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Thermo-Gel is an innovative product, created to save lives and property from fires. It is a concentrate, which mixes with water to create a fire-preventing and heat-absorbing gel. This gel is spayed on the walls of the house, the glass windows, any types of surfaces and that way a barrier is created to protect the house from fire. It can even be sprayed on plants, trees, shrubs and other kinds of vegetation and works very effectively to save them from fire. It is not affected by low humidity and works much better than foam that uses an encapsulated air. It is very water efficient, non-toxic and minimizes the time it takes to contain the fire.

As a matter of fact there was a ‘cool’ test performed to show exactly how effective Thermo-Gel is. They burnt down a house No, I’m not kidding. One half of the house was treated with fire-protective foam and the other half - with Thermo-Gel. Then they burned fuel for 10 minutes and used a fan to simulate wind. After 10 minutes the foam side was a total wreck and Thermo-Gel side … remained just the way it was before the fire, untouched. Unbelievably, even the window pane didn’t crack from the heat.

Not only houses and vegetation can be protected - but also power poles, pumps, supply lines, fuel tanks, etc. When you no longer need it, either wash it off with a strong jet of water pressure or just leave it on - it’s biodegradable. There’s no need in any training to apply it, just use the nozzle in the home kit to spray it over the surfaces you want to protect.

Have a look how simple it is (they have a video on YouTube)

And if this product has helped you save your property, I’d love to hear what you think - so that together we’d help more people do the same.

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Remember how I asked you “What do you think, will property prices stop if no more overseas IT engineers, doctors or accountants will be allowed in Australia?”

So here is what doctor T. from Germany thinks:

“I guess property prices will stop if no more overseas doctors will be allowed in Australia.

Why ?

No more doctors from overseas to meet the shortage of doctors, not only GP’s but also Specialists like Surgeons, Anaesthetists etc, in the country means not enough doctors for all citizens.

In a kind of “biologic solution” the number of people living in Oz will be reduced. Less people means less potential house buyers and this will result in a decrease of property prices.

You want it faster ? No problem. Send all descendents of the original POM’s back to England and you’ve cleared at least half of the country.

The statement that wealthy immigrants would push property prices reminds me of an Austrian guy who 80 years ago told people in my country that wealthy Jews are responsible for pushing up inflation.

This was absolutely bullshit as well as the idea that wealthy immigrants push up prices in Oz.”

Thank you, Dr. T. for saying something that probably many would agree with - if only they weren’t too shy or too busy to respond.

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Apparently those “monstrous” migrants, even though their number is in average 500,000 a year (peanuts, compared to the total annual number of property transactions), somehow manage to drive the property-price inflation. You’ve got to be kidding.

How on Earth can they be doing that, you ask? Well, the explanation John Edwards from Residex offers is that they earn above-average salaries, which they spend, buying houses for crazy prices. Yea, that makes a lot of sense.

Let’s see how much sense exactly it makes.

Imagine that you are a newcomer. You have just arrived in a new country that has a more expensive currency than my own, so the money you brought with you shrunk a fair bit. You haven’t had any predecessors here, who left you an inheritance, something to get your foot in the door of the property market - you are making a fresh start. Your salary may be above average, because you are a highly skilled professional - but locals are paid just as much, and the Immigration department makes sure you don’t get better employment terms than any Aussie born person with the same qualifications. You have the whole future of your kids to worry about, you have to pay their school tuition fees and put them through college. Why don’t you just go and buy a house that will cost you 5.5 times your household income, and top it up, throw another 10 grand in, so that nobody beats you on the price.

I rest my case.

If I had to name a suspect, I’d be having hard time to pick just one - but I can promise you, migrants wouldn’t be on that list. How about the taxation incentives that encourage investing in property, how about the banks that allow people to borrow amounts that are 500% of their annual income?

Reading the comments on that article, I could see that some people found this article to be racist to an extent. I, however, think that this article isn’t being fair to Australian-born people; it really presents them in a bad light. It basically says that Aussies are not skilled enough - and therefore not paid enough - to afford a house, if a small proportion of overseas immigration can price them out of the property market. If I was an Aussie by birth, I’d be offended.

I’d really like to get your opinion - what do you think, will property prices stop if no more overseas IT engineers, doctors or accountants will be allowed in Australia?

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But what exactly IS a better kitchen? The top-end hardware and storage solutions.

People like lazy susans - if you’re not familiar with the term, it’s a circular revolving shelf installed in your cupboards to utilize the space better. Often they are installed in corner cabinets to solve the so-damn-hard-to-reach-pots problem.

Another favorite is the soft closing drawers and cabinet doors. Push them as hard as you like - there will never be a “bang”, very helpful for people with little babies or folks recovering from the night before.

Lift-up doors are very popular, because of the ease of access to the cabinets’ contents and for safety reasons - these doors you can’t walk into (well, unless you try very hard). Touch-opening doors and drawers are in demand as well - imagine cabinet doors with no handles, how cool is that!

Kitchen also includes the appliances installed with it - and people are choosing to have wine fridges, LCD/ Plasma TVs, dishwashers, water filtration systems and free-standing stoves in their kitchens.

As for the kitchen bench tops, nowadays the preferred material is granite - and stainless steel or timber become less and less popular.

Giving their bathroom a makeover, most often people replace the basins with modern-looking ones, replace the older vanity units, tap ware and tiles. Apparently semi-frameless shower screens are a hit, and there is a growing trend for multiple basins and multiple shower heads.

That’s it from me, now it’s your turn to speak up - what does your dream kitchen or bathroom look like?

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And in any renovation project, what are the 2 major components? The new kitchen and bathroom, of course. Now this part explains the HIA report about Australian kitchens and bathrooms getting bigger and better. They say that in 2008/09 the average cost for a new kitchen / bathroom, including installation, was $14,000 and that people will be spending more in 2010 and 2011.

If we do the math, to replace both the kitchen and the bathroom will cost us $28,000 - compare it to $60,000 for relocating and you get a saving of $32,000. Of course there are other costs involved in a renovation, but still - this alternative looks much more attractive.

And now back to you - what do YOU think, renovate or relocate?

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- Who else hates a cluttered house?
- I do! I do!
- So why don’t you do something about it?
- Because… I don’t know where to start.

So here are a couple of ideas.

Before we begin, this is not your regular tutorial on de-cluttering the whole house - it would take a lot of time and would not serve the purpose of selling your house faster and for a better price. This post is about “cosmetic” de-cluttering, meaning you deal with visible areas only. Anything that you can hide and lock stays put.

Let’s begin with surfaces in your house, because they seem to attract clutter like a magnet. Usually these are kitchen tables, kitchen benches, coffee tables, desks, book shelves, etc. Believe it or not, simple clearing of these surfaces will make your home look and feel bigger and nicer.

What works? Get a big cardboard box. Approach each surface. Dump everything in the box. Wipe the dust and smile, because it looks SO much better already. Now what do you do with this box full of, ahem, stuff? Put the family photos and any of the stuff you’re proud to display back. The rest - I am confident you will find a place for it. Just in case you were running out of ideas, think about donating things, selling them on eBay, giving them to friends or tossing them out.

Now let’s proceed to kids’ stuff. When people come to inspection and walk into your little one’s room, a pile of soft toys looks very cute - it won’t look as cute in your living room, and the same goes for the rest of the toys. Get some plastic or cardboard boxes that you can store under the child’s bed, put the artwork, pens and pencils in one box, toys in another, books in the third box.

The bedroom. If you have a night stand, hide all the medicines, the remote, everything that looks messy, in its drawers. Leave the night light and a couple of books, if you’re a reader. If there is no room in the nightstand, get an under-bed box.

The study. If you’re a creative-mess person, this will inconvenience you - but remember, it’s all for a good cause. Let’s begin with your desk - pencil-holders are essential, all the papers need to be put in neat piles, and while you’re at it - get some light drawers to sort the bills, the invoices, the mail once and for all. As a rule of thumb, free up 70% of your desk surface to make it look good. Tie all the wires hanging down from your PC together, use a braided sleeve or a Velcro fastener; they will look much tidier this way. Put all the CDs and DVDs in one place - even a plastic box will do.

Are you still here? The clutter is not going to sort it self out

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Do you even feel like answering these questions? Nahhhh… me neither

I’m just thankful for having you as my readers, no strings attached, no questions asked, you are welcome here any time and I am wishing you a very good year.

When you’re all back from the holidays and are sober enough to think straight, it will be my pleasure to continue writing about my favorite thing - Aussie property world.

Let’s just hope for the best, forget about the worst and step into the future (as if we had a choice!)

By the time the countdown is over, it’s HAPPY NEW YEAR 2010!

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We may not have the snow here in Australia, but we sure have the spirit! We’ve decorated our gum trees with ornaments, and put on our Christmas shorts and thongs, because it’s too hot to be wearing anything else.

My best wishes to you in this festive season, may you get lots of presents and give even more. Have a nice holiday, and then come back to my website, check what I’ve been up to

Happy Holidays!

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1. Ask your friends what they like and dislike about your house. The reason why is that you can’t be objective about your own house, so you need a “second opinion”. Think how you can enhance the areas they liked. Think how to make areas they disliked look more attractive.

Example 1. You ask your best friends Fred and Linda what they like about your house. They say it’s your deck. Buy some flowers in hanging baskets and hang on the deck to make it look like a little piece of paradise, buy a nice candle holder and a beautiful scented candle and put it on the table to make the place look more romantic. These are just a few ideas, I am sure you can come up with more.

Example 2. Fred says he doesn’t like your ugly coat rack and shoe rack by the front door. You remove the coat rack and hang a picture to hide holes in the wall. Instead of the shoe rack, you decide to put an plant in a pot by the door. Again, when you think of your specific home, this may seem as a silly idea, but it’s only here to emphasize that you shouldn’t be afraid of moving things around.

2. Go to inspections of other houses in your area. Make a list of all the negative things that you notice there, and then compare it to your property - does you house have any of them? What can you do to fix them or make them less noticeable?

3. Make a list of the good things you notice about other houses for sale in your area, can you make yours look the same?

4. Have your house spring-cleaned (even if it’s the middle of winter). Clean windows will make it look brighter, nicer and well looked-after. Get a cleaner if you’re too busy to do it yourself, but get it done before the first inspection.

5. Have your carpets cleaned (especially if you have pets). You may not notice the smell, but the buyers certainly will. Pet hair is a major turn-off even for people who have pets themselves, not to mention that some folks are allergic to it.

6. Cover ugly spots on the carpets with little cute rugs. Any house with wall to wall carpets will have stubborn stains that can’t be removed even by professional cleaners, but with a little creativity you can mask those using rugs.

7. Put slipcovers on dirty or worn out furniture. This is the a much cheaper alternative to reupholstering. They will make your furniture look so much nicer with so little effort. On top of everything else most slipcovers are machine washable and you get to keep them even after you’ve sold the house.

8. De-clutter. Take this as a general guideline; my next post will have specific tips for de-cluttering the problematic areas of your home.

9. Each room needs to show what it’s for. If you’re using one bedroom as an office / study, make it look like a bedroom again. Yes, it’s a nuisance, and no, you shouldn’t leave things as they are. Otherwise potential buyers might remember your house as 2 bedroom instead of 3 bedroom - see the difference?

10. Put stylish pictures on walls.

11. Make your bathroom(s) look nice. How? Using colours. Instead of choosing towels and rugs of the same colour as bathroom walls, chose a different colour - the colour of tiles or floors or of accessories, such as soap dispensers etc.

12. Add a stylish touch to your bathroom cabinets - replace the old knobs and drawer pulls to make them look SO much better. Same goes for kitchen drawers and cabinets.

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We’ve heard a lot about foreclosures in the USA, but not so much here, in Australia. Nonetheless, apparently we’re not doing too well on that front - Port Melbourne was identified as an area where people are experiencing a pretty strong mortgage pain. According to ratings agency Fitch, 4% of households are behind on their payments.

Port Melbourne is not the only spot - the mortgage defaults rate in Oak Park, Mornington, Hoppers Crossing, Melton and Boronia is over 2%. Read the full article in The Age here.

Do not assume that people who default on loans are owner occupiers - there are investors as well that can’t keep servicing their mortgages. This article in Sydney Morning Herald puts this in a totally different light - when an investor defaults on a loan, what happens to the tenants? Do they become homeless? The article speaks about Sydney, but I wonder how many people in Melbourne are being forced to look for another home - and the rental market is tight as it is already.

Economists expect the interest rates to go up in 2010, to be more precise they expect a raise of 1% in 2010 and a raise of another 0.75% in 2011. This would mean that on a mortgage of 300K the increase of monthly repayment will be $190 in 2010 and $340 in 2011. As if people didn’t have a hard enough time already, with all the financial crisis, unemployment and unaffordable housing. Read the full article here.

And this last article is on entirely different topic. Did you know that Aussie homes are the biggest in the world? Australian Bureau of Statistics says that the average floor area of a new Aussie home is now 215 square meters.

Ironically, although the houses are becoming bigger, blocks of land are getting smaller. If you think of it, this is exactly the opposite of what you’d want - you have now more of a depreciating asset and less of an appreciating asset. Go figure Read the full article in Australian Property Investor magazine here.

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