BrickX

BrickX Story

- Pam Walkley

What is it?

BrickX is a property investment platform that allows investors to acquire fractional interests in residential properties.

How does it work?

BrickX is a managed investment scheme. It buys properties and splits each asset into 10,000 units (or “bricks”), which it sells to investors. Each property is held in its own unit trust, separate from the BrickX business. The price of each brick is based on the initial purchase price plus acquisition costs and a cash reserve. At the time of writing there were 14 properties available and for nine of these the price of a brick was less than $100.

What are the pros?

• Enables those with very low funds to enjoy the benefits of investing in residential property, one of the best performing asset classes in Australia. These benefits include regular rental income distributions and capital growth.

• Allows you to choose the specific property/ properties you want to invest in from those available through BrickX, which enlists professional help to choose them.

• Gives investors, including self-managed super funds, the opportunity to diversify their property portfolio at a very low entry cost. Currently the properties available are spread between suburban Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide.

• Investors can have exposure to residential property with none of the usual hassles of being a landlord.

• Members can benefit from professional management including measures to mitigate risks, such as landlord insurance and a cash reserve to cover about three months of expenses for each property.

• The transparent website provides a lot of information on each property in an easy-to-access format.

• The fee structure is simple (see “What are the fees involved?”).

What are the cons?