Shaun, Platsak, I absolutely agree with both of you. Shaun, you're definitely on the right track, especially if you're young and in a position to leverage property ownership. I did the same for a couple of years and then skipped out of property in 2005. You're definitely right that the R250k market is where the relatively safest action is. The rent is affordable, there's big demand, and selling prices are within young working people's budget. That said, you're also right to wait at least another 6 to 8 months (personally I've told myself to wait 12 to 24 months, to look for recovery in the US and EZ, and to follow trends at auctions and on PIP lists). Auctions and PIP's are amazingly accurate gauges of who is in charge of the market be it buyers, sellers, speculators, investors or banks. When we get to the point where geniune home buyers are missing, sellers give up, banks panic, speculators back off (includes developers or agents), and geniune investors bid and set the prices, then you can know that a bottom is likely setting in. At the moment I'm seeing far too much action similar to what happens at car repo auctions where 2nd hand dealers bid prices up against speculators to protect their market. Same thing is still happening at property auctions and it will still take some time before they realise that the market will stay irrational far longer than they can stay solvent. Anyway, property is almost never a bad bet, you just don't want to buy into negative equity and right now that's the risk. Though I do know of some blokes who are taking high risk bets on commercial and upper middle class property. They buy at auction for 10% to 20% below what the bank asks and then they quickly flip the property for a 5% to 10% profit, and believe me, there are still buyers in those segments who can afford 800k but just not 1 bar.