Hi Many of the reasons for why a crash won't happen are explained in Buy to Let Secrets - which PRO members can download for free from http: / /www .propertysecrets .net /product _viewer /buy _to _let _secrets _2006 /1 .html

Do you guys actually read these books? Cheers Neil

Yes Neil. I have read your books and find them very interesting and a reliable source.

. . . are the reason I am here :-) Interestingly, I am off to a session by Parmdeep Vadesha, organised by The Money Centre next week in Somerset, on how to buy below market value, which I suspect may be the key to successful investing (and mean that we don't need to finance deposits out of equity growth to the same extent).

Ah, Parmdeep, Beware his marketing machine! He's a nice guy with a great marketing machine. I guess he makes as much money out of that as he does his properties. A lot of what he says is common sense. Some of the stuff he suggests you do is impracticable unless you are to do it full time. You get just as much, in fact a whole lot more from the PS books. Peter

In the article you are comparing property to individual dot com shares again. This is obviously not a reasonable comparison. They were clearly extremely high risk. No reasonable investor will pile all his money in shares of a single high risk company. He will have a broad portfolio. Or an index tracker. As you've admitted yourself, market indexes have historically outperformed property, although admittedly its a lot easier to get gearing on property investment (if thats what you want to do). Plus - any high risk stock (should you want to take a flutter) has a MUCH higher upside than property. If you were an early investor in Microsoft you would have thousands of times your original investment. Or you could have nothing. That is the nature of high risk investments. Most of what you say on here is interesting, and I've learnt a lot, but lets not pretend that its unbiased. Before you all go off on one again - I am not saying property is crap and equities are great. I am a property investor myself. I'm just trying to redress the balance.

Ah yes, I had sort of got that impression. However, I hope I may pick up some ideas from what he says. I'll report back afterwards. I don't get the impression that TMC are great fans of the rip-off training concept, so we shall see.

Buying below market value can work, but it is a heck of a lot of work. One BMV strategy involves delivering lots leaflets or ads to find people who are desparate to sell (for whatever reason).. and in some cases they later become yr tenants, after you have bought their property from them at below market price (and solved their financial problems) As I say it can work but it does involve a lot of hard graft (and some would say, a heart of steel too) I've been in the market a while in the UK and recall 8 years ago when everyone was pushing UK off plan. You dont see much UK off plan at the property shows now as BMV is one of the latest things. I agree with whoever said to get a good book and read that - mine - or Property Secret's ebook which is a good read and contains all you need to know. There really is no easy money in property and no magic formulas. Just do your research and look at the fundamentals of property supply and demand locally.

David, I agree with what you say. It takes a hell of a lot of hard work to find BMV. Sure, you can follow Parmdeep but who has the time? Auctions aren't much good either, except that you avoid the lottery of the buying process. I can tell you that I have looked at hundreds of properties and found 4 that are BMV, and that includes auctions. Mind you I haven't done leaflet drops, websites and all the other stuff so who am I to judge whether it works or not. Frankly, I'd rather leave that to the others and spend my time on a more focussed approach. Peter

Seemed a nice enough guy but as you say, his thing looks a bit tacky and American Get Rich Quick in style. However, there seems to be a possibility of picking up leads from his people that aren't in their own areas which may be worthwhile, paying a 1% finder's fee if it comes off. He also sells leads that come from his own advertising and websites, but I'm unwilling to speculate that much money up front at this stage. The idea of BMV is great, of course, but I'm not convinced that his techniques are for me. Piggy-backing on people who spend a lot of time on it, however, makes sense if it works.

Hi Minsk Fair point - perhaps we should compare property returns to those of Microsoft or the telecoms companies. Or even, oil companies. Still, you are right - I'm biased. I do still prefer property to stocks. Cheers Neil