Two years into my property journey, I was technically going backwards. My first property hadn’t grown. On paper, I was negative $30,000 in equity.
I had a decision to make.
I could do one of three things:
- Blame the deal
- Blame the timing
- Blame the person who helped me get in
Or… I could find another way forward.
I was close to walking away. Friends and family were in my ear saying: “You’ve made a mistake”, “property won’t keep growing, “cut your losses.”
You’ve probably heard the same noise before.
Then something interesting happened. My mum came into about $80,000 after an injury payout. She couldn’t borrow a cent due to recent bankruptcy. And I had borrowing power, but no deposit.
Individually, we were stuck, but together we were a perfect fit. So, we partnered up.
In 2013, we bought a 1,000m² block in the Brisbane suburb of Tingalpa for $506,000.
Fast forward to right now:
- The property has more than doubled in value
- We subdivided the block
- Built two homes on it
- Mum now owns her own place (five minutes from my sister and I, and our respective families).
Today, we’ve each built more than a million dollars in equity from that single property.
But the numbers aren’t the best part. The best part is this; my mum, who sacrificed everything for us growing up, owns her own home again for the first time in 15 years.
It’s my favourite property purchase and one that might never have happened if I didn’t make the choice to have a certain mindset.
The lesson?
Nothing about my first property changed; only my mindset and my opting to find a way to keep moving forward, instead of giving up.
If you’re standing still, you’re going backwards.
If I’d sat there blaming the market… or waited for things to ‘come good’… or sold out of frustration… none of that happens.
If I had given up, I probably wouldn’t have 10 investment properties to my name.
This was the lesson of property number two – you get to choose the mindset you adopt – and this is choice is almost as important as the knowledge you accumulate when it comes to the decisions you make, actions you take, and outcomes you realise.
Postscript: a sliding doors moment
The neighbour next door to my first property sold in 2016.
They made ~$100k (about 30%). Not bad, but that same property has since tripled in value.
They had the equity. They had the opportunity to buy again. But they were frustrated, negative and looking for someone to blame. They stood still.
Same street. Same timing. Same opportunities. Different mindset.
AND … very different result.
