A Sydney couple reveal how they built a $4 million property portfolio

Written by Georgia Palgan.

Five years ago, Sidd Sureshbabu bought an investment property in Sydney. Until it moved. Today, he owns four properties across three states worth $4 million, and has earned $1.4 million in equity. He is still working full time.

The difference? He stopped trying to do it alone.

For the Meadowbank couple – Mr Sureshbabu, 38, a senior manager at a major technology company, and his wife Liz Siqueira, 37, a GP – their dream of early retirement while building an income seemed out of reach five years ago.

“We were on our own without much knowledge,” said Mr. Sureshbabu. “At the time, you think you’re making a good investment, but if you look at the performance compared to the other ones we’ve recently bought, it hasn’t performed well.”

What changed in 2021 was registering a buyer’s agent InvestorKit. Their first purchase was a $610,000 property in Ferny Hills, Brisbane, a suburb Mr Sureshbabu had never heard of. Five years later, it’s worth $1.285 million.

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With the dream of building a steady income and retiring early, NSW couple Sidd Sureshbabu, 38, and his wife, Liz Siqueira, 37 quietly built a property portfolio worth $4m over five years while working 9 to 5 jobs. Image: Provided

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Most aspiring investors fall into three pitfalls when investing in real estate, and every three years means a missed opportunity, according to InvestorKit’s Arjun Paliwal: making Image: Provided.

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“Time is now people’s most valuable asset,” said Arjun Paliwal, CEO and Head of Research at InvestorKit.

“Three-quarters of our customers are very busy and have analytical disabilities. This is a half-million to a million-dollar decision.”

Mr. Paliwal said that most of those who want to invest fall into three traps: doing nothing because the job seems impossible, buying cheap units in the suburbs that they know have not done well, or they end up thinking that they need more money than they really do.

All three of these situations mean years of lost opportunity.

InvestorKit’s formula includes data-driven research, thinking beyond in-house boundaries, and identifying emerging growth markets before they develop.

“We have changed the portfolio system,” said Mr Paliwal. “We don’t need 10 buildings in 10 years as the slogans say. In this case, it was four.”

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Helping busy 9-to-5 workers build a successful real estate portfolio is InvestorKit’s CEO and Head of Research, Arjun Paliwal. Image: Provided.

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The couple now own properties across Queensland, South Australia and Victoria, priced between $550,000 and $950,000. They are not in their hometown of Sydney.

“We will look at the potential yield over time – the growth yield – and the rental yield. The price had to match our price to make sure we didn’t overextend ourselves, and we weren’t paying capital we couldn’t afford,” said Mr Sureshbabu.

That Ferny Hills success gave them the confidence to buy three times in a diversification strategy.

“It’s been about 40 years since the Australian property market did the same thing,” Mr Paliwal said. While Sydney stagnated, their central buildings expanded.

But Mr Paliwal cautioned against rushing to recover rents with rising capital.

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“You don’t need cash flow to build wealth. You need cash flow when it’s time to retire,” he said.

“1 percent on an $850,000 purchase is actually only $150 a week. $150 in income doesn’t change your life and it doesn’t change your ability to borrow like people think,”

For those looking to get started, Mr Paliwal recommends a purchase budget of $650,000 or more for housing in high-growth areas, with $80,000 to $100,000 in savings for a 5 percent deposit and fees.

The couple’s goal is to generate enough income for early retirement and use their equity to buy a home in Sydney.

“Sydney is our home. Ideally, we want to maximize the performance of these properties by using the equity to buy our property in Sydney and reach that early retirement.”

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