This is the 100th episode of The Your Life! Your Terms Show… crazy!! When we started this podcast we had no idea it would be as much fun as it has been, and we had no idea how much feedback we’d get from you all about it. So thank you for sharing your thoughts, thank you for listening, and thank you for giving us a platform to share some of the good, the bad and even the ugly side of real estate investing. We started Rock Star Real Estate with the idea that perhaps we could help other Canadians live life on their terms. This podcast hopefully is having some small impact on people’s lives and it’s definitely allowing us to live life on our terms, so thank you!
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Transcript
Hey everyone, it’s Tom Karadza. And this is the 100th episode of The your life your terms show. And for this episode, we got a bunch of the coaches here together. And not everybody, not everybody was around to be able to pull this off when we’re booking something like this with as big as the team has gotten, we can’t get everybody in one room at the same time. It’s just near impossible. But we’ve got a chunk of the coaches here at Rockstar that work with investors together in the boardroom, we went around, and we just had a little bit of fun with it, we asked everybody to share a few stories in real estate you’ll hear and and that’s it, you’ll get to hear some of the coaches here at Rockstar that maybe you’ve never heard from before. Some are shy or than others. Some are very outgoing. And you’ll you’ll see what I mean in a second. And if there’s someone you know, here at Roxbury that you didn’t hear on this episode, it’s because they just weren’t around, they were working with an investor, they were on vacation, for whatever reason, they just couldn’t be here. And you should know that. We have right now about 14 full time coaches that work with investors on a full time basis. But the entire group here at Rockstar is much larger than that. We have about 50 people here at Rockstar now. So this is really been something that we never expected to grow as big as it has grown. And we’re very thankful and grateful for the entire team, Nick and I both quit our jobs to start this and we were literally by ourselves. I mean, the first office that we rented out that we had enough money to rent out was in another brokerage that we were out of a Keller Williams brokerage, and we had enough money to rent out their closet, which they allowed us to rent out. And that was our first office. So from there, we went into Burlington or in our own office space, we rented some executive suites out there. And a lot of members know us from those Burlington offices. And then eventually, we came back to oak film to the offices that we are in now. And later this year, we will move into our new office space, which we have purchased. So we’ve purchased a couple of commercial units brand new, it’s being built here in Oakville. And we’ve purchased a couple of units in that development that they’ve built, it’s all kind of professional services on the ground floor there, it’s really nice, kind of modern new offices inside, I think is going to be really beautiful, much nicer than we’ve ever had before. And, yeah, we’re really excited about it. So this has been quite the journey going from quitting our jobs, having the support of both our wives to go through this. For those of you who don’t know, I quit my job with a mortgage on my family house, four year old son and a 10 month old daughter. So I’m forever grateful to Carol for supporting me through that whole journey. And then now coming to this point where we’re doing 100 episodes and sharing all this real estate information that we’re able to share. And having a team where we’re able to share that with us to everyone else is really, really powerful. So we’re just super grateful, you know, this is living life on my terms. So I’m just thankful. And I know Nick feels the same. Nick’s just not here right now because he’s over in Croatia, truly living life on his terms, having some fun with the family. And I’m going to be joining him soon. So with that, we’ll leave it there. And let’s get on with the 100th episode of The your life your term show.
Are you ready to live life on your terms? Is it time did take charge, real estate,
business building, the economy, health and nutrition? and more.
It’s the your life your terms show with Tom and Nick.
Are you ready? Let’s go.
So welcome. This is the hundredth podcast. And the idea is that we’re going to go in a circle here. And there’s a bunch of people everyone just got so quiet. We’re going to go in a circle here. And there’s a bunch of Rockstar coaches in the room who work with a ton of investors. And we’re going to share one thing we like about real estate one thing we hate or don’t like about real estate, and then a quick story about real estate. We’re going to go in a circle and you can’t repeat what this person before you said. So Andrew, Nick, Mike, you guys at the end, I’ll go right at the very end. So you just can’t say whatever someone else shared. Cool. So in this room are people who’ve probably helped investors by over a billion dollars now probably have helped investors by over a billion dollars in real estate created millions of dollars in monthly rental income for investors right across Ontario. So with that, we will have Mark Greenidge, who lead us off and I can share a quick story about Mark Wantage. I’ve known him since grade one. With the first day of school, he when they opened the door to let him in his dad and him were at the door there to let him in. Like I guess they were guarding grade one. But they opened the door. We were already in class. I know why you came in, like the middle of the day. And you were at the door just bawling and crying. And I thought, Oh my gosh, who’s this guy crying and great one. And then he made sure we can make everyone stand for the Yeah, we’re just gonna make everybody stand. Okay, great. But so mark one good. One thing you like about real estate, one thing you don’t like in a story,
like how you started with back in grade one. So actually, I will piggyback on that and say that, when, you know, growing up to my favorite games were Connect for a monopoly. And I feel like what we’re doing here, sorry, what we’re doing here is pretty much playing our own version of Monopoly. Helping investors buy green houses. Eventually, hopefully they turn those green houses into right houses or hotels
stop moving the mic around. Hold it.
Used to holding a mic?
swinging around?
Sorry, there we go. Two hands. dance.
Yeah. So in terms of monopoly in grade one.
Advance I played
pretty young. Yeah. can afford an awfully Yes.
So that’s one thing you like, I gotta keep this going. You don’t want one thing you don’t like,
one thing? I don’t like, I think my wife was here. She would say that.
I was gonna say my wife.
No, no, she’s, she’s, she’s still
in the good books. He’s still not good books. I should probably say, you know, missing out on family events, social gatherings on the weekends, and while
you’re missing out, because you’re dealing with crap.
Yeah, occasionally, you know, we’ll have to do work related stuff. So
yeah, that’d be the only negative thing that’s a interest in your one of your favorite real estate stories, positive or negative.
I’m going to go back way back in time, when I first started, one of my first investors, when they were, you know, everyone has are all investors that we work with, they have that anxiety about showing that first property for this one, for whatever reason, their anxiety was at the next level, it felt like they were like, actually petrified of going through this process. So much so that they begged me, begged me to come out to the property. And I said, Okay, listen, what I’ll do is, I’ll come to the property, but an income before you actually do the showing. All right. And then but once you guys, it’s time to start, you guys are on your own nice, okay, fine. Going up to the showing, I was shocked. They had just not just the directional signs, but they add, you know, orange pylons and balloons leading up to the property, Holland, these aren’t the same people that I thought were so anxious and petrified. And I got there, and we do some role playing. And, you know, I left them and they had an awesome showing. They had, I think, a few applications that day, they would change their Kijiji every week, like from what I saw the beginning to what how they changed over time. You know, it was a good example of fear, or, you know, have these false false events appearing real. And that’s what I was going through their mind and they just totally transformed themselves and turned, it turns on things like marketing wizards and man of filling the property within two or three weeks and
real estate makes you grow, whether you want it to or not, it makes you grow as a person. So cool. Awesome. Thank you, Mark, granted, okay, JP Gulbis is up next. So JP, one thing you like about your you can’t say anything Mark said. So you can’t say you like monopoly? You can’t positive negative in a story.
Yeah, I mean, I think the kind of record all this is to give people choices. And and I think that I that that has to stand with the financial benefits of it. I mean, we’re not doing this for just fun, obviously. So
you know, if you got a nice way to save that money.
Yeah, I mean, look, I mean, it is what it is. But obviously, then it goes way beyond that. So it’s nice to see beginner investors, I guess, get that first property and then see that sort of that sort of aha moment, once they get over that, that that first hurdle. And then like all the sudden they’re like, Whoa, all right, like, and they really want to do more. So that’s really nice. And, of course, all of us have been affected by that. And all of us have also seen the financial, you know, benefits of investing ourselves. So that would be the positive just
give everyone a really hard time because you just basically said I like the financial benefits. So now Yeah, everybody go after you can’t say anything about the financial then. But but
but then there’s also challenges with it. big challenges, sometimes sometimes it goes real quick, sometimes it doesn’t. But I think the most frustrating part, which everyone can attest to, is the just getting to the point where you can actually acquire property. So from a financing perspective, it’s a nightmare for, you know, I would say on average for most people, it’s it’s probably the biggest thing. And then once they own it, it’s not so bad. So dealing with the banks. Yes, yeah, that’s, that’s that part sucks. But you know what, that’s a positive and a negative, because a lot of people will just sort of, they’ll just give up. You know, and investing in real estate isn’t going to be for everyone. And that’s probably a good thing for those who have the stomach to keep going story a story, man, honestly, you know, the when I started and Mike was my coach, I don’t know, I know. But share know, it’s, it’s it’s probably a story many people have heard. But honestly, having gone through that on my first rental property was, you know, having a deal not close on time, because funds were frozen an account with one of my part. And then you know, getting insurance pulled and then once we finally close the week later, than having a suicide. So having all of these things, backup the suicide car, just just explain that a vacant house, we’d had it for about a week, we went up there to show it how all these families lined up, we get there and there’s a homeless person in the house. And while we were there, unfortunately, he he committed suicide. So that was a pretty big challenge. But having gone through all that, honestly really prepared me for working with investors after that, because with all that, I mean, gosh, we
got all that. And so sad and horrible that experience was which is, you know, very sad and totally horrible. It strengthened you because you had to deal with the situation totally deal with the police showing up you have to deal because you’re nervous that you just have a vacant property. Now you’re you just went from dealing with a vacant property to having a major scene, it was the stigma we were most worried about on how to deal with that. But no, so you rented it out. Okay, after two weeks later, it was full. Yeah, we’d
rented it.
Yeah. And it just so happened that, you know, the it was, the people didn’t care if we disclose it, there’s no problem. But anyway, so having gone through that it just made any other problem that someone’s going to approach me with? Not a big deal. So that’s it.
Cool. Thanks, JP. Erica Spencer is up next. So Erica?
Yeah, something you like something you don’t like in a story.
So I think something I like about real estate is that it’s always changing. So it’s always I get bored with things that are always the same. My previous career was as a biologist, and it was always the same thing. So with real estate, as an investor, and as a coach, just helping people through different challenges and buying different properties. And they have members right now that are I was just telling, lastly are kind of shopping and all different markets for all different things. And it’s like, you know, you should focus that at the beginning. It’s exciting because you have so many options at your fingertips, and you can go in any direction. And I always say that as long as makes sense, right? So it’s like, nice houses on a streets. But that also is like whatever deal makes sense. As long as there’s cash flow, as long as there’s something that that kind of benefits later. So you never really know what you’re going to get right. It’s always something new.
Something you hate.
I always think about an ex comment to that member event with he who deals with emotion wins, right? So it’s like, however many properties we or our investors have in their portfolio. It’s, you know, 20 roofs, it’s 20 leaky basements, it’s it’s multiplied, multiplied by a factor of your success. But also if she goes south, it goes us in a big way. Right when we had a rainy spring, two years ago, it’s like how many wet basements did we have all at the same time? Right. So it’s like the multiplication factor can either be awesome or it could be really bad.
So wait, what did Mark say was his net negative thing he didn’t like? Oh, your wife you’re missing family events because of real estate your negative thing JP was
financing,
financing and now yours was when shit goes so they can go south in a big way. Can I’m trying to keep track so that we don’t repeat ourselves cuz we’re sticking we’re still at first stepping over each other. Just a little video. So the story is the story. Erica?
I’ve been sitting here trying to think of a good story. And I don’t have you have
so many good stories. Just pick one.
They’re all just like little stories. And I know like it’s
been a potluck. Because I think so far we’re sharing negative stories you can pick it is there someone you’ve helped? that comes to mind?
Yeah, of course. But nothing that’s like
epic. Okay, give us the negative epic story.
Quite like so
JP told a story about what Mike was his coach. So I have a story about that, too. And we’re doing your rent own showing. And, you know, we’re in communication with Mike and, and it was like, okay, Mike, if you don’t hear from us in the next two hours, we’re following these people who we just met to their house and agri falls and we don’t know them. And they they’re a little bit odd and, and he had investors in the car and you’re going to show properties. And we were on speaker and it was just kind of nuts. But so we ended up with this property that was not beautiful and was not my daughter didn’t want to stand on the floor. It was you know, so dirty and gross. And we ended up buying it because it was a great price. And then that the end of the story was beautiful because the people were like very great people. We help them they they moved into our rent own they put down all the proceeds of their sale into the rent to own but they were so helpful and we’re like praising the Lord like actually because they could live across the street from their in laws and their family was it was like it turned out to be a great story. But we could have been murdered in that basement and kind of knew
the only person who knows who you are
to bury or something so wouldn’t.
Cool. Thanks, Erica. That was perfect. jp hunt, john paul hunt. Yes. Something you like about real estate, something you don’t like?
I’m gonna go a little sappy. It’s who what is who real estate is linked me to over the years. So maybe just because I got married and a lot of good friends were there. at the wedding, who I directly would have never met before wasn’t for real estate. So that’s really been everyone in this room. Really? I guess
there was some people in this room who weren’t there. So now I know the people who were at your wedding are your real true friends. Yeah, yeah. So that’s cool. Okay, so yeah, I’m Well, yeah, I was there for the record. friends were good friends.
Well, you know, the people I met just with never would have come across if it wasn’t real estate. So that’s been my biggest, biggest thing I like for sure.
I don’t think that’s happy. That’s cool. Okay, yeah.
Things I Hate most problems could probably be rectified. If people would just think outside the box a little bit. Whether you’re dealing with another realtor, dealing with an issue with a house, maybe a home inspection that didn’t go maybe as good as it as you hoped. Things could probably get figured out if people just would have. A lot of people are just black and white thinking. And if you just think a little bit outside the box, probably get a lot things make things a lot easier and get things done.
So it’s frustrating to you when people just focus on the problem and don’t think about the succession. Yeah,
yeah, that’s exactly a cool story.
story. I had a member who had a student rental, and he was looking to get more income out of it. So one thing he did do is put in coin laundry, which a lot of people have done. But then he also went out and I don’t know where he found it. But he bought a vending machine for chocolate bars and stuff like that. He started making $75 a month extra to the student rental from literally charging $1 for chocolate bars. And
this is one residential student rental. And you know, the vending machine, not anymore in your
basement, put in the basement and because literally, it was a convenience. He was charging $1 whatever, like whatever you charge in a vending machine, dollar dollar 50 for a chocolate bar. He was making $75 a month he still is.
So then he goes every month and restock. Yeah,
because he was going every month anyway to collect the coin out of the coin laundry machine. He goes across
is that right? I know he goes
machines with the jelly beans that you put in like the quarters, you know, you put those into your student rental because the
students will just walk downstairs and buy chocolate bar instead of going to the store. So
yeah. Wow. Yeah, no, that’s a great whenever the neighbors may come over and start buying stuff.
Put aside.
Directly entrance to this. Yeah, so the public loaded outside on the front lawn.
Nice. jp, thank you. Sandra is up next. And Sandra is going yeah. So Sandra, I don’t want to say your last name, which Thank you. So Sandra, a positive, a negative and a story.
Okay, positive is now I’m going to go out and look for vending machines for my we all are. So I guess positive would be. So I came from the corporate world. So the positive on this side is the fact that I love the lifestyle that it gives me I get to see my kids go to school every day. Most days I’m there when they get dropped off at the bus. At the age of 49, my husband at the age of 49 decided to quit his full time job. And we put him through engineering for for two years, three years. And then I decided how babies and and so the lifestyle of it was was the fact that I got to spend two to three with my kids that most people don’t get to without being in debt. Cool. Negative. I guess negative would be in real estate that I’ve learned that no one told me before is that you need to have magnificent bladder control. And lots of snacks. And why
is that? Because you’re driving around from property to property.
Yeah.
Okay, never thought about that negative but good point. Yeah. And you end up knowing the places where you’re going to stop you. I don’t know about you, but I know certain places have clean washroom, so I’m like, okay, I can park in there anyway.
Exactly. Or when you’re showing houses like okay, this is the one we’re going to stop at. Don’t use this one check the water is all
a story, I guess is I guess you’ve always said is not timing the market, but it’s time in the market. And one of my stories is just this weekend, I refinance two properties and pulled out that money. And I made that lifestyle jump that I was talking about, and I put an offer on a beachfront property. So we’ll see how that goes. Awesome. That’s
a great story. Yeah. So cool. Cool. Thank you, Sandra. Nadeem Ahmed is up next. Nadine? Boy, you came in charging for that mic pretty strong. So edema positive and negative in a story.
Positive is
a different experience for me for Ryan. I was in a different world for 1516 years, running my own retail business and different environment. Never thought I would do real estate. Thanks to Mike I’m here.
Because I guess as in a retail environment you were in the store every day store
different hours. Yeah, just different lifestyle complete different.
But yeah, here I’m here helping other people make money besides myself. So that’s the positive. Negative would be Saturday morning drives being stuck in traffic couldn’t go to St. Catherine’s Niagara Falls, going to bury just that’s the double the time that’s probably the negative forget everything else. It would
be nice if all the properties were all close together as an investor or helping investors if we didn’t all have to drive right across Ontario to do this totally. Right.
Yeah. And the good story that I that I have is like one of my members has been working there for about five years when I met him. He says the closing closing and retirement and he wants to build his his life for his retirement and he’s bought over a dozen properties set himself up nicely for retirement and
that’s probably the positive very cool. So he
was able to qualities your partners to do that because it doesn’t properties. That’s a lot of properties. Yeah. He started with his family. Yeah. Okay. Cool. The children. Awesome. Adam, I just thought of something as an investor, you should start in a helicopter tours, where you can get on in Mississauga to go look at properties in Agra, and you just fly people over. No one’s going to pay for that. But the idea is really great. Cool, thanks to Dean, Bernie Frazier’s up next. So in a past life, Bernie and I used to work at the same place at NetSuite. We never really crossed paths. Because we would sell the software at the front. And then when the got the software, and it couldn’t do what we told them it was going to do. Bernie’s team would handle the tech support on the back end. It was a beautiful relationship
on the back end. Yes. We
did cross paths. We did. We did.
Yeah. You were begging me for some sort of help. I recall.
Yeah, I think it was politely convincing you and persuading you with my massive negotiation skills.
So on the positive side, I was actually my last two stories would definitely have been at but an extension of the the family thing. My kids are much older. And they both still live at home. And we still get to spend a lot of quality time together, which there was no way I would be able to, because of the hours they keep versus the hours, I would be keeping in my old rat race job. So the family thing, but the joy for me, I get some sort of joy out of weekday traffic when I’m heading out of the GTA. And there is just a single line not moving coming.
That’s a good point. And it seemed to your point. Yeah, we all get to choose our hours when we drive to So yeah, that’s a great that is I just need to jump on this. Bernie I used to drive to nuts. I’m saying this because I used to work at NetSuite with you. I used to live in Oakville drive to NetSuite. And I was in the bumper to bumper traffic, but Nick and I already owned properties in Hamilton and there was no traffic going that way on the 43. And I always remember thinking, why am I driving this way? And traffic when all the money is that way? Yeah, you know, I just thought it was totally the wrong move. So yeah, I can totally relate. Yeah.
So for me that’s on a daily basis. I’m smiling, just looking at those poor souls coming into the, into the corporate world. The negative side for me,
the listing paperwork, I
heart nobody likes
me a lot with this. I, I just do not understand why it’s so complicated. And the fact that I have not been able to automate it frustrates
me. Yeah. I can totally see that. Okay, and a story.
So I’ll go with a negative one,
I guess.
One of my first properties. We were doing a rent to own and we had a family and they were international students going to Mohawk, and the parents wanted to buy the property. And they wanted to do a rent to own. They had just moved in. They’ve been renting in Hamilton for maybe six months, I discussed the rental with them actually turn them away because I didn’t feel they were going to be a good fit. And it was actually the girls that came they were students going to Mohawk. They came back a couple days later with their father. Note, this is what we want to do. I’ve got money coming. It’s going to take me two years to get my money. And we’re going to buy the house. Here’s the down payment. We were doing it so they actually were doing the rent on. They were great tenants. And then about a year and a half, two years in Berta, my wife gets a call from one of the girls and says, you know, I’m sorry, the house just isn’t big enough for us anymore. So it was a four bedroom townhouse. Big yard big house. And she’s going okay, well, you know, there was four of you there. So what’s the problem? Well, my dad brought his other wife over. For other kids. And in the last two years, they my mom had two other kids. So there was 11 people living in this house, and obviously wasn’t big enough. And one of the rules that I used to break on a regular basis was I tell your clients that you got to go to the property. I wasn’t going to the property. It was a hellhole. It started out beautiful. It needed a lot of work. So they ended up moving out. On the positive side. It was during the time when we bought really low in Hamilton and the prices were peaking and competitive offer. So we sold it. But it was kind of unfortunate. Culturally to
renovate that before he sold it. Yeah,
we we put in like 10. So still
profitable at the end?
Yeah, it was very profit from the app. But interesting on how quickly so the lesson is, go
buy your properties. When you tell other investors to go buy their properties. You your shut yourself should go buy the properties as well. Yes, yes. Cool. Thank you, Bernie, Leslie kitchen. So Leslie, if you’re listening to this, Leslie started working with us when nobody should have started working with us, she trusted us and believe this, Nick and I needed help. And Leslie heard what we were doing and thought that seems like such a good idea when no one else was working with us, and jumped on to start working with us. So we are forever grateful.
I’m forever grateful. So
that kind of leads into what I was going to say one of the things I love most about real estate is working with people that are up to something. And so not only do I get to work with you, and Nick and Tom, that were up to something, but I got to work with these amazing investors who wanted to create something for themselves in their life, and I get to work with them. And, you know, it’s just all the adventures that we get to go on. Like some of the, you know, I’ve been locked out of locked in a house and not being able to get out when we are showing property. And don’t ask me how that happened. And then there was times when I’ve been locked out of a house in the pouring rain, and I’ve stepped in dog dirt. And I have to figure out how to get back in the house where my keys is Dr.
A nice way of saying dog shit. Yeah.
It’s really mushy because it’s raining.
We don’t need the visual. Yeah.
Yeah, so those are, I guess that’s one of the stories what I don’t like. So I like a lot of things about real estate to the financial side, which has already been covered and but just working with some amazing people and seeing them fulfill on their dreams. And that that’s so rewarding for me. Like, you can’t get anything like I get even today when you were in the meeting, sharing your new office and how its laid out. I started feeling our it’s our new Oh, yeah, but our new office but you know, I started feeling tears come into my eyes because I’m thinking, Oh, my god that went from the closet to this office. You know, and I just heard of all that and got to see that may be contributing to that. And that’s to me, really rewarding. Yeah. So
what about the negative Oh,
the negative, I just I would say the theme is people who lie
to say your body demeanor when you just said the negative just changed so much. You went from having goosebumps and smiling to the negative, you started frown, you’re like, well, this is your people. So people
who are whether it’s a tenant, who lives
or even a contractor, like especially contractors who who mislead or lie, anybody who’s just, you know, just be just telling me the way it is and be straightforward and and that works for me. And so I guess that’s the only thing is that when we run into people like that, right when we’re out there in the field, and, and and not always, to me is kind of this tailspin, I just,
and a story story.
So many stories, that I tell mine about those Adventures of being locked in and locked out. A member story. So one of the things is, I think one of the stories that I’ve always loved is being able to help you and some of the families into the rent to own and actually having them fulfill on it. You know, and, and, and working with people that have done that. So, you know, one of the ones was a family who it was they were up and Barry so he was a funeral director. And he had the big house, the Porsche, you know, lovely lifestyle, and he lost it all. And he got into a divorce and then bought another property. But when he was settling, there was a debt that wasn’t looked after. So it ended up his financial advisor told him to go bankrupt, which he did. And then we got to work with him and find him a property and I strategy created a five year rent to own because I knew it would never happen in three years. And he was able to fulfill on that and purchase a property five years later, I hear from the investor who actually I partnered them up with and you know, it’s just really that’s great. Like it’s really awesome that they the investor one they were so happy, they never had to deal with the property it was well looked after. And then the tenant buyer was happy and they bought the property cool.
You’ve always been the master putting Win Win situations together you really have. So cool. Thanks, Leslie. All right, Sonia, Sky, something you like something you don’t like and a story.
So one thing I really liked about working with investors is sometimes their first time people are nervous about buying a property. But when I’m able to share that my story and tell them that, you know how nervous that I was and I was what I was able to achieve. And then when I see them by their first property, and it is a success and they’re happy and they’re getting the money. They’re like, okay, when do we go buy the next one? They’re excited about it. So I’m going to
let you off with this story. But this is what I think JP used on p you know, people so yeah, we’re repeating a positive story. We’re gonna let you off because we are nice people. But Mike does our most next and we’re not going to let Mike dissolve off on Okies. That’s a positive. And you’re right. Absolutely, absolutely. And a negative.
So a negative, I would say is multiple offers.
From an investor point of view, or when you’re helping an investor from the
Yeah, when I’m helping an investor? Because if we lose the deal, then everyone’s upset. But sometimes when we actually get the property in a multiple offer, then it’s, the question is, did we spend too much this time? Could we have gone in a bit lower, which is always a question that people seem to be a little bit concerned about. But in the end, as long as they have a great property, and they see that they’re getting money off of it, then they’re happy about it, it’s just in that initial moment, you start questioning things, sometimes a story. So a story I’d have to say is, I have a couple. And their goal was to buy three properties, which they did, which was great. And I was able to work with them, not only to get the three properties, but they also wanted this goal about retirement. And we came up with the idea of renting they’re basement and the husband was all for it and the wife wasn’t. So after showing her the numbers and what things could look like and how soon, much sooner they can get to their retirement in Costa Rica. She changed her mind about it. And last week, she sent me a video where she renovated the base and it was so excited and showed me and had to show me the video of how good it looked and was so happy that she found a great tenant for it. So they’re all on their way.
Cool. Cool. Thanks, Anya.
All right, Mike. Some positive or negative.
What I like about real estate is that I find it’s the most forgiving business that I know of it real estate if you’re an investor. It doesn’t matter if you’re a single mom, if what color you are, what age you are, if you’re new to the country.
You know, the the the year show what the days can’t.
We’ve seen investors, we had Dan and Neil, Dan and Laura Elman the other day where Dan had a fear of talking to people. And I was at his very first showing, maybe a second showing actually where he told me he had this fear. And I see him push through it. And now we’re these are these are people that the gentleman had a fear of talking to people, but now there’s multiple millions of dollars of equity in this couple’s life and their children’s life. By just pushing through that, I don’t know of any other business where somebody could survive with that type of fear. That’s first and foremost. What I don’t like yeah, the maintenance calls. There’s one particular property that I have, if I get a phone call or a text message, and I see that property, my butt cheeks always squeezed together. And I’m like, here we go from Mike there centipedes in the basement or spiders, or the front porch lights out. I’m like, You gotta be kidding me. So back in the day, I would do all I’m sure all of us have gone through it in the beginning. When you first start off, you go out and you do all these repairs yourself. As these properties spit off more and more cash, I call it when that phone call happens. Here comes my shit sandwich. But the shit sandwich the more bread you have, the less you eat.
And then story.
The more bread you have, you can hire you can hire spiders now.
Look at the equity in the properties and you’re like I’ll eat that shit. It’s worth it. Yeah,
well, yeah. The other day it was a freakin hot water tank leak fried the circuit board to the furnace. And we’re in the you know, we’re, we’re in a bit of a heat wave. So then now the furnace is not the AC is not kicking in, right. So before I’d be like cringing, I gotta call, you know, the furnace guy out but now it’s like, okay, it’s gonna be a couple hundred bucks.
That’s such a big deal. Because the more you have the less
and then story goes back to Angela heat is back in the day when Andrew started off as an imbalance
gonna be mine.
Working with some tenant buyers. We’re at our last house. It’s in Brampton. It’s about nine o’clock at night. It’s a summer’s night. We just finished going through the house. We’re standing in the driveway. It’s a young couple with I believe a daughter, I think right?
Yeah,
yeah. And we’re sitting there talking to them and they’re saying okay, we like this house or so these were tenant buyers who are helping find a home in Andrew was going to be their investor who’s going to buy the home for them and do the rent to own program. As we’re they’re talking just talking about Okay, well, we’re gonna have to do the offer right away. A car goes down the street smokes another car parked car on the side of the road. And we see this mirror go bouncing down the road sparking as it bounces away. And the tenant say that’s our car. Andrew RNI without even saying anything to one another Andrew bolts after the car on foot. I jump into my car. I’m racing down the street, Andrews cutting through neighbors grasses and whatnot. I get around the corner. Andrews on the front
was doing that cuz he’s done that before.
Yeah, he’s on the front hood. Yeah, the cars parked I parked my car sideways. I bought a brand new Lexus. I don’t know what I was thinking because the guys either going forward or backwards. He’s only got two directions to go. Anyways, he’s the guy in the cars revving the car. And I’m like, Andrew, just let the guy go. Let the guy go. I got his plate. I’ll chase this guy down call. I was already I was already on the phone with 911. Andrew backs away. The guy pulls up for houses and pulls into the driveway. So I get out of the car, like what are you doing? Because you know what? That could have been the family that could have been one of us. That could have been one of the little kids. But the guy was basically a hit and run. So cops calm. There was a helicopter that went down in Brampton. Apparently that day, so we were waiting forever for the police to come. Please finally come guy gets arrested Andrew and I actually had to go to court for this case. But I remember while the police were there and he was like, well, they really liked the house. How do I segue this?
tenants who are these are the tenants. Yeah.
So I’m like, well, you got to ask for the down payment. It was like $10,000. And lo and behold, Andrew walks away talks to them. And I think he was counting like 10 grand in cash on the hood of a car some of their smashed up car. Yeah,
yeah. Oh, no. On the hood of the car that was smashed. Yeah.
Cool. Cool. Thank you. And like I said, I didn’t say Mike disarm. I didn’t say your last name when you spoke. But thank you. All right, Paul at the brute. So let’s hear your story. No positive and negative first sorry.
positive about real estate, I guess there’s after know, almost 10 years doing this. There’s there’s really no cap and or there’s, yeah, there’s no cap and where you can do in real estate. So I started out doing rental properties. And I’ve done some larger multifamily and commercial properties. And we’re, we’re building some small subdivisions now. And there’s, if there’s, there’s, there’s so many different things you can do. And you’re never really bored if you if you don’t want to be. And some of the things I don’t like, I don’t know.
You don’t know, because the list is so long or you don’t have any.
I’m trying to pick the right one. No, I just I
because I know there’s things you don’t like in real estate, because you tell everyone about the things you don’t like in real estate.
I just I don’t like some of the the lack of professionalism in our industry. I know that’s a, that’s a that’s a big one. But not all professionals are created equal. And I think we’re lucky to be in a group like this, where we all kind of treated seriously. And we really care about the success of our members. And investors. I think that’s
what makes it frustrating, because you’re trying to help an investor and you’re working hard to help that investor, then you bump into another professional in the industry who’s making your life difficult. And it just it’s frustrating, cuz you’re trying to explain it to the investor, what you’re trying to do, and you’re getting roadblock by somebody else. So yeah, I get it.
It’s paint a grim picture. But I just it’s not everyone, but it’s, you know, one person just colors is all black and blue if they don’t if there’s no kind of respect for the profession.
So for your story, do you want to share an example of that, or you want to share something else?
Oh, yeah, I’m gonna pick on Mike since he picked on Andrew.
So one of our, I don’t know, if there’s a second or third property, Mike was helping us with student rental in, in Hamilton. And we’ve gotten a deal done, was accepted and then sent to the mortgage broker, and, you know, financing qualified. And then just before closing, I had gotten, I get a call from my lawyer, it was Jerry at the time. And Jerry Gato good guy. And he says, Hey, Paul, were $2,000 short. I’m like, What the hell are you talking about? And he’s like, Well, you know, just $2,000 short somehow. So anyway, we tracked this all back. And it turns out somehow, the instead of the final accepted offer getting submitted, the last counter offer was submitted that was $2,000 less than the actual purchase price. So the butler at the mortgage office as probably so the mortgage like that. And once the lawyer and all that stuff went through, and we were $2,000, short, when they when the lawyer by your lawyer and the sellers were communicating with each other. So I had to kind of come up with them in cash, and it wasn’t my fault. I’m just picking on him for no reason. It was just I can see you staring them down, you’re standing right above them right now. Just some clerical error. But you know, I turns out, you know, we had to come up with the money. I was a young, much younger at the time. And, you know, I didn’t even know where I was going to find that. $2,000. But it was interesting, but I still have that property today. And, you know, knowing what I know, now, I would have paid an extra 10,000 to keep that property because it was definitely a good one.
Because what how old you read that but you were like 23 or 2424? Where did you find the extra 2000? Some Visa card? You took a cash advance or something? He can’t say it? Okay. You can’t.
was illegal. Yeah, we can’t say.
All right, cool. Thank you, Paul de Rosa. Thank you. Who’s going next? Andrew? Nick? Yeah, okay. Um, okay. So something I like, I’m trying to figure out what everyone said, we allowed some repeats through this process. I think I like, I don’t know, it’s not like, Here, I’ll tell you, I’ll give you the story. And then I’ll explain. That’s, that’s what I like. So there’s been times when you go down to filled you and you feel like multiple properties in a day, and you signed the leases, and then you’re driving home and you’re like, holy crap, man, like I just signed, like, you know, whatever, that whatever, that maybe it’s like, not quite 100. But depending on the rent splits close to like, $100,000 worth of income for this year, in these leases. Like, that’s a big income day. You know what I mean? Like, I know that incomes gonna come over time, and there’s expenses and stuff like that. But I’m like, man, I just like saluted the salt. You know, I just signed agreements, 400 grand, and like, that’s a big thing. I don’t know what the average income in Canada is. But it’s well below that. And again, I know it’s a business and there’s expenses, but I’m like, man, those are good feelings. Those days when you’re like in the trenches, and you kind of pulling those things off. And again, that’s, that’s kind of cool. You know, that’s, that’s the plus side.
The stuff I don’t like is, it’s really the length of time that it takes in to make money in real estate. I’d be nice if it happened, like every week, these days, you’re frustrated. Yeah. Like it like the get rich quick stuff. Like I’m still looking for, like, I know, there’s a lot of people that come into this office, and they’re like, hey, this all sounds good. But like, you know, I heard about this way that you could do it like this. And you can make millions overnight, not getting off your butt not doing anything. I’m like, Yeah, I want that to like, tell me, you know, let me know how it works. Because I want to do that, too. So yeah, I wish it was a little bit faster. But someone said earlier thing, like I think it was you about just how much the taught like when you’re someone said the whole time in the market, but it’s just how like, just when you have when you spend time in the thing, you know, you can refinance properties like that, if that the benefits are enormous. I just wish that happened more regularly, more quickly, like every six months, if that could happen. That’d be nice.
And the story, I didn’t know I didn’t know what I can’t, I can’t share. There’s some stories from like our Christmas parties. I was going to share that. I was like, share those stories.
Right. And then there was Mike celebrating that one time in the office when he decided to like there’s a few other fish story which probably shouldn’t share that one either. I don’t know. So we’ll both don’t share the time where you eat the fish.
Go back to I’ll go back to the an investor story. We were renovating students had moved out it was time for them to move out. They moved out of a property we’re renovating the basement we’re going to kind of redo it. So we went in and this one guy left so much of his stuff there. I couldn’t believe how much for stuff that he left there. Like whatever. Let’s go get the basements. We got everything. We threw it all out in the dumpster. We fill up the dumpster came like the next day or something. This guy emails I guess a couple days later, he went back to the house. The basement was gutted. He’s like hey, we’re back for all my stuff. I was like oh sorry man. We threw it all out and he had some signed Oilers jersey f2 was signed by he said I don’t care what there’s my stuff can I just send my jersey back I’m like sorry man. It’s like in the dumpster and is gone. We’re only fans so
so we literally threw it I’ve kind of fell back to the student staying in Hamilton I didn’t know but we gave him a heads up proper notice all that stuff. And he never told us that he was like leaving and stuff. So we just we throw it all his stuff. We just chucked it all so I kind of feel bad for the guy. That’s the water version of the story I’m going to share cool Andrew Paul he this the
dumpster was yet Enoch when the dumpster and
the dumpster was gone. We got someone to already replace it. So it was long gone. You know, all these stuff was gone. It was literally thousands of dollars worth of stuff. And you know a student when you’re a student man, that stuff is like that’s
a Nick and I are usually about getting things done. So it’s like, Hey, you left all the crap, especially Nick. He’s like, we got the box there. We’re dumping everything out. It’s gone. Right? doesn’t take long. But we didn’t know he didn’t have an email. We just I just assumed that he because students often leave stuff in the thing. I’m like, this guy just left way more than usual. Right? So Andrew probably does.
All right. I can’t repeat anybody stuff now know, my like unreal estate is going to be that. It’s not just the money like JP said, but it’s the fact that the equity builds and you can’t touch it. So it’s almost like you can’t spend your money even if you wanted to. And you just constantly have this equity building in the mortgage is being paid down, the appreciations happening. And then when you need it, you can refinance. So I like that about investing that any moment you can tap into the equity in any one of your properties. Similar to what Sandra just said she did and pull that equity out and buy more properties. So I like that that you can’t spend it dislikes nothing. I like everything I even like like Andrew enjoys the pain evictions and landlord tenant board. I don’t know I just love it. I always have. It’s amusing to me.
You have an eviction call Andrew.
It’s pretty entertaining to me. Have you
actually investors that we’ve worked with I’m sure everyone’s got one or two if they know that like they could just start eviction services and they’d be amazing.
Yes, I honestly there’s love everything.
And then the story I was going to do the exact same story Mike stole from me. So I had about two minutes here to think of a new one so I actually going to steal one of Mike’s stories. When we were out looking for properties for myself Mike was my coach. And for whatever reason the listing agent was at this property and I came over as a triplex or something like that Mike’s got a nervous look on his face. He doesn’t remember then this lady goes into the house because there’s dogs there. So she for whatever reason these dogs chase her into like a back room or a bathroom or something like that. And so she calls or texts Mike say she’s stuck in the house. These dogs are like barking going crazy. Mike’s like close close.
And we’re going up the stairs to the triplex some guys were darting down the stairs. Oh, yeah, like don’t go inside. There’s a lady trapped in there.
Yes, you’re right, actually a
lady showing that house she was trapped in the washroom and there’s two very large medium sized dogs that are freaking out inside the house and this lady can’t escape.
Yeah, so Mike is like I know dogs. And he’s I don’t even know he’s just like like musher he are so he starts yelling he goes and grabs a chair or something like that. You have a chair I went in.
As soon as I was like a lion tamer was a cereal box on the counter and the dogs had me cornered. So I reached into my hand I grabbed the cereal, I think were you filming?
Or I think at the time I don’t know where the where the sledge is now the door I
was just record I was in there by myself. I remember that. reached into the cereal box, I grabbed the cereal and I threw it on the floor. The dogs looked down at the cereal and looked right back up at me. This is not going well. So then I reached for something that was close by with some kind of big statue or something and I Lord the dogs down a narrow Hall and I only got as far as being able to get the woman out because we went down the hall. She now I was beyond the bathroom door where I told her Get Out Run she ran. But now the dogs are getting really really vicious. And it was because I had them back to the owners master bedroom. So they’re just trying no owner was there but they’re protecting their owner. And then
so he So Mike comes out comes out with this cherry or summer stature, whatever’s in his hand like a lion tamer, just yelling at these Yeah, ER down or some, like bush or I don’t even know what you yell at a dog but and so it was pretty I was recording it at the time. Actually, that was like even like that was long time. It was like blackberry phones. But whatever, one megapixel camera, it was all I just had my hand in the door, record it. And then So Mike came out save this lady’s life, probably she may have died of starvation in there. So
cool. Cool. Okay, so I’ll go next. So a positive is, I think that the the success rate of small businesses in Canada, you know, you always hear those stats, like small businesses fail like 90 some odd percent, I consider real estate income properties as small businesses in a box. And the success rate of it is almost guaranteed to Mike to your point to the investor who was really nervous speaking with people, but then he goes on to build multiple millions of dollars in equity, I feel like it’s the best little Plan B side business you can have, because it almost guarantee success. You buy the thing, you put some tenants in it, you deal with the crap, you hold on to it for longer than five, even 10 years, and you’re going to win. So I love that about real estate, the negative on it, I feel like it’s a mirror to your character. And what I mean by that is when something goes wrong with a property, and you don’t feel like dealing with it, it’s it’s to me, Nick, and I’ve always had this thing we’re like, you know, the attendants complaining about something, and I don’t want to deal with it, he doesn’t want to deal with it. And when when that happens, we know we have to deal with it, because it’s something we’re scared to deal with. So we know one of us has to then step up and deal with it to overcome that fear of dealing with a parent, if it’s a student rental, dealing with a flood in the basement if we just don’t have the time to deal with the contractors. So it’s kind of like a mirror on us and the state of where we are. And not just from our own properties, but also dealing with investors. Because when you deal with investors, and you tell them, hey, you’re going to get this rental property, and you’re going to get this much in rent. And then if you don’t get that much in rent, I’m going to come to the property and I’m going to help you find a tenant. And when you get those phone calls with a tenant struggling investor struggling on a property, and you’ve told them you’re they’re going to achieve something, and now you have to live up to your word. I feel like that’s a really special moment, because that’s another time where it’s like, I don’t want to deal with something. But I told them this was going to happen, and they’re not able to achieve it. So now I have to go to the property and make it happen. And I feel like that’s just another moment where it’s like a mirror on myself. And it’s an an opportunity for me to grow. And then the story that I’ll that I’ll share is right when Nick and I started, we we both quit our jobs. And you know, at that time, we didn’t have any that many investors that we were dealing with. And we had this one investor from British Columbia call and say, hey, I want to buy I heard Hamilton’s really good. I want to buy a property in Hamilton. We’re like, absolutely, you know, Hamilton’s a great area, we sell this guy a property, and he’s like, how much am I going to get and rent? And I told him the amount He’s like, Well, you know what, I’m gonna have to go higher because I’m doing like zero money down. Like he was borrowing money. There was interest on the money he was borrowing. He was buying this property. So he had to get like higher than we normally get on this particular property. And I’m like, you know what, you’ll get it. And we sell this guy this property. And I committed to find finding the tenant, and we sell this guy’s property. It closes in the middle of winter. It’s a snowstorm the first day we’re showing it and he’s on me. He’s like, Hey, we have to close. We have to find a tenant. I have no money to carry this property. You got to find a tenant, like right away. And I’m like, why did I commit to this? But it’s a snowstorm. We have all the leads lined up. And everybody starts calling saying, Are you guys going to be there? Because it’s a snowstorm. And we’re like, yep, we’re going to be there and we drove from Oakville to Hamilton in like a death defying snowstorm. And we get there and there are tenants lined up in their cars on the street and the street has so much snow it’s like single file. So we’re kind of fighting through there. We get there. I get out of the car and the snow in front of this house, Nick, I don’t know how like how deep was that snow? I feel like it was a foot and a half. It was the it was it was a long story. It was really deep and Nicholas at the house and it was so deep at some parts because we’re snowdrifts that you couldn’t even walk to the front door. And Nick looks at this thing. And he’s a he just has if you ever seen the kid series, he just gets this look is not a problem. And we pumped a pop the trunk and he starts shoveling like a human snowblower. And I just look over to the side and there’s snow like flying like 10 feet in the air and he’s carving like a path to the door. And the tenants are like, Oh my gosh, this is great. I we didn’t think we would be able to make it to the front door we can see the property and right then I checked my pockets. And I realized I forgot the keys. So we drove all I made this commitment to this guy that we were going to fill this property we drive in a snowstorm to Hamilton Nick is human snowblower tenants have driven through the snow to see this property. They’re all excited. And we can’t even we didn’t even we weren’t even able to be able to break into that one or anything. No, he took people up. Some people came back as he took them up to the front and started we Use a flashlight to start looking through the couple of the Windows computer trying to show it looks nice. I swear it’s nice in there. Look at the size of the family room. It’s early. Anyway, so we drove home and I felt like an epic failure. I thought I quit my job and they quit his job. I can’t even remember to bring the keys to a property that I’m filling for somebody from British Columbia, who’s depending on me. I really thought everything was going to come crashing right here on the way home. What kind of brother are you? Yeah, he’s your the older brothers, we respond to what is this? I think it was so bad that you would normally do do that to me. But in this case, I think you thought you felt actually badly for me. But so we drove home. We didn’t feel it that day. But a week later, we went back, we had multiple people there, we filled the property, we got the number that I never thought we were going to get. And it was it was good to go. So for some reason that stands out. And the other thing that stands out is working with everybody here, I think Nick and I feel so grateful to have cross paths all in different ways, with everyone here and their own different way. And to work with this many investors together over this year, it’s been 12 years now. I mean, just the the stuff that we’ve all been able to do as a group, we all know investors here who have made money and used it for their family in different ways. Whether it’s to adopt children, help their family out in a financial situation, live their own dreams, buy a vacation property. So whatever it is, I mean, the impact, as cheesy as it sounds that we’re all having that gives me personally purpose. And in doing that all together with you guys. And with my little brother. I mean, it really makes it all it really makes it all worth it. So stronger,
smarter. There’s not many little brothers that can like significantly, you know, are much stronger than their older brother. So I got I’ll take that.
I think when you’re the older brother, you’re automatically stronger. Like it doesn’t matter, you know, who can lift more weight to the gym, you’re just automatically stronger by default. But, but that’s it. Thanks, everyone, everyone. So hopefully you enjoyed that. And listen, if you listen to that, and you want some more real estate information, you can go to with what started all of this is with a free copy of our book income for life for Canadians, you can go to www dot Rockstar inner circle.com forward slash books to get that so that’s www dot Rockstar inner circle calm forward slash books. To get a free copy of that book, you can actually buy that book on Amazon we give copies away for free. We actually have four books available now for free off that URL. income for life for Canadians is where most real estate investors who we work with have started with that particular book. So if you want some more real estate investing information, that would be a great place to start also on that website or different reports that we have and different access to classes that you can book to come out and check us out and get to meet us and talk and talk real estate. get your questions answered. So it’s all there at Rockstar inner circle.com. And if you want a copy of the book, you can go to Rockstar inner circle calm for slash books. With that, until next time, your life your terms