Property forecasts for 2001

January 2001

Way back in 1978, when I started doing my first tentative property forecasts, life was simple. The forecaster could assume, and bank on, an inflation rate of 15% or so. All metropolitan areas and all property types were growing at a similar rate, or so we assumed, because nobody knew better for want of statistics. There was no decaying node, no crime crisis. There were no sharp hikes in municipal taxes or interest rates. Capitalisation rates were pretty stable. Hence the risk of owning property was low and property was still regarded as an inflation hedge by the investment community. And it was cheap to finance property with loan capital.

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