There’s a slew of information to scour through for property advice, offering a range of ‘perks’, ‘risks’ and ‘tips’. Taking the time to dig below the surface of a source can mean the difference between a property investing disaster or a wealthy triumph that ideally synergises with your end goal.
But what should you be wary of when a dinner party serves a side of property advice?
Head of research at Propertyology, Simon Pressley, sits down with Your Investment Property magazine editor Sarah Megginson to discuss how bias can impact your investing route and how to avoid acting on advice that won’t be suited to what you are aiming to achieve.
“It’s something that’s not always obvious to pick up straight away if you’re just starting out with your property investment journey,” Pressley says.
“But over a period of time, the more information you consume – if you take some time to actually understand who the author is or who the person quoted this – after a period of time you’ve got a bit of a body of evidence that tells you a bit of a picture about that individual person and their biases.”
As the economic climate enters a momentary cloud of uncertainty across all corners of the globe, investors more than ever will be seeking experts and advisors that can assess their individual circumstances and direct them towards the most appropriate, bespoke path.
“What you really need is someone who is objective to all locations,” Pressley notes.
“I think a lot of people in property have that mindset [of] cheering your own home city. You need to look far and wide and follow what the fundamentals say and there’s going to be plenty of times, more often than not when the fundamentals aren’t as good in your home city as what they will be somewhere else,” Pressley explains.
When it comes to becoming consumed by media headlines, the head of research advises investors to be aware of who crafted certain articles, which will also help them to gain an understanding of how much of the advice or information being offered stems from an underlining interest, personal experience, or bias.
He recommends investors to not take everything at face value and to ground themselves in what they set out to achieve in their investing journey. This includes being aware of your own bias also, which Pressley explains happens when you are “wanting to believe something and then going on a mental mission and looking for information to support it”.
“I’m actually not helping myself if I allow [my] confirmation bias to dictate my decision,” Pressley says. “I need to totally forget where I live or what I would like to happen and actually look at the evidence and make a decision based on that.”
To find out more about how to screen your property sources, watch Simon Pressley’s full interview above.