Millennials are starting to throw their hats in the property investment ring; they’ve progressed in their careers and now many have the buying power to start investing their extra cash. Growing up a native to the internet, and therefore cautious and questioning of everything, Millennials are doing their research as to where would be the most financially responsible and most rewarding place to invest their money.
Although there are lots of exciting high-risk investment opportunities for young professionals – such as Bitcoin and other blockchain currencies, for the large majority they’ve lost a lot of well-earned money due to not understanding how these opportunities work. But there is one investment opportunity that has always been a financially secure investment, and that is the property market. The regional Director of Remax, Adrian Goslett, remarks that “while certain things change over time, others remain the same. The investment value of property being one of these constants.” The thing that young professionals have in their favour is time, they will see more return on their investment and are more likely to purchase multiple properties if they start early. The longer you own a property, the better an investment it becomes. When you are young you are more flexible, have fewer commitments, and can take more risks.
While young professionals have so much to gain from property investment, there are some considerations that they need to take into account when taking on an investment property with the idea to rent it out. Rental income is a great way to help pay off bond costs for a property, but the biggest threat to this investment is managing and recovering rent and utilities from tenants. It is difficult to track utilities accurately and recovering these funds from renters who default on their electricity and water bills can be difficult, costly, and admin-intensive.
However, a lot of property owners have found the solution to this problem through prepaid meters. By installing prepaid meters in rental units, tenants can easily pay for electricity and/or water usage upfront, eliminating any post-payment issues or risk to recover the cost. This is a very attractive option for first time landlords who have little or zero experience with managing tenants and payment disputes. With prepaid billing, there are no tenant disputes or unpaid utility bills. Tenants also prefer this option as it helps them easily budget their monthly expenditure. More and more renters are seeking out homes and apartments that have prepaid meters installed.
Young property investors are tech-savvy and prefer to monitor and track utilities consumption online. Having an online system which allows for remote access transaction data and reports is an appealing benefit to landlords as they can conveniently track utilities from anywhere, at any time. The Citiq Prepaid Meter Management Portal offers detailed reports to help track rental utilities and can be customised per property, building and meter.
Many young professionals are hesitant to invest in property for a number of reasons, but tracking utilities shouldn’t be one of them. At Citiq Prepaid, we’ve helped numerous young property investors recover utilities through prepaid meters and with our unique vending system, landlords are now more in control of their property investments.
