Top 5 Reasons · Episode 005
You bought the property. But what else did you buy exposure to?
Cross-border investors rarely choose a property because of the currency. But it can play a role in the outcome long after that decision is made — for better or worse.
1. The property has one return. You may have another.
The difference appears when you measure it in your own currency — whichever side of the border the asset sits on.
2. The property can’t control the currency.
Exchange rates move for reasons that have little to do with any single asset — yet both ultimately affect the return you realise.
3. You enter at one rate. You exit at another.
The exposure lives in between — for as long as you hold the asset, not just at those two moments.
4. Currency can amplify the outcome.
A strong property return can weaken after conversion, and a soft one can strengthen. The property doesn’t have to change for your return to change.
5. Currency risk belongs in the investment decision.
Like market risk and liquidity risk, it’s better considered before you commit than after.
The property is only part of the investment outcome.
Currency can shape that outcome too. Our advice: plan for it from the start — the same way you’d plan your financing or your timing, not as an afterthought once the deal is done.
How to do that well is worth a conversation of its own.
If this question applies to your own situation, we are happy to talk it through. Start a conversation
The episode as published
