How to Buy Property While Serving in the ADF (Step-by-Step Guide)
In this step-by-step guide, Robbie (ex-Army) and Ryan (ex-Air Force) break down how ADF members can start investing in property while still serving—using a clear plan, the right entitlements, and a long-term strategy.
Serving in Defence gives you something most civilians don’t have: a stable pay cycle and strong housing support through entitlements. But Robbie and Ryan make one thing clearone day, every serving member becomes a veteran, and the real world doesn’t come with guaranteed income or accommodation. This video is designed to help you reduce that future uncertainty by putting a plan in place you discharge, whether that discharge is years away, or happens sooner than expected.
They walk through Axon’s four phases of the property journey, Prepare, Accumulate, Consolidate and Enjoy, starting with the preparation phase where most ADF members should focus first: living in Defence-provided housing where possible, saving aggressively, and getting educated with the right coaching and accountability. From there, it becomes about buying in the right growth locations (not necessarily your posting location), setting up the right financial structure, and building towards long-term capital growth and intergenerational wealth.
The key takeaway is simple: doing nothing isn’t a strategy. Whether you’re ready to buy now or still building savings, getting a mission plan together early can remove stress, protect your family, and create the kind of financial resilience that supports a smoother transition out of service – on your terms.
Video Transcript
Robbie: G’day everyone, my name’s Robbie. This is Ryan. Welcome to the Axon Property Group.I said, mate, let’s have a really great conversation about how to buy property while still serving. Yeah, can’t wait. Super important. You’re ex-Air Force, I’m ex-Army, been doing this for eight years now, so yeah, I think we’ve got a few indoor cricket seasons under our belt about how to sort of get it right and how to get it wrong. Let me just start philosophically. Let’s just go straight to the main topic, veteran suicide and the stress that people find themselves when they don’t have access to a guaranteed income. What I mean by that, you guys all know this, right, if you’re still serving, if your heart is beating and you can put your uniform on every second Thursday, is it still Thursday? I think so. Every second Thursday you get paid. But as you and I know, brother, as veterans, it ain’t like that in the real world. No. So I guess if people find themselves, you find yourselves on the outer sooner rather than later if there’s some sort of unfortunate event, be that medical or admin, and you don’t have that guarantee pay anymore, and you have not been smart with your finances whilst you’re still serving, it’s just an extra layer of stress. It’s an extra layer of worry. It’s an extra layer of like, fuck, what am I going to do now? We’ve coached countless people over the years that they’re like, oh, hey, I’ve just got out. I need a place to live for my family, haven’t we?
Ryan: Yeah. And I mean, people that are still serving are known as veterans, but you will become a veteran that doesn’t serve one day. It will happen. So it’s incredibly important that you think about that time ahead and start to put a plan in place and secure your financial future when you don’t have that stable pay cheque, you don’t have that stable accommodation, and you have the all face with the uncertainty of what’s going to happen once you’re no longer putting that uniform on. Yeah.
Robbie: So I guess, you know, if you’re just discovering us, just pull your finger out and start to do something with your financial future. Like make your financial future love your financial self love you and just bulletproof your financial future. So no matter what happens, the rock and roll of life, whatever fucking matrix shit starts to come your way, you can actually go, yeah, cool. That’s unfortunate, but I’ve got a plan B, I’ve got a plan C. And most importantly, you need a roof over your head when you get out and or you don’t want to be under any sort of financial stress. Because if you’ve got the stresses of getting out and finding a new purpose and finding a new you and finding a new job and finding a new income or fucking working with DVA or the CSE pension, whatever it is coming your way, yes or no, what I’m talking about. And you’ve also got the added stress of immediate financial burden upon yourself. It’s little wonder people spiral quickly. Yeah, so yeah, let’s all now work together and be on a bit of a mission to unfuck that sooner rather than later. Righto. You can see we’ve got this thing called the four phases to your property journey. And I’m just going to build it all now to allow Ron and I just to effectively talk through it. But really, you can see prepare, accumulate, consolidate and enjoy. It all just starts with the preparation phase back here. And I just want to say well done now on you know, finding us and being willing to sit here and watch these videos to go right. How can I now? I’ll go back a step. Let me go upstream as I call it. If you have had the realisation or you’re about to have the realisation that you’re going to embark on an endeavour that you don’t know everything about, you got two choices or you got three choices. You do nothing. That’s not smart. You do it by yourself. And then you’re going to undertake something super important about how to build a property portfolio to secure your financial future that you have not received formal training with from the schooling education system. Or you can reach out to someone and say, hey, can I can you guys now mentor, coach and lead me through this? Yeah. So the sooner we can plan and the sooner to prepare and plan, we can you know, basically get it get it’s gone. So just sort of register these ones right?
Ryan: Yeah. And look, I frame this as a property mission briefing. It’s like putting a mission brief or a mission plan together and we start with that preparation phase. And really for defence people while you’re still serving, as you can see the dot point one living in ADF provided housing, that is your strongest entitlement whilst you’re still putting on that uniform.
Robbie: Philosophically, mechanically and financially, especially with interest rates of the way they are at the moment, it’s a lot higher than what most other people remember that have only been in property for the last four or five years. Like oh shit, what happened to 3% interest rates? Heck, I’m at 6% now. It makes so much more sense financially to be living in your own, to be living under DHA or RA or living in accommodation as opposed to paying the better part of 1000 bucks a week on your own home. So I definitely want to outline that for you properly.
Ryan: Yeah. And that’s, you know, as I said, the strongest entitlement that people have in their toolkit. And then that allows you to go into savings mode, right? If you don’t have the savings to get into the property market straight away, we’re in that preparation phase. We need to go into a savings mode. Alternatively, you might have access to funds or equity that can get you into the market sooner.
Robbie: Now we’ve spoken to, you know, again, countless clients over the last couple of years that have come to us and I’m like, hey, so how’d you discover us? They’re like, oh, spoken to another couple of firms. You know, I’ve only got 40 grand saved at the moment. I’m probably another two years away from starting, you know, my first property. I’m like, okay, cool. So, you know, what are you doing here? They’re like, well, everyone else has turned their back on me so far. I’m like, I’m sorry to hear that. That’s not too good. It’s really common. When you don’t, when you’re not ready to go right now, that’s when we want to metaphorically wrap our arms around you even more. What are the gates? What are the most, what are the milestones? What are the key areas of your life that you need to improve, consolidate, fix up, pay off debt, whatever it is. The sooner you can put a plan in place, you can then, and then you’ve also got an accountability buddy. So you can then work towards what that minimum amount is as Ryan’s putting forward there as far as the savings mode. Because the longer you are sitting on the bench and you’re not playing the game of property, you’re not benefiting from the game of property. So we need to be able to get there sooner rather than later. So yeah, I please just want to really emphasise if you feel like you’re a couple of years away for whatever reason, mentally, emotionally, financially, whatever, then still put a plan in place and reach out to us and we will not be turning our back on you anytime soon. Please mate, go ahead.
Ryan: And as a part of that preparation phase, as you can see there, it’s all about educating yourself and putting that mission plan in place. Now to educate yourself, you can do that on your own. Of course, there is Google, there is the internet, you can go down that rabbit hole as far as you want to go. Or you can find a coach and a mentor and a team that are incredibly experienced with decades of property investing that can educate you. Yeah, gold.
Robbie: Then of course, you get to a point where you’re actually playing the game. So you’re not sitting on the step. Yeah, we’re not sitting on the pine anymore. You’re not playing reserve grade, you’re playing first grade. So I guess the first thing that matters is we need to be able to focus on your strategy and the financial structure. Yep. So once the planning is all done, and you’ve got you understand how much you can borrow from the mortgage broker, well, okay, great, let’s now implement the plan. So strategy is all about buying in the right location and buying the right type of property. So that is brand new, or the land and build or brand new built within your budget underneath the umbrella, for lack of a better term of a growth corridor. So that’s the overall strategy that we put forward. And of course, then you need to be able to put the right financial structure in place. And what I mean by that is, you’ve got to think long term, the horizon of 10 to 15 years of having this property in your portfolio is what everyone should be thinking about. Think about the intergenerational wealth. Think about the Asians and the Europeans that have come to Australia after Second World War have done so well with their families. And I grew up around a lot of Greek and Italian kids that I went to school with back in countries of Australia. And the intergenerational wealth that they have created by, you know, building portfolios and starting businesses that they then get naturally handed over to the kids is fucking phenomenal. So how about you be part of that?Yeah, break your cycle. Don’t be one of these, you know, families like, well, I didn’t get anything from my parents. So I’m not going to leave everything for my kids. Well, good on you, champ. That’s not a very good outcome. So what I mean by financial structure is I go on that little rant for a reason, right? Let me close it with you now. You can have the best property, the best built property in the best location. And you can have even if it’s got tenants in there, and the tenants are paying perfectly rent, and it’s going up in value. But if you don’t have the right financial structure around you, and you need to sell the goose that’s laying the golden eggs, you don’t actually benefit from that. And that 10 or 15 year horizon, Ryan, is broken in three years. And like what a fucking waste of time that was. So yeah, financial structure, mate, is vitally, vitally important.
Ryan: Yeah. And as Robbie said, buying where capital growth is expected. Now, the Australian property market over the last three decades has been incredibly strong, as long as you’ve selected the right location. And you know, property is a long term game. It is a long term investment. We’re talking decades. And that goes back to that intergenerational wealth where if you bought properties in Melbourne, or Sydney, or Brisbane, 20-30 years ago, you’ve incurred about three to 500% growth. Not so much if you go out to regional centres and things like that. So it’s really, really important to buy where capital growth is expected. How do we determine where capital growth is expected? We’ve got a thing called the seven ingredients to a healthy property market, which allows us to analyse those markets, overload those seven ingredients and give us the best chance for that capital growth. It’s super important.
Robbie: You said before, the Australian property market, and as you and I are well aware, there is no the Australian property market. There’s literally hundreds of little micro markets about what’s going on. You know, what happens back in Port Pirie, where I grew up in a country town in Central South Australia has got nothing to do with what’s going on with the Melbourne market, for instance, to draw those two extremities. So it’s really, really important that you know, if you are posted to Townsville, or you’re posted to Darwin, or you’re posted to other areas of Australia, Puckett, Tyndall and the like, there where the market is flat, even if it’s gone through a little bit of a growth phase post COVID, but the next 10 or 15 years is actually going to just have it sit where it is at the moment and meander along. Meandering is a fucking rubbish term. You don’t want your portfolio to meander along. You want it to be in some sort of growth mode. So yeah, just having that extra layer of coaching education about where to buy becomes vitally important.
Ryan: I think that’s a common pitfall with defence people is that they can get wrapped up and want to buy in their posting location. And if you’re looking at buying a property in a place like Townsville, or Darwin, or even Perth, Cairns, when we look at that capital growth and the seven ingredients, you know, it’s a mistake or can be a mistake to pull the trigger on your entitlements, jump into a home where you’re paying 1000 bucks a week in a location where the property is not going to go up in value.
Robbie: Yeah, and especially compared to other areas for sure. Of course, you shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket. So you know, if you’re going to build a portfolio, make sure that portfolio is spread around different areas. You know, we’ve got a number of clients that have built three properties here in Southeast Queensland, but they got one in the sunny coast, one out west, one down south. So you know, they’re diversifying underneath the same umbrella. But again, those markets are not interconnected that strongly. But ideally, if you can buy one in Southeast Queensland, one in Melbourne, you know, one in whatever that looks like borderless markets, it’s a great term. I love it when he comes up with a saying. Oh, I did not come up with that. Yeah, so now and then of course, you can diversify within your super, you can diversify within your shares and whatever else speak to your financial planner about that. So yeah, I’m not talking about just, you know, trying to becoming the mayor of one particular suburb by having five properties there because if that property market goes tits up, then you got five eggs that are going, you know, smashed on your head pretty, pretty soon. And of course, when you’re playing the game, whilst you’re finding a coach and a mentor back here, you’re actually learning from your coach and your mentor because you’re going through the mechanics of actually building a portfolio. So it’s a really, really awesome opportunity for you to be able to do that. It’s one thing I love about the business model that we have. We’re not, I didn’t create this business to, you know, jam properties down people’s throats. I created this business to generate a community. You know, by the middle slash end of this year, we would have built 600 properties for the defence community, that’s own home and investment properties. And I love the fact that I’m mates with all those people as you are really close. You know, you’ve been with us for two and a bit years. And I know you’ve got really strong relationships with the people that you coached back in the day that are now coming back around to buy their second and third property. So yeah, it’s really great opportunity just to really learn from your coach and your mentor. And we want to become friends slash mates with our clients because in the name of mateship, think of just put your military hat back on. Mates don’t let mates down. Mates don’t bullshit to each other. Mates stand by next to each other during the good times and the bad times. So, you know, that’s exactly what we’re trying to do here. So yeah, welcome. If that resonates with you, then you’re definitely in the right place. And then of course, when you’re in your accumulation phase, every few years at the maximum, you should be looking to refinance, restructure, you know, see if there’s a better deal out there. So keep working with your mortgage broker to almost always make sure, I’ll go back to my first point, that the financial structure that you have around your portfolio is super optimised. Then we get to a point which you and I both discovered with a couple of clients that are like, cool, we’ve got three or four properties, we just want to consolidate now.
Ryan: And guess what? At that point, you stop buying and either you come to that decision and you do that on your own, or you may reach a T-junction, depending on salaries and circumstances where you are at a maximum borrowing. And now you just naturally progress into consolidation phase where it is now about allowing the rents to rise until there’s passive income in those properties, the debts come down, and you’re just cruising from there.
Robbie: Yeah. As you and I experienced that some people value, well, all of us place different values on different things. In the accumulation phase, it’s all about capital growth. There’s no passive income that you need to be able to create when you’re in the accumulation phase. Because when you’re doing that, you want to be able to access the equity to then go and buy another property. But then of course, as Ryan has just said, we need to be able to allow those rents to rise because every time you access equity, it does impact your cash flow, because you’re going to go and buy another asset so that the payment of that asset needs to come from somewhere. So continuing to refinance and restructure again to optimise your circumstance. And then you can sort of do these little mini restructures and mini refinances because that might be the time where you can start to, perhaps you have separated or will start to separate from the military, where you can use your own home. So buy your dream home slash go back. Not many people get out of the military and launch into their dream home straight away. No. Because if you’ve been in the rock and roll, the posting cycle, and you’ve been living in three, four, five, six different areas over your, you know, five, 10, 15, 20 year career, a lot of people don’t really know where they want to settle.
Ryan: I often ask a lot of the clients, where’s your dream home going to be? And they’re like, I don’t know.
Robbie: We don’t know yet. What do you say? Yeah.
Ryan: Good. It’s all good. You don’t have to know now.
Robbie: Yeah. So even if it may or may not be your dream home, but yeah, certainly depending on how you have restructured, how you have gone with, you know, the use of your entitlements, government and defence force so far, you may be able to still use some of your ADS, how do you have housing entitlements, particularly DOHAs, which we’ll cover off on a later video about how to get that DBA subsidy on your home. So yeah, don’t be afraid of the consolidation phase. It’s, you know, it’s there for a reason. You don’t prepare, accumulate and go straight into like enjoyment phase. You need to stop buying and do all those things that Ryan and I have just covered off on there.
Ryan: And that also might be coming back to, you know, what we’re talking about at the start of this, this presentation is you might be discharging voluntarily or not. And you could be at that consolidation phase where one of those properties or the property that you’ve got, you might need to move into.
Robbie: Yeah.
Ryan: Very true.
Robbie: Very true. It’s like, hey, Mr. and Mrs. Tenant, we need you to break lease because I need a roof over my head. Exactly. And obviously different states have different laws around that. So make sure you do engage with your property manager to see what the feasibility of that looks like. I’ve got a five in front of my age. You not yet. No, way off. A way off, quite a way off, a decade off or so. But you know, let me reassure you, buddy, you’ll blink your eyes five times and you too will be bloody 50 and still looking as fit as a fiddle. And I’m not as old as this gentleman down here either, looking anyway. But look, at the end of the day, when you have signed the dotted line, committed your life to service, spent time away, put your life in danger, and hopefully build a bit of a portfolio along the way. So you’re not on the bones of your ass financially when you do want to get out. And we can effectively, what I’m trying to say here, let’s take control of your financial future separate to what’s going to go on from a superannuation perspective. As a 52-year-old, I’ve got 850 fucking something thousand dollars sitting down in Canberra somewhere that one day in another 10 years or so I’ll be able to get access to. I ain’t waiting till then. I want you to wait till then. So let’s really take control of what your retirement looks like. Because if you do get medically separated and you do become retired a lot sooner, you’re not going to have any super because you’re starting to cannibalise it straight away on any sort of pension that you might be on. So yeah, let’s really make sure that all the work that you’ve done professionally and personally, you can get to a point where you do enjoy your life. You don’t have a mortgage on your own home anymore. You’re not stressed about money. You can fucking go do whatever you want and live life with no regrets.
Ryan: Yeah. This is ultimately all about that acronym out there that’s called FIRE, which is Financial Independent Retire Early. And if people are separating from the military but before retirement, they might be in a position where they don’t need to jump back into the workforce because they’ve got property portfolio, they’ve got no mortgage, and they’re stress-free and they can live off that passive income.
Robbie: Yeah.
Ryan: Love it.
Robbie: All right. Yeah. So hopefully you found that really, really helpful there about the macro four phases of your property journey. And yeah, just do something. I don’t care if you buy a property or not, but doing nothing is not feasible. You just can’t get… I’ve just recently… And the reason why I’m so passionate about this, a young guy that used to play on my footy team up in Townsville, I coached him a couple of nights ago. He’s in his early 40s now. He’s got an amazing family with his wife, three young kids, three under five. And he is so happy with the family that he’s built and the 20 plus career that he’s had. But he’s shitting himself financially. No names, no pack drills, but he’s like, all right, but I haven’t got anything to show financially for all the money I’ve earned, the places I’ve gone, the things I’ve done, except for my amazing family. And they’re like, they’ve watched these videos now, similar to what you’re watching. And they’ve had that little light bulb moment going, ooh, separate to my superannuation that I can’t get access to for another 20 years, babe. That’s his missus, by the way, he doesn’t call me babe. He’s like, we need to start doing something, you know, with our future. So yeah, you don’t need to wait till you’re in your 40s to have that realisation. And how good is it when you and I coach clients in their 20s, and they come to us and they’re like, nah, I want to start thinking about my retirement now. Well, I was not thinking about my retirement in my 20s, not a fucking chance, as that was in the early 90s, by the way, and then when there was no internet, but it’s so good when people have time on their side, that you and I can sort of reflect back and go, when you do become 40 and 50, and you bought your first property in the 20s, that future self that I mentioned 20 minutes or so ago, is going to love you. Start taking steps towards it right now. Hey, one thing I do know, mate, is that when people see you and I converse, and we’ve got that passion, we’ve got that context, we’ve got that sort of ability to be able to pass on all things ADF property that no one else can deliver in the same way. It’s pretty cool. So I hope all of you enjoy it. We love presenting it to you. I’m on a fucking mission at the moment is that I stuffed a few things up when I bought my first couple of properties. Because I’m like, I don’t need any help. I’m a buddy. I’m a SOCOM officer. No one’s going to take advantage of me. I can do this all by myself. And then of course, short notice taskings came up being put, you know, SATG trips coming in left, right and centre. And I’m trying to do this by myself. Right? So I guess I put it to you straight away. Hopefully, you’ve got a little bit of a fire under your bum now by going, that was interesting. I don’t have to wait till I’m 40. I want to take control of my life. Now, the sooner I start, the better. I’ve got an opportunity with my you know, defence subsidised housing. I want to put you in one of three categories or you’re going to put yourself in one of three categories. Category one is you just keep scrolling and you do nothing. Yep. And you’ll keep doing and you’ll keep getting the exact same result what you’re getting now. Category two is like, Oh, that sounds pretty cool. Yeah. I don’t reckon I need any help. I can do that by myself. And you go do that. No dramas. We’ll always be here for you. Category three is actually gone right. Remember the thing, put your hand up and say, okay, I’ve got a fire in my belly that I want to be able to do something. But this is an endeavour that I don’t know everything about. I need some help. Or at least I just need to learn more about it. You’re in the right place. Links below just go straight there. You know, we can see we’ve got steps of HPAS, steps of DOHAS, steps of Hep C. We’ve got everything there for you. All the stats, all the research, all the data, everything you need to know exactly. As you can see, the ADF entitlements explain. We’ve created these series of videos to make sure that the little bit of inspo that you got from that first bit of interaction with Ryan and I, it actually means something. It’s got an actual destination for you to go to. So yeah, click on the links and go do it now. And Ryan, I just want to finish this little video by you and your wife Amarna were clients of ours back in the day. And your first journey with Axon started how? Watching these videos.
Ryan: Watching the videos. I was category three. Thank God. Yeah. At first, to your credit, you weren’t. No. We were category two. We tried to do it on our own for about 12 months and spun our wheels and we’re not getting anywhere. And then we reached out to Axon and thought there’s got to be a better way to do this. And for me personally, the reason that I’m sitting here wearing this shirt is because of being category three, reaching out to you and the and starting, well, Amarna and I starting our journey and ultimately the education, the mentorship, the friendships that we have experienced is what I want to pass on to as many people in defence and as I can. And yeah, that’s why I’m here and that’s why I love what I do.
Robbie: And Ryan, he probably doesn’t like me saying this, is the next intello in the RAF. So we’re talking about a RAF officer here who’s highly skilled and highly trained and he still didn’t want to do it by himself. Anyway, enjoy. See the links. You’ll see Ryan and I on there again, doing another set of videos, which really sort of puts the nuts and bolts together. And yeah, you too may be able to reach out to us at some stage as well. Take it easy. Thank you.