The Truth About Real Estate Investing... For Canadians

This week we are talking to Steve Kulakowsky, co-owner of Core Urban Inc. where him and partner Dave have renovated and converted an 26 unit apartment building into condos, turned a former school into 36 condos, and transformed a few other dated and rough buildings into attractive, interesting places for people to call home in and around downtown Hamilton.  Steve’s story in his rise to fame and success contains many lessons for new and old investors hence I’m really excited to share his story with you. Do make sure to check out Steve’s portfolio on his website at www.coreurban.ca/projects/ as words do not do justice to what Steve means by “interesting places” Check out this article as well on Why restaurant veterans are ditching Toronto for Hamilton. The article mentions several restaurants located in Steve’s buildings on King William in downtown Hamilton.  The article says a lot about why people from all walks of life are moving to Hamilton. Quoting the article, describing Toronto "$25-a-day parking, brutal

This week, we have a very special guest in Tom Karadza (https://twitter.com/tomkaradza), co-founder and co-owner on Rock Star Real Estate, a two time Profit 500 company, which makes Rock Star one of the 500 fastest growing companies in Canada.  Rock Star manages a membership of over 800 investors called the Rock Star Inner and you can learn more about it on their website www.rockstarinnercircle.com. Even though rock star members invest in every real estate strategy imaginable, they are best known for rent to own having members transacted on 1,800 – 2,000 rent to owns to date. If anyone out there has done more in Canada, kindly let me know because I don’t think any other group or company comes close. During this interview we talk about the day Tom was yelled at in front of his co-workers for missing a sales target which was the catalyst for Tom to change paths and begin his and brother Nick’s journey to starting Rock Star Real Estate. We talk about the investment of Tom’s money, time, but more importantly, the

Charles Wah was born and raised in Hamilton where he invests in many forms of real estate, from rent to own, long term hold, a commercial building and for the topic of today’s discussion, land development where they have two proposed developments for a total of 150 townhouses.  Charles is a full time entrepreneur and co-founder of the Gateway Group, his real estate and development company. Charles was a finalist for Canadian Real Estate Wealth Magazine’s newcomer of the year, he is a proud member of the Real Estate Investment Network, a Rock Star VIP member, Hamilton-Halton Builders’ Association, and Hamilton Chamber of Commerce.  Charles is always looking to connect with like-minded entrepreneurs to network and raise each other up. In his personal life, Charles is a sports fanatic, especially soccer, we’re actually attending Major League Soccer’s Eastern Conference Final tonight cheer on the Toronto Football Club and depending on when you’re listening to this, hopefully we won J.  So without further ado, I g

For this week’s episode we have Police Constable Jules Mckenzie, successful real estate entrepreneur in the Barrie/Orillia area of Ontario. Jules who has held an interest in 50 separate real estate properties and is the operations manager in over 12 joint venture partnerships  The truth about Jules’ rise to success as an investor is, back in 2001 he took some unsophisticated real estate investing courses not specific to Canada.  Jules was taught to call his creditors to extend lines of credit and apply for more credit card capacity to be used to financing down payments and renovations on run down rental properties.  Unfortunately, the strategy did not work out and Jules had accumulated over $140,000 in expensive credit card and line of credit debt. How did he climb out of this hole to become an ultra-successful investor?  Have a listen to this week’s episode titled, the Jules of Real Estate Investing.  Without further ado, I introduce to you, Jules Mckenzie.   If you would like to reach out to Jules, you can

Ruben Furtado brings a new perspective to real estate investing like no other.  With over 20 years experience in successful real estate investing, he has leverage his unique strategies to set new highs in sale prices and has helped many of his customers meet and exceed their real estate goals. Prior to becoming a Realtor, he bought and sold a large number of properties for himself and with clients. Check out Ruben’s Instagram account here: https://www.instagram.com/thefurtadogroup/ to see a few of his projects. Starting out as the child of Portuguese immigrants, from the age of 12, Ruben was able to identify quality investment properties and was hooked on real estate both for lifestyle and wealth creation.  Check out the home Ruben built for his family, Toronto Life article here: http://torontolife.com/real-estate/house-of-the-week-44-belvedere-drive/ and live, action video here: https://vimeo.com/44799732 When the house got too big for the family, Ruben masterfully sold the property when the other area expe

Quentin D’Souza (https://www.facebook.com/qdsouza) is a multiple award winning Real Estate Investor, and a trusted authority on investing in the Durham Region of Ontario.  He is an Ontario Certified Teacher and holds two university degrees, which includes a Master’s in Education.  His company, Appleridge Homes, uses the Buy, Fix, Refinance, and Rent strategy on long term rental properties from Pickering to Bowmanville, as well as joint venture partnerships to create win/win relationships.  Quentin is the author of “The Property Management Toolbox: A How-To Guide for Ontario Real Estate Investors and Landlords” and “The Ultimate Wealth Strategy: Your Complete Guide to Buying, Fixing, Refinancing, and Renting Real Estate.”  He is also the Chief Education Officer of the Durham Real Estate Investor Club and coaches up and coming real estate investors.   In this episode, we cover a ton: How Quentin doubled his income How he built his real estate investment portfolio The conversation he had with his family about

We were super excited when Don accepted our invitation to the show and we are even more excited after the interview!! I (Erwin) tried to be a good host and stay present but I couldn’t help but take tons of notes as Don was handing out gold (figuratively)!!  I’ll share them later in the show notes on our mrhamilton.ca website but we couldn’t wait any longer to release this episode because: ACRE / SOS is coming April 15-17th to Toronto, link: http://info.reincanada.com/real-estate-sos-toronto-2016 As a favour to me, Don and the Real Estate Investment Network (R.E.I.N.), the hosts of ACRE / SOS are providing my guests a very special price of $287 plus tax!! Discount code: MRHAMILTON (no spaces) to be entered upon check out.  Thank you Don and REIN! If you don’t know Don, he is the best-selling Canadian real estate author in history. But that is just the surface. He is also a veteran investor, a teacher, a Philanthropist & market analyst (and, if you’re friends with Don on Facebook https://www.facebook.

In this episode, we learn Julie’s lessons on starting with just $16,000 in 2001 to becoming a real estate millionaire and, more importantly, to living a comfortable, relaxed lifestyle. Real estate investing is not all roses and Julie shares her stories from the trenches, including investing in what became a crack house. Julie talks to the importance of building a brand and shares stories of success.  As someone who’s worked hard to build a brand myself, I can personally attest to the importance of having an established brand in order to attract investors. We also dig into fitness regimes, books, and habits that allow Julie to stay at the top of her game. Just this morning I borrowed Julie’s morning ritual of drinking a glass of water with a “greens” powder followed by a second glass of water and I felt terrific afterwards! If you want to be elite, then adopt the same habits as the elite – it’s that simple… and here is our show!!