What does a buyer’s agent do?
Rich Harvey: Buyer’s agent work exclusively for buyers. We don’t sell property. We provide independent advice on what to buy and where to buy. For home buyers, it’s all about helping them select the right area, one that’s going to suit their lifestyle, one that suits their budget, close to shops, schools and transport and all the features they are looking for. So we help guide them in their search. We will then give them a shortlist of properties, we appraise the value of their most preferred property and then from there we negotiate the lowest price possible.
And for investors?
Rich Harvey: What we do is find hot spots. We find the most areas they got to provide the best return for capital growth and for yield. And then again we do the same thing to identify the right properties, shortlist them, appraise them and negotiate the best price.
How do I find the best investment ‘hot spots’?
Rich Harvey: Some people come to us with all sorts of great ideas and even wonderful ideas, but we help guide their decision making. We have some very sophisticated research tools that we use. One of those is the DSR score, the demand-supply-ratio score, that takes 8 leading market indicators and compresses that into one single indicator. A score out of 48, we also use residex, hot spotting, APM, RP data plus we have our own extensive research system that we have inhouse, that we use for clients. And the quality of the research will actually determine the quality of the investment property that the client will buy. And that’s a very important step.
What tips do you have for property investors?
Rich Harvey: On our website we have our top 20 criteria. So really buying close to median price, buying in areas that have strong infrastructure, strong population growth and a diverse range of employment. Really I often use the acronym pie, easy as pie, population, infrastructure and employment. Those 3 key indicators, but there is a whole lot more than that. I mean I’m just scratching the surface with it.
