Family who started property investing while earning money serving snacks now own more than 50 homes
A family who own more than 50 properties, some bought by the children when they were teens, have revealed how clever tricks allowed them to build wealth with little money.
A Western Sydney family have played the housing market using a mix of clever banking tricks and market forces to acquire more than 50 properties between them.
Each of the members of the Linder family aged over 18 own property, with mum Kimberly and dad Jason owning 42 homes and their three eldest children buying at least 10 between them.
Their eldest daughter was reported to have owned seven properties by the time she turned 22, with their son and second eldest daughter making their first purchases as teenagers.
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It’s an unlikely property empire considering the parents started investing with an unremarkable income 14 years ago.
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The Linder family, including parents Kimberly and Jason, along with daughters (from left) Tess, 11, Giorgia, 26, with her 6-month-old son Tait and daughter Aliyah, 1, Chloe, 22, and Laney, 15. Picture: Jonathan Ng
Kimberly was working as a part-time aerobics instructor and also ran a shop serving snacks at a golf course, while Mr Linder worked as a landscaper.
The two had a combined income of about $100,000 a year at the time and – with three daughters, a son and another daughter on the way – were in a position Ms Linder described as “cash poor”.
“We have a beautiful, but very ordinary family, except we have all these properties,” Ms Linder said. “My kids think it’s ordinary to own heaps of property. They are not frightened of debt.
“Most people don’t realise what they can do in the housing market. They say they can’t get in, but it’s never been easier if you know what’s out there.”
Ms Linder said their success in the housing market – more than half of the total value of their portfolio is equity – was the result of some key principles and tactics.
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Many of their early purchases were on the Central Coast.
Both parents started in the property market early, buying their first homes a few years before they met each other.
Ms Linder bought her first property in Penrith aged 19 while working as a model and got her friends to rent out the rooms. Their rent paid her mortgage costs.
She sold the house after the couple met and they used the proceeds from the sale to add value to Mr Linder’s first home, a property in the Kurrajong area in northwest Sydney.
A few years later, thanks to the improvements and price rises in the area, they had about $500,000 equity in the property, which they drew out through refinancing deals to use as deposits for their first property investments.
Using these funds, the couple bought seven investment properties between 2007 and 2009, mostly $200,000-$300,000 houses in the Penrith region and Central Coast. Some were fixed up with cheap cosmetic renovations.
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Hope Island in Queensland has become one of their favourite places to invest.
They were able to continually secure loans for these properties because their rents eclipsed the mortgage repayments and it cost them little to keep their portfolio.
“In the beginning it was all about the cash flow, because we didn’t have much money to contribute, so we chased high yields. I treated it like a business.”
Ms Linder added that the couple were not aiming for quick capital growth but, as luck would have it, the value of the properties rose quickly.
“We had so much growth in our properties. We bought when rates were high. Everyone was scared (and) prices were low.”
By the time the couple were ready to start buying more properties in 2014, their original seven properties had increased considerably in value and they were ready to take out more equity for new buys.
“There’s a lot more you can do when you’ve got equity in multiple homes,” Ms Linder said.
She added that it was around this time they began to use more sophisticated financing structures because she had changed careers to become a mortgage broker and knew how to make their money work harder for them.
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Ms Linder said the family were not frightened of debt. Picture: Jonathan Ng
After starting a property advisory company known as the Linder Group, their income was also higher and they could borrow more and dabble in quick development projects.
More than 30 of their properties were purchased in the last seven years, mostly on the Gold Coast and other parts of southeast Queensland, along with Newcastle and Geelong. Profits from some of their developments helped pay down the debts on their properties.
Ms Linder said some people may scoff at the idea of owning so many properties, but there was nothing holding them back from doing the same. “There’s no reason you can’t do what I did,” she said. “Opportunities are out there.”