Private property issue #107 - Buy a house with $0

I bought an investment property with $0 cash.

Most investors do. And no, it's not a scam or illegal.

It’s called the No Cash Needed method. Here’s how I did it (and how you can too).

It all started back in 2021

I wanted to buy this property for $625k. The plan was to use it as a long-term investment property.

TSB bank said they’d lend me $500k to buy it.

But that meant I still needed to come up with $125,000 for the deposit.

Not many people have that much money lying around in their bank accounts.

And I certainly didn’t. So, how could I come up with the other $125k?

While I didn’t have cash. I did already own one of these properties:

So I went to Westpac (one of my other banks) and said, “Can I borrow $125k against this property? I want to add another rental property to my portfolio.”

They said, “Sure thing”.

I’ll show you how this looks in my real bank accounts in a sec.

But first, let’s answer the question that’s probably running through your head: “Can I buy a house with $0 cash, too?”

Can you buy a house with $0 cash, too?

If you want to use the No Cash Needed method, you need something you can borrow money against.

That’s usually a property.

(Not always, but most of the time).

Then, you’ve got to find a useable equity calculator to see how much you can borrow against the property.

So far, 10,964 people have used this one on the Opes Partners website. You might like to use it too:

Here’s an example of how it can work.

One of our advisers at Opes Mortgages is currently working with Carol and Steve.

They own their own home worth $850,000. And they have a $400k mortgage.

To cut a long story short, they can borrow $280,000 against their property. They can use that money as a deposit for an investment property.

What could they do with that? They can spend up to $1.4 million buying investment properties.

They still need to pass the bank's income tests. But it’s looking promising.

Here are (some of) my real bank accounts

Some investors give me blank stares when I explain the No Cash Needed method.

So, to make it super clear, here are some of my real bank accounts:

As I mentioned, there’s a $500k loan from TSB.

Then there was I borrowed just over $125k from Westpac:

Put them together, and that’s how I paid $625,000 for a property (without putting in any cash to buy it).

It was entirely bought with other people’s money.

Isn’t this a bit risky?

Let’s be clear. The No Cash Needed method isn’t right for everyone.

There are pros and cons.

And you can see this in some of the YouTube comments in my most recent video, where I shared this story:

The pros are that you get to buy a house with $0 of cash. Then, as the property goes up in value, you get to keep all the house price growth.

The downside is if property prices go down (as they have), your mortgage may be higher than the house value.

That means you need to keep holding that property until prices go up before you sell.

So the takeaway from this newsletter isn’t that “go and buy as many houses as possible with $0 cash.”

The message is: “If you didn’t know this was possible, you might like to consider it.”

After all, this is a 600-word newsletter. It’s not formal advice from a financial adviser.

Here’s a truly crazy story

Most people borrow against their house to buy an investment property. But it’s not the only option.

Here’s a truly crazy story. One investor we worked with borrowed $80,000 against his car to buy his next property.

Check out this video if you want to hear the full story.