Sam and Jordan: Stage 1 – Starting our home buying journey with an investment property

Being an only child, Mum loved the idea of keeping my husband Jordan and I close by. So close, in fact, that when I told her we were saving to invest in a house of our very own, Mum and Dad were more than happy to help by building us our very own granny flat out the back of their property. The ability to save on rent was a blessing in itself – after all, our ’empire’, as Jordan lovingly calls it, wasn’t going to build itself – but being so close to family was definitely a welcomed plus.

Since we were totally comfortable with our lives in the granny flat, we decided we’d start with an investment property. It made sense to invest in the property market sooner rather than later, and our intention was to eventually renovate whatever property we purchased and either move in ourselves, or use the equity from the place to buy something else.

All of our memories, our families, and everything important to us is here on the Central Coast, so it was really important for us to stay here.

Both of us grew up on the Central Coast, and have lived here our whole lives. Actually, Jordan was my boyfriend in sixth grade! Eventually, we moved on to different high schools and lost touch, but met again at a party when we were 18. I guess the rest is history, as they say. All of our memories, our families, and everything important to us is here on the Central Coast, so it was really important for us to stay here. There is literally nothing better than coming home to Mum and Dad’s after a long day of work and looking out over the acres of land out the back. It might be a while before we have little ones, but when we do, we wouldn’t dream of taking them away from all of this.

The decision to invest made the most sense to us at the time – we could stay where we were, find a place close by that we could keep an eye on, and eventually turn it into our own dream home. It was really the perfect scenario. Or so we thought.

Once we’d committed to starting our search, we’d slow down at every ‘For Sale’ sign we drove past, and I’d be flicking through real estate sites nearly every chance I got. We figured that we’d take our time, but it was important to me to understand what was out there and what kind of deposit we’d need to be saving. Our minds were overflowing with plans and possibilities (okay, more mine). Needless to say, we were excited!

The thought of making these plans a reality was a little more daunting, though. Luckily, I work at ING and Jordan and I both bank with them, so the first decision was an easy one. I set up a call with Gerard, our dedicated home loan specialist, and he talked us through the basics. Before we’d even decided on a neighbourhood, we knew exactly what we’d need to do to save for a deposit, and what our next steps should be.

Knowing we could lean on Gerard as questions arose really set us up for our journey. We were comfortable in knowing we had plenty of time to save for our deposit and find the perfect little investment property.