FEATURE ARTICLES
	There are plenty of good property investment options August 2009
	How to make your home value more? July 2009
	Peas in a pod! June 2009
	NAVIGATING THE MORTGAGE MAZE... it's a good time to borrow! April 2009
	Let's step up to the plate! February 2009
	'Tis the Season to be Jolly... January 2009
	Time for Change? February 2008
	A Winter full of Promise December 2007
	All's well that ends well at BS and T October 2007
	Two months is a long time June 2007

But in the current economic environment, realism and pessimism are not the same things, and there are plenty of opportunities to make good business decisions if you have the resources, or the ability to raise the resources.
Most local investors keep their investments in managed funds or fixed rate bank deposits, most of them accumulated with the benefit of generous tax concessions that produce an annual scramble every year-end to maximize on the government's incentive to save. But these funds have also suffered like most investments in recent times, and although there have been mitigating circumstances, perhaps now is the time to take a more critical look at performance. That in itself will be a culture shock for many investors, as there's a lot of apathy amongst investors, and many are quite prepared to ride the storm and let the fund managers bounce them back to prosperity. If that's your take in the investment stakes then good luck, as you'll need plenty of it, but if you have a bit of vision and enterprise, you may be looking a golden opportunity in the face.

This is a buyer's market in every sense, and it won't get much better than being able to go to a seller and negotiating a price. If the seller wants to sell then you enter a negotiation process, and if the seller is desperate to sell, then that process is almost entirely under your control. There is no evidence of panic selling in the normally conservative Barbados real estate market, but there are certainly buyers that want to sell and are prepared to talk at figures below their asking price. You simply have to search them out.

Not everyone has the option to take advantage of the bargain buys that are available, but two areas of potential investment must be of interest to anyone hoping to get a foot on the real estate ladder.

Land lots won't get any cheaper, no matter what happens in the more mature markets as sales are essentially local driven. This is simply a case of supply and demand, and as every land sale goes through, less land is available for purchase. Therefore, if you are thinking about buying land then do it soon as the price is still going up, and it seems improbable that it will ever come down.

The second attractive area of potential investment lies at the bottom end of the property market and it is again a product of the supply and demand syndrome. After all, this is the segment of the market that has more potential buyers that any other, but where are the properties in the $250,000 to $350,000 to meet the demand?

We often hear public figures lamenting on the absence of low income housing, and government ministers have publically committed to providing affordable properties at the bottom end of the market, but properties in the lower to mid property range are still in big demand and if you can purchase in that range, you are almost guaranteed capital growth going forward.

You don't have to be a millionaire to make good investment decisions. If you purchase land or property below $350,000 you have a sound investment even in a depressed real estate market. It won't be like this for ever, and when the market swings back into a positive cycle, you'll reap the benefits.

However, your challenge may be to find properties in this range!