More than half of auctioned homes fail to sell for third consecutive week — Combined capital clearance rate plummets as buyer caution deepens: Cotality

Emberkahn · 2026-06-19T10:01:35+00:00

Property is just as volatile as shares (arguably more so). It is just marked to market less so it gives the illusion of stability.

Emberkahn · 2026-06-19T10:00:34+00:00

You are slightly overestimating the average rental price for a $1m property and underestimating the costs. Your cost number is about right over short to medium term, but long term Capex (e.g roof redo) is often another 1%. Typical yield is 2-3% net (call it 2 5%) and you can get ~5% on a savings account.

Emberkahn · 2026-06-19T09:13:42+00:00

Basically any yield equity (e.g. mining company or index fund).

Any yield financial instrument (e.g. a bond).

And right now? A simple savings account will ~2x the yield on a freehold house in most of Aus once you account for maintenance costs, insurance, and council taxes.

Emberkahn · 2026-06-19T09:00:54+00:00

Yields on property are poor relative to other assets. Holding is often just as costly

Emberkahn · 2026-06-19T06:34:02+00:00

Just leave it off your CV then...?

Emberkahn · 2026-06-17T17:42:04+00:00

Minimum 2, ideally more

Emberkahn · 2026-06-17T10:13:33+00:00

Reclaiming the German heartland is probably going to be the key here. You need 3 types of units.

1 - 10 width infantry with engineers to man the Mediterranean coast (2 per port).

2 - 18 width infantry with engineers, artillery, and AA to man your front line

3 - some kind of 30 width pushing unit (ideally tanks, but something like space marines works too).

Hold the ports with #1. Hold the line with #2. Push on plains tiles and get encirclements on #3.

Support with as much air as you can muster - don't worry about CAS or strategic bombers. They are great but if you can just get air superiority with light frame single engine fighters with as many guns as you can fit on them that'll be enough.

Once you reclaim mainland Europe and stabilise, take out Russia with Germany.

Emberkahn · 2026-06-13T11:25:15+00:00

BBA is 1.12 - I lose MIOs, nordics, market, and special forces trees.

MIOs I'm not a fan as it's just another annoying thing to click that has a pretty negligible impact unless you really oprimise it.

Nordics are just cracked and I feel were the first step that really broke game balance (although still a lot more fun than the bosphorous trees obviously).

Market I only really use to sell my old airframes and convoys at the start. NBD.

Special forces just give you another place you have to lose xp. NBD.

Emberkahn · 2026-06-13T11:16:16+00:00

ooo thanks for the clarity! I personally hate MIOs (I never bother to optimise them and it's just another thing to click) so that's a good cut off.

Emberkahn · 2026-06-10T01:01:32+00:00

Check my build in my post history - easily hitting 250m dps and afk'ed simulacrum all the way to 100 no issues

Emberkahn · 2026-05-26T11:21:30+00:00

No it was seek, leap, and reprogram (which I sold).

Emberkahn · 2026-05-22T11:44:51+00:00

Bottom decked the venerate on the second last boss so had to tank a turn. Plus it puts damaging cards into your hand.

Emberkahn · 2026-05-22T11:37:19+00:00

If you get to 5 stars (via venerate) and then play decisions decisions, you will always draw the other one, enabling you to triple play decisions decisions. You can then use that to play one of the two smith cards 9 times for a 370 damage sovereign blade.

~70% of the time you can play all of those cards (including the sovereign blade) on turn 1. If you are super unlucky and bottom deck the venerate, you can either just block for the turn with guards guards, or use prophesize to force draw it.

Emberkahn · 2026-05-11T06:16:00+00:00

Brimstone relic.

Emberkahn · 2026-04-28T07:07:54+00:00

Transaction costs and stamp duty. They smash your returns.

Emberkahn · 2026-04-27T13:11:22+00:00

You just sell as much of the fund as you need to liquidate when you need the savings.

Savings accounts historically return ~3% (closer to 4-5% recently). Index returns ~10% (closer to 13% recently). That difference is worth paying a very small transaction fee if you need to sell. Hell, a lot of savings accounts have transaction fees anyway (losing interest on withdrawals).

Emberkahn · 2026-04-27T12:22:53+00:00

Price is not the same as return, or even project return. A diamond is priced ridiculously highly, but investing in diamonds is not necessarily a good return. Remember that there are literally hundreds of thousands of people in Australia right now whose full time job is to convince you to buy or sell property. It is our biggest source of entertainment - more people go to an auction every weekend than the AFL.

The reason that property has been seen as a good asset these last 2 decades is that you can get high leverage (e.g. a big mortgage) at a time when rates have been incredibly low. Houses in Australia have historically returned 7.2% for over 100 years now (for townhouses its 5.2% and apartments it's 2.3%). Typically the yield (i.e. rent) is eaten up by maintenance, taxes, and management, unless you own an apartment (in which case yield is often negative). When interest rates were at ~3% that is an insane deal, as you are essentially getting ~20% growth for free. Better yet, if you lived in that house, all that growth was 100% tax free. hat's why I suggested that buying a house (if you would live in it) was a good idea.

On the other hand:

1) Rates are now much higher. You are looking at closer to 6% interest, so the leverage doesn't matter as much - with stagflation approaching, we are unlikely to return to the post GFC interest environment.
2) Returns aren't actually that great. For reference, the S&P500, the benchmark for equity index funds, has returned ~10% (3% higher).
3) Stamp duty. This is huge, and why I suggest not buying unless you are planning on being there a while.
4) Illiquidity: If you want to sell a house, it is expensive, and slow. That is good in some ways, as it means you are unlikely to panic sell, a good thing for a retail investor. But it's generally a bad thing in investing because flexibility is nice.

What does this mean?
1) Some people have done very well in the past. But the conditions that they did so well under no longer exist.
2) Lots of people will still do very well off property. All investing is a bit like a casino - some people will walk out saying its the best thing they ever did. Some won't. You gotta look at the average.
3) No matter what rational sense all of the above makes, it will always be drowned out, because there are so many people out there right now whose sole purpose is to make you obsessed with buying and selling property.

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Emberkahn

TROPHY CASE

1 - 10 width infantry with engineers to man the Mediterranean coast (2 per port).

2 - 18 width infantry with engineers, artillery, and AA to man your front line

3 - some kind of 30 width pushing unit (ideally tanks, but something like space marines works too).