INTRODUCTION

If you read my first book 30 Properties Before 30, you will be familiar with my story and my strategy of buying high‐yield, metro properties below market value as aggressively as you can to achieve your financial goals. This book is all about the step‐by‐step practical details you need to know to go and buy your first property, then your second, hopefully your third and, best‐case scenario, I hope you continue on and buy at least 10. Property is a great way to get ahead financially, and I hope to help you on that journey.

For those who aren't familiar with my story, here is a bit about who I am and how I got here.

I grew up in unlikely conditions to become a property investor — with my single mum, we lived in commission houses in poor neighbourhoods, and no one in my family owned any property (they still don't). Money was always tight. I'm the youngest of three children; when I was born, my dad was 45 and my mum was 41. There was a lot of financial stress, and my parents were always fighting about money.

When I was eight, my parents split up. My father moved to Adelaide and my mum, sister and I moved to the United States because Mum's sister lived there. We went over with $300 and moved into an ugly two‐bedroom unit in the slums of Austin. When I was 12, we returned to Sydney; Mum had a few hundred dollars and no job, house or assets. She arranged with a local church to stay in a church‐owned house until she pulled enough money together to rent her own place. As a single mum in her mid‐fifties, finding work was tough and she supported us on a modest pension. After a long wait, we were finally approved for a housing commission house in Willmot, a suburb of Mount Druitt. For those unfamiliar with the area, Mount Druitt is a low socioeconomic area an hour's drive west of the Sydney CBD. It has long‐carried a reputation for crime, drugs and domestic violence.

I still remember seeing the house for the first time. I wasn't expecting a palace, but this place was truly awful. There was a scrawl of graffiti on the back wall, the carpets were old and worn, there was a distinct smell of mould, and it was in a sorry state of disrepair. The thought of living there filled me with despair. I remember begging Mum not to make us live there, but with private rentals in the area going for more than $250 per week we had no choice — my mum's weekly pension was only $180. At $65 per week, this subsidised place was all we could afford.

Willmot was rough. There were domestic disturbances every other night, with police cars regularly patrolling the streets and helicopters buzzing overhead. When I was 14, four houses near us were fire‐bombed within about six months. It was scary. They were commission houses; people would move in and out, or the houses would stand vacant. People in our neighbourhood were very low on the socioeconomic scale — almost everyone was on drugs, and they would go out, get petrol and just burn the places down.

Being constantly short of money caused a lot of stress for my mother, who was trying her best to provide for her family. We relied on government assistance and food stamps just to make sure we could eat. I might have been one of the rebels in school, but if somebody threw 20 cents on the ground, I picked it up.

My upbringing made me more aware of the importance of money than most kids. You need money to survive; you can't buy food without it. I didn't want to end up on the dole and just continue living like everyone around me. So how could I fix the situation?

I started asking questions about money and property at seven. On Sundays we would go to church, and then visit one of Mum's friends in Baulkham Hills, Castle Hill. It's a nice area in the hill district of Sydney. They had a big TV that blew me away. They had nice stuff, in a really nice house, and the drive home from their house to ours left a deep impression on me. I told myself that one day I would own one of those nice houses. Year after year I told myself that when I grew up, I would make enough money so that I wouldn't have to worry about it anymore.

When I was a teenager and started getting more interested in property, I realised that people who create wealth and live in nice areas usually own their property. Either that or they own investment properties — and at the very least they have jobs. No one in our family owned any property. Because my family and close friends never went to university, it wasn't on my radar; I just thought that going to university or college only happened in America.

At 16, my interest in owning property took off. I worked at McDonald's and a 19‐year‐old colleague happened to mention that he had just bought his first investment property with the help of his dad. I was blown away. How had this guy only three years older than me managed to buy a property when none of my family members, friends — or indeed anyone I knew — had managed to do it? My goal of owning a home suddenly started to look achievable. If he could do it, why couldn't I?

As a start, I made sure I saved as much as I could. I was saving at least $200 to $250 a week out of my part‐time wage of $340. It took a lot of discipline, and as much as I wanted to (and nearly did!) buy a nice car like my friends, instead I drove a bomb and by 18 had managed to save enough for a small deposit.

I spent hours trawling real estate listings, and I read and re‐read some old property investment books that Mum had picked up for me from the op shop (which I still have to this day). I also got a new job as an office junior at an automotive paint shop. In this role I did the daily banking, calculated the daily earnings, reconciled accounts, and dropped off the daily takings and receipts to the bank. Working with numbers every day was an excellent learning experience and gave me a valuable insight into the financial end of running a business.

I knew that getting finance for an investment property was going to be tough. I used every online mortgage calculator I came across to estimate what I could borrow. I tried 11 different lenders all up, but due to my woefully low salary of $26 000 I was either rejected outright or offered a measly $30 000 home loan. What could I buy with that? I took on a second job as a bartender at the local RSL, working long hours in the evenings and on weekends.

After months of setbacks and rejection, I was driving to the bank to drop off the daily takings for work when I decided it was time to speak to a lender in person. I nervously approached the counter and asked to speak with someone about getting a home loan. The teller raised her eyebrow and gave me a funny look. I looked young, but nonetheless she made an appointment for the following day with a mortgage lender named Kathy.

Kathy was awesome. Together, we went through my income, expenses and overall financial situation and I felt like someone was finally taking me seriously. We spoke about the sorts of properties I had been looking at and my expected price range. Finally, she told me what I had been waiting to hear. If the property I wanted to purchase had a rental income of over $200 per week, my borrowing capacity would be boosted to $140 000. I was ecstatic! I walked out of that meeting with conditional pre‐approval.

I returned to looking at real estate listings with vigour, and after a lot of searching for something in my price range, I came across one listed for $145 000. My eyes lit up as I read the description. It had two bedrooms, one bathroom, a balcony and a car‐parking space, and it was rented out at $200 per week. It seemed too good to be true! Comparable properties in the same area were selling for over $165 000. There had to be a catch. I arranged to see the property that weekend.

As I drove to it, it became clear why this place was cheap. The road was full of potholes, and the 12‐unit block was covered in graffiti. There was rubbish spilling out from the six commercial units on the ground floor. At the door of the unit there was a pile of junk and abandoned furniture, graciously left by the former tenant. The estate agent was a little embarrassed and assured me that the tenant had told him they would remove it, but they'd clearly done a runner. Despite the less‐than‐ideal first impression, I tried to keep an open mind.

We walked inside and my excitement returned. Inside was not half bad! It was clean and airy, with crisp white walls and older grey carpet that still presented well. The bedrooms both had built‐in wardrobes and shared a breezy balcony with views of the lake. The kitchen was an older‐style wood grain but perfectly fine, and there was even a second balcony off the dining area. The council rates and strata levies were very reasonable. The area was quiet and rentals were in high demand, and I knew the unit had only been vacant for a couple of days. It was close to schools, shops and the train station. It ticked all the boxes, though I was concerned about the state of the exterior and the seedy feel of the graffiti. But I knew the median price for units in the area was around $185 000, and comparable listings were at or over $165 000, meaning the unit was technically below market value at $145 000. And I could use the state of the exterior as leverage to negotiate the price down further still. I decided...