Overseas Property World

I just read an interesting article in OPP magazine online (no link because it is members only), well surprising actually. Apparently overseas property developers and agents are having successes sending out special offers on payment plans to their email databases.

That is not the surprising part; the offers that are achieving success are those that offer guaranteed rental to pay the finance.

Those kinds of offers were common before the credit crunch, but many of the people that accepted them were let down when the change in market conditions meant the rentals promised never materialised. Because of this they have been frowned upon.

Not that I am doubting the article is correct or the honesty of those quoted, unfortunately. All around there are signs that — because the credit crunch did not cause the complete collapse of the world economy that was feared — people and companies feel it is okay to go back to how things were before the downturn began; to go back to the same irresponsible behaviours that caused the crash in the first place.

The lessons that everyone thought would be learned from the crash have been forgotten. Signs like… estate agents getting excited about the rise in sales of multi-million pound properties when city banks began their bonus pay-outs. Signs like the FSA failing to regulate the amount people can borrow to buy property.

Signs like Britons buying Florida properties that were repossessed from the last wave of British buyers. The last one isn’t really relative to the point per se as the buyers of Florida property at the moment, are getting very good deals and paying in cash, however they are often buying before doing proper due-diligence and that is never a good idea. It is also poignant that foreigners are now buying up the repossessed properties in Florida, when it was primarily foreigners defaulting on loans that led to Florida having among the highest repossession rates in America.

All that said: I do actually believe that now is a very good time to capitalise on overseas property bargains. But only after doing even more research than I was recommending before the crunch; flights may have been reduced so check into that, some of the shops or attractions may have been shut-down, and these things are not as well publicised as openings of new flight routes.

There is one property in particular; in fact I just looked and it has been sold out. Property Frontiers were marketing some new-build houses in Ft Myers at a hugely discounted £35k starting price. The properties were not reliant on tourism or foreign demand, simply the rising demand for affordable housing to rent in a growing community with solid economic prospects. There are loads of opportunities like that.

Developments that would never have been advertised on the foreign market, because they would have sold well enough on the domestic market. Not to mention the offers you can get on the properties that you would expect to see, luxury off plan resort properties with free furniture packs, 20% discounts, maintenance fees paid for 2 years and much more.

Another good thing about buying now is that the buyer holds a lot more power than during the good times. It is fairly easy to negotiate the kinds of offers mentioned above, and/or money off the final price, a more favourable payment plan, and… you get the idea.

So, as the Average White Band sung: Let’s go round again. I just hope that when the current hype dies down we do spare a thought for the fact that we caused the crash, so that it may prevent us from causing another — I always was an optimist.

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