Real estate myths dispelled

bargain at a pre display/pre construction commencement price, as they helped the developer kick start getting the development off the ground.

It was all pretty fair really as the buyers did bear some of the risk and in most cases it is true – they did see capital gain rewards in a fairly short period of time – although not always of course.

However as finance became easier to secure and the off-plan secret became the in-word for a new breed of lazy property investor, you bought as soon as the ads hit the press, even queued up if you had to, then sat back and waited for the rising market to almost seemed to guarantee you a profit. Developers cottoned on to this. So the words off-plan came to mean that buyers were blind and sheeplike and that means what used to be a great concept actually became high risk and fraught with danger as the ‘‘discount’’ early buyers could expect for bearing some of the risk of the project, became instead the windfall for developers.

Soon it became the norm to see prices paid at off-plan stages as the highest in the suburb and in these kinds of situations, buyers expecting quick profits discovered quick losses.

Our changing market environment is meaning buyers are more cautious again nowand know there is a risk to the off plan purchase.

Once again developers need to start to tempt buyers at the early stages of a site – the property market like everything goes around in circles.

So buying off the plan is only right if the scheme and the price and your research tell you it is.

Abit like every other property transaction really.