France selling Property to reduce debt

Interesting consequence of the GFC is that the French government is selling Australian property to reduce their $2.1 TRILLION national debt. In November they sold a house in Bellevue Hill for $23 MILLION, after buying it 50 years ago for $26 THOUSAND.
Now they have put a property another Bellevue Hill house for an estimated $6M, fifteen years after buying it for $3.75M.

BCCT Silent on M2 Widening

The August 2010 bulletin of the Beecroft and Cheltenham Civic Trust provides an interesting history of the origins of Chilworth Recreation Reserve. The bulletin explains how in 1997, in response to massive public protests largely instigated and coordinated by the Civic Trust, the route of the M2 had been modified "to avoid destroying the park".

Perhaps more importantly, the carriageway over the park was deliberately split into two separate three-lane carriageways, to allow sunlight down into the space under the road. Here you can see how well that worked. My dog Binzi is standing under the city-bound carriageway, where the sun doesn't reach and the soil is of course barren. But in between the two concrete strips the greenery flourishes so this remains a very pleasant walk.

It is therefore rather surprising that the BCCT's August newsletter on the topic doesn't explain that Transurban propose to fill in this gap, and to extend the west-bound carriageway's width, to turn the overpass into a monster ten lane highway - a bicycle lane, three car lanes, and a bus lane, each way!

Compared to the outrage in 1997, described so comprehensively by the Beecroft Cheltenham History Group in this bulletin, one has to assume the present apathy of locals is more due to lack of information than anything else. Why isn't the BCCT out there telling people of what is about to come, instead of just publishing the decade-old history of the park?

Their website says "The BCCT has been very active in informing the 2119 residents about the forthcoming M2 upgrade. We have informed people via our newsletter and also we targetted a letter to all residents living adjacent to the M2" yet this latest bulletin contains only a history lesson. All their latest bulletin says on the future is "The 2010 proposed widening of the M2 means further impacts on the adjacent bushland and nearby households." I would have said, to use the BCCT History Group's own words, the proposed M2 widening project will destroy the Reserve.

PS added Jan 2011: I am now pleased to see that the BCCT has started its own blog and is addressing M2 and other issues there.

Property Investment Information Evening

Ray White Beecroft is pleased to invite you to a free Property Investment Information Evening on Tuesday 7 September, with guest speakers provided by Ray White Corporate.
Talks will be on topics like:
Stamp duty exemption for investors
Industry statisics and market trends
How to profit from changing trends in locations and property types
Maximizing borrowing power
Purchasing property through superannuation
The property clock and Area Hot Spots
How to use tax to assist wealth creation and financial security
Showcase of new projects and investment opportunities.
Contact our office for details and to book a seat. You are welcome to bring friends, but you must register in advance.

Gala Auction Day 4 September

Douglas Macarthur of Ray White Beecroft is organising a Gala Auction Day to be held at the Beecroft Bowling Club, morning of 4 September. Registration for bidding will be open from 9am, bidding will start at 09:30, and the event should be over by 10:30.
Those who list for the event with Ray White Beecroft before 7 August will receive discounted advertising and free promotion.
Contact Douglas (0408 87 239), or the office (9479 8444) for details.

Hornsby Housing Strategy for Beecroft

If you want to read Council's findings on the submissions sent by residents of Beecroft and Cheltenham, go to Part 4 of
https://businesspapers.hornsby.councilsonline.com.au/Open/2010/PL_07072010_AGN.PDF

It includes:
"A total of 3,341 submissions were received during the exhibition period, including individually written letters or emails, form letters and petitions. Submissions raised objections to the Strategy (or aspects of the Strategy), provided constructive feedback on how it could be improved, indicated support for the Strategy and suggested other precincts for inclusion. The attached Housing Strategy Volume 3a - Report on Submissions 2010 provides a summary of submissions. The report does not attempt to capture all of the information put forward in submissions. The report focuses on providing an overview of submissions, along with a snapshot of the reasoning, key local issues identified and suggestions made. A copy of all submissions (including late submissions received up until 14 May 2010) has previously been provided to Councillors. The major reasons for objection to the amended Strategy continue to be traffic generation, impacts on character/streetscape and uncertainty surrounding the provision of infrastructure."

And it concludes, for Beecroft, "no change", ie to be rezoned for 5 storey mixed development.

An analysis of submissions received is at:
http://www.hornsby.nsw.gov.au/uploads/documents/Housing_Strategy_Attachment_2.1.pdf
for an overall summary, in which it says only 2% of submissions were in favour of the proposal, which should be a message to the people driving this push to swamp Sydney with multi-storey housing.

Individual precinct analyses, including for Beecroft, are at
http://www.hornsby.nsw.gov.au/uploads/documents/Housing_Strategy_Attachment_2.2.pdf
and record that, for Beecroft, 443 form letters and 168 individual letters were received.

Of the individual letters relating to Beecroft, 13% (ie 20 letters) were in favour, 4% suggested alterations and 83% (140 letters) were against. Of the 443 form letters received only 3 (less than 1%) supported the proposal but say heritage should be preserved. Of the rest, the report records key issues were parking, traffic, character and infrastructure. So of the 611 submissions, 95% were against the proposal, but apparently that wasn't enough to influence the council.

The final paper
http://www.hornsby.nsw.gov.au/uploads/documents/Housing_Strategy_Attachment_2.3.pdf
includes submissions from Greg Smith and others and descriptions of the publicity methods used.

Ray White Beecroft Emails

In an earlier blog I warned that Ray White Beecroft had lost our email system during the power failure on 7 July. We reverted to a backup email system while the relevant databases were restored on our server, and have only just put everything back to normal operation.

In the process we may have lost some incoming emails dated after 6 July, or not responded promptly to some emails, for which we apologise and ask you please to contact us if you think this has happened to you.

Fortunately our Disaster Recovery system, with frequent automatic back-ups onto hard disks, and frequent cycling of physical hard disks to ensure a recent copy of all our information is always stored off site, is working fine. No actual information (property details, transactions, letters, etc) was lost.

Hot Idea for House Buyers - Bento for IPad.

I found the following on the Bento website, purporting to be from a young first-home buyer:

"It's easy to get overwhelmed when you're buying your first home. There are dozens of factors to consider: Neighborhood, price, square footage, year built, lot size, repair issues, landscaping—the list goes on and on. That's why first-time homebuyer Jessica Fonseca turned to Bento for iPhone to organize it all. “With Bento for iPhone, I can have all the information in one place. When my husband or Realtor talks to me about a house we've looked at, all the information is right there on my iPhone. It makes the whole process a lot easier to deal with and it was extremely simple to set up."

One interesting point made about IPads (I just bought mine!) is that it is easy to hand an IPad around at a meeting, whereas laptops are cumbersome, usually run out power during the meeting and need to be plugged into the wall, and can only be seen by those sitting directly in front of it. I am setting my IPad up so I can store all our rental and sale properties on it for use during home opens, appraisals, and other real estate activities.

Foreign Buyers Spooked

So says Sydney Morning Herald's Business Day, suggesting that overseas fund managers are concerned about the sustainability of a surge in prices over the past year. A survey in The Economist assesses Australian property as being the most over-valued of the twenty countries it tracks in Europe, Asia, and North America.
Mr Johnson, banking analyst for CLSA, is quoted as saying the catalyst for a meaningful correction in Australian house prices woud be rising interest rates, rather than unemployment. Interesting times!

Landlords' Expo

Nearly 150 people attended Ray White Northern District's Landlords' Expo on Monday night, to hear speeches from a range of property management specialists.

Nick Vrabac, CTTT Deputy Chairman Determinations, gave an excellent presentation on the workings of the Tenancy Tribunal - 50,000 hearings a year! Unasked, he explained one thing has always puzzled me. Why are we not allowed to send eviction notices by registered mail? The answer is that the law allows us to assume a normal letter will arrive within four days. To prove they didn't receive it the tenant must explain what happened to the letter while it was in the possession of the post office! With a registered letter, the tenant must actively receive and sign for the letter, and let's face, which tenant in arrears and anticipating an eviction notice would sign for a registered letter from the estate agent? And if they don't sign for it, it's not been received!

Auction Cancelled - Property Sold Prior

Ray White Beecroft advise that the auction due Saturday 17th July at 34 Austral Avenue is cancelled, the property sold Friday afternoon.