Historically and in general terms, real estate doubles in value every 10 years . . . if you take the time to learn a few critical skills, you can reduce that to around 6 to 7 years. The big question is: 'is it worth spending a little time and money on your personal development if it means significant dollars in your pocket?'

For many years now we have been espousing the virtues of residential real estate - the old reliable 'bricks and mortar', as the only way to confidently build significant wealth. We are not talking overnight millionaire stuff here, rather the building of a low risk, multi-million dollar investment portfolio over time.

It seems we are not the only ones prepared to 'stick our noses out' in an attempt to predict the future. We recently attended a presentation by Michael Matusic who described in some detail why he believes in the virtues of residential real estate. Some of the more critical points he mentioned include further falls in interest rates; increasing rental yields; low vacancy rates; significant undersupply of new stock and net population growth . . . ahhh, a man after our own hearts!

Even more recently Terry Ryder appeared on Channel 7's 'Today tonight' offering his vision for 2020. His message was very clear - average property prices will double over the next 10 years. Let's consider an example: a property purchased today for (say) $300,000 should be worth around $600,000 by 2019; on average that's a $30,000 per year increase. If you structure your purchase correctly AND do your numbers, it's possible to achieve this sort of result without it costing you a cent.

When you add such reputable sources as Residex, ANZ Property Outlook, The Housing Industry Association, Rismark International and RP Data Research to the mix, even the most skeptical amongst us must start to think there is something to all this.

One of the most common questions we get from members of The Australian Buyers Club (our group of like-minded real estate investors), is 'when is the best time to buy?' Just like Matusic and Ryder, our message is very clear AND consistent . . . DON'T WAIT TO INVEST IN REAL ESTATE, INVEST IN REAL ESTATE AND WAIT! Based on our (over 40 years) experience, there is no better time than NOW to get into real estate and hold on - hold on for the ride of your life BUT . . . if you don't have the necessary skills and knowledge, get help from professionals you can trust - you will save significant amounts of money, time and stress!