Two reports from the Globe and Mail in Canada. "A major cause of the last two downturns in housing prices was an oversupply of properties for sale. Could it happen again? Veritas Investment Research set out to answer this question recently using an informal, quick and dirty survey of more than 200 real-estate investors across the country on their intentions over the next 12 months."

"Exactly half of the survey participants said their investment properties did not generate positive cash flow after mortgage, maintenance and other ownership-related costs. Eighteen per cent overall were in a break-even position, while 32 per cent were in a negative cash-flow position. The risk to house prices is that we get a recession that makes it untenable for the 50 per cent of real-estate investors not generating positive cash flow to hang onto their properties."

"'If everyone who is cash-flow-negative lists their property for sale, you would get the worst supply shock on record for Canadian real estate' said Veritas analyst Nigel D’Souza."

"Homeowners hoping to sell a house in the Toronto area for a jaw-dropping premium may be disappointed during the dwindling days of October. David Fleming, a real estate agent with Bosley Real Estate, is envisioning deflated sellers sitting around the dining room table, wondering why their property didn’t inspire the skirmish they expected."

"'The eight people that they expected to bid are going to turn out to be three,' Mr. Fleming says. In coveted first-time buyers’ territory, a lot of new listings came out right after the Thanksgiving long weekend, Mr. Fleming says. 'Everyone had the same thought – ‘We’ll wait until everyone’s back,' he says."

"He has also noticed a new trend of house hunters submitting lowball offers, whereas they were waiting for price reductions if they thought a property was too expensive in the past. Mr. Fleming represented one pair of buyers who had some luck when they decided to submit an offer on a detached house in the Eglinton West area. The house had been sitting for a short while with an asking price of $790,000."

"Mr. Fleming’s clients submitted an offer of $750,000 with no conditions – and the sellers accepted. 'We offered $750,000 just as an opening salvo,' he says. 'I was shocked at how quickly they gave up.'"

From ABC News in Australia. "The expression 'safe as houses' is now meaningless to property investors Matt and Peter. The two men both invested in newly built apartments via the same Sydney-based property research and investment firm. The experience is an ongoing financial nightmare for Matt, whose dreams of buying a home to live in have been put on hold because the debt on his investments is worth more than the properties."

"'Recently my wife and I were interested in possibly purchasing our first home in Sydney, so thinking about selling both investment properties,' he tells RN's The Money. 'I rang my real estate agent in Townsville and she told me that it probably wasn't the best time to sell because the exact same property that I have recently sold for $150,000.'"

"Matt bought his apartment new for $289,000 around six years ago, on the advice of the firm. In 2016, he paid $504,000 to buy a one-bedroom flat in the inner-Melbourne suburb of Brunswick off-the-plan. When it came time to settle last year, the bank valued it at $450,000."

"For Peter, one investment through the company was more than enough. He paid close to half-a-million dollars for a flat he now estimates to be worth around $400,000, based on the rents he's receiving, which keep falling."

"'It did come with a rental guarantee — so, for the first three or six months we received $495 a week,' he explains. 'As soon as the rental guarantee finished, the property dropped to more of a market value, which was around $470, and every time a tenant moves out the rent drops. We're now down to about $430 and the real estate agent is saying to me: 'You'll get more options [for tenants] if you drop it to $410 or $400.'"

"Even though residential real estate has generally been a strong investment for people over the past few decades as Australia went through its biggest ever property boom, plenty of people have lost money, especially buying off-the-plan or new developments. But what is truly disturbing about the cases of Matt and Peter — and thousands of others like them — is not that they bought new properties and lost money, nor even necessarily the 'investment' seminars that convinced them to do so."

"Rather, it's how they came to be at those seminars. When Matt told his then-accountant about a $30,000 inheritance he'd just received, the financial professional sensed an opportunity. 'He invited me to an event — I guess you could say networking, but it was a property event — to possibly spend that inheritance on a brick-and-mortar house,' he says."

"In Peter's case, it was his then-mortgage broker. 'My business got really, really busy and because I was so busy I had some cash that I wanted to invest,' he tells The Money. 'My partner at the time also was pregnant and we were going to have a child and we thought, 'Oh we better do something quickly to invest some money we had,' and time was very limited. Our mortgage broker/financial adviser at the same time reached out and said: 'There's a seminar coming up, would you like to come along?'"

"Peter later learned from some of the documentation around his purchase that this broker had received $4,000 in exchange for that referral. Matt isn't sure what his accountant got out of the property sales, but is quite certain he received some payment."

"Independent financial planner Bruce Brammall, based in Melbourne, says he's constantly receiving offers from developers and the property 'research and investment' firms they sometimes use as sales agents. While he bins them, he's concerned others succumb to the temptation."

"'Way too often, large amounts of money [are] paid to hangers-on in the industry or people such as financial advisers or accountants or mortgage brokers to assist in finding clients to purchase the development properties,' he observes. 'They can be up to 7, 8, even 10 per cent of the value of the property. It wasn't rare, and it certainly was happening in Melbourne in the last couple of years, where an $800,000 property may well have had a $70,000 or $80,000 commission paid to a financial adviser, mortgage broker, accountant, etc.'"

"Mr Brammall says the sheer size of these commissions, as well as the advertising costs and developer's profit margin, are the main reasons why most off-the-plan or newly built properties are terrible investments."

"'Property spruikers, property developers are there to do one thing and one thing only, and that is to make a profit,' he says. 'The majority of the time — whether it's inside a self-managed super fund or to those who are purchasing in their own name — the cost becomes pretty clear fairly early on and it's largely been a disaster. I have not seen good stories come out of the property development industry.'"

"Talking about his property investment mistakes is an emotional experience for Matt, as he ruminates on the implications for his financial future. 'All I can do is work hard between now and whenever there's light at the end of the tunnel,' he says, choking up. 'Hope to be able to pay off the mortgages one day, and maybe still be at a loss but at least not have the mortgage cloud over my head, and just that sting in the back of your throat when you have made a bad investment.'