Our method
Data from primary sources. Conclusions written by a person.
Every Precursor report is researched and written by an analyst with five years in Victorian planning and property data, across 300+ properties assessed. Here is exactly how the work is done.
01Why Precursor exists
Built after watching too many buyers learn the hard way.
Before Precursor, I worked in real estate. I sat on the industry’s side of the table, and I kept watching the same stories play out.
Buyers who paid top dollar expecting strong rental returns, only to discover the yield was never there in the suburb’s numbers to begin with. Families who bought in areas they had never researched and then spent months struggling to find good tenants. Buyers from overseas with no local context at all, sold into locations that locals knew had underperformed for a decade.
None of these people were careless. They were making the largest purchase of their lives with far less information than the person selling to them. The agent knows the street. The vendor knows the property. The buyer gets a brochure and a fifteen-minute open home.
Precursor exists to close that gap. Every report is the research I wished those buyers had seen before they signed: the real yield picture, the planning constraints, what the suburb has actually done over ten years, and a plain conclusion about whether the deal stacks up.
02Principles
Four rules every report follows
01
Primary sources only
Conclusions are drawn from VicPlan, Landata, council planning schemes, and licensed sales platforms. Never from listing copy or agent claims. Portals tell you sentiment; records tell you facts.
02
Written by a person
Every report is researched and written by your analyst, end to end. No templated scores, no automated verdicts. If something in the data is ambiguous, we say so and tell you how to resolve it.
03
No conflict of interest
We don't sell property, take referral fees, or earn commission when you buy. The report is the product, which means it's just as valuable to us when it tells you to walk away.
04
A conclusion, not a data dump
Each report opens with a plain-English rating (strong, proceed with caution, or doesn't stack up) followed by the evidence. You should know where we landed within one page.
03Sources
Where the data comes from
Each report cites its sources. These are the records your analyst works through for every property:
- Victorian Planning Portal (DELWP)
- Landata title search
- Council planning scheme & overlays
- DEECA flood & bushfire mapping
- CoreLogic comparable sales
- SQM vacancy & rental data
An honest boundary
Desktop research, deliberately.
We don’t visit the property, and we don’t pretend to. Everything we analyse (title, zoning, overlays, sales evidence, council records) is documentary, which is what keeps reports fast and affordable.
What we can’t see from records, we flag: every report tells you when a building inspector, surveyor, or conveyancer should take over, and what to ask them.
Judge the method by its output.
A complete, real client report is public. Read it before you spend anything.