The Truth About Real Estate Investing... For Canadians

Every morning the first content I consume is business or self development books. I’m loving the app Blinkist right now (thank you @tashamonaghan71 for the recommedation). Super cheap and summarizes much of the greatest books in history. The screen capture is Eat That Frog by one of my favourites @thebriantracy. Pretty much the perfect book to start the day. I just downloaded “How to Win Friends and Influence People” by Dale Carnegie as it’s been a while since I last read it and the book keeps coming up in my coaching of other investors and coaches on my team.  The lessons from this book have enabled me to attract mentors, be a better leader to clients and employees, build relationships with contractors and celebrities in our industry. Getting guests on this podcast to deliver you all the best information is no cake walk either as everyone’s time is precious.  Many guests need some coaxing and cajoling as we have no budget to offer speaking fees LOL. Speaking of budgets and celebrities, if I were to hire a gue

Ben is among the best natural sales people I’ve met. Sales may sound like a yucky skill or profession but to steal a joke from the legend Brian Tracy, the oldest profession is not what you think it is but rather it is a form of Sales :) Ben will share his lessons from starting out to where he is today.  Ben started out as a new agent like anyone else but he earned $400,000 in commissions in his first year and not long after that $800,000. Ben shares how he started off working for free to build a name for himself and how he today is always looking to blow people's’ minds so they send him referral business.  Plus his lessons on mindset for his team for them to break through their own perceived barriers. I even took some of Ben’s advice and the next day we were able to help out a friend in serious need due to a nasty divorce.  That’s actually a good lesson if you want to be a good mentee, let the mentor know which I did and it made Ben’s day. The mentor will then know you take action and continue to mentor. Ben

Thanksgiving Hamilton Basket Brigade Edition Complete!! 40 underprivileged families have a lot more warm clothing, winter boots, toys, games, food. As the President I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who made this happen.  Our board of governors, our donors and volunteers. The Hamilton elementary public and catholic school boards for your support.  They are the ones who identify for us which families need the most help and allow us to be proactive vs. reactive. For Thanksgiving we changed up our format to deliver more quality instead of quantity by spending the same budget we do for 300 families for a Thanksgiving dinner to 40 of the most impoverished families in Hamilton.  We asked the school boards for their worst and they definitely delivered. We have lots of single mom families, a single dad family who just moved to a trailer park after the loss of mom to cancer, a single mom who just sold the family car to make rent. This time we asked the parents what they wanted and they asked for

You as the CEO of your life and business.  If you were to take a third person view, say you’re the chairman and have a look at the CEO you have employed to run your life and business.  Would you want them to have high energy and eat a healthy diet or would you want someone sluggish who considered french fries a vegetable? In masterminding with many entrepreneurs, health and weight are concerns for many as they should be.  Much of your health and weight depend on your inputs meaning what you eat and here to help us all with what the heck should we be eating is my performance Dr, Dr Callum Cowan.  If you follow him on Instagram (@phenom_doc), you’ll notice his patients include many elite athletes whether Canadian Olympians, to NHL’ers such as local Hamilton boy and defenceman for the Nashville Predators, Ryan Ellis to UFC Champion Max Holloway. Dr Cowan answers my millions of questions on what to eat vs. not to eat: e.g. coffee, chocolate, a glass of wine a day, most science backed optimum diet, the fastest pat

Hello Investors!!! What a great weekend of weather!!! The weather man has been way off, it’s been way hotter than forecast these last few days and of course we spent Saturday morning indoors at our Halton Real Estate Investors group meeting talking about ecommerce businesses with Greg Kowalcyk and Brian Zammit.  It was great to see so many investors taking interest in becoming more entrepreneurial with side hustle because we all know having a single source of income from a job is not the fastest path to financial freedom. I’ve actually had a number of clients who recently lost their employment and are now going full steam into eCommerce and real estate so I wish them all luck! We have a big announcement, have you heard of that other real estate podcast out there called the Breakthrough REI Podcast with Rob Break? It happens to be among the top rated real estate investing and possibly the most downloaded podcast on the subject. I know, I haven’t heard of them either…. To tell you the truth when I started podca

Hello investor! I hope you all had as great a weekend as I did!!! My Friday and Saturday were spent with my wife Cherry and friend James Maggs at the Archangel Summit: a business and self development conference and it was excellent!! I’m fired up to do more, be more, help more!!  I will summarize my notes and present them to you all at a later time. Happy birthday to my mom, the lovely woman who gave me life. A blessed life that I lead where I can take my mom to lunch on a Monday afternoon in a near empty restaurant as if it were a private, chefs table, just mom and I.   We had a great meal but more importantly I had time to reconnect with mom about what it was like coming to Canada.   My dad’s brother was the first to immigrate who then brought my dad to Saskatoon. Thank the powers that be he soon decided to move to Toronto as he found Saskatoon to be too cold.  My mom followed on a student visa a few months later at the age of 19. For my fellow Canadians, imagine uprooting your life from a tropical climate

First Day of School Today I’m a bag of mixed emotions. My daughter is off to her first day of school, as in no more daycare (saving $500/month in daycare fees is a big win! Like gaining cash flowing property!! HAHA) , she’s going to a real school, junior kindergarten to be specific. I was choked up watching her get on the school bus for the 2.1 km commute. Cherry, my wife told me I’m silly and I am. Here is how just one example of how nuts I am. I’m reading Wonder Woman comic to my daughter (I’ve purchased many childrens’ books showcasing strong female characters where a female is the main protagonist) and we come to the last page of her book and here it is below. I read the page quickly as I’m getting choked up.  Too often I’m looking for lessons in meaning in all aspects of life.  This time I’m reading the story from a parents’ perspective, instead of “I would use all my training with the Amazons to make the world a better place.” As it is written, I rephrased the words and turned it around to my perspectiv

Life is too short to not have more fun, more often. I was thinking this after a night out on Friday with a bunch of buddies who all happen to be real estate investors, to celebrate a friend’s birthday doing axe throwing, indulging in an adult beverage or ten, gambling, clubbing, and more gambling. Then on the following Tuesday, I was reminded how short life is as I was driving home from my colonoscopy appointment.  My family doctor requested the procedure because we lost my uncle at 51 to colon Cancer and the emotional toll it cause.  My cousin was ten when he lost his father, he’s a good man now having turned 18 and is apprenticing as a car mechanic at Honda. But I’ll never forget the image of my cousin after the coffin was in the ground and buried how he ran back to place his hand on the mound of dirt to say one final goodbye. My friends, life is short, go have more fun, stay away from negative people, make lots of money while you’re young so you can enjoy it. Last week I made the decision that on my 45th b

The bearish Ryan Carr is back on the show to share about his latest investment, a 250 square foot house.  That’s right, 250 sq feet. That may just be smaller than many of your master bedrooms in your homes. Sadly that is the reality of today’s housing market. On a recent vacancy of mine that we just filled last night to four lovely young adults, vacancy is too low and rents are unaffordable to many unless folks are willing to share. The young adult tenants we signed were willing to do just that.  The applicants we didn’t get were often couples who could not afford the rent, to them I would highly recommend to find some friends and share a house together.  Four adults making a total of 8,000/month can afford a lot more places than just two adults making $4,000/month.   Anyways, Ryan is becoming a regular guest of ours, he invests in the far east areas, east of Toronto, the markets he invests in including Oshawa are behaving differently than what we are seeing in the west so it’s great to hear his perspective o

Oh the lengths we will go for our kids….   On Sunday, my wife Cherry planned a half day event for us to ride Thomas the Train.  No idea what I’m talking about? That’s ok. He’s a crazy popular cartoon character who is a train and for $25, you can ride in the train that he pulls.   The price is fine, it’s the distance, 122 kilometres from home in Uxbridge, ON that was my biggest problem but fine, we did it, me driving without my license as I brilliantly left my wallet at home

Happy August Everyone and happy birthday to my Wonder Woman who has her own business, does Crossfit 3x/week, mom to our beautiful kids, runs our household and the most difficult part, taking care of me. Happy 6th birthday!! No really, the kids buy it she's six years old…   To celebrate Cherry’s bday like anyone when they turn 18 is to go to Niagara Falls this past Friday.  To start, joined by fellow real estate entrepreneur Charles Wah, we took a relaxing cruise down the Niagara river in a Whirlpool Jet Boat, seated in the front row no less.   After that, we pigged out at the Sheraton’s fall view, all you can eat buffet, walked around Clifton Hill to burn off the calories then a stop at Casino Niagara’s black jack tables where Cherry sat down with $100 and walked away with $150!!! Yay!! We didn’t lose

Summer is in full swing now that we’ve had our July Halton REI meeting and taking the month of August off but don’t worry, there will be a tour mid August for investment opportunities in St. Catharines.   This past Saturday, our Street Smart Tour brought us to a city truly open for business in Brantford, Ontario with my team, the Team Titans and our friend Paisley Mackenzie, former Economic Development Office of Brantford.  Paisley has nearly 30 years experience working around investments and Brantford so it was a special treat to have her along.   Brantford is an underrated market as many regular Brantford investors know who are enjoying the returns in a market that is flying under the radar.  Brantford is situated between Hamilton and Cambridge, Ontario and there are not many hotter markets than these two for those who care about the ripple affect.  Also what many do not know is how good the Planning Department is, they are actually consistent in following Ontario Building Code and sadly, not all cities can

The young and brilliant Ryan Carr is back to share his current project where he is turning his poorly performing property into a winner but adding an 850 square foot coach house in the backyard of an existing property and rent for 1,500-1,600/month plus utilities.   If you haven’t heard Ryan’s previous interview, go back to the episode titled ‘How a Mechanic Invested in 20 Properties in Two Years’ or google truth about real estate investing dot ca ryan carr to find it.   Ryan updates us on his ultra conservative investment strategy while acquiring 1-2 properties per month and his current lifestyle as a tenant.  Quick refresher, if you believe the market will decline, sell your home and rent, deploy your capital else where for higher returns.  Ryan is putting his money where his mouth is.

Susan is a veteran investor who started in 2006, the perfect time right before the Financial/credit crisis of 07/08.  She’s done flips, legal basement suites, 30-40 rent to owns, student rentals and currently holds over 30 properties.   We talk about raising capital and credit from investment partners for joint venturing, her forecast and equity splits for investment partners, her strategy for the “infinity house” as in infinite returns, favourites books she recommends, how she develops talent so she may delegate and limit her active work to only 15 hours a week.   You will want to have a listen to how she does what we all want, more money, limited investment of time so she may spend more time raising her family.   youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHh7SUOjTdwdnr6DUZEQshg   website: http://www.libertypropertysolutions.ca/about/      

What can I say about Jay, he had it all, successful investments, business, a growing family till tragedy struck and took the mother of his three young children.  Thanks to his real estate, his portfolio was able to support Jay and his kids while on leave for three years to mourn and care for the kids.   We go deep into what happened, how it affected the kids, how Jay got through it now four years later, lessons learned, what Jay would have done differently for his wife and Jay’s three sources of passive income that allow him to be a full time dad, yet still living in one of Canada’s most affluent cities.   This is part one of a two part series of the most difficult interview I have done. If you’re a parent or ever plan on being one, have a listen.  

Can You Get Rich Working for a Start Up? With Tony La   This week’s guest is Tony La, Chief Technical Officer of start up Honk Mobile. Haven’t heard of them? That’s ok because you will.  They take mobile payment for parking and they just signed Pearson International Airport in Toronto.  With Honk Mobile you can pay or parking and re feed the meter all from your phone so you don’t need to have change and you don’t need to run back to the meter to pay for more parking if the meter is running out.   The business and founder is so hot, they were featured on Dragon’s Den and four of the five Dragons made the owner offers: http://www.cbc.ca/dragonsden/pitches/honkmobile   As you can tell from my recent line of questioning for guests of our show is how can we make money? Preferably passively, reliably, predictably, securely, insurably. I know I made that last one up but you know where I’m going.  What’s the best way to get rich hence we needed a guest on the show to talk to start ups that have the potential to be th

This was me (Erwin Szeto) being interviewed as the guest on the Your Life - Your Terms Podcast by Tom and Nick Karadza.  Credit to them for the recording, title and show description:   On this episode, Erwin Szeto shares his real estate journey and how he ultimately walked away from his corporate job to work with real estate and investors on a full-time basis. Over the past eight years, together with his growing team, he’s helped hundreds of investors create cash flow, build equity and navigate the tricky business of real estate. Erwin shares how he bought a home with a wooden foundation, how entrepreneurs and investors are risk-averse, why giving back matters and how he calculated quitting his job was the right thing to do!

How to Claim Thousands of Dollars of in Home Energy Rebates with Nick Crosby   “I wish I knew you before I did my renovations” is what ever tells Nick “the Rebate Guy” Crosby upon meeting him.   It is exactly what I said because for years, I have not been able to locate a home energy auditor since many of the last set of rebate programs went away and the majority where only for your principle residence and NOT rental properties.   No more!!  Friend of the show and our client Kaush Nanubhai recommend Nick to us after he hired Nick to inspect his property and Kaush is netting a cool thousand dollars in rebates for renovation work he was planning on doing anyways.   I personally could have netted several thousand for my AC and window replacements in the last two years but I’ll be having Nick inspect for sure before I have my ancient, mid efficiency furnace replace.   Show Notes: The gas program links, depending on where you live, are below... https://www.uniongas.com/homereno OR Home Energy Conservation - Enbrid

John Roumanis is back again and upon his insistence we opened a 2009 Italian bottle of Chianti (I can’t help but think of Hannibal Lector’s line how he ate liver and kidney beans with a nice Chianti…) and chatted about real estate, mindset for success, challenges and successes, stock investing and so much more.  I know it’s a long episode and but do listen to the end to hear what motivates John. It wasn’t what I expected.   John is my friend and client, he holds a CPA, MBA, and he’s a part time instructor at Sheridan College to round out his busy life as an executive at a major coffee company and new father.   To follow or contact John: on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/john_roumanis/ on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnroumanis/

My friend and Marketing guy John Cerpnjak just entered the housing market, a new construction apartment condo on the west side of downtown Toronto.   John is a hard working millennial who works from home for the most part helping small businesses with their online, direct Marketing.  Much of the work is contract based and from home, a trend that is becoming more and more popular, and no different than many millennials, they rent and want to enter the real estate market as an owner.  Who can blame them, pay rent forever or join the middle class buy owning property.   John was expecting to pay rent for the majority of his 30’s but something happened allowing him to afford a downpayment on a property and the following is his story.   As a socialist, I want to see more affordable housing but that’s just not happening considering the sellers’ market I continue to see at the starter home category and rents in major markets continue to climb.  It is a sad reality in which we live and something I want to see my kids