While this can seem overwhelming at times – especially for first time investors – the good news is that you don’t have to go it alone. There are professionals whose very job it is to help you on your way.

In fact, it is recommended you have a property investment team of sorts – each player with a different role to help you towards investing success.

As the team captain, you get to pick the players. Here are the experts you should include on your team:

1. Accountant and/or Financial Advisor

A common goal of property investing is financial reward. But you need to use your money wisely. An Accountant will help you manage your money and advise of any tax changes you should know about, as well as help you claim everything you’re entitled to. A Financial Advisor is slightly different and looks at your financial situation more holistically. They can help you determine your financial goals and set a realistic plan to achieve them. Ideally, your Accountant and Financial Advisor may be one in the same, but both of these services are incredibly useful.

2. Real Estate Agent or Buyer’s Agent

When you’re searching for your first or next investment property, it’s good to have a Real Estate Agent or Buyer’s Agent you can trust. Their commission should be transparent, they should have a thorough knowledge of the local market, have a deep understanding of your requirements and be proactive in helping you find your ideal investment.

3. Property Manager

While some investors may be tempted to self-manage their property, there are a lot of risks involved in this approach if you don’t have the knowledge or time to manage this effectively. A good Property Manager will help you secure quality tenants, be on top of any damage, will save you time, tell you of any requirements and will help take some of the emotion away from the process. As their fees are tax deductible this shouldn’t be looked at as an unnecessary expense.

4. Mortgage Broker

In the past year, Mortgage Brokers have been gaining market share in Australia.  The 2017 Property Investment Professionals of Australia (PIPA) investor confidence survey revealed that 83 per cent of respondents are hoping to finance their next loan via a Mortgage Broker, up from 71 per cent last year. If you’re looking to purchase a new investment property, it may be worth speaking with a mortgage broker to help you find the best product to suit your situation and your finances.

5. Conveyancer

There’s a lot of complicated paperwork involved in purchasing a property including the contract of sale, mortgage documents and other paperwork related to the transaction. It’s best to enlist the help of a qualified and reputable Conveyancer to do this legal legwork for you. They’ll help decipher any complicated terms and conditions and translate the legal jargon. While you’re not legally obliged to hire a conveyancer, it should help you reach settlement sooner and with a lot less stress.

6. Quantity Surveyor

Ensure you get a Quantity Surveyor that specialises in property depreciation to prepare your tax depreciation schedule. A specialist Quantity Surveyor is worth having on your team as they will ensure you’re claiming everything you are legally entitled to. A specialist will also keep on top of any tax changes so you don’t get on the wrong side of the Australian Taxation Office (ATO). The ATO recognises Quantity Surveyors as one of only a few professions which possess the required construction costing skills to calculate the cost of items for the purposes of depreciation.

7. Building Inspector

It’s essential that you get a building and pest inspection carried out before you buy a property. The last thing you want is to buy a property only to later find it’s actually riddled with termites or structurally unsound. A trusty Building Inspector will help you determine if you have a quality property on your hands and can save you from forking out thousands on surprise repairs and maintenance after the time of purchase.

8. A mentor

It’s great to have someone who is an experienced investor who you can turn to for advice and learn from their real life experiences. Investing in property has its ups and downs so it’s nice to have an investor friend on your side to help, even if it’s just to chat about your situation and investing plans.

9. Yourself

While you don’t need to be an expert to invest in property, it’s important to arm yourself with some basic knowledge of the market to keep on track of how your investment is performing. It will also give you more confidence when dealing with other professionals to ensure you’re not being taken for a ride. There are many resources out there you could use to improve your investing knowledge from books, blogs, magazines and online resources to information nights and investing courses.

If you would like to have BMT as a part of your property investment team contact us today on 1300 728 726.

Article provided by BMT Tax Depreciation.
Bradley Beer (B. Con. Mgt, AAIQS, MRICS, AVAA) is the Chief Executive Officer of BMT Tax Depreciation.
Please contact 1300 728 726 or visit www.bmtqs.com.au for an Australia-wide service.

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The answer to this lies in what makes you different to your competitors and what you can do for your customers.  In marketing terms, this is called developing your competitive edge.

To be truly successful in your business, your edge will be unique in relation to your product or service.  Unfortunately, many people have never thought about their competitive edge, or what makes them different from others in the same industry.  You need to ask yourself – why would someone prefer to deal with me over my competitors?

It may be that you are advanced with technology and you can provide superior service with those means or it may be that you have managed to create a unique image for your business – something which is more personal and makes people want to come to your store.

For you to be able to develop your Competitive Edge – there are many questions which you could ask yourself:

• Do your customers know what you do?
• How can you tell your customers what you do as well as how you do it differently to others
• How do you treat your employees or suppliers
• Are there any competitive edge elements that you can work on with suppliers or employees
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of your business
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of competitors?

Most importantly you need to remember that you need to know your customers – what will make them happy?  What will make them come back for more?

Ultimately, preparing a plan for your competitive edge and then monitoring this on an ongoing basis to ensure your business changes with other world changes is essential and a very important step towards business success

The post Why should YOU be in Business? appeared first on Satellite 360.

More than half of the businesses they visited in their Protecting honest business campaign needed to improve their record keeping.

Issues they found include businesses:

• estimating their sales and income;
• using the ‘no sale’ and ‘void’ button on cash registers when taking cash payments;
• not keeping cash register tapes and not reconciling at the end of the day; and
• paying their employees cash-in-hand.

They are writing to these businesses to recommend they attend one of the ATO’s record keeping workshops, which cover why good record keeping is important and how it will save them time.

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The draft laws extend Single Touch Payroll to all employers from 1 July 2019, and will require superannuation funds to commence ‘event-based’ reporting to the ATO of payments they receive for employees from their employer from 1 July 2018.

Combined, these measures (if passed as drafted) should provide the ATO with more timely information to support earlier detection and proactive prevention of non‑payment of superannuation owed to employees.

The ATO will have a suite of enforcement and collection tools for employers who break the law, including

• strengthened arrangements for director penalty notices and security deposits for superannuation and other tax-related liabilities;
• the ability (for the first time) to apply for court‑ordered penalties, including up to 12 months imprisonment; and
• the ability to require employers to undertake training.

The Government’s commitment to a Director Identification Number will also help identify those directors who are robbing their employees of their superannuation.

Editor: The Government introduced legislation last year to implement another recommendation by the Working Group to close a loophole that could be used by unscrupulous employers to short‑change employees who use salary sacrifice arrangements, and will progress that legislation along with this broader compliance Bill.

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Mark Bouris said: “When a business begins to digitise and use digital tools, it opens up new opportunities to grow, diversify revenue streams, find talent, access finance, work smarter and enhance the value of the business when it is time to sell.  If you’re not going digital, you should be.”

Deloitte research has found that small businesses with advanced levels of digital engagement are 1.5 times more likely to be growing revenue, 8 times more likely to be creating jobs and 14 times more likely to be innovating.

The Taskforce will conduct a series of meetings, workshops and ‘hackathons’ with businesses over the coming months to explore impediments for business in engaging with digital technologies and how these impediments might be addressed.

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It will also review whether, and the circumstances in which, a perpetrator’s superannuation should be available to pay compensation or restitution to victims of crime.

The review will not examine other general conditions of release for superannuation.

The Government also announced that it will transfer the regulatory role of administering the early release of superannuation benefits on compassionate grounds from the Department of Human Services to the ATO in 2018, to enable the ATO to provide a more streamlined service to members.

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It is estimated that records of 20 million individuals will be obtained over the course of the three year period.

These records will be electronically matched with ATO data holdings to identify non‑compliance with obligations under taxation and superannuation laws, as well as (for example) support compliance activities under Australia’s foreign investment rules.

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From 1 July 2018, a first home buyer will be able to withdraw voluntary superannuation contributions they have made since 1 July 2017 (up to $30,000 each, with individuals being able to contribute up to $15,000 a year within existing caps), along with a deemed rate of earnings, to help buy their home.

Also, from 1 July 2018, when Australians aged 65 and over sell a home they have owned for at least 10 years, they may contribute up to $300,000 from the proceeds into their superannuation accounts, over and above existing contribution restrictions.   Both members of a couple may take advantage of this measure, together contributing up to $600,000 from the proceeds of the sale into superannuation.

The post Further ‘affordable housing’ measures passed appeared first on Satellite 360.

Under the federal award, apprentices are entitled to $12.66 an hour, compared to the state award of $8.75 an hour.

The Housing Industry Association, Master Builders Queensland, All Trades Queensland and Master Builders Queensland appealed a commission full bench ruling to the Federal Court.  The appeal was rejected by the court, prompting the Electrical Trades Union to declare it would seek backpay on behalf of over 4000 apprentices.

Mr Reichman said employers across Queensland thought that they could exploit legal loopholes

“For years, apprentices in Queensland have been paid less than those in every other state because of this kind of underhanded behaviour,’’ he said.

“Today’s ruling makes it clear that this was always illegal, and means we can seek wage justice for these young people.”

“What goes through someone’s head when they decide to pay a team of lawyers thousands of dollars a day to argue for their right to employ an apprentice on eight bucks an hour?” he said.

“The independent umpire has decided — twice — that it’s actually not okay to pay apprentices eight dollars an hour. Any reasonable member of the community, if you asked them, would say that it’s not okay to pay anyone eight dollars an hour”

“It’s despicable, shameless behavior aimed at lining employer pockets at the expense of even the most basic living standards for Queensland apprentices and their families.”

Article provided my

Financial Review
Nov 27 2017
‘Queensland apprentices were underpaid, owed millions in back pay after court ruling’
And
The Australian
Nov 28 2017
‘Unions to seek $70 million in backpay for apprentices’

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An electronic log book is an automatic trip recorder that records the position, speed and other data of your vehicle so that the mileage can be accurately tracked.  This data is then uploaded via USB to your computer where you can easily mark trips as either business or personal and enter any comments.  This then allows you to generate an ATO compliant log book.

There is a specific App strongly recommended by the ATO that can be found on this link:

https://www.ato.gov.au/General/Online-services/ATO-app/

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