My CCKO CK9919 20 litres stainless steel smart rechargeable sensor garbage bin

During the recent 11.11 big sale promotion festival, I have purchased a CCKO brand (model CK9919) 20 litres stainless steel smart rechargeable sensor garbage bin to be used in my kitchen. Its price was around RM170 after discount.

It is "smart" in the sense that it can automatically open its lid whenever its infra-red sensor detects an object near its top, then start a 5 seconds countdown after the object is cleared, and then automatically close back its lid.

You can see it in action in the video below:

Besides infra-red object detection, its lid can also be automatically opened by slight vibration to the bin (such as gently kicking its body) or by pressing a button on its top panel.

In this way, you can throw your rubbish into it without touching any part of the garbage bin. Convenient and hygienic.

There are other even smarter models of garbage bin available in the market. Some can even automatically wrap up the garbage bag inside when it is full, and automatically reload a new garbage bag after the existing used one is taken away. However, those types of smarter garbage bin require the use of their own special garbage bag (which is not cheap), and their price is higher too. Therefore, I did not choose those smarter type.

There are quite a number of different sizes available for CCKO elegant stainless steel garbage bin. In terms of shape, there are also 3 choices: round cylinder, rectangular and square.

For kitchen use, I found the rectangular type is more space-saving, and the size of either 15 litres or 20 litres is more suitable. Both the 15 litres and 20 litres have the same base size of 30cm x 22cm. Their difference is on the height: 20L one has a height of 50.5cm whereas 15L one is 39.5cm.

You can use smaller size one for living room, bedroom, writing desk, toilet, etc. accordingly.

The CCKO smart garbage bin consists of 3 parts: the stainless steel outer bin, black colour plastic inner bin, and its cover. Just like normal garbage bin, you can put garbage bag inside the inner bin to collect your rubbish.

This CCKO garbage bin comes with a user manual, a QC certificate, a USB charging cable, and 3 sample garbage bags. The user manual is written in Chinese.

Its actual opening available for you to throw rubbish is approximately 25cm x 13.5cm only.

The magic is played by its cover, with sensors and electronic motor to open and close its lid. It is powered by a 1,500 mAh rechargeable 18650 lithium-ion battery. The size of this 18650 battery is larger than AA size battery.

Charging can be done by connecting the round connector of its charging cable to its charging port, and the USB end to either a wall charger or a power bank. It is said that a single charge can last for more than a month operation.

When you take out the cover and turn it over, you can find 2 compartments. One is the battery compartment, and the other compartment is used to place a bag of activated carbon to remove bad odour.

I like this garbage bin very much. It is smart. Its stainless steel body looks solid, classy and elegant. It is easy to use.

More importantly, this CCKO CK9919 garbage bin is water-resistant, protecting its electronic parts from damage being splashed by liquid. I did read some online reviews to some of its cheaper counterparts without water-resistant feature that those garbage bin will stop working after some time, probably due to electronic parts damaged by liquid.

Upgraded my Roborock S7 cleaning robot with its auto-empty dock that supports both bag and bagless debris emptying

When I bought my cleaning robot, I have chosen Roborock S7 instead of S6-Max or S5-Max because I knew it is the model that can pair with Roborock auto-empty dock.

In fact, I find it quite difficult to empty out the dust in the Roborock S7 dust box because the debris can be trapped in quite a lot of places inside the dust box. The only effective way to quickly empty it out is to vacuum out the debris, which is exactly what the Roborock auto-empty dock function to do. As such, I suspect that the dust box is designed that way to entice people to buy its auto-empty dock to make life easier.

Currently, there are already 3 generations of Roborock auto-empty dock:

• The 1st generation can only work with disposable 1.8 litre dust bag, which can easily hold debris for more than a month.
• The 2nd generation has a cyclone separator unit to collect debris into its dusbin without dust bag. Alternatively, it can also work with the disposable dust bag by replacing the cyclone separator in it with the dust bag components.
• The 3rd generation, not available to S7 yet, is able to automatically refill the robot's water tank and clean the robot's mopping cloth, besides emptying out the debris from the robot's dust box.

If you intend to buy a Roborock auto-empty docking station, I strongly encourage you to buy the 2nd generation that comes with both the cyclone separator and also the dust bag holder and disposable dust bag. I bought it at the price of slightly above RM1,600 in Banggood online shop.

The Roborock auto-empty dock has 2 colour selections: black and white. The Roborock S7 cleaning robot also has black and white selections.

I find that mixing the colour between the robot and its auto-empty dock also looks nice and would not cause any dissonance. Here is my white Robock S7 and its black auto-empty dock.

You can see that I have already replaced its cyclone separator with its disposable dust bag unit. In this way, I don't need to clean its dustbin, as all the debris will be stored inside the 1.8L dust bag.

Its cyclone separator looks like lotus seedpods. The Roborock auto-empty dock user manual has the instruction to change it with the dust bag unit, and vice-versa.

The Roborock auto-empty dock comes in 2 pieces after unboxing, which we need to assemble its body onto its base by screwing 5 screws that are marked with the screwdriver sign. An L-shape screwdriver is available at the base for that purpose.

The Roborock auto-empty dock comes with a dust box with an air-inlet, to replace the one in the S7. You will need to remove a lit that covers the air-inlet window in the S7 robot too. Detail instruction is given in the user manual.

The debris in the robot's dust box is sucked into the left cylinder of the dock station, and then settles down in the right cylinder, either in its dust bag or directly in the dustbin.

There are 2 filters inside the left cylinder, namely the rear HEPA filter and the front cup filter, both are removable and washable.

After the Roborock S7 robot made its first docking onto this auto-empty docking station, you will find additional functions for this auto-empty dock in the Roborock mobile apps.

The left button at the bottom of the main page has changed to "Empty Dustbin".

There is also an Auto-Empty Settings menu option, in which you can set the empty mode to be either smart, light, balanced, or max.

When assembling this Roborock auto-empty dock, I was amused by its state-of-the-art brilliant and beautiful design, which is a combination of engineering, art, practicality, hygiene, and user experience. It's just amazing. You could be feeling the same when you assemble a unit too.

Note that when the robot is docked onto this auto-empty docking station, it is pretty tightly "sucked" on it and not manually removable, unless by force, which is a big no-no.

If you want to bring the robot to another place for multi-floor cleaning, you can detach it from the docking station by using the Remote Control function in its mobile app. Just control it to move backward, and it will come out from its docking station.

In certain countries, Roborock has bundled them together as S7+. If you see the S7+ model, it is actually an S7 rebot that comes together with its auto-empty dock. But, you need to beware that the auto-empty dock in the S7+ might be of the first generation, without the cyclone separator.

2022 auspicious dates for moving to new house / office

 Here is the list of auspicious dates for moving to new house/office in year 2022, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

If you are looking for auspicious dates for moving in 2021, click here.

You might probably also be interested with the auspicious dates for the following occasions in year 2022:

• Wedding / Marriage
• Wedding / Marriage (year 2023)
• Renovation
• Getting a baby
• Marriage proposal or engagement
• Signing contract
• Hair cut
• Start job
• Opening business

 

2021 auspicious dates for moving to new house / office

Due to the global pandemic of COVID-19, moving is restricted during the first half of the year of 2021. Hopefully, it can happen during the second half of the year.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for moving to new house/office in year 2021, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

If you are looking for auspicious dates for moving in 2022, click here.

You might probably also be interested with the auspicious dates for the following occasions in year 2021:

• Wedding / Marriage
• Wedding / Marriage (year 2022)
• Wedding / Marriage (year 2023)
• Renovation
• Getting a baby
• Marriage proposal or engagement
• Signing contract
• Hair cut
• Start job
• Opening business

2022 auspicious dates for home / office renovation

There are significantly less auspicious days for renovation in year 2022 than 2021.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for home or office renovation in year 2022, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

If you are looking for auspicious dates for renovation in 2021, click here.

You might probably also be interested with the auspicious dates for the following occasions in year 2022:

• Wedding / Marriage
• Wedding / Marriage (year 2023)
• Moving
• Getting a baby
• Marriage proposal or engagement
• Signing contract
• Hair cut
• Start job
• Opening business

 

2021 auspicious dates for home / office renovation

Due to the global pandemic of COVID-19, a lot of renovation works are unable to be carried out during the first half of the year of 2021. Hopefully, it can happen during the second half of the year.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for home or office renovation in year 2021, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

If you are looking for auspicious dates for renovation in 2022, click here.

You might probably also be interested with the auspicious dates for the following occasions in year 2021:

• Wedding / Marriage
• Wedding / Marriage (year 2022)
• Wedding / Marriage (year 2023)
• Moving
• Getting a baby
• Marriage proposal or engagement
• Signing contract
• Hair cut
• Start job
• Opening business

Replaced the strainer of my Teka Jumbo kitchen sink with a better one

I had been troubled with drain blockage problem under my Teka Jumbo kitchen sink every 1-2 years.

The strainer that come with the giant size stainless steel sink looks good. Just that I think its gap is still a little bit too big, and there are food substances managed to drop into the drainage pipe, accumulated there and causing blockage after some times.

I found this Haodex brand L-size stainless steel strainer with handle selling at the price of RM5.5 at local online store, with smaller straining holes, which is a good solution for my kitchen sink straining problem.

Its quality is pretty good. It is quite thick and very solid, compared with some other cheaper similar products also available in the e-commerce stores.

Although there are many Japanese words printed on its packaging cardboard, there are 3 English words mentioning its place of origin: Made in China.

It fits perfectly with my Teka Jumbo kitchen sink. Its handle makes it very easy to be taken out from the sink, for us to clear away the food substances trapped in it.

And this is its measurements for your reference:

By the way, my original Teka Jumbo kitchen sink strainer is of the type as below:

Note that there are 2 limitations with the new Haodex brand L-size stainless steel strainer:

• Unlike the original Teka strainer, this strainer does not have a rubber stopper to temporarily stop water from flowing out of the kitchen sink.
• As the new strainer has much smaller holes, the water flow out rate is slower than the original.

Therefore, it is advisable to keep the original strainer, just in case you want to use its rubber stopper function occasionally.

My rechargeable portable mosquito killer lamp

I had bought a few units of the electronic UV light type of mosquito trap before. They were functioning well in trapping and killing mosquitoes.

Unfortunately, after one to two years of usage, all of them became problematic and unable to function well. The problems faced are:

• In some units, the LED lights became dimmer and dimmer, until no longer able to attract the mosquitoes.
• In some units, the LED totally unable to turn on.
• In some units, the fan became noisier and noisier, causing it to be an annoyance itself, particularly during the silent night.
• In some units, the fan totally not rotating, and therefore unable to trap the mosquitoes.

This time, I decided to buy the electrocute type, at almost the same price as the previous suction type. It looks like this:

The lamp has a similar bluish lamp to attract the mosquitoes and insects to fly towards it. Surrounding the lamp are metal wires with electricity current to electrocute the insects. At the outer layer, there is a plastic cage to prevent ourselves from accidentally touch on the metal wires.

The plastic cage is easily removable for us to clean up the dead body of insects at the metal wires. There is a small brush that comes together with the lamp for this cleaning purpose.

This type of lamp comes with 3 different models:

• Without a rechargeable battery, that needs to be always connected to a USB charging source in order to work.
• With 2000 mAh rechargeable battery. When fully charged, the lamp can work for up to 8 hours without connecting to a power source.
• With 4000 mAh rechargeable battery. When fully charged, the lamp can work for up to 16 hours without connecting to a power source.

There is a switch for you to turn on and turn off the light. In fact, the switch has 2 ON positions. The upper position turns on the blueish mosquito attraction light, and the lower position turns on a warm white reading light.

At the base of the lamp, there is a hanger to hang it in an upside-down position. So it is flexible to be put on tabletop, or be hung up in the air.

Its rechargeable feature is in fact very useful, especially for the following situations:

• You can put it up and running anywhere, even in a place without a power source.
• It can still function well during the time of electricity blackout. That is also the time you are likely to get more mosquitoes disturbance since your fan and air-cond are not functioning.
• You can use it as an emergency light during electricity blackout.
• You can use it during camping, as a dual function light in your camp.

My Roborock S7 hybrid vacuum and mop robot cleaner

Finally, I have retired my 4 years old Neato XV-11 robotic vacuum cleaner and replaced it with a new Roborock S7 which has both vacuum and mop function.

  

The Roborock S7 is currently selling at the price of RM2xxx. You should be able to get it at a lower price of RM2,099 during certain online promotion period. It is slightly more expensive than Roborock S6 MaxV.

The main differences of Roborock S7 from its previous versions including:

• It is the first, and currently the only, Roborock model that supports Roborock auto empty dock. Anyhow, the Roborock auto empty dock is sold separately, and the price is quite high too.
• It comes with Roborock's new innovation in vibration mopping technology that can scrub the floor at up to 3,000 cycles per minute, to be more effectively remove dried and stubborn stains on the floor.
• It comes with new VibraRise technology, which, when it's ultrasonic sensor accurately detects a carpet underneath, it will automatically lift up its mopping cloth so that not to wet up the carpet, at the same time able to increase its vacuum suction power to clean up the carpet area.

However, the Roborock S7 does not come with A.I. cameras as in Roborock S6 MaxV, therefore missing the function of being able to "see" and avoid obstacles that block its path.

 

Roborock S7 can be configured and controlled using the Roborock mobile app, and also with your favourite voice assistant such as Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri, Tmall Genie (天猫精灵), Xiaomi Xiaoai Classmate (小爱同学), etc. You can even control it using Xiaomi Mi Home app too.

One thing I like is that Roborock supports multilingual, although it can only use one language at a time. It will report its status with voice using your preferred language, which can be English, Chinese, Deutsch, Espanol, Francais, Italiano, Russian, Hebrew, Polski, Portugues, Ramana, Turk, Thai, Viet, Indonesian, Malay, etc.

Before start using it, you will need to connect Roborock S7 to your home WiFi, which in turn connected to the Internet. The Roborock mobile app in your handphone is able to auto-detect the Roborock robot cleaner nearby, and push your home WiFi settings to the robot.

Roborock S7 only support 2.4GHz WiFi up to Wireless-N. The 5Ghz WiFi and WiFi 6 are not supported. Anyhow, the 2.4GHz WiFi has the longest reaching range among them, and this is crucial for the Roborock S7 to get connected in order to work properly.

Roborock uses LiDAR navigation technology to scan and map your house. The map is stored in the cloud under your own Roborock account. You can share your robot with other Roborock users, and once shared, they will have access to your robot settings including the maps too.

You can also install Roborock app in multiple mobile devices and login with the same account, and all of them will have synchronized robot settings and information.

Roborock S7 supports multi-level mapping. Up to 4 maps can be stored for each robot.

The floor map of your house will be automatically drawn with LiDAR navigation during its first usage, and it is pretty accurate. The carpet area(s) are also identified and marked in the map.

After the map is drawn and saved, you can separate it into different rooms, or to merge rooms into larger one. You can configure it so that different room can have different intensity of cleaning and/or mopping.

As one of the standard features, you can draw virtual wall(s) on the map to prevent the robot from crossing over. You can also define certain area(s) on the map, such as your toilet or staircase, as no-go zone. You can also specify certain area(s) to be vacuum only without mopping (the no-mop zone).

This way of setting blockage to the robot using software configuration is much more better and much convenient than my Neato XV-11 way of using physical magnetic stripes.

Roborock S7 supports 4 levels of vacuum power, 4 levels of mopping scrub intensity, and 2 levels of mopping route. This enable you to ask the robot to clean more thoroughly in certain areas, such as the dining room and kitchen area, than the rest of your house.

Another standard feature is scheduling for its cleaning routine. It is fully customizable, as shown in the screenshot below.

Roborock keeps its cleaning history in the app. You can see its entire cleaning path and time taken in the history. This assure you that the cleaning was done properly and according to your instruction.

The Roborock app has a section to show the estimated time remaining for the replacement of wear-and-tear parts of the robot, as well as the time for upcoming maintenance, such as cleaning its sensors to upkeep its performance.

The Roborock app even comes with manual remote control function, for you to drive and control the robot like a remote control car, to move it to your preferred location. There are even 2 different modes of remote control - buttons and joystick.

Just like other cleaning robots, although the Roborock can help you to do automated floor cleaning, it is not the set-and-forget type. There are still 3 items that you need to periodically do, namely:

• To take out its mopping cloth and wash it, then put it back. This should be done after every mopping.
• To take out its dustbin box and empty it. Wash and then put it back. This should be done when the dustbin box is about to be fully filled up.
• To take out its water tank and wash it. Refill with water and put it back. The water tank should be able to supply water for 2-3 times mopping of a typical terrace house.

If you have purchased the Roborock auto empty dock, then the dock will handle the job of emptying the dustbin box for you. You just need to replace the dust bag of the auto empty dock every few weeks.

One thing I dislike is that this Roborock S7 only comes with one mopping cloth. I would suggest you to buy a few more mopping clothes for changing, so that you have more time to do the washing and drying.

Note that the mopping cloth of Roborock S7 is different from the mopping cloth used in older versions - S6 MaxV, S6, S5 Max, etc. This is because of the new vibration mopping function. As such, make sure you buy the correct mopping cloth for Roborock S7 to be compatible with its base.

Repaired scratch on touchscreen HVAC surface with Polywatch scratch remover cream

Having a touchscreen HVAC control panel in your car might look cool, but the touchscreen is vulnerable to accidental scratches too.

One day after a car wash, I found an obstructive scratch on my car's touchscreen HVAC control panel.

How to remove the scratch line and restore the touchscreen surface to be as smooth as before? I found the German-made Polywatch scratch remover cream to be a good solution.

The Polywatch cream looks like toothpaste, and comes in tiny 5 grams volume. But that amount of cream is enough for it to be applied multiple times.

I think it is named as Polywatch because it is originally formulated to polish and remove scratches on watch surface. In fact, it can be used to remove fine line scratches on smooth glass, acrylic and plastic surfaces. It works especially well with plastic surface.

It can magically eliminate tiny scratches and restore the surface to be as smooth as before. However, it might not work too well for deep scratches.

Polywatch works by slightly dissolving and grinding down the target surface to smooth the edges of the scratch and fill the gaps with the dissolved material, therefore restoring it to unscratch condition.

Using Polywatch is pretty easy. Just clean the target surface, make it dry and dust free, apply some Polywatch cream on the scratch, and polish it with a piece of microfibre cloth or cotton wool.

If you are facing similar problem of having obstructive scratches on glass, acrylic or plastic surfaces, you might give Polywatch a try.

Have you done your washing machine cleaning service?

Recently I engaged a washing machine cleaning professional to dismantle and perform deep clean-up to my washing machine.

I did periodically make use of washing machine cleaning powder and the tub cleaning function of the washing machine to clean it up, but I was told that was not good enough as there is much dirt inside the washing machine unable to be removed with that method.

That is really a true statement. You can see the "before" and "after" photos below for the difference The washing machine had just been treated with made-in-Taiwan washing machine cleaning powder right before the washing machine cleaning professional came to do the deep cleaning. If not, it would be even more dirtier than in the photo.

The service includes sanitization in the washing machine by using UV light to kill virus, bacteria, germs and microbes inside the washing machine, after all the parts were assembled back into the machine.

Similar to the concept of air-cond service, which we all familiar with, I think washing machines also need periodic thorough cleaning service like this. Otherwise, it is very dirty inside. Can you imagine the situation of your clothes being washed inside a dirty washing machine?

Cash out refinance: How to know if it is time

 

Photo by todd kent on Unsplash

Traditional refinancing entails swapping out your current debt, often a mortgage, for another loan with better terms. For example, many people choose to refinance their homes when housing market interest rates drop so they can pay less money in the long run.

What is a cash-out refinance, though? It’s a little different. Instead of trying to pay less, you borrow more than your house is worth and use the extra money for other debts, purchases, or payments.

How do you know if acquiring funds this way is right for you? If it is, when is the best time to do it? Let’s dive into why people choose to go through this process.

What is a Cash-Out Refinance?

You might use a typical term-and-rate refinance to exchange your mortgage for one with lower monthly payments or another benefit. However, a cash-out refinance means you switch out your mortgage for a larger one. 

Why would anyone want to borrow a bigger mortgage? It’s a way to access the value of your home that you own through a loan instead of selling it. If you have paid off any part of your mortgage, then you have built “equity.” You cannot use your home’s equity to make purchases in illiquid form, so taking out another loan and using your equity as collateral allows you to use that value as cash.

How Does a Cash-Out Refinance Work?

Next, how does a cash-out refinance work? Most lenders limit the amount you can cash out to between 80% and 90% of your property’s equity, so you cannot withdraw as much as you might hope. 

Because you are borrowing against your equity, you need to have accumulated a sufficient amount (in other words, you have paid off a sizable portion of your mortgage). It’s also advisable to keep around (and sometimes required) 15-20% of your equity once the process is complete. For example, if your home is worth $400,000, you could take out another loan worth 80% of your home’s value, which is $320,000. How much money you have left to spend on other things depends on your mortgage balance. If you have $150,000 in equity and $250,000 left to pay, you would have $70,000 left over.

What Can You Use a Cash-Out Refinance For?

How you use your refinance money is up to you. Many people use their new cash to pay for: 

●        Outstanding bills and debts, including credit cards

●        Make a significant purchase, such as a vehicle

●        College tuition

●        Major home renovations.

 

Do you want to modernize your kitchen but can’t afford to? Do you want to go back to school but don’t want to burden yourself with high-interest student loans? While there are other options you should consider first, cash-out refinancing can provide you with the funds you need for significant expenses.

Is it Necessary for Me to Cash-Out Refinance?

No, it is not strictly necessary for anyone to exchange their mortgages for a larger one and withdraw the difference. You might hear of your neighbours and friends refinancing their homes in the traditional sense because the market is optimal, but the cash-out variety is not a trend you need to jump on if you don’t need to.

People have different reasons to refinance their homes this way. Some might owe a wide variety of debts and want to consolidate. Others might have fallen on hard times and need a large sum of money as soon as possible, but they don’t have any other options than to sell their possessions if they don’t want to move. They cannot sell their equity, though, so the best option is to use it as collateral for another loan.

You might be considering cash-out refinancing because delays in receiving your paycheck have made you miss important payments. You had to dip into your savings, which you prefer not to do, but having larger savings from your home’s equity could be useful in the immediate future. Instead, you can turn to apps like Earnin that allow you to access your money on time, up to $500 per pay period. Instead of doing a cash-out refinance to borrow a large sum to pay off monthly bills, you can use Earnin to take out your own earnings.

What are the Disadvantages of Cash-Out Refinancing?

There are several disadvantages to consider before you cash-out refinance. One of them is closing costs, which are typically between 2% and 5% of your loan and can, therefore, amount to thousands of dollars. Similar to how you must pay for private mortgage insurance if you put less than 20% when buying a house, you will have to pay for PMI if you borrow more than 80% of your property’s value. 

Time is also an essential factor. It may take longer to pay off your house, and your monthly mortgage payment could increase. Though interest rates associated with this kind of refinancing may be lower than HELOCs or home equity loans, your lender might charge you a higher interest rate than the first time around.

Cash-out refinancing has its uses, but consider the pros and cons carefully and talk with a financial advisor before deciding it’s right for you.

 

This article originally appeared on Earnin.

 

Please note, the material collected in this blog is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be relied upon as or construed as advice regarding any specific circumstances. Nor is it an endorsement of any organization or Services.

Tips to rent out condo / apartment unit with good rental return

Despite the current relatively soft rental market, it is still possible to have above-average rental return for your invested new condominium / apartment unit.

I am sharing the tips below based on my own experience, which worked well with me, and hopefully will work with you too.

Tip #1: Choose lower unit when buying new condominium / apartment

It is a common developer's practice that the higher the floor, the more expensive will be the unit of the same layout type.

Higher floor has better scenery view, which can see further away. If you save your cost on this by buying a lower unit, you can use the saved money to do better renovation, and also to furnish the unit with more furniture and electrical appliance.

In addition, lower unit is normally nearer to the car park and also to the Ground Floor. In the event of a long waiting lift, or lift under maintenance, you have the advantage of using the staircase to reach your car park or Ground Floor, without having to walk down too many floors.

This is also of advantage to your tenant during fire drill exercise, as there will be fewer floors to walk down to the evacuation area.

Tip #2: Choose a unit that less likely to be blocked by neighbouring building

When you choose your unit, make sure that it's view won't be blocked by neighbouring building, either presently or in the future.

This is because blocked unit has much lesser scenery view, less privacy as it can be seen from the other building, and dimmer sunlight.

You can ensure that your view won't be blocked by future development by choosing a unit that is facing the sea, or a lake, or a river, or low-rise landed properties, or golf field. Avoid facing a vacant land, which you won't know if there is another high-rise building erected in front of you in the future.

Tip #3: Choose smaller unit with 2 bedrooms or 3 bedrooms

Smaller unit has a cheaper selling price than larger counterparts in the same building. As the building maintenance fee and sinking fund is directly proportional to the area taken by the unit, you can also enjoy a cheaper monthly maintenance fee and sinking fund by investing in a smaller unit.

The ideal size is between 800 sqft to 1000 sqft. Depends on the floorplan layout, it is possible for you to partition a 2 bedrooms unit into 3 bedrooms. If that is the case, you will be of more competitive advantage to invest in a 2 bedrooms unit, having the option to convert it into a 3 bedrooms unit if required by your tenant.

Smaller unit is easier to get tenant who are either individual, couple without kid, or small family. You will have better bargaining power on the rental price, since your cost is lower.

For larger unit, your demand will be from larger family, or you will need to allow for sub-renting. Otherwise, since your cost is higher, if you are not willing to lower down your rental price to be on par with the smaller unit's rental price, it will be more difficult for you to secure a tenant.

Tip #4: Choose corner unit

Based on my own experience, usually the smaller units in a condominium / apartment are also corner units.

Chosing corner unit has the following advantages:

• You will have more windows, brighter sunlight, and more external views.
• All your rooms are likely to have external views. For intermediate units, it is common that one or more rooms will have corridor view, or even without any window.

Tip #5: Choose a bare unit

Certain development projects allow buyers to choose whether to let the developer to furnish the unit with built-in furniture and kitchen appliance, or to leave it as bare unit.

For investment purpose, it is strongly advised to go for bare unit, because:

• Every developer renovated unit will have same type of furnishing, making them look the same to the potential tenants who view the unit. There will be no difference and uniqueness.
• You can't control the quality and material used by the developer's contractor who furnishes the unit. In many occasions, I found people complained about substandard furnishing they got, and they regretted for not choosing a bare unit.
• By having a bare unit, you have good control on getting your trusted renovation contractor and/or interior designer to provide good quality furniture and fitting, nice looking design, and having a unique design different from other units. You also avoided the situation of having portion of standard renovation that you dislike.

Tip #6: Make sure your unit's electricity tariff is of residential rate

If you are buying a residential unit in a service apartment, it is very likely that your electricity tariff by default is of commercial rate, which is much higher than the residential rate. You can apply for the tariff conversion online pretty easily by following the steps as written in this article.

Your tenant will be happier to know that the electricity tariff of your unit is of residential rate rather than commercial rate.

Tip #7: Renovate and furnish your unit into fully furnished or close to fully furnished

This is the key of getting a relatively better rental than your neighbours in the same building. Your unit needs to make a difference and need to be more tempting to your potential tenant.

Your renovation and furnishing need to be practical for daily living. You need to supply your tenant with all the daily living essentials, such as ceiling fans, air-conds, sufficient lighting, refrigerator with sufficient capacity, washing machine, drying machine (if it is difficult to find place to dry clothes with direct sunlight), kitchen cabinets, wardrobes, etc.

Although you might not need to choose to supply with high-end electrical appliance, it is better to provide good quality and branded one. Firstly, they are more presentable to your tenant. Secondly, the chances of breakdown are probably lower, and in case of warranty service is needed, you are likely to have better after-sales service from branded products.

It is a very good selling point if you could make your unit a comfortable and convenient place to live in, with the comfy feel of "home" to your tenant. It needs to be presentable and honorable for your tenant to welcome his/her guests visiting to your unit, a.k.a. your tenant's sweet home.

To give you an idea, below are 2 pictures of the kitchen area of 2 of my invested units respectively.

Tip #8: Take nice photos and videos to advertise your unit

Whether you want to rent out your unit by yourself, or through property renting platform such as SpeedHome, or using property agents, you need to take nice photos and videos to advertise your unit.

You will need altogether 3 sets of photos and videos:

• Your unit
• Highlight your unique selling points.
• Highlight what's your difference compared with other units.
• Highlight its security features, such as: digital door lock, invisible grilles, etc.
• Highlight its privacy features, such as: curtain & blinds, soundproof, etc.
• Provide good impression to potential tenant to fell that "this is the comfy home to live in".

• Your condominium/apartment
• Highlight your building's unique selling points compared with other neighbouring buildings.
• Highlight how presentable is it to visitors - parking, visitor waiting area, OKU considerations, etc.
• Showcase the common facilities - swimming pool, sauna, gym room, children playground, recreational facilities, sports facilities, social facilities, etc.
• Showcase the security and privacy.
• Showcase the convenience.
• Showcase the friendliness of residents, quality of management office and security guards, etc.
• Interesting events, functions and happenings in your community - festivals celebration, parties, marriage occasions, BBQ, educational events, etc.
• Available high-speed broadband Internet service providers, the more choices the merrier - UniFi, Time, Maxis, Astro, Fiber@Home, etc.

• The nearby surroundings of your condominium/apartment
• Convenience stores
• Eateries and restaurants
• Sport facilities - badminton, tennis, basketball, volleyball, soccer, golf, stadium, etc.
• Recreation places - parks, lake, riverside, hiking route, etc.
• Clinics and shops
• Marts, morning market, night market, ...
• Shopping mall, commercial area, banks, ATM machines, ...
• Kindergartens, schools, colleges, universities, daycare centres, tuition centres, ...
• Medical centre, hospitals, police station, fire brigade, ...
• LRT/MRT stations
• Traffic condition
• Surrounding community

With all these in place, I believe you will be able to get a good tenant with a good rental return too.

Renting a Medklinn air ionizer instead of buying it

Among the many air and surface sterilizing products in the market, Medklinn ionizer has been proven effective in sterilizing the air and surface around it by killing the bacteria and viruses,  as well as eliminating allergens, bad odours, smoke, dust, moulds and pollution.

Recently, Medklinn has started to provide renting as an option to use their air ionizer, other than buying it.

Benefits of renting instead of buying:

• You can terminate the rental after a minimum 3 months period. This enables you to try out the product with small cost, after that, you may opt to continue or terminate the renting. Upon termination, you can opt to buy a brand new product, or just discontinue using the product.
• You will get 1-to-1 replacement for faulty, malfunction or damaged unit, provided it is not intentionally damaged.
• You will get free cartridge replacement every year, until the end of rental period after 3 years.

Disbenefit of renting instead of buying:

• After 3 years, when the rental period is completed, you need to return the unit to Medklinn.
• The total cost of using the unit with renting for 3 years is higher than buying the product and buying new replacement cartridge every year.

Other considerations:

• The warranty period of Medklinn product is 15 months, after you register your bought product in their website. By renting, you effectively extend the warranty period of your product to 36 months.
• Normally, Medklinn will come out with new model every 2-3 years. By renting, you can always use the latest model of the product. Even if you buy and keep the product, being an electronic product, it will still have a lifespan and will degrade from year to year.
• If you buy the product, certain credit card allows you to split the cost to 12 months installment. If you rent the product, your credit card will be charged at a relatively smaller amount every month for 36 months.

For the case of Medklinn Asens+20 indoor ionizer:

If you opt for buying, the cost is:

• Medklinn Asens+20 = RM560
• 2x cartridge = 2 x RM139 = RM278

Total cost (3 years) = RM838

If you opt for renting, the cost is:

• 1st year = 12 x RM36 = RM432
• 2nd year = 12 x RM25 = RM300
• 3rd year = 12 x RM16 = RM192
• 2x cartridge = RM0

Total cost (3 years) = RM924

Different between renting and buying = RM86

For the case of Medklinn Autoplus car ionizer:

If you opt for buying, the cost is:

• Medklinn Autoplus = RM439
• 2x cartridge = 2 x RM90 = RM180

Total cost (3 years) = RM619

If you opt for renting, the cost is:

• 1st year = 12 x RM26 = RM312
• 2nd year = 12 x RM19 = RM228
• 3rd year = 12 x RM13 = RM156
• 2x cartridge = RM0

Total cost (3 years) = RM696

Different between renting and buying = RM77

So, which option is better for you? You decide yourself.