Not too long ago American magazine Forbes published its 2007 list of the richest people on the planet. Well as the story goes today, the Mexican telco entrepreneur Carlos Slim Helu apparently just wrestled the number 2 spot from my favorite oracle, Warren Buffet.

How rich?
As published in this article, 67 years old Slim is now a one happy billionaire sitting on a net worth of $US53.1 billion, around US$700 million more than Buffett.

How was it achieved?
Well it seems that Mexican economy is going through some rather extraordinary times growing around 50% in last year and Slim’s telecommunication giant Telmex is riding the wave to its fullest, enjoying an unchallenged monopoly position on the Mexican market. These two factors combined than increased Slim’s wealth by $US23 billion in last 14 months! That equals to about $US1.64 billion a month or approximately $US322 per week. An incredible growth, which most probably won’t be replicated any time soon.

Its all in the mind
Tons of paper have been written about the principles, motivations and changes of the way one thinks in order to become successful and wealthy. From my experience most of the time the advice will boil down to “follow your dream”, “do what you love”, “never give up”, “keep learning” and “don’t get discouraged by anybody” (well there may be few more but you get the idea). If applied, all these will require you to “wear a thick skin” (others may call it arrogance) and single mindedly obsess over your quest to success.

And so it appears that there may be some true to it as, undoubtedly successful, Carlos Slim Helu apparently brushes off criticisms of his business by

When you live for others’ opinions, you are dead. I don’t want to live thinking about how I’ll be remembered.

and comments on charitable efforts of Bill Gates’ foundation saying

Poverty isn’t solved with donations. Building businesses did more for society than going around like Santa Claus.

Wow! Who is to say, for what we know he may be absolutely right so I am the last one to judge him. But use this as a reminder that extraordinary success in any field is not achieved by an average, conventionally thinking personality.

Not that long ago, I wrote an article Australian vacancy rates low, rental yields to increase pointing out the changes in dynamics in the Australian property market. At that time I was trying to suggest that the time has come for the savvy investor to once again look into property market. It seems that lots of them did just that.

Today in article Investors drive up housing finance, Sydney Morning Herald came up with some interesting numbers which indeed confirm the renewed interest in the property market. Quoting the words of ANZ’s chief financial analyst about the increase in investment loans in February:

“The number was quite strong, driven by another surge in investor housing loans, and that’s consistent with our expectations that investors will be pulled back into the market this year by the dramatic tightening of rental vacancies that we’re seeing across most capital citiesâ€?

Overall there seems to be a general agreement within the financial and property industries both seeing raising number of investors coming back to the property market despite the current interest levels.

So is now the right time to buy investment property?
As always the answer will largely depend on one’s personal circumstances. In my opinion, buying an investment property today most probably won’t be the worst investment decision you have ever made. However don’t forget, that once the news reached the mainstream media, any value investor will advise you that its probably too late.

Watch those interest rates
One of the biggest concerns to any investor using borrowed funds is his ability to service his loan. Should the interest rate on the loan increase to levels far above those of the rental return, an investor may find very difficult paying the cashflow shortfall from his own pocket.

As, at the time of writing, the aussie dollar is reaching historical highs, an interest rate raise in the immediate future is less probable. Combine that with historically high (and raising) rental yields and one could be excused for seeing the future all too rosy. But we should not forget that property investing is, in most cases, a long term play and that seemingly favorable facts of today are unlikely to last for the entire period of your ownership.

So keep that in mind, carefully calculate your borrowings and take on only as much debt as you can comfortably withstand during the periods of significant interest rate movements.

What are you plans and expectations about the future of Australian property? Would you invest now? Let us know!

Looking for a potentially profitable investment can be, at times, rather daunting task not unlike a little treasure hunt. One needs to look under enough rocks to discover a stock which may fulfill his investment requirements and bring in the potential rewards.

So I thought it could be helpful if I list here some free online tools I normally use for scrutinizing the 1,600 or so Australian and 7,000 or so US shares.

Australian markets

• Australian Stock Screener is a free online stock scanner which I found very helpful over the time. It was the first stock scanner for ASX I discovered while back and I keep using it until these days.
  The use is pretty self explanatory - simply tick the boxes according to your investing needs and let the treasure hunt begin.
• Equities info is the web where I look for value amongst the companies currently trading at their 52 week highs and lows.

US markets

• Yahoo Finance Stock Screener is one of the more obvious tools I only came across not that long ago. The screening facility for US stocks there is extensive and you can narrow your search down to levels not available in the ASX stock scanner mentioned above.
• Barchart.com is what I use for highs/lows and other market indicies of US markets. I am sure that there will be lots of similar US sites freely available but this one is the one I found good enough for my initial lookarounds.

With help of the tools above you should be able to find some potential value investments fairly quickly. But don’t forget, that you will also need to put the newly found treasures under your “investor microscopy�? for some closer look at its earnings, balance sheets etc.