilated or you've gotta be a little bit aware of, is there rising damp is, are there bigger concerns? Your nose can be your best friend in that aspect as well. 'cause you can smell it.
Again, you're wearing a different hat when you're an owner, occupier versus an investor versus somebody who is potentially looking at this as just a business transaction. And it is like a renovator flip. If you are a renovator, you wanna make sure that most of the [00:13:00] work that needs to be done is cosmetic.
And therefore, you can turn it around quickly with less approvals, paid in award doesn't require council involvement. And yeah, look, you've got a vibe, I know it's crazy as that sounds, and I know it is just a, it's just the term, the vibe for the vibe of a thing. But you definitely walk into some houses, and I find this a lot when the roof line is quite, when it's encroaching and it just feels.
Makes you feel claustrophobic. Some properties just don't have beautiful flowing light and it impacts the flow of a property for sure. So I definitely will, I feed that back to my clients when I'm looking at properties for them. I'll be saying it's got a lovely high ceilings, got really nice natural light coming through.
And other times I'll say, look, the property is fine, but the ceiling heights are just, you know, it's 2.4 throughout the property. Yes, that's legal height, but it just feels like you're enc encroaching upon. Like it just doesn't feel good. And that's [00:14:00] something that's really important to understand if you are not a renovator and a lot of people aren't and or have very little appetite for it as well.
There are some things that you shouldn't reject on the merit of work needing to be done, and that is properties where you might find feature walls or one room's pink, one room's lavender. Painting is a really low touch point to modernize a property, so don't turn your back on something, even if you just looked at the photos online.
If everything else stacks up, get there and have a look at it because that is a very minor. Adjustment for you to then make the property feel and look a lot better. Likewise things like, new curtains. And I see this a lot with a carpet and the property has been rented or people have had, dogs living inside.
Sometimes it, it does smell and it just, especially if it hasn't been changed over for some time, carpet's actually remarkably affordable. So if it's in within your budget that you can make it stretch a little bit more, don't turn your back on the fundamentals like that because it's this [00:15:00] very low cost to add a hell of a lot of, profit to a property or an uplift to a property, and if it's gonna be your home for some time, it doesn't mean you have to do it all immediately. You could just take on board, your bedroom at this point and a hallway and just. Just the areas, that's gonna be your main lifestyle areas. And then you can slowly add and do things to the rest of the property over time.
And I think, looking at window directions, you know what's, when you open up a window, if the curtains are down the room, I always all blind. They'll have a little behind to see what's at hiding. I'm not worried about looking at a carport, but I'm more concerned that if I pull back a blind and I'm looking straight into the neighbor in-house, that, I can see them cooking their food and they're only a meter away.
It's not particularly ideal for anybody. But I think in wrapping up over overpowering, sorry, overhead cables just anything to do with, intense wiring trees, yes. Trees will grow again. But isn't it lovely to have them around us? So these things are gonna [00:16:00] have to be a consideration to cut back.
But again it's not that expensive to do and it's a really good value add to you if you can, especially a garden, if you can put some elbow grease into it. People forget, they bougie up the home for the sale and they forget to cut back and look after and tend to a garden. So again, that's an opportunity for you if that's something that you enjoy doing and you can do it slowly over time as well.
And I think that in wrapping up, touches on a lot of things that you need to look at when you're attending an open home. Maybe when the agent's really busy and there's a lot of people around, isn't the best time to pick their brain, so to speak. But when you get in the car, make sure you make a note of everything that is a concern or that you forgot to ask about.
They will, agents will follow you up if it's something you, the health, the property is something you really like. Reach out to them and let them know that you'd like a call back on Monday. I'm really interested in the property. I do have some questions for you. Most agents will probably call you back, even if it's a Saturday afternoon, they'll still call you that day so that you can make a fair [00:17:00] judgment decision and take it from there.
Negotiate the heck out of it anywhere. That's me. Happy investing people.
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All the links for how we can work with us are inside the show. This podcast was recorded on Garal country. I acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land and pay my respects to elders past and present Happy investing.
