NZPIF Conference : Conference 2010 Speakers

Steve McKnight is a respected property investor, accomplished author, and media commentator. Prior to 1999, Steve, a qualified chartered accountant worked for international accounting firm Deloitte before starting his own accounting practice and specialising in audit and management consulting.

Since 1999, Steve has used his investment philosophies to acquire an incredible 260 properties. He was approached by John Wiley & Sons to write investment books, and has gone on to become one of Australia’s most successful real estate authors. His first book From 0 to 130 Properties in 3.5 Years has sold more than 150,000 copies and was the top business book in 2004. Steve’s areas of expertise include residential property, commercial property, property related finance matters, general comments about economic activity including interest rates, property related statistics. He is somewhat unique as he can approach these issues from a professional, investor and day-to-day homeowner perspective.

Steve co-founded and remains the resident expert on PropertyInvesting.com – an independent community for property investors to share ideas and help each other. Currently there are more than 65,000 registered members. His comments and opinions about real estate and finance are regularly sought by various media organisations.

Joan Baker, together with Martin Hawes, owns and operates WealthCoaches.net to help people get the life they want. They believe that everyone should have a wonderful life – not merely survive, just get by, or struggle to get the mortgage paid off and retire. People want more – more leisure time, travel, time with family, opportunities to study, write books, put something back, etc. But they find it difficult to create the time or wealth in their lives that would allow them to do those things.

A few do succeed. They are the ones who have learned to be financially free. They do not have to ‘work’, though, of course, they may choose to for a variety of reasons. They enjoy a passive income – money earned while they sleep or have lunch.

WealthCoaches.net has developed a model that allows individuals and couples to learn the secrets of this financial freedom. People can learn how to become wealthy and stay that way. The WealthCoaches programmes teach people all they need to know to manage their wealth creation so they can have secure income for life.

Joan’s role as a wealth coach is to work alongside individuals to provide the expertise and support they need to achieve financial success.

A background as a business consultant, in senior management, marketing, and human resources has been invaluable in giving her a deep appreciation of the opportunities and challenges today’s business people face. It’s also made her adept at managing change both at an individual level and in the wider commercial context.

One of her key focuses is actively demystifying the process of wealth creation and promoting understanding of financial maths (something she has explored in her recent book "Improve Your FQ”). Joan is also the author/co-author of seven other books including the popular "Smart Women, Smart Money" and “A Man is Not a Financial Plan”

For more than thirty years, Harry Lawson has been very successful in the property investment business and is quick to share the somewhat unorthodox secrets of his success. He is also a great believer in putting something back into an industry that has been good to him. He was a foundation member of the Hawke’s Bay Property Investors’ Association, of which he was President for 13 years, and served as the President of the NZ Property Investors’ Federation for six years. During this time he founded the Auckland and Southland Property Investors’ Associations. He is therefore very qualified to look back on these years of experience and comment on how to grow a property investment portfolio and how to make it fun.

He is convinced that many hard working investors do not enjoy the full fruits of their hard work, so he is able to talk knowledgeably about knowing the right time to exit and having a strategy for doing so. At the 2010 Conference, he will outline a 10 point plan that is his recipe for making investing in property not only successful and fun as well.

Author of Residential landlording for the absolute beginner, he has a no nonsense and humorous approach to investing. It is all about getting the basics right, enjoying what you do and being professional (and successful of course).

The recipient of two business awards, Harry is Napier City’s most experienced Councillor and a former editor of a business magazine. Nowadays he spends much time travelling to China and Japan, where he has received a citation from Tomakomai, Napier's Sister City in Japan, for his service to the Sister Cities.

John Anderson was born in Wellington New Zealand, educated at Scots College and Victoria University where he studied for an accounting degree. At the age of 22 he left New Zealand for the United Kingdom on a one year “Overseas Experience”. He returned some 20 years later with his wife Alison, four children and an international business, Contiki Holidays.

After a few months in London, John’s desire to see Europe was overwhelming but he had insufficient funds to achieve this. With just 25 pounds he found a way to not only see Europe, but start his own business. When John eventually sold the company it was and remains one of the world’s major tour operators. Contiki is now firmly established as an international “brand” name. It is a household name in New Zealand, Australia and Canada. An estimated 1.6 million passengers have already travelled with Contiki.

Subsequently, as a member of the Auckland Rotary Club, John conceived the idea of a major fundraising opportunity. This became “The Ellerslie Flower Show” which is now established as the largest event of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere. John travelled to London and met the “Chelsea Flower Show” organization who assisted him with the development of the New Zealand show. He was the CEO of the event for the first year. John and Alison, wanting a change of lifestyle, now live in Marlborough New Zealand. John is regularly asked to be a keynote speaker, telling the incredible story of how he developed a simple idea into one of the world’s major tour operators. He is also writing a book about his many experiences

Khoon has worked as an economist in various roles for over a decade, starting off in a private sector
consulting firm, and then moving to the public sector where he worked at both the New Zealand Treasury
and the Reserve Bank. He returned to “the dark side”, joining the ANZ Bank in 2006 as a Senior Economist. At the Treasury, he was the Manager of their Macroeconomic Forecasting team, and served as an Economic Advisor at the Reserve Bank. Khoon has a Master of Commerce (Hons) degree from Auckland University. At ANZ Bank, Khoon produces markets based economic research for the dealing room and bank clients, ranging from near term financial market developments to medium term economic issues. A large part
of his time is spent discussing the global and domestic economic environment with clients and the
implications of these on their businesses. Khoon writes a regular economics column for the NZ Property
Investor.

Introducing Mark Withers - speaking at the post-lunch breakout session on Saturday.

Mark Withers is a chartered accountant and director of Withers Tsang & Co Limited, founded in 1998. The firm specialises in accounting services and tax advice for property investors. He was a founding member of the Auckland Property Investors' Association and served 10 years as treasurer before being made a life member. Mark is a popular speaker at Property Investors conferences and writes a monthly column in the NZ Property Investor Magazine, and provides the “Ask an expert” advice in the magazine.

He is the Author of the popular book, “Property Tax – A NZ Investor Guide”, and is a regular speaker and commentator on property tax matters.

Introducing Sally Couper - another Saturday afternoon speaker

Sally grew up on hill country sheep farm in Hawkes Bay. She married young and had four children whilst setting up and running a successful insurance business.
After becoming a widow she moved to ADELAIDE, South Australia and began another insurance business, gaining many awards within the industry.

At the age of 50, Sally became disenchanted with the insurance industry and the rules and bureaucracy, and travellng from one end of town to the other in the evenings to see clients. About this time she came accross Robert Kiyosaki`s book RICH DAD POOR DAD, and life took a radical change. Over the last 10 years, Sally along with her partner Alex, has acquired an interest in approximately 60 properties in 3 countries, and become very knowledgeable about real estate and how to create wealth from property.

Most imortant in Sally`s philospohy is to love what you do and have FUN!!
Mindset is the key to happiness, wealth and success,and this must be in the right place to succeed at ANYTHING!!

Introducing Sue Tierney - speaking at Mahi Wines.

Sue has had 25 years experience in the finance sector and is an experienced property investor. Sue’s financial expertise was forged during her time in Christchurch, where she handled day-to-day business and rural accounts for a major bank. This expertise has been fine tuned in Auckland, where she has developed a flair for finding and developing new investment opportunities.

Introducing Frank Stace - speaking at Moa Brewing Company.

Frank Stace joined Westan Johnston in International Property Consulting Ltd in October 2006. Both were experienced investors in Australia and New Zealand and Westan had already spearheaded an investment foray into the San Antonio and wider Texas market. As a result of their shared vision, Global Property Deals.com was created and launched to facilitate bringing quality local and international investment property deals to investors who seek better returns otherwise unavailable to them. Today Westan Johnson and Frank Stace collectively own properties in 3 states of the USA and in 5 different cities. These properties include homes, duplexes, vacant land and commercial projects.

Investors have the opportunity of registering on www.globalpropertydeals.com and gaining access to property investment opportunities the moment they become available via automatic email alerts. They have total control over what they want to be notified about by accurately profiling their investment goals when registering. Frank and Westan organise regular investor tours to the USA, where over a period of 6 days investors get a comprehensive overview of how to invest safely in the USA, and to evaluate dozens of different investment opportunities for themselves. These tours are highly popular and regarded by many as an essential first step to investing overseas.

Introducing Tracy Hintz - speaking at The Ned.

Tracy Hintz was born in Kawarau, New Zealand and spent her childhood in different parts of New Zealand as well as overseas. She became a qualified Architect in 2002 which was also the year she purchased her first investment property. After purchasing two rentals and completing two rent to own deals in late 2002 Tracy moved from Auckland to Rotorua where the market was best suited to her property methods at the time. Since then she has completed over 150 property deals. Tracy has been successfully involved with rentals, rent to owns, property trading, do-ups and developments of both subdivisions and building. Tracy has had experience financing her deals in a variety of ways, working with banks, money partners, vendor finance, and option agreements. Tracy’s business is currently predominantly focused on developing affordable homes and trading residential properties.

Introducing Paul Wright - speaking at Hunters Wines.

Paul began investing in property in Wellington in 1981 and has been involved in residential property ever since. He now owns 350 tenancies, all in Wellington. While he sees the advantages of commercial property investment, he has remained solely in residential as he feels it is much less risky. From the first purchase of a property with four flats, Paul has purchased other multiple unit properties, and converted two commercial buildings to flats in association with a friend. With his son Matthew, he converted a nurses’ home in Newtown into the Pickled Parrot Lodge, which has 67 bedrooms. Paul looks after all his properties with the part time assistance of two friends and has much information and advice to share with other property investors coming to the 2010 Conference.

Steve McKnight will be speaking at Allan Scott Family Winemakers as well as being the keynote speaker on Saturday morning.