Aaron Horne
Basically this Aussie company. I think they called like fuzzy games or something. They're probably hiding that we're in the real estate industry. We're talking about them on our podcast, but it's a video game where they asked people to post in like the horror rental stories. Yeah, because it's basically a big F-you to landlords and like all the things like, they won't fix my fridge, there's mold here, there and everywhere.

Aaron Horne
So they've made this horror video game.

John McGreggor
Let me just go. It wasn't going to. I know you're listening to the property.

Aaron Horne
All right, guys, welcome back to the property pod, your weekly engagement into real estate here in the Hobart marketplace. I'm your host, Aaron Horn, back in action at the desk that looks pretty excited to be back here. How are you, my man?

Patrick Berry
I'm very good. I was just thinking, just before we started with the mikes, you said, let's talk property and John was like, Yeah, maybe.

Aaron Horne
Just let's just talk.

John McGreggor
We just talk.

Patrick Berry
Maybe it should be just changing the name. Say, welcome to the West. Sometimes we talk.

John McGreggor
Property.

Aaron Horne
I'm okay with that. I just thought we just kind of in here. We said property so that we could like, get out of work for a little bit. Exactly. And get straight into things. Speaking of work, the funny bit is we had a new employee this week, someone wearing the uniform hoping to get paid to talk us through kind of the newest employee joining the team.

Patrick Berry
Yeah, my ten year old son got up yesterday morning, John, and he went and then he's fallen for t shirt and hat and he's like, If I wear my uniform to work today, I can I get paid that.

John McGreggor
Should influence that.

Patrick Berry
And then I was like, Well, we actually have to do stuff at work. Then I thought, What do I actually say? This is where it's to get paid.

John McGreggor
So maybe, yeah, he's had the best role model.

Aaron Horne
So yeah, we're family in school holidays, so not only are we running a property company here, but you guys amazingly allow everybody to bring their their kids to work. It's bring your kids to work every other day. So we've had a lot of extra staff and the funding that was tight was in there sitting at one of the.

Patrick Berry
Is full for and focused on full kit.

Aaron Horne
On and I'm like peeking through music. Is there someone like officially new here because like the hair was coming out of the beanie and I was just like.

Patrick Berry
He's told us that you used to work.

Aaron Horne
For us. Exactly. And that's so, yeah. So there's been been a plethora of people around. It's actually it's fun to see kind of just kids running in and out of the office. I always remember being a kid, never being able to go to your mom and dad's work, but always thinking like, Man, I wish I was one of those kids that could just show up at the work and just like rule the roost.

Aaron Horne
Yeah, there's heaps of roof drooling going on. Well.

John McGreggor
When we had a when we were growing up in that mom and dad's, well, they still own the building in Main Road. Mona, with the two stories, of course, you just run up the stairs, so it would just be a matter of time. Well, I mean, everybody be trying to work, but all they could hear is.

Patrick Berry
Oh, I can imagine. Your dad loved that job.

John McGreggor
Oh, that was a dad. Oh, the staff had full rights to just chastise if we had to. So we kept it from all stuff.

Aaron Horne
I'd love to see you doing that now. Right in the coffee shop, playing hide and seek because of mischief.

John McGreggor
Oh, it was so sweet. We're just playing one of the games. Because when the kids have got the headphones out, they've got no concept of the noise. Oh, and so she's played it herself. Next to they're just shouting into the pit is like just had to just lift up these sweaty Would you mind go to the kitchen.

John McGreggor
But okay.

Aaron Horne
Autoclave games I like I see a good jumping off point for one of the things I brought to that I show. Have you come across this? Janet Dimona is a slumlord and a witch. Non. Have you seen this? I thought you'd be all over this, but I think I've showed up at.

Patrick Berry
The I have seen it.

Aaron Horne
And so this is a video game that's been developed. It's kind of come out of Cove and let me like pull up my notes. But basically this Aussie company, I think they called like fuzzy games or something, they're probably hiding that we're in the real estate industry, we're talking about them on our podcast. But it's a video game where they asked people to post in like their horror rental stories.

Aaron Horne
Yeah, because it's basically a big F-you to landlords and like all the things like, they won't fix my fridge, there's mold here, there and everywhere. So they've made this horror video game. Let me just pull up what I've got on there.

Patrick Berry
So do you get to play? So you get to play as the landlord or No.

Aaron Horne
So the landlord is a witch. There's like a portal in under the sink or something like that where So she's actually a real witch and the landlord's first person saw.

John McGreggor
Horror escape game.

Aaron Horne
Yeah, it's like a horror escape game, basically. So yeah. Sydney by 40 ghosts. I was pretty close as and that's a new game called Janet de Mornay is a slumlord and a witch and it turns the rental experience into a horror comedy game. So I was like, solving puzzles. Like you all got a Monkey Island style games, but it a little bit different and it was formed yet during lockdowns rental And so they asked people for rental horror stories that they'll include in the game.

Aaron Horne
And if you gave a horror story you got a free copy of the game to play. So that's awesome.

John McGreggor
Yeah, it's like really awesome.

Aaron Horne
It's super weird. It looks over funny. They probably we're not their target demographic. They probably don't want to be pumped up by us. But yes, the funny guys, the new cable.

John McGreggor
Pub, but it's.

Aaron Horne
An interesting one in that there obviously would be horror stories that would come from the bunch of the property management girls. Yeah, they just work in a set of rules as well. And it's this really tricky thing. Like there's so many horror stories out there at the moment of what's happening with rental conditions and kind of being able to get rentals, especially on the mainland.

Patrick Berry
Actual rentals, because there's too many people applying for them.

Aaron Horne
Yeah, So it's it's funny that that leads from there into the next kind of horror story that has coming out of the news in this week. And this is that $0 rent rental in Sydney.

John McGreggor
Great Segway van. That's because that's exactly what these games are for.

Aaron Horne
So that's.

Patrick Berry
A level two that is.

Aaron Horne
Talk us talk a 30 $0 rental someone give us some info on.

John McGreggor
I saw it on the news article, I think I caught it on a Reddit thread.

Aaron Horne
And I found it through Tik tok. So it's out there all across the.

Patrick Berry
Country writing around.

John McGreggor
What what. Obviously this.

John McGreggor
Genius.

John McGreggor
Owner is thought, well, they're going to you've got the potential phenomenal opportunity as far as as far as I remember it, being sold for someone with tradie or handy skills to be able to lease a property for free for the first year, all you need to do is completely renovate the property because technically it's uninhabitable at the moment at your own expense.

John McGreggor
So, I mean.

John McGreggor
What do you have?

Patrick Berry
I love some of the Reddit comments on this. There was someone that wrote something along the lines of So you're telling me if I do a great job, I have to pay more rent, I might as well do.

John McGreggor
I should just keep my rent at a reasonable just like just do it up like a minimum.

John McGreggor
I was like, you'd probably just slip up a crappy poster and put a heater in or something. That was that was what was I mean, I don't know if in the, the news article with from what I've read, if I remember correctly, was that once you've renovated the house after the first year, then you then have the privilege to lease back off the landlord at $650 a week.

Aaron Horne
Yeah. Yeah. So like.

John McGreggor

Aaron Horne
Like I was trying to do the math of the, the repairs. Like, basically we look at that calculator and I'm.

Patrick Berry
Thinking first year with the repairs, $650 is quite cheap because you spend more in the first year.

John McGreggor
Right. Well, let's think it's not only do you have to take.

John McGreggor
Time off work if you're a professional tradesperson and then you've got to pay for that stuff out of your own pocket. So they said none of the costing on your time, plus the plus the cost of materials because you pay more than 30 grand expenses.

John McGreggor
But what I.

John McGreggor
Love to think, though, is to get in the brain of the person who, like brought up this idea.

Patrick Berry
Yeah, it's actually listed by a real estate agency, I believe. So the question then lies, was it the agency that came up with this amazing idea and said, Oh, we've got Mr. Vento, you can't fix the property. We understand we have a great idea. If you let's do this.

John McGreggor
I would almost be tempted, you know, like it got all the people that take parodies. I would be tempted to create a parody real estate company and just come up with all these ideas just to get traction out of it.

John McGreggor
Well.

John McGreggor
It's just this discredited. It's like a comedy skit.

Aaron Horne
I haven't had a chance to watch it yet, but apparently the new Aunty Donna show, they only done a cafe. So this came out on iview. There is a full real estate episode. I'm not going to say the words that. Have you seen the Auntie on a real estate skit that the skit that they've got on YouTube? I haven't.

John McGreggor
Yet now.

John McGreggor
But there he is, giggling, thinking.

Aaron Horne
I can't say the word on here, but.

John McGreggor
I'm going.

John McGreggor
I mean, if I could just.

Aaron Horne
Go, Yeah, I can't say the word. I won't say the word. My mum would decide me.

John McGreggor
Oh.

Aaron Horne
Yeah. They might say like.

John McGreggor
Oh, that was classic. Is the skit that for it.

Aaron Horne
Hi, I'm Paul, that I'm a real estate agent and I'm a Yeah, insert word here And that's the whole video. Yeah, it's apparently there's a whole 30 minute episode about real estate agents. I'd be very interesting to sit there and watch that, and maybe we can come back and talk about that next week.

John McGreggor
The attest to it that I like. If you go to conferences and you meet some of the look, most of most of us are.

Patrick Berry
I'm glad you clarified that because when you started that conversation, I'm like, what you're owning up to the stuff.

John McGreggor
You just did? Yep. I thought right into that cookie cutter mode.

John McGreggor
Well, it's just the there's just certain businesses that were just like, go encapsulate exactly what that Andy done, a character that they're portraying. I mean this obviously all comedy has an element of truth in it but like I'd like some people you made along the way it's just that's exactly as they.

John McGreggor
Say.

John McGreggor
As I do. And I'm sad to say that.

John McGreggor
But what is it is.

Aaron Horne
I forgot where we went. I forgot how we got onto there.

John McGreggor
I'm just sitting there, just crap it on him.

Aaron Horne
I didn't know you were talking about creating the Falls Agency. I'm wondering about the agency kind of. Is it? You know, when you get pretty forceful owner or landlord or vendor who I kind of like, these are my needs. This was I can't understand how an agency popped up an ad like that. Like it would be bad press if you were the then to follow through on domain and find out that it's agency X that like tried to pull this swindle this.

John McGreggor
This guy look.

Patrick Berry
The way I read it because I was reading the act, someone had a screenshot at the actual.

Aaron Horne
The domain listing of yeah.

Patrick Berry
And like they made it very clear do not inquire about this unless you understand this, this and this. Yeah. I honestly think that the agency that put it up in their own head, they thought it was a genuine offer. Like this is a great opportunity. This helps the vendor fix the property you can't afford fix this, help someone have a I think they genuinely thought what a great idea.

Patrick Berry
We've we've helped bridge the gap between solving homelessness. And it wasn't until it went live, like all great online ideas, they'd be like, shit, that did not work. We need to.

John McGreggor
We, we, we've made a business. I mean, I could.

John McGreggor
I could. I could just you could justify that if I said, look, all we want is your labor.

Patrick Berry
Oh.

John McGreggor
So but then it was at your own expense, like that's just.

Patrick Berry
Oh, maybe it's three or four years free range in exchange for fixing the house up, knowing that you've got a capital home that you can then make money out of later. But a year's free rent, which isn't really free.

John McGreggor
Oh, Jesus. It it's just it's awesome. It look, I know friends of mine have had, you know, private relationships where the house isn't in great condition, but the person living there just, you know, pays them next to.

Aaron Horne
Nothing and tinkers away.

John McGreggor
Just when it's good, then that's fine, because it's a but that one's just that's probably in their head how they thought that and looked until and.

Patrick Berry
That's it We've had tenants ring up and say look can I paint the home for my own benefit? You pay the paint, I'll, I'll do the work. Yeah. And like the house is me painting, but the tenant would like to do it because I just have a different want it to be fresher and cleaner and whatever it might be.

Patrick Berry
Yeah. And so they offer their time to paint it in exchange for the window of buying the, the materials. Yeah. Which. Sure. But this is just amusing.

John McGreggor
I want to just buy a crappy property. And then to someone who approached me and said, Look, this is what I want to do. I want to read it off it for free, but I'm going to fully renovate the house for you when I'm done. I want to lease it back. On he.

Aaron Horne
Record. I'm wondering, is there like a legitimate way that this could work? Because like as you're saying about the tinkering around and having someone that's, you know, a handyman that's living in your granny flat, I'm like, oh, that kind of does make sense in a way. Obviously, this is like you're just.

Patrick Berry
Thinking, how can I get my.

Aaron Horne
Back now? Yes, but yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. I'm going to rent it out for $0.

Patrick Berry
And for all our long term listeners now would know that our owns renovating a granny flat at the moment now is thinking, can I rent this app for free.

John McGreggor
If you have.

Patrick Berry
Legal obligation?

John McGreggor
Yeah. If you're looking for free rent and the renovations. Well we've got a property for sale at the moment. Well I had to ask Joe, our investment specialist, to say, look, is this, is this a possibility? What what's happened is we've got this house where the family done it forever. But this is significant structural movement in there, which is making it almost impossible to sell.

John McGreggor
Yeah, because the sunken cost of actually bringing it up to a standard where it just is not going to fall off the hill is enormous. Yeah. So we would have sold it a dozen times over, but people walk in and just walk out and say, Look, I can't deal with it. So what we're trying to do each time we chat to the families, it just gets grimmer and grim and grimmer as builders, plumbers, civil engineers come through this house and everyone says no.

John McGreggor
So what we've have to strongly consider is we go back to the buyers and say, look, if you've got interest, just just bring it to us. You know, that's fine. Yeah, but no one's been interested, unfortunately. So every time we go back to the families, like unfortunately that's they're using that sell to purchase a, you know, one of those independent care living units for her.

John McGreggor
So it just keeps getting worse. When I went to the she said, look, we need to come up. What are some alternatives here? You know, okay, so maybe maybe sells an option. Could it be leased? But when I chat with Joe about it, she said, well, I thought, is there the idea? We look, they know that there's water problems underneath.

John McGreggor
Is that okay? Yeah. If someone's getting into it fully, Fully where? You know, is that a problem? I just could could that work in her opinion? It's just like just now. Yeah. You know, it's eight.

Patrick Berry
People out into a swimming.

John McGreggor
Grotto now. Exactly. And look, it's. It's fine, look. But the what? You. The first of it absolutely have to fix a mold that's happened in the on the ceiling because of it being closed off and accumulating moisture. But the thing is if you go into the act like you have to provide a habitable space for. Yeah. And so even though the like if you're doing it all above board, all correct, the reality is the act would still probably contravene that you know that that relationship so it's really difficult from an agency point of view to create that.

Aaron Horne
Which seems so interesting with this like uninhabitable space that obviously doesn't comply with the act. But for it to then like land on you real estate tokens and domains, it's like that's.

Patrick Berry
Where the $0 comes in. That's if no money's been exchanged. Are you renting it?

John McGreggor
Well, I guess guess.

Aaron Horne
Okay. Is this like where.

Patrick Berry
You could build an inhabitable house in the ad? Yeah. They've made it clear that you can't move into this home until you do work to it. So are you renting it if you're not actually exchanging funds?

John McGreggor
Well, he's okay. Yeah, well, he's another interesting one. Where in the event of a delayed settlement, where you'll the person will move into the house early though, to find that it's a possession fee and not rent. And that's a very important word because if it's you paying a position fee, you're not renting from the owner. Yeah. So it's not officially under the Normal Tenancy Act.

John McGreggor
It's a possession because they're just, you know, residing in the home for as early possession. So I'd like those words really matter in terms of that.

Aaron Horne
Relationship changes everything majorly. I guess it's like the idea of paying a $1 deposit or when you say in the movies the lawyers are like, Give me $1. And then it's like, now I represent, you know, sort of thing. It's like, have we've made a official fee for this relationship. So now you can do any crime you want, like.

John McGreggor
Go crazy with.

Aaron Horne
The crime.

John McGreggor
And I suppose all, all these, all these relationships are fine, provided both parties feel like it's fair. Yeah, I suppose once it moves into the point of professional management, we've got a hot dog.

John McGreggor
If I get the other house guy. So. So now I can go get it to go along with you guys. You can't do anything to me.

Aaron Horne
Look at him. Just with his Benjamins, just silly.

John McGreggor
This is what Australia and Canadians are saying. Like they don't use paper.

John McGreggor
This one has ripped it out. If you throw it, you.

John McGreggor
Leave it in your jeans. He goes the wash. It's still in the same condition as well.

Aaron Horne
Well, Pat's got other money. That's like it sounds like you're laundering it, but you got to have the money out in the ether at the moment. Some Filipino pesos that maybe is showing up in the mail.

Patrick Berry
John, I'm going to the Philippines next week.

John McGreggor
Fair enough.

Patrick Berry
But I'll go of the offshore team. I ordered some pesos that was supposed to arrive at the post up on Monday and they're going, nobody knows.

Aaron Horne
The pesos.

John McGreggor
Now. It's like four.

Patrick Berry
Thousand pesos are just somewhere in the mine.

Aaron Horne
And the guys like it would just cancel. It's fine. And then what happens if the pesos show up like that? I legit pesos.

Patrick Berry
So I rang I rang Travelex and said, Hey, where's my money? It's like Star Trek. Don't know where it is. I've just spoken to them on the phone. I was like, okay, no problem. What do we do now? He's like, I have no faith it's going to turn up before you leave next week, so how about we just refund it to your credit card?

John McGreggor
Okay.

Patrick Berry
As I go in my head, I'm thinking.

John McGreggor
That happens if it does go through the process, you know.

Patrick Berry
Very strange conversation.

Aaron Horne
And because we've just had this dollar exchange between us, this is a fine conversation.

Patrick Berry
We're not liable for anything. Whoever else is listening, that has.

Aaron Horne
To be like Hamish and Andy. They give you a if you're a listener and you go up and ask for a dollar, they'll give you one. If they don't have a dollar, they'll give you a bail. So if someone comes up and asks for a dollar, you don't have it. The balance of a bail on them and they're not not liable to.

Aaron Horne
This conversation I've just had about Travelex and pesos and your money laundering. I've run out of real estate stuff to talk about. You guys got anything else you.

John McGreggor
Want, Sam? I'm expert money laundering, but.

Patrick Berry
Well, the only thing I thought it'd be worthwhile touching on is the event that you and Aaron attended on the weekend. Oh, yeah. So obviously, for one four, we always try to give back to the community wherever we can. And you guys sponsored an event on Sunday. I think it was.

John McGreggor
Well, because it's the Hindu calendar, it's the New Year's celebrations at the moment. Okay. So yeah, we, we, we supported the an Indian festival that was happening at the Polish Polish Club or to polish whole a new town, which I didn't even know existed. I knew the club existed. It would be a bunch of birthdays there. But next door they've actually got a hole and oh.

Aaron Horne
I thought you meant that part where we went to the parties.

John McGreggor
Yeah. No.

Aaron Horne
Oh, different.

John McGreggor
Bit. Natasha was just there's a giant hole behind it. I didn't even know it existed.

Aaron Horne
But behind where the.

Patrick Berry
Where the bombing of.

Aaron Horne
The city used to be, it's.

John McGreggor
All connected. So it's like a separate building. You can't. Yeah, but there's a massive hole. So if you're going up Newton Road and you got the club on the corner. Yeah. Like this one down next to it, there's a door and it was in a huge hole.

Patrick Berry
I don't want to get off track or anything, but I don't know if you guys remember we went to an 18th there when.

Aaron Horne
They bring up Martin. Yeah.

Patrick Berry
I don't know who I'm bringing out. I know that I had a learner's license at the time, and there was a bouncer at the door. I just handed that to him. I was 17.

John McGreggor
Yep. This is we've had a dollar exchange. So the bouncer.

Patrick Berry
Was right on those years. He could work that out.

Aaron Horne
Well, my story involves Martin. Martin Lynch being able to go in like he literally walked in in like a pimp outfit and just walks right up to the bar and ordered like 15 shots or something. And there was no one question that it was just like, yep, this guy clearly 30 when he was like 15.

John McGreggor
You.

John McGreggor
Know, and dresses like this with a kid. Yeah, he's obviously a pimp.

John McGreggor
Really got to.

Patrick Berry
Track back to the charity work that you're doing at the Polish Club for the Indian Festival.

John McGreggor
And it turns out there are no pimps to club. But the what it was, was awesome. It they, it was not what we expected because often when you go to these events, it's sponsors that are we thought it was going to be like it where they'd have multiple tents, etc., where people would be serving their dishes at. No, it was it was it was like we went back to like a talent show at school where for 4 hours we just watched all the little community put on, act after act after act.

John McGreggor
And, you know, some some are great. Some you know, kids and others were amateurs. But it was surprising how enjoyable it was. Yeah. Yeah. And we. So then.

Aaron Horne
Did they do, like stand up or anything like that or was.

John McGreggor
It like, no, it was just dances. One of the things that was really lovely that we had to get up just for a couple of minutes to say thanks. Because when you look at the volume of inquiry now and the new migrants have come to us to come to Tasmania, huge proportion of them are from, you know, that region.

John McGreggor
Yep.

Patrick Berry
And the South East Asia area.

John McGreggor
Absolutely. And once it finished, they really appreciated our contribution to the fact that we actually care and want to give back. Yeah, but in the end, like so many of them, our clients now, which is awesome. There was a guy came up to me, he, he'd been here for about 1015 years, he said, and he said, I know maybe 1% of the people in this room.

John McGreggor
He said, I had no idea our community had.

Aaron Horne
Grown and I was so strong. Yeah, that's awesome.

John McGreggor
So it's so interesting, I guess, is that all those people that had been searching for their community didn't even realize just how big it is. So the festival was actually really nice to bring all that together where they no one actually knew that it existed. And then after they finished, they had this huge, big binary spread of all these different dishes from the different regions that were represented.

Aaron Horne
Yeah, No.

John McGreggor
And it was it must have gone for about 4 hours, I guess. But it was phenomenal. Like it wasn't anything like Erin. I thought we're going to have to do where we had to be testing and Self Services service is done now we're just and we're a part of.

Aaron Horne
It. Yeah, that's actually really fun to kind of be at something like that where you've got this expectation like, are you going to show up and I'm going to be on show and do all these sort of, yeah, come on and check out for folks like, No, no, you were just like.

Patrick Berry
I would probably just excited that you turned up. Yeah. I reckon in the past when we've had sponsors for those type of events like, you know, finances, exchange and that's it, no one bothers to actually come and be part of the event. That's a good sign, I think. I reckon you got a lot of value and a lot of like rapport and you know, the excitement that you and Arron took the time out of your day on Sunday to not only sponsor and pay for the event but also turn up and be part of it as well.

John McGreggor
Well, I suppose for me when it comes to sponsorships, you have to, you know, because that that actually shows your care. Otherwise it's just for money. Yeah. Yeah. No it's was quite fun. That's and that got me thinking that I, I wouldn't have known that it was on unless we were approached by them originally, but it made me really excited to just go experience those festivals more often, even if it isn't related to sponsorship or anything like that.

John McGreggor
Yeah, yeah.

Aaron Horne
Just get involved in the community that way. It's funny, I'm just trying to trawl through it. Hey, I joined like a Tasmanian podcast community just in the last little period and there was a guy on there that is doing a podcast with I think it's like 172 registered nationalities in Tasmania, like on the census. And I wanted to find someone from every nationality and, and speak to them sort of thing.

Aaron Horne
So I put like a call out, I'm trying to find it. But yeah, yeah, it's.

Patrick Berry
Going for episode 173.

Aaron Horne
Well I guess the show ends.

John McGreggor
Kind of not very.

Aaron Horne
Good. So it goes back to start. I can't find it here, but yeah, a lot of.

Patrick Berry
People think we should have finished about.

John McGreggor
What I thought it was about. Guys. If you thought ideas, turn it up, just turn it up.

John McGreggor
That's the difference.

Aaron Horne
Well, I've got to finish this here. That's enough of that. Thanks for joining us. It was a pretty loose episode. Check out Janet Demo Night, which shadow landlord and John there at our house. You can check it out. Renovate it yourself. Hey, guys. Hey, guys. Like you have been listening to the property both recorded and edited by 414 media house in conjunction with full and full property code.

Patrick Berry
This podcast is general information only, and the thoughts of views expressed is the opinion of our panel and listeners should always seek use their own investigation into any topic we discuss to ensure they fully understand their own situation.

John McGreggor
It does not constitute and should not be relied on as purchasing, selling, financial or investment advice or recommendations expressed or implied, and it should not be used as an invitation to take up any agent or investment services. No investment decision or activity should be undertaken on the basis of this information without first taking qualified and professional advice.