Real Estate Investor Magazine South Africa December - January 2014 | Page 19

information in a visually understandable way
will stand a greater chance of gaining a buyer’s
interest,” says Andrew Kumm, director of new
business development at RED-i.
Another RED-i offering is the Digital Site
Model which is an interactive replacement for
physical site models. A union of Geographical
Information Systems (GIS) and 3D modelling,
the Digital Site Model benefits the development
team in the initial planning phases, all the way
through to the eventual sales and marketing
activities. User interaction with the model is in
real-time via mouse and keyboard, providing the
freedom to move around and view the site from
any vantage point as well as access information
regarding site features.
Complex management is also entering the
technology age following a partnership between
global technology company, Mystrata (www.
mystrata.com) and Paddocks (www.paddocks.
co.za), an online training and consultancy
company for the sectional title and home owners’
association (HOA) industry. David Bugden, the
CEO of Mystrata, comments: “The exciting thing
for South African property managers, trustees and
unit owners is they will benefit from cutting edge
cloud-based technology that is specialised for the
sectional title and HOA industry and customised
for South African laws and terminology. With the
customer portal system, schemes and their trustees
can pay bills, view invoices and statements, raise
and track maintenance requests and much more.”
Of course, all of this technology is readily
accessible – and of great value - to property
investors. The search, save, compare and
notification functionalities provided by property
portals makes it quite possible to follow the sage
advice from Dolf de Roos. He said investors
should follow the 100-10-1 rule: look at 100
properties, shortlist ten for further investigation
and identify the one great deal. While previously
this may have seemed impossible, it can now be
done from the comfort of your home or office,
thanks to the vast amount of information on
property portals, including virtual tours and
Street View capabilities.
Doing a thorough due diligence is also much
easier thanks to the range of online property
reports available through various players in
the market, including obtaining title deed
information, getting Automated Valuation
Reports and verifying the details of sellers,
www.reimag.co.za

partners and even tenants, all instantly and
online.
Of course, there is also software designed
specifically for property investors and these are
usually available through property investment
coaches and organisations.
One example is the P3 Property Wealth Manager
Software, the first South African real estate
software that combines the Score Card model
with an intelligent data feed, unique interactive
forecasting analysis, and portfolio and mortgage
management features to deliver a powerful, yet
simple-to-use, real estate decision-making tool.
It features a Score Card Evaluation that allows
investors to make their own informed decisions,
based on aspects such as valuation data, suburb
capital growth, cash flow and breakeven point,
taking into account market rental factors, vacancy
factors and even property condition. It provides
a comprehensive analysis of a property including
nominal vs effective return on investment (ROI);
after-tax (capital gains and income tax) ROI; 10,
20, or 30- year projections and sophisticated capital
appreciation ROI analysis. It also provides for easy
month-to-month rental management, automated
inter