How do we know where to buy?
 

Q:  'Since we don't live in the US, how do we know we are buying in the right locations and in areas that are good safe long-term investments'?

A: Location Assurance

Location Assurance is a phrase that estero have coined to describe the three-step process we follow to buy all our US properties.


Step one: We visit the properties and neighbourhoods ourselves. There is no substitute for physically walking around the property, and the area, to see how it feels.

Step two: There is no replacement for local knowledge. We only work with people have personally met and trust and only if those people have lived 20 or more years in the cities we want to buy in. We get a great deal of information from these people that is not available on the internet.

Step three:  We have privileged access to an address checking database through a local US bank and as part of their decision-making process as to whether to grant a loan for a particular property, many US loan facilities (particularly 2nd-tier) use very sophisticated algorithms and data-sampling techniques to check demographic information for the proposed location. 

The location cross-checking referred to is much more sophisticated than most individuals could perform and samples data that historically is correlated with the performance of real estate, such as:
• Changes in population and population density of an area and/or city
• Housing characteristics including age, types of unit structure, value, appreciation, market variations in value
• Occupancy statistics for the area including percentage ownership, vacancy, housing stability
• Economic characteristics including per capita incomes and unemployment rates
• Social characteristics including property crime, violent crime, schools, commuting distance to local services

This 3-step 'Location Assurance' programme is designed to provide Investors with the highest level of confidence, that their property(s) are excellent long-term investments