Cherie Barber, Australia’s Top Renovator, reveals to us a quick, simple and cost effective way to move from novice landscaper to seasoned expert with her one simple tip on raising garden beds to improve the value of her well-regarded TV renovation projects.

Hi I’m Cherie from Renovating for Profit

Now, for viewers of Stuart Zadel, I thought this month I’d film a quick video about what I do with my garden beds.

As many of you know, one of the great ways to add value is to improve the landscaping. The great Australian dream is the BIG backyard. But unfortunately, your front and rear yard tend to be the most neglected area of a property.

I want to share with you what I’d do with my garden beds.

If you’re renovating a property and it’s a low budget cost renovation, you don’t need to go elaborate landscaping lengths. You can actually get a good look, make your property look neat and tidy without spending much money at all.

What I do with my low budget TV renovation is install treated pine sleepers. Now you can pick this up from many of the major hardware stores for anywhere between $ 8-12 for a 2.4 metre length.

Now, here’s where a lot of people go wrong. A lot of people buy the treated pine sleepers and they actually install them flat, and that’s perfectly fine. But what it really doesn’t help you with is accomplishing bulk and scale.

What I do with my renovation is turn them up on their edge. What I’m doing is, I’m giving the garden beds height which is technically called, adding bulk and scale to your property.

Just by turning them up on their side you’re beefing up the property; making it look like it’s more substantial quality than what it really is. And this gives you the ability to back fill it with garden mulch, plants and pebbles as well.

So a handy little hint that I find very useful for my low budget cosmetic renovation.

I hope you find it valuable too.

See you next month.

Daniel Kertcher, Australia’s Top Share Trading Expert, gives us a comprehensive market update for the month of February 2013. He explains some leading market indicators of the US economy and how they’re likely to affect the Australian economy.

Hi, my name is Daniel Kertcher, CEO and Founder of Trading Pursuits. Welcome to the monthly market update for February 2013. Now, before we get started, there’s just a couple of key things I need to share with you.

Number one, what we explain today is what we call General Advice. It’s not individual, specific advice. Furthermore, we haven’t taken into consideration your personal financial objectives. Number two ,trading involves risk. Should you choose to trade, you must understand your risks and know how to manage your trades. And finally, our company, Trading Pursuits, we hold an Australian financial services license.

Okay, now there’s been quite a few things to talk about over the past month or so. One of the big things to notice is that the US New Homes starts has been surging quite rapidly. In fact, this is a very important point because in order for unemployment to improve in America, and therefore for the global economy to surge, as the United States economy starts to surge;- we need to see new home starts being built. That is, in order to provide employment, people have to have some place to work. If new homes are being built, and we’re also seeing new shops, new schools, new offices, etc. and this provides opportunities and areas for people to work. So one of the key factors for unemployment to fall is new home starts.

Now, we’ve been watching this for many many years now. And what we can see is specifically in the last six to twelve months new homes starts have surged now to a point where they are back at the all-time lows from the past forty-fifty years. Now, after the 2008 global financial crisis, new homes start to fall, an all-time low in America. And it’s literally taken five years for them just to recover to the lows of all the previous recessions. And that might not sound so exciting but considering the super low that it came off; from 2008, this is a very very bullish sign.

We can also see this in US initial jobless claims. This is new claims for people seeking unemployment benefits. And they have fallen to a five-year low as well. Now, we can also identify this in the earnings announcements. Just recently, the top S&P 500 companies in America have made their earnings announcements. In fact, about 400 of the top 500 companies now made those announcements. What we can see here is that companies earnings (that is) their profits are coming in higher than expected. We also see however, that sales are higher than expected. It’s one thing to have more profit, but it’s an important thing to have greater number of sales. Because companiescanincrease their profits without increasing their sales, sure, they can cut costs, but they can only cut back to the bone. In order to see real growth in the market, we need to see or get sales growth as well as profit growth. And that’s certainly what we’ve had in the past three months. In fact, this one has been one of the best earning seasons we’ve seen in the past three years.

Certainly showing us a lot of strengths still coming out of the US top 500 companies. In fact, if we look at the chart of the S&P 500, we can see now that the value of S&P 500 has surged all the way back up now to 1,525 points. That’s only 25 points away from the all-time high of around 1,550 points, hit back in 2007. So, it’s quite feasible that within the next few weeks or even a couple of months, we’re going to recover back to the all-time high of the S&P 500. Now once that occurs, I suspect that the media will start to change its tone from being very negative and bearish to saying: “Hey, look! The entire GFC has now been recovered and the S&P 500 a[...]

Cherie Barber, Australia’s Top Renovator, teaches us how to quickly add massive perceived value to a property. Today she specifically shows all of our budding renovators how to use a specific render to change a fibro house into one that looks like brick dwelling, and how to eliminate the need for external paintwork altogether.

Hi, I’m Cherie Barber from Renovating for Profit.

Now for exclusive viewers of Stuart Zadel, I’m going to film for you this week, a really great video on how to add a lot of perceived value to your property. In fact, in this strategy, it’s all about camouflaging. What I’ve got here, one of my TV renovations at the moment: and what I’ve got here is a five-door dwelling. We all know that there are lots of fibro houses right across Australia. And, there’s a real opportunity for you, as renovators, to come through and make these old fibro houses look like a brick dwelling.

So you can see here, this is the old fibro behind. And, what I’m doing is I’m actually cement-rendering. I’ve actually just applied the base coat of cement render. This is a really great product called “Rock Coat”. And what it is is just a flexible render that goes straight on top of the fibre. The renderers can do a whole house in approximately two to three days at the most. Just to give you an idea of the cost, this whole property is a standard three-bedroom family home: the cost is $5,000 to render the whole house.

Now the beautiful thing about Rock Coat, I absolutely love this product, the beautiful thing about it is that the color is actually already in the render. So it totally eliminates the external painting process on your wall. For those renovators who are on the budget, you need to really check out this product, because it’s fantastic.

So this is once again really giving me the illusion that this property is much better than it really is. We’re taking an old fibro house, we’re rendering it, and we’re making it look like a brick dwelling – which jacks up the property value.

I’m Cherie Barber, see you again next month.

Dominique Grubisa, Australian Legal & Debt Expert, shares with you (all the way from Thailand) her special P.O.S.T. formula for best practice negotiation. Listen to her succinct video and use her tips to ensure you get the absolute best result from your next property negotiation.

Hi, I’m here in Thailand where I am spending my summer holidays and I’ve been out in the market place, I’ve been watching the Thai people negotiate and barter with Westerners and they’re on a massive advantage. They negotiate every single day and they know exactly what they’re doing. And it made me realize as negotiators, as property entrepreneurs, we need to be able to negotiate effectively. 99% of people just can’t do that and I have a body of skills that I’ve learned over the years in LOA as a negotiator that I want to try and impart to you because it’s not all about price.

Most people get stuck on price and timing. They have a deal on their radar for maybe a week and they go back and forth on price and then give up. It’s so much more than that and if you are better prepared you will succeed.

So how do we become better prepared? Simple acronym, POST, P.O.S.T.

P – is for PREPARATION, you must be better prepared than the other side, you must gauge the environment, you must know what you want, you have to do your research and your due diligence and I don’t mean just in your head. Record it – record it in a way that is presentable to the other side, have all your facts, figures, comparable sales. Everything ready, you are prepared.

Secondly, O -stands for OBJECTIVE, what is your objective? Not just in the whole negotiation but at each stage, be ready to sit it out, don’t rush it, it could take months, sometimes when there’s several parties to a deal, be prepared for that. Have several on the boil, but never, ever be under the pump for time, which is a massive disadvantage.

Okay, so what is your objective at each particular meeting? The first one should be just to gauge your opponent, get information about their personality their style, what they want.

Bottom line is basically a feel for them. Information is power, the more information and background you can draw out that first meeting, the better prepared you’ll be. So I would also suggest that the first meeting, you get a feel for them as a person and you build trust and rapport. That’s all your objective should be then.

So what comes next is S – stands for STRATEGY. What is your strategy for this particular deal? Are they a dominant personality? Are you going to match them and be pig headed like them and be like them? That’s fine.  Are they scared? Are they afraid? Are you going to take a make up more team approach? Match your personality and style to theirs. Your strategy could be anything from good cop-bad cop. If there are two of you, my wife hates this property, I like it, how can I convince my wife?  Is there any room for movement? Then, that’s a good strategy to have.

Finally, T-stands for TACTICS. Tactics means, when to adopt a particular strategy. It may be that if the other side is pushed for time, as I said, massive disadvantage. You may take your time and go slower if the other side is set on a particular dollar value; your tactic might be then to say okay, well what if we did it in a different way, and what if we negotiate in another aspect? If we put that to one side, can we sort out one, two, three, four or five? Most people will do less work in a negotiation. If you are better prepared and do their job for them, if you control the negotiation, you will win every time. Control it with your documents.

Okay, we’ve got all that together, let me draw it out for you.

Hey, when we’re talking about price, look at all this research I’ve done. People will appreciate the less work they have to do, and people will stick to a negotiation the more time they invested in it. Little tactics that can take you a long way[...]

Cherie Barber – How To Renovate A Kitchen For Under 1K

Cherie Barber, Australia’s Top Renovator, teaches us how to cosmetically refresh a kitchen for under $1,000! She reveals the specific products and steps to facilitate a complete cosmetic refresh of a ‘tired kitchen’ on a minimum budget and in a minimum timeframe.

Hi, I’m Cherie Barber from Renovating for Profit. For loyal customers of Stuart Zadel, I’m going to teach you how to cosmetically refresh your kitchen for under $1000.

Now let’s face it, money can be a little tight sometimes, so this is the way you can get creative, still transform your kitchen and give it a great look without spending a huge amount of cash.

The first thing is your old bench tops. You can see with this old kitchen that the bench top is structurally in great condition, it’s just cosmetically the wrong colour. So one of my personal favourite products is the Rust-Oleum Countertop Transformation Kits. In effect, these are just benchtop resurfacing kits. A lot of them have granite look-alike sprinkles, where you come through, you sprinkle it on and you come through with the gloss coating where you put one or two coats on and your bench top will look brand new.

You also have your cupboards. Now they’re old, they’re dark, they’re drab, again they’ve got the wrong colours, but they are structurally in good condition. So what you would do is take the handles off, and you come through and you use a product called White Knight Laminate Paint. You have to buy the laminate primer first. So you come through, give the cupboards a bit of a light sand and then you come through and apply the laminate primer first. So that’s the undercoat, and then you come through and you paint the cupboards. Now the great thing about that product is that you can actually tint it to any other colour that you like as well, so ask your hardware supply to tint those for you. So come through, paint the cupboards inside and out, then go to the major hardware stores and buy some brand new handles. Your kitchen will literally look brand new.

So let’s talk about these tiles. Again the tiles are in structurally good condition. They just have a horrible colour. You come through, you apply the White Knight tile and laminate primer which is the under coat, you come through and do two coats of the tile paint in a bright white that will look brand new and you can do that literally in less than a day.

Let’s talk about your old fixtures and fittings. Sometimes the sink, the tap, the oven, the cooktop and the rangehood have seen better days and you have no option but to replace. But do you know you can get some incredible appliance packages these days? Shop online as opposed to going into store  you’ll save yourself a whole heap of money. Look for the fake clones. They basically design knock offs at a much cheaper price.

And lastly, the floor. Again flooring material can be quite expensive. There are some absolutely beautiful liners that you can get in the market these days. There’s also a wide range of floating floorboards that you can pick up for as low as $20 per square metre. Typically, most kitchens are in a large space, so I would encourage you to use the liner, floating floorboards or certainly tiles in this area. Now I’m standing in one of my own personal projects that needs a cosmetic renovation. This is the before photo and with what  I’ve just told you, this is potentially how this kitchen could look after a cosmetic refreshment. Again, all of this kitchen could be done for under a thousand dollars if you’re prepared to roll up your sleeves and do a little bit of DIY yourself.

I’m Cherie. I look forward to seeing you in one Stuart’s events!

See Cherie Barber Live Click Here

U.S. President Obama has won a 2nd term in office last week, but the markets have reacted to two seemingly more important issues. In this November 2012 Market Update, Daniel Kertcher discusses the fallout from the recent U.S. Election results, the Top 500 U.S. Company earnings reporting season, the European Debt Crisis plus the looming U.S. Fiscal Cliff deadline coming in December.

Hi! Daniel Kertcher, CEO and Founder of Trading Pursuits. And, this is my global market update for November 2012.

Now before we get started, there’s just a couple of little disclaimer things I need to share with you. Number one, what you’re seeing today is what we call General Advice. It’s not individual, specific advice. Furthermore, we haven’t taken into consideration your own personal financial objectives. Trading involves risk. Should you choose to make any trades, those are your own decisions and you take your own risks. And finally, my company, Trading Pursuits, we hold an Australian financial services license.

Okay, well this month we’ve seen the finalization of the top 500 companies in America making their earnings announcements. And that of course is every three months, the top companies or all public companies for that matter have to make their profit/loss statements.

What we can see here is that for the top 500 companies in America, almost every single one of them has now made their earnings announcement. And, we’ve seen that there’s been an earnings surprise- that is, close to 3.69% of the Top 500 Companies have had greater earnings than expected.

However, if you’ll look next to that- you’ll see the sales surprise is actually been lower. So what this simply means is, that companies have been making less sales, less revenue than expected, but actually greater profits than expected.

So that could be through cost cutting, laying-off staff, improving modernizations of their factories, etc. So, it’s a good sign that companies are growing their profits. But, analysts are pretty spot-on with the amount of sales that they’re expecting the companies should be making right now.

Now despite this seemingly good news, the US Stock Market has had a substantial drop in the last month. Now of course, in the last month, we of course are aware of the US government election won by Barack Obama.

Now, in the last review I did last month, I mentioned that the market was going sideways and it will lead up to that decision, that election. Now that we’ve seen the results, I suspect that the market may have just continued moving in the same trend it was on before.

However, following the election, we had two major announcements. Number one was the European drama. And that is the European credit crisis has flared up even further and further talk of what’s known as the US fiscal cliff.

So what we can see is that in the last month or so, the S&P 500 value has dropped close to by a hundred points. Now the overall index itself is stumped by over a hundred percent in the last 3-4 years, but it’s dropped 8% in the last month alone. In effect 1,350 points. As we see in the graph, it could easily fall back down into the 1,200’s or even the 1,100’s level.

So, what are we talking about this two particular points- well, despite the fact that US unemployment is still in a downwards trend, which is good, it’s still quite high, up near the high 7% range. Now, the European debt crisis problem. This is again, flared up with again, Germany, France, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy, etc. struggling to come to agreements to deal with the European debt crisis.

What we have seen in the last couple of days though, is that there has been an extension granted to Greece. And, that is they have an additional two more years, and Greece has only just literally recently announced that they passed their austerity measures.

So, Greece is doing the right thing as far as the rest of the [...]

In this October 2012 Market Update, Daniel Kertcher discusses the all important U.S. Election results coming soon and the effect this is and will have on the global markets. We’re also well into the S & P 500 reporting season which is a strong barometer for future market direction. Daniel also covers the Aussie dollar and current ASX surge.

In this August 2012 Market Update, Daniel Kertcher reveals the fact that the U.S. S & P 500 Index has gained 111% since March 2009! Money’s starting to move out of U.S. 20 Year Government Bonds which is a telling sign and Europe’s on summer holidays which keeps everyone happy (and in case you wanted to take advantage of the cheap prices and rallying Aussie Dollar). Get educated and enjoy.

In this months Market Update Daniel Kertcher explains how lower than expected U.S. jobless claims, a positive start to the earnings reporting season on U.S. companies and falling Greek 10 yr bond yields have created a surge in the S&P 500. Daniel also shows U.S. Government bonds at an all time historical high and what’s causing the rise in Oil and what this could mean for Australia.

Are we on the verge of the biggest boom in history? In this fascinating finance update Daniel Kertcher explains the underlying fundamentals driving the U.S. markets. Profitability is high, debt is low, the S&P 500 is at its highest levels since the 2008 market crash and the Apple graph…! What will happen when the Consumer Confidence Graph reflects this?