The driver is considered by many to be the most important club in the bag. Other than the putter, it is the second most used club during a round of golf. Most courses have at least 14 holes where you will be able to hit your driver. And hitting a great drive sets up the entire hole for success.

It makes sense, then, to make sure that your driver is one of the best clubs in your bag. If you are worried that is going to set you back a small fortune, think agin. You can get a great driver for a lot less than you think.

Golf Digest comes out with its equipment issue each winter and for the last several years, Ping drivers have been the hottest drivers in golf. The Ping G10 driver was the top driver for two years running until it got knocked off its perch in 2010. But it was only knocked off by its progeny – the Ping G15 driver.

If you have money to spare, it’s worth every penny to go out and buy a new Ping G15 driver. But most of us average goflers are looking to save money wherever we can.

There are basically two ways to get a great driver while saving money. Buy a used driver, or buy a Ping G15 clone driver.

If you decide to buy a used driver, I would not suggest using eBay unless you are really savvy. You can find some great values at the big electronic auction house, but you can also get taken to the cleaner. And most of the clubs sold by individuals online aren’t certifed or tested.

So if you do buy used, go with a reputable source that sells certified preowned golf clubs that have been graded and tested. In addition to the Ping drivers, another highly rated and popular driver are those made by TaylorMade, including the TaylorMade R9 driver. Here is a great list where you can find a used Taylormade driver for a great price.

You should be able to pick up a used Ping G10 driver or used TaylorMade R9 driver for about 50% off the orignal price.

The second option is to buy a Ping G15 driver clone. Don’t fall for the ones that are purely lookalikes. You want a golf club that also has the same type of technology built into it. The only place to find the quality like that is with Gigagolf. They have a new driver that uses the same kind of underlying clubhead technologies that make the Ping G15 the most forgiving driver in golf. The new Gigagolf Verve 17 Ti driver has variable face thickness, aerodynamic design and a lower center of gravity that makes it easy to hit the ball high and straight off the tee.

Playing golf can be fun. Playing good golf is really fun. Have the best time of your life playng golf by getting a great dirver. Don’t get caught hitting an inferior driver just because you can’t afford a new, name-brand driver. Buying preowned or direct from the manufacturer will get you a great driver and save a lot of money at the same time.

Property investing has become a popular Australian pastime with one in ten taxpayers owning a negatively geared property. But just what makes a good bricks-and-mortar investment – known as investment property? It’s not about buying any old house or unit, that’s for sure, and it’s most certainly not about buying something you’d want to live in or even in an area that you necessarily find desirable. Over the next few weeks I will investigate what factors to consider in an investment purchase.

The first biggie is what is better – good price growth, or a high rental return?

There’s two ways to measure your return on your investment property australia. Capital growth – the change in price over time – and rental yield – how much rent you’re getting as a proportion of what you paid for the place. Gross rental yield is your annual rent divided by the purchase price, or value, of the property.

People often talk about buying investment properties with high rental returns. However, most of the professionals who buy property on behalf of investors would advise going for capital growth primarily, and then aiming for a decent yield. Their argument is that just like interest payments left untouched in a bank account, house price rises have a compounding effect when the market is going up. Rent payments on the other hand are generally used to service the costs of owning a property – that is they help to pay interest payments, rates and so forth, and they don’t compound. A bit like if you had a bank account and kept withdrawing the interest payments, it might provide an income stream but you wouldn’t get the benefits of growth on growth.