A long Post
Property is not easy to buy and sell but still it is best investment at least at this time in Pakistan, In this Post I will summarize my key observations which may help others to explore.
First be clear in your mind that you are looking for property for what? Making home, making assets or Investment alone and if investment how long?
If you want to make home better Buy ready plots with Possession or at least full development ready. Calculate the distance that you or your kids will have to cover if you are working or they are studying. Wise People go to bit beyond I know a friend of mine who is a banker is Pakistan and bought a Plot in Bahia in Good Time, he wanted to Make Home But his father was not that keen though impressed by beauty of Bahria Town. They decided to live in Bahria for a year on rent at that time rent was nominal as it was not very populated. They had excellent experience anxiety gone and they built a beautiful house.
Another Brother working with me wanted to make home in Izmir Town he had excellent plot there and Izmir was well populated [2011] all family was living in UAE had no plan to go to Pakistan in near future but they were thoroughly convinced that now they need to make a shelter in Pakistan. He contacted me for advice at that time minimum cost of Building house on Kanal was 80 Lac. Based on my experience he opted to buy a well-built 10 Merla old House in Allama Iqbal Town in 75 Lac. He is very satisfied as both have grown tremendously ever since 2011. [I aslo did similar thing in 2010]
Now few words about investments
Investments means that you may have to sell so Buy only big Brands DHA is highly recommended as Volume of trading is huge. You may have to wait a year to sell a plot in AWT but not in DHA.
Buy the investment when you fell it is under priced, that only you can know by comparison.
Property booms are cyclic but thankfully not sine waves at least in Pakistan, Buy a property when it is relatively less
prices not when it is relatively overpriced.
For investment alone never buy a bad
Location, for making home you may consider, as all bad locations are not ‘Bad’ it is only market assumption and you have to face when you sell.
Buy a property which is hot in investors as this may post unrealistic gain as compared to property which is over looked by investors, though may have good Ground realities I give an example of AWT and Sui gas one Ground realities both have no Comparison but Sui gas price bit more than AWT.
The properties which are not performing good for last few years have some reasons for not gaining you need to be clever enough to know those reasons and some inside information before you should buy in them the examples are Bahria sector f, park view villas Non possession Blocks etc etc., I will invest in these only if I have “inside information”
And last but not least in if you buy a property for investment keep in mind long holding, I don’t like investor who are seeking advice to invest for 6 months and one years I have seen them weeping bitterly. Yes you can do that only if you are in real estate business yourself. In 2015 I don’t advise any investors to buy for 2,3 years [read between the lines]