Location to invest

How to find a location to invest in is one of the key questions that are asked by budding property investors. There are many different theories, depending on who you talk to, as regards to how to find a profitable location to invest in. If you have been looking into property investing for any length of time, especially if you live in the south of England you will know that it is not always easy to get the figures to stack up and for the rent to cover the mortgage. In fact, I will go even further than that and say that it is almost impossible (almost) to get the rent to cover the mortgage in many parts of the UK. Because of this very reason many investors venture far and wide to try and find the best yields. This is not a bad strategy, however in practice what you will find is that the most successful, I am talking about the top 30% of property investors, will generally focus their portfolio in 1-3 different locations only.
Novice investors or the investors with twenty or less properties that are struggling to manage them all in such a way that they can give up their full time job are normally the ones with properties scattered all over the country. They may have two in Newcastle, one in Leeds, one in Manchester, three in Burnley and so on.
As mentioned earlier the majority of the really successful investors only concentrate on 1-3 locations and these locations all tend to be within a commutable distance from their home. They may still have the odd property outside these areas but the large majority of their portfolio will be within them. The problem with getting into property investing in today's property market is where to find the properties that the figures stack up on so that the rent covers the mortgage, without having to travel to Wales or Scotland or somewhere similar to invest.
However, just because it is difficult doesn’t mean it is impossible. What investors ideally want to aim for is to invest in a location within 75 minutes commutable distance from their house (ideally within 45 minutes or less, but for those that live in an area like London this can be difficult). Then it is a case of using a website like rightmove.com to break your search down, you can do things like specify how far from your post code you want to search, so for example you can specify up to thirty miles from W5 4SS. You can also specify what your price range is and what sort of property you are looking for.
After you have properties that meet you specification price wise, you can also use right move to check what sort of rent you would expect to get from them. If after all your checks you are still finding it difficult to get the figures to add up then here are three options still at your disposal.
search for a different type of property, so if you were looking for 4 bed-roomed houses before you might want to now explore 3 and then 2 bed and if necessary even flats and maisonettes. The most important thing is for the figures to add up so if you have to adjust your investment strategy for that to happen then do so. Once you have a few of these properties under your belt and money in the bank you can always then choose to have another look at the 4 bed-roomed houses if you like. Work out how much you would have to buy the properties at in order for the figures to add up and then learn and use effective techniques to buy properties below market value at the price you need to. Speak to other local property investors and find out what sort of properties they are investing in and how they make the figures add up. You can do this by joining a local property investors club and groups
If you do these three things effectively you should start to find that the problem of how to find location to invest in is no longer a problem you have to worry about as much as before.