Solid Reliable Investment Products the Order of the Day

Well, the deepening depression, worldwide economic turmoil and a genearal flight from high risk/potential high return products has meant that 'safe and secure' is the way to go these days. There was a time, in the not so distant past, when safe and secure meant storing your money in the bank, any bank. Obviously this is not the case today. Although the Irish government, and many others, have guaranteed deposits, there are still those who are now feeling that the very fact that it was deemed necessary to provide these guarantees is an indicator of just how deeply in the doo-doo most of the banks really reside. Consequently, people are getting very wary of having all their savings lodged there. And probably rightly so.

This begs the question, what else is there to invest in? There are lots of things really, the problem with most of them is inherent volatility. Shares are a real gamble at the moment, but of course values are low. The problem is we don't know who will survive and who will fail over the coming years so the gamble element is probably even more inherent now than ever before. Commodities such as gold and oil are proving popular, of course neither makes interim returns and both are proving yo-yo markets so it is hard to tell what they will do in the longer term.

Then, of course, there's property. We all know the saying 'safe as houses' but, in the recent past, this saying has been questioned, quite a lot actually. House prices in a wide variety of countries have nose-dived and negative equity looks like the 

But there is still property out there that can justify inclusion in a strong investment portfolio. We're not talking resort or holiday property here, in fact we're seldom enough talking about residential property at all. Good commercial product in strong stable countries such as Germany and Sweden are still producing the goods, downturn or no downturn. In fact, property bought at the right price due to the downturn in the UK and US can still be considered a runner, and there are those Irish that are still very interested in these markets.

Our advice? Take the workload off yourself and take a close look at a well organised, professional property syndicate. If you don't know anything about the concept then take a look here.

If you want some further information on some currently available syndicate products, fill out this form and we'll send a selection to you. You're committed to nothing by filling in the form and we won't share your details with anyone else.

Syndicated Property Investment - Tread Warily

Syndicates, a new way to invest? Well not really, syndicates have been around for decades, but only recently has it become a common vehicle for the 'ordinary investor'. Before this it was a vehicle only applicable in the realms of the Bill Gates' and Warren Buffet's of this world. By an ordinary investor we mean those with 50-100k to invest. OK, so it's not buttons but in terms of property it is not an astronomical amount of money.

The proliferation of syndicates in Ireland over the past five years or so has meant that, as with anything else available in bulk, quality has suffered. Indeed, an investor I met recently visited a seminar by a company purporting to have lined up several properties in Germany for an upcoming syndicate. Unfortunately for the company, the owner of one of the properties was Irish, was present at the seminar and swore blind he had no intention of selling the property in question seeing as he had only bought it six months previously. What are the chances?

It just goes to show, if you are getting involved in a syndicate you need to know that the guys with whom you are getting involved aren't going to pull the wool over your eyes. It is now, more than ever, extremely important to do a certain amount of due diligence on the company, their products and the property they are claiming as part of their proposed fund.

For a full advisory piece on the pros and cons of investing in syndicated property investments have a look at this article.

For a list of general advisory articles on investing abroad click here.

For a list of syndicated investment opportunities click here. If you want to be updated when syndicated opportunities are loaded on the site log in and Save the above search. You will then be emailed every time a syndicated investment opportunity is uploaded to the site.

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