**Transcripts are auto-generated.

Erwin  

Welcome to the truth about real estate investing show for Canadians, My name is Erwin Szeto, host of the number 81 ranked podcast for iTunes, president of the trustor charity, the Hamilton Basket Brigade, four time realtor of the year to investors. And among our masterminds, we have 45 Self, maybe off the millionaires. I spent all this time sharing all this, not because like to brag, but quite honestly, there’s a lot of coaches out there love do recent real estate influencers, some of them are going bankrupt and taking their clients with them. So I’m just here to share what we’re up to. And we are very grateful for the trust of our clients that they’ve placed in us. And we’re overjoyed with the results that boring systematic cash flowing real estate has provided, I was just reading an article about a gentleman, a lawyer who purchased two preconstruction houses for close to $2.5 million each. And they are at risk of losing their $100,000 in deposits, because those properties will not appraise and that the mortgages will be higher than what the properties are worth. So it’s unfortunate what some people are doing out there for real estate investing. I honestly do not know what Java does decisions. I do believe that pre construction speculators, speculators in general flippers and Burr investors, they will continue to leave the headlines for 2023 in terms of where the pain is. And that honestly means that’s where the opportunity is from me as well. Continue to hear rumblings among our lawyer market, legal market lawyer market, our lawyer friends, a local lawyer friends are telling us that they are seeing more and more power sales crossing their deaths. So I don’t think it’ll be huge amount, we’ll see. We’ll see. We’ll see how many there will be. I don’t think there’ll be a massive amount, though, that will flood the market and cause any sort of significant correction. If anything, we’re seeing a lot of buying activity, we’re seeing the last two weeks or so we’ve been very busy actually, including selling off the majority of our listings. So our listings, which are primarily entry level real estate, they were sitting at some of them were sitting and now they’re gone, sold as sellers are coming to terms with the market values are and buyers are adjusted to the current interest rate environment. So we’ll see who was right at the end. Whether or not these optimistic buyers are right, but just look to know the market is active for entry level real estate. Speaking of entry level real estate, especially ones that generate income, positive cash flow income, say the date the morning up Saturday, February 25. In Hamilton, we are going to be on the streets in Hamilton. We’re bringing our poli sci view investors who are listening on to this we’re going to learn on the streets in Hamilton in properties that my clients own, that they are currently doing burrs or flip Sue, where they aren’t converting houses mainly, specifically the basements into the old basement apartments. If you’re already on my newsletter, then you’re still see the registration is available. www dot truth about real estate investing.ca is where you can go to enter your name and email address if you don’t already get if you’re not already on my email list. Our newsletter goes out to over 10,000 Hardworking comedians, so maybe it’s a good idea that you join them as well. And maybe even one day join my Hall of Fame. Millionaire self made real estate millionaire clients. Also thanks everyone who attended our sold out in person only island meeting last this past weekend, we raised over $1,000 for those are on the proceeds for our personal meetings, we raised over $1,000 and selling tickets for that meeting. And those funds will be used to buy warm winter clothing and boots at this tenant will sell prices for underprivileged children in Hamilton. Needless to say, the idea of children going cold in the winter. Wearing cold soaked shoes with holes leaving toes exposed to the elements is just a sad thought. Hence we here at the Hamilton bash brigade are doing something about it. If anyone would like to help, honestly the best thing to do is other than making a donation is to refer people you care about to charity and ice businesses. The more people we can help become rich, the more donations and the more generous donors we help and donations come back to business. Does everyone see the baby calves latest raise tertiary increase of 25 basis points. So that’s 0.25% increase to a total of now 4.5%. And tip Macklin also promised continued quantitative tightening as in there’s gonna be less money in the system and a plan to conditionally hold rates there to see where inflation in the economy goes. Our central bank is the first major bank to say it would pause rates. The Bank of Canada forecast the economy will stall in the first half of this year does not foresee a significant recession. and inflation is expected to be about 3% By the middle of the year. I have any thoughts for you many thoughts about this subject? That’s the lawyer who bought the two properties in Ottawa pre construction homes for almost $2.5 million each. It’s the same people I do. Funny enough. Yeah. Why didn’t the government so fast forward? Why didn’t the government baby Canada control their spending of debt level in the early pandemic? I think it’s an excellent question for our leadership, especially after our former Finance Minister Bill Morneau his book, which came out in January 17. It details how the Ministry of Finance would make recommendations. That’s our job. You know, the Ministry of Finance, which was supposedly about finances. Bill says there are fiscally responsible recommendations to target those specifically those who are losing their jobs due to the pandemic, only for the Prime Minister to ignore said recommendations in creating greater Oh, his own decisions to spend more, make more people happy, which would get into and get more attention from the media, or great optics, great politics in the short term, terrible fiscal policy and hindsight and also as we into the medium and long term. As we the taxpayers will forever be burdened. Bail is at a debt. Only see small businesses like gyms and restaurants only now fail now. due to inflation, recession, lack of labour, all of this can be dealt the pandemic with technology terrible, without all of us tax payers being on the hook for it. Plus, when we’re going through economic pain mail, all this inflation added debt to only delay the recession about three years, all this debt and money in the system inflation to delay a recession three years wasn’t worth it. In hindsight, hindsight, so it’s been 2020. That I don’t think so. These government decisions are well done, I pay grade. So we investor entrepreneurs must just roll with the punches and play the hand that were built. I know what I’m doing. I know that sounds cliche. But if you tune in into any representations of the wealth hacker conference at Cherry’s client, we webinar or our past, I have a meeting that was done in person meet, contain which we then you know, where we think this is all going. And honestly, I haven’t seen more green lights in a long, long time. Pretty nice to tell me that should be buying long term Bible cashflow and investment properties. So if you’re interested in learning more about these opportunities, and how to cash flow real estate, make sure you’re on the Nelson tour. And also we will be offering an offshore tour in in March as well. We will be turning quality income properties from what we’re seeing does look like we’re past the bottom in terms of the properties that we target for investment purposes in the startup market. And our clients stand to benefit the most from this market. Again, if you’re not already already on newsletter, www dot truth about real estate investing.ca Get on our email newsletter, enter your name and email right. I’ll see you at one of our events. onto this week’s show. We have an author coach, mentor, mom, wife, and investors since only 2017 has done a lot while keeping her day job. Keeping those kids and keeping her husband happy. English isn’t even brushings first language she moved to Canada from Taiwan at the age of 17. Brooke has done a lot in her career. She’s had lows, she’s openly shares that she lost $50,000 on a joint venture in Winnipeg with a non bank partner who drove a Porsche. to Now she’s done nearly 33 Zero rental property deals, she owns a bunch of duplexes and she’s now focusing more on private lending and building her custom home custom dream home. Thanks to paid for by the profits from tenants buying out rents owns and also selling other income property is a leader within the trustor talent Academy. Like pass tests, Tim sigh in bits Lee Brooke story is a good one, how much one can accomplish very much in a short period of time, while keeping their day job and how its goals change over time. For example, Brookings hustled very hard beginning, but now she’s more focusing towards more passive investments and more equity growth. All of it works. Wonders must decide for themselves what journey they’re on. Please enjoy the show. Everquest keeping you busy these days,

Brooke  

lots of things lately, building my own home, taking care of the kids still work. A lot of them Busman still going and coaching and mentoring as well. A lot of public speaking lately. I think it’s because probably since the pandemic, there’s a lot of zoom meetings, and we have a lot of time at home. So started to get trained on speaking communication, that kind of thing. That’s actually what I’m focusing on personally in terms of learning. Yeah, what is your personal goal every year this year for me is communication. That’s the only goal. No, that’s a personal goal. That’s a personal goal. And like I mentioned, I told you I was building my own home. So another financial goal, of course to build up my portfolio again. I actually sold a few properties so I can take all the bucket of gold to build my home in Midtown Toronto,

Erwin  

okay,

Brooke  

let’s have a full you got to note.

Erwin  

How many houses do you think you’ve sold in order to finance your finance fund your custom build

Brooke  

my custom builds, there’s quite a few rentals closing my own. It’s basically almost one or two every month last year. I actually didn’t tally up. I know our tax will be high last year, even though our castle was significantly reduced. And my physical year for my company is what June? I know this year, we’ll have to Yeah,

Erwin  

no, I love it. It is your point in the master journey where your your investments are paying for things that you want in your life. Yeah, right. Yeah. Can you tell us a bit about the custom home you’re building? Yeah,

Brooke  

I actually set that goal for four or five years now, when I started investing, and you know, the market kept going up, right? So at the time, we couldn’t even secure a property. And funny enough, we live in a very old part of Toronto. So at least I’d close to East York, a lot of the properties are old, built in the 1940s. Some are, they call it cat, so used to be a bungalow, a lot of them are still in Scarborough. So they kept it, they just build on top. When we did inspection, there was quite a few issues. So even when we finally secured a property, we always found something. And in the end, we finally decided let’s just rebuild something of our own. So we bought a really old house. Actually, the owner is she she was 90, we bought it almost two years ago. She was almost 90. So she was the original owner, she was closer 90 or 91, I think at that point, and she smoked her whole life. So the house was gross. The house was was coated and smoke grease on the wall. Yeah.

Erwin  

Oh, just for listeners benefit. Like for US veteran investors. That’s what that’s the stuff we buy. Stuff we bought, how many offers? Was it 13, still 30, you know, all the all ones tear down, then

Brooke  

they all wanted to tear down and you won. We won, I think because we’d live two blocks away. So before I put in an offer, I already talked to my neighbours. And I said, put in good words for me if you know this lady, and I wrote a letter to say, I know a few good friends on your street. Because we’re in the neighbourhood. We’re two blocks away, my friend’s friend, and then you’re part of the community, not just not something crazy, but little things help. And then we have the bank draft ready with our offer. When we put in the

Erwin  

was that aggressive? No, a lot of people do that. Yeah, we my experience, not a lot of people do not a lot of

Brooke  

people do that. So we actually put in six figure the word we thought, hey, if it didn’t go through, I’ll just put the money back. So yes, we were really aggressive. And as I was setting in the parking lot off the bank, my realtor said there were a lot of offers coming in. So we’re just sitting at that time, I think was like six or seven. And then the number just kept going up, which is sitting typing the letter saying I live in the neighbourhoods, I have good friends on your street, I’m pretty sure they would have given me the recommendation. So I just throw them out there saying I have friends there. If you request recommendations we would. So I think that’s what set us apart.

Erwin  

Right? Right. So sorry. You said your realtor was sitting at the property in their car waiting unless you were

Brooke  

looking up a ladder to say, Okay, I want to go with my offer.

Erwin  

That’s actually a really good point for anyone. Like, for example, this is what we did all the time, pre pandemic, when we were doing offer presentations in person. If you wanted to win, I always tell my client think of all the things you have to do to win. I be there, right? Because a lot of people will not. And also these agents who’ve learned recently how to be agents. Yeah, the email everything. No idea how to negotiate in person, let alone present an offer in person. This email they’re offering does just pray. Right. Yeah. That’s how they represent their client. Do you believe it?

Brooke  

Yeah. So I guess you would tell your realtor or yourself how Yeah, I wants to be done. Right.

Erwin  

Or I want to negotiate a face to face. You know, I I’ve trained for this. Yeah, I played a win. Exactly. Right. Yeah. I don’t just send offers into cyberspace.

Brooke  

Yeah, exactly. So same thing we put in a lot of offers. We actually were pretty lucky considering how we live in a community where there are a lot of kids, so a lot of families want to get in. So we were lucky that we actually got all the other properties under contract. Like I mentioned, however, after inspection, we found something and that’s investors. We actually call the city sometimes when people add an addition to the house that we found problems. Another sorry, something funny because

Erwin  

which is often something that’s always a common issue additions that were done without permits, like Yeah,

Brooke  

yeah. Or even when we walk in the house, we realise a part of the house was really cold. So they just basically put the slab and then build another room. And we actually call a city just to confirm then the city showed up at the house for quickly, and we were surprised because we were just inquiring. And usually you know how long it takes for the study to come when you need a permit. Interesting. Yeah. So, so we didn’t get into that deal. But even then we didn’t secure another property under contract to.

Erwin  

Okay, so what are you building? This is like a big hose? No, the

Brooke  

lot is only 30. In the front. Okay. Yeah. 3030, about 140. So it’s a long of deep, yeah, free. Yeah, we’ll still have to go through variants. Because an ECR, they’re pretty limited as to how much land you can build on.

Erwin  

Right. So you’re gonna tear down the house? Are you reusing the foundation? Anything? It’s completely new? It’s fresh. It’s completely fresh. Yeah. And then we’ll be building couple 1000 square feet

Brooke  

2600 And then plus basements. So it’s a huge, huge, it’s good for a family of four, or even occasionally entertaining. It’s pretty good.

Erwin  

Plus garden suite or anything? Absolutely. Could

Brooke  

I’ve seen laneway? In our neighbourhood? Yeah. Yeah.

Erwin  

Awesome. Love it. No, I love the fact that you’re paying for this through the proceeds from investments.

Brooke  

Yeah, that that’s not just it, because I think also, you know how to finance, right? Because if you don’t know how money works, I mean, we now live in a 1200 square foot. That’s how we got into the neighbourhood. So you’re, you were frugal, we were full gold. But at the time, we were so nervous when we bought that house. So thinking back, if I have to take on something that’s big, it’s just mentally, I don’t think we could have, if not have gone through all the mortgages for investment and knowing how money works and built up a little bit of equity. Yeah. From other properties.

Erwin  

So why did you start investing? Like you seemed really smart? I think you make a lot of money at your job. Why did you think you need to invest to

Brooke  

actually, our house was always my big why? Because we live in a 1200 square foot, I look at your exercise equipment. Now I work, I work at home, I don’t even have enough space to lay down. I have to push everything away, right? It’s things like that. And when I started investing, actually stayed at home with my kids for 10 years. And when I went back to work, we’re double income, and chariots koa dealing with that, we will realise we pay a lot of tax and we hardly save enough for RSP we did however, that’s not without hard work. And life. I don’t think our quality of life improved that much. Even though we were double income from a single income family. And I was already over 40 then so I thought if I don’t learn about this now, I would probably never do it or would have been pretty late. Yeah,

Erwin  

so like what was your first income property? What was your first education in real estate?

Brooke  

My after like we had the condo we used to live in and downtown However that’s not really investing because we just happen to be there happened to be in Toronto happened to have equity. The first investment I had was actually in Windsor. Income Property.

Erwin  

Okay, yeah. From downtown Toronto Windsor. Okay,

Brooke  

I never saw the property it was just somebody I took the class with. And we were both the new nobody wanted to invest in Windsor at the time. I remember we closed in January 2017. Okay, so beginning of 2017 That was my first Yeah,

Erwin  

so you just want a leap of faith with the with a fellow student

Brooke  

Yeah. However, this was exactly what we learned in class it was income property. So it was a three bedroom home easy to add another drywall no structure issues then it became a four bedroom and at the time Windsor properties were just above 100,000 at the time. So it really makes sense. And you can you can at least get 1200 of rent for example, so easily meet the 1% rule at the time and is the single family home. So that was my very first income property after I got educated. Yeah, that my second one was rental.

Erwin  

Sorry, the first winter property was a buy and hold

Brooke  

flipper. No, it was just a single family home straight rental,

Erwin  

straight rental so board

Brooke  

get a more credo right?

Erwin  

Because everyone’s goals are different, right? Because we were discussing before before we were recording I personally never did rent to owns because I’m just greedy. I want all the equity gains for myself. Right hindsight 2020 It was I was very right. But you know, the attractiveness of rent to own makes a lot of sense. Right tenant takes better care of the property higher cash flow, you get some income you get some money up front to help with the down payment and all that sort of things to you know, protect your your cash flows stay very positive on the cash flow side. A lot of it makes sense again.

Brooke  

Well, well I get that. Well, you said the goal because you know we had equity right in Toronto and you’re in Hamilton the surrounding area. So I want to see this really works. To me rental is interesting because it’s really creative. Not something I’ve heard of before. I started with real estate A education. So one thing is I want to test it out, make sure this worked. And I started working. So I want to see if the cashflow can really replace my working income

Erwin  

right here. Right? Yeah. And then how many rentals Do you think you’ve done since then?

Brooke  

I’ve slowed down. Because since 2017, that’s when I started. Probably 20 to 30. Not crazy numbers consistently. And I slowed down quite a bit. Yeah, I slowed down quite a bit right now, in terms of rent to own another thing is harder for tenant to qualify, you know, the mortgage rules, etc.

Erwin  

Yeah, cuz prices have gone up so much. Equity games, I’m banking,

Brooke  

also stress test, right? They have to be able to qualify. Yeah. So now, the reason three rentals I did are in Alberta.

Erwin  

And currently, how many do you hold? How many do you have in your portfolio? Now,

Brooke  

under 10, I will say I think I counted in my head was around eight right now. And they’re mainly just maintaining, they’re not new rental almost recently. And I’m just waiting for them to complete the programme right now.

Erwin  

And because you’re slowing down, so you can take the capital to rotate into your custom build

Brooke  

that too, and also into other investment. So I’m involved in more private lending now. Long term holds. And I get that now, I think I want to build equity. Now my rentals are closing, I have to actively look for new deals. If I want to keep that going. Everybody’s goal is different. So at this point, cashflow is not my number one, it still has to cashflow. However, I do see that at this age, I think I should build more equity. Right? Build more wealth.

Erwin  

Right, right, right. Yeah, yeah, I think we might piss off a lot of people by saying that cash flow is not our number one.

Brooke  

It was for a very long period of time. Well, for three years now, though, that was my number one

Erwin  

concern for recording because my stance is multiple streams of income. And because Chennai, we enjoy our careers, we generate good incomes, right? So then I the way I view it is that I’ve looked at my everything is very holistic. So so because I have we have income coming in from our careers, it’s less important to me that our portfolio cash flows a lot of money. Okay, right. I’m okay with like, my with, like my duplexes being like minimal cash flow, right, because I’m more in, you know, historically, we’ve been seeing even before the pandemic, historically, we’ve seen about 7% appreciation a year. Okay, that’s a lot. That’s a lot. Right. So, you know, even if we get 4% appreciation, I’m very happy. Okay, going forward from here. Okay. So that’s, that’s my own stance. And that’s where I am my journey. I see. Because I’m not trying to retire. I don’t think I’ll ever retire.

Brooke  

I don’t think I’ll ever ever retire. I don’t think that’s a term in my vocabulary, at least as far as I can see.

Erwin  

Right? Yeah. I just like you’re saying it’s more difficult than than ever due to rent to own. extrapolate that to say, it’s harder than ever to become a full time real estate investor, unless you can really slasher your living costs, like like, like Vince, who was on the show. Now he lives in Edmonton. Yeah. So he just slashed as housing costs. Yeah. Right. So I can see how that’s more possible. I like living Ontario. I like living in Oakville. It’s not an option for me. Yeah, you obviously like living somewhere, you’re in the GTA, like, your build is not going to be cheap.

Brooke  

Isn’t this crazy expensive. I’ll be honest. However, when I started building, we didn’t want it to be limiting because of our financial resources. At the same time, I don’t want to be taken over right either when it comes to expenses. And when it reflects to rent Oh, it doesn’t work well in Ontario. Now. However, that’s why I invest in Alberta for example now, right? And also I work with a lot of say flippers or people in the real estate community. When I mentioned I did private lending, sometimes we joint venture or however I can see that for you have to work with people who are experienced, yes, it’s getting harder. However, there are still people who are able to do it.

Erwin  

There is people able to do it, like like I mentioned, like Vince, but also on the other side. Yeah, incomes are higher than ever in terms of wage incomes. So you know, I’m a capitalist. I make the most money for my time.

Brooke  

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that’s how you evaluate right your ROI is high.

Erwin  

I speak to many investors are new investors who make like two 300 grand in their day jobs. Exactly. Okay, how easy is it that replacing as a real estate investor?

Brooke  

I know you have to really active I can see that if you’re constantly buying and selling.

Erwin  

If you first level

Brooke  

however, is you have that income you can tolerate more risk. That’s a side hustle right

Erwin  

right. Yeah. Oh, exactly. That’s why I’m saying like cheap income. It really it really reduces your risk for real estate. Miss me. How’s it hustle. Sorry about that income. Yeah, I mean go full time, you have to take on quite about quite a bit around risk.

Brooke  

Yeah. Because I’m at the age, if I hate my job, even if it’s a lot of money, I probably still wouldn’t do it. I don’t know about you. So I see a lot of people, yes, high income, especially as a lot of my friends at this age. And I think 47 If I remember, the sad is when you you have your peak income throughout your career. So I’ve seen people doing that. However, a lot of people are very, very unhappy. I’m happy with my work. If they’re unhappy for real estate, too. If you’re unhappy, you’re making 200 or 300. Don’t do it. Because return on your time, like you said, yeah,

Erwin  

you can start work at five, six o’clock, and then like, not have any worries. As an entrepreneur or a real estate investor. Yeah. And that doesn’t happen. Exactly. Don’t.

Brooke  

Don’t end it. However you feel you have more control, right?

Erwin  

Absolutely. There’s just everyone. That’s why I like talking to veterans like yourself, is you can share your journey. And then I think people can can take from that, where they fit in. Right, versus what’s marketed out there. Yeah, quit your job today become a full time real estate investor, like, yeah, people that understand you take on a monstrous amount of risk. And then now in hindsight, those are the folks who are now going bankrupt and moving back into their parents basements. Right. But that wasn’t that wasn’t mentioned marketing.

Brooke  

Yeah, I’m like you i open to everybody at different stages in their life. Yeah. For people who have health issues, I’ve seen some friends with health issues. And even if they made a lot of money, they probably couldn’t sustain, then cut your expenses. Right? I don’t think it’s a bad idea. We’ll ask them faster. It’s not a bad idea. If you rent or, you know, rental, expensive versus mortgage people have to take on today. I mean, find alternatives. You don’t have to live in a bigger house. I’ve seen people downsizing as being a private lending and alternative financing. I’m thinking about what can we do with reverse mortgages? Well provide opportunity and in different ways for people to retire as as investors. Sometimes we’re the private mortgage, maybe we can help other people to do reverse mortgage, a lot of people are doing retirement homes, and a golden girl type of housing. I can see that.

Erwin  

Yeah, I love all those investments. Yeah, I’m not sure where I want to go with this. Okay, that’s, that’s private lending. So again, ignorant outsider observing, like the trust your talent community, is the same as a lot of you do business among yourselves, which I think is pretty wise, since you seem to be all be pretty good investors,

Brooke  

is because I think mainly people have the same mindset. I just want to clarify, we don’t directly do deals with students, students would come together naturally, to work together. We as trainers and mentors, yes, we do among ourselves. However, students, they usually naturally work together, just like I mentioned, my first investment was somebody sitting on my table while I was training, right. Well, while I was being trained, right, yeah. So it’s mainly I think, the mindset, and naturally, people have the same frequency. Right, what gets together? I think that’s just natural.

Erwin  

But your coaches and mentors are vetting a lot of these deals? We would, yes. So then there’s, you know, there’s actually oversight.

Brooke  

That’s the point, right, we won’t tell them exactly what to do. We’re part of their power team, right? Yeah.

Erwin  

So you’re talking to garbage deal not to touch it?

Brooke  

You know, it was funny, you don’t say that directly? Because it’s part of that training, right? You have to figure out yourself. So we kind of direct them. So if they, they want us to look at it. We have to not directly state yes or no, they still have to analyse that’s what trainers and coaches do.

Erwin  

But what I liked about the treasure Tang community is, you know, like, Tim, is Tim the only lead like the top of the chain top of the organisation.

Brooke  

So he and his partner Ray are the founders. We the OGS started on the beginning. We were also there. That’s all Tim basically is the principal that started the organisation.

Erwin  

Tim Sykes has been on this podcast. So he’s actually been a professional educator in wrestling for for 10 years. 10 years. Yeah. So he was paid for 10 years to teach real estate investing.

Brooke  

So I was part of that group. So I started by learning from him and, and started my journey that way, too. Right. So I see it as a legacy. You basically pass it down to the new investors. Yeah. So that’s

Erwin  

what I like about the community. Is that a strong education experience oversight over what transactions get done within the community? Yeah, versus the bankruptcies that I’ve been studying with not not within the wider real estate investor community. Yeah. Is certain organisations have consistent failures, right? Yes, but I don’t see that from your community, your specifically your group. So All right, you guys are doing something, right?

Brooke  

Yes, that’s a good indicator, Ashley, and we’ve only been around three years, but we have at least four or five students reaching their financial freedom goal. So that’s the passive income. We’re talking about the cash flow. However, we mentioned that perhaps capital is not what we focus on. However, I

Erwin  

think I like my day job. Yeah, I

Brooke  

1. I do, too. I get that if you want to not worry about survival at all. You want your money to work to have the cashflow? Yeah, at the same time, they’re also I think, the first set of students, they cut their expenses. I’ve done that too. Yeah, I’ve done that in the past couple months, because we went over budget by quite a lot. So there was one month except basic expenses. I didn’t spend anything, which actually not hard, just don’t go shopping as much. No new clothes, new shoes. It’s actually not as smart as x. I thought.

Erwin  

Yeah. Because my when I started investing, I knew this is early days, right? So I knew two people personally, who I considered very financially free. One on two triplexes lived in one of them. Okay, no car, no kids, right? So very frugal living. Right. So she can live off of that rental income from just two triplexes. And again, living in one of them are showing a five units rented. Right, initiative dog. That’s it. So that’s, that’s probably the only that was probably her biggest cash outflows. So very modest living and then my other friend in St. Catharines. He owned I forget the number of Eagleton closer to like 10 Student rentals. And then the car he drove very modest. 10 years old, paid off. Right? His home very modest, probably like yourself, like probably 2000 1200 square foot house. Right. So to me that was from from them sharing their experience with me. That was the path to financial freedom. So very different than what’s been marketed at us.

Brooke  

You want to have that choice? Oh,

Erwin  

absolutely. Absolutely. Just realise that frugal living is a much easier path to financial freedom than filling up a gigantic or real estate portfolio. Yeah. Cuz I think one of the things that’s gonna come out of this, this high interest rate environment, this tough market housing market, we’re gonna see some of these influencers go bankrupt, I think I

Brooke  

think I’m not sure who however, I do see a lot of people being quiet, because I’m thinking they don’t want to have the exposures now.

Erwin  

Yeah, yeah. But social media, people only only shout out successes. They don’t share failures. Yeah. But what I’m learning from this period is that you’ve run into these people are like, are they just like, they’re like, Wow, I can’t believe how many transactions you did. I can’t believe you’ve found that many. Like I had one guest on his podcast who said he was like writing offers like almost every day, right? How do you find that many deals? Unless they weren’t really deals. Now isn’t the quality what’s the deal wasn’t there?

Brooke  

Or you just lowball everything and then see which ones stick?

Erwin  

No, no, he was actually executing deals. Oh, wow. Right. So then like, so. I used to be like, I was like, I was so impressed. Now more like I saw seems like a potential red flag. That’s true. Yeah. And that was turning out to be a legitimate red flag based on the ads. It’s all rumours right now. But we’ll see. I don’t wish bad on anyone. Yeah, I’m just more interested in learning from everybody. Everybody else wants what’s working? What’s not working?

Brooke  

Yeah. When you mentioned duplexes, and triplexes I actually sold three duplexes doing my belt. One was before, before we even had the property under contract, I’ll tell you why. I think at different stages, I would do different things. But the reason being a found in Ontario, I have to get it vacant in order for it to be marketable. How is that control for investors? And I didn’t like that fact. And like you said, the cash flow is getting slimmer. So if I have to take out my bucket of gold from different investment, I decided to sell all the duplexes I had. So one the basement tenant moved out, that was the first one I sold, then the second one both moved out. Finally, the third one which is closing in five days, the opera unit tenant, it took me nine months to evict through landlord tenant board. I finally evicted him. And then I thought do I want to keep it because the rent is really good now. However, I thought I don’t like the fact I don’t have control another tenant comes in. I have to wait till that tenant moves before I can decide what I want to do with my property. Yeah.

Erwin  

are using front lobby please donation from I am Yes.

Brooke  

Also I want to say for rent to own operators use it because you help them improve their credit. So for all my rental and tenants, I use it and there’s one rental and tenant for a very, very short period of time his credit score was increased by 30. I think that partly that

Erwin  

helped. Wonderful. So that helps you actually helps you your tenants exit the rent. Oh,

Brooke  

yeah. So I’ve been using them from probably day one when they were under a different name too, right?

Erwin  

Yeah. And their

Brooke  

landlord credit bureau. Yeah. So I’ve been using it

Erwin  

confused the crap. And I mean, when they change their name.

Brooke  

I even used them to do a collection a while ago. Yeah, yeah. But that tenant declared bankruptcy. So I was on their report whenever we received the bankruptcy report. My name was Ashley there. Yeah. No, knock on us. Luckily, like you said, I think a lot of us were saved by the appreciation in Ontario. So yes, I came up pretty well. However, that’s that was what happened,

Erwin  

are using single key for screening.

Brooke  

I have property managers. I actually switched a couple property managers until I found one that was really good. Yeah, yeah.

Erwin  

It’s a challenge. Property Management. You know, I’ve been through like five of them. Wow. Yeah. Which as I always say, like before, before anyone ever decided to pick a pick a where wherever they’re investing neighbourhood town, whenever I say you have to have at least three property management options. Yes, right. Yeah. Three good ones. Right. So if a town only has one, I won’t invest there. Yeah, well, because if you if you go through them, like they suck, and then now what? Now you’re the property manager.

Brooke  

Exactly. Even though I have property manager, there’s still incidences where I do have to take a look at the property and decide what to do. Because you have to manage the manager. And also at the end of the day, it’s still yours. Oh,

Erwin  

yeah. Yeah, it’s your financial, everything. Yeah, exactly. So you mentioned that your other than the build, other than the build that you’re trying to you’re capitalising, you mentioned private lending. But you also mentioned that you trying to build your equity, how are you trying to build your build, build your net worth.

Brooke  

So active income is working private lending is mostly short term. So that’s where I have money to pay for a lot of the financing, for example, for the house, in terms of building our worth, I’m keeping properties that are a tenant in Ontario, because the tenants the tenant, like I mentioned, I do find it to be problematic at times. And from lobby, I think sent me an email not too long ago. I think there’s over 40% of tenant being late recently. And I do see that happening. I have tenants constantly every month. I do have to chase them. And I mentioned I just went through landlord tenant board evicted in September. Yeah. So I do see that happening. That’s why in Ontario, I’m going to just keep the A tenants. Yeah,

Erwin  

knock on wood. I’m good on rent. Yeah, thank you front lobby, shout out with our lobby. I’m pro tip from lobby.ca or.com. I forget, if you don’t know what they are, just Google them. You know, I type in front lobby.com. You mentioned private lending. What are you looking for in a private land? Because I know it’s a it’s a really popular topic. I think a lot of people do and don’t do it. Right. As a lending on, I’ve seen some, I think they’re the term that they’re getting. I wouldn’t touch What are you looking for in a private land?

Brooke  

You know, when the market was really good knock on wood? It all came back?

Erwin  

Is everyone returning your calls? Everyone who’s borrowed money from you? Was that is everyone returning your calls your private Landstuhl there were so

Brooke  

low that got me worried. Which is important. That’s exactly so there were times and I’ve done promissory notes before without putting the collateral on the property. I’ve done that. However, this is investor I don’t know. Well, but I know. And I know he has a lot of properties under his portfolio. And even though it’s promissory note, I found that during this time, the return that’s fantastic and crazy high Come to think of it. Now I would rather put on the collateral meaning being registered, even though the interest rate might be slightly lower. I think I would rather do that. And so you’d

Erwin  

rather more security, that’s gonna like your lesson from this period. Yes. However,

Brooke  

now the interest rate, say 70%. Even if it’s from your own HELOC, I don’t see. I don’t see the private lending rate being that much higher, though. It’s not climbing as fast.

Erwin  

Interesting. Okay. Yeah. And your are you doing live living within your community?

Brooke  

I did one through a mortgage broker, which I just closed yesterday. This personal because I think if it’s somebody I know, I can call you and ask you what’s going on, even though there’s mortgage broker, who is probably the middle person in their experience, sometimes I found myself lean towards working with people I know. I’ve learnt before,

Erwin  

right? Because you have relationship equity. You’re on the same community. Yeah. wants to maintain the reputation.

Brooke  

Exactly. Deals are vetted, and they save on broker fee too. So they’re willing to do that. Right. Right, right.

Erwin  

Okay. Can you share, like what are terms you’re looking for in this market? So again, we’re recording sales for a second. We just had hopefully our last rate increase. So I think we’re up overnight rates are About 4.5, I believe right now. So what kind of terms are you looking for? If you’re attending today’s market,

Brooke  

still in double digits right now? Yeah, well, that will do. Yeah. So 10 is probably the lowest I will go. Okay. And so usually with people I know, at this point, I did have lazy money sitting around. So I reached out to mortgage broker in the past. However, for that reason I mentioned to you I do want to have more control. Yeah.

Erwin  

So, so registered on title is your now your requirement? Yeah,

Brooke  

now, it’s my requirement, I would actually advise people to do the same. And I do get that now, why the private lending rate hasn’t gone up that much. Because for people who are borrowing your money to the opportunity is probably different from before. So for them to just go up and return because your borrowing costs go up? It’s also harder for them to find the deal, too. Yeah.

Erwin  

So what are you lending on is that these flips? These birds are just for just a bridge finance, it’s mainly flips, mainly flips. And then is there like an LTV target along the value target that you won’t go over?

Brooke  

Actually, no, as long as it makes sense. And if I’m as long to value over 100, if after repair value makes sense, in the right market, where I’ve done flips myself, so if I see the number making sense, I’m not handy. I don’t know what’s behind the wall. I can read inspection reports. However, I haven’t an idea if they can actually make that money back.

Erwin  

Right. Right. All right. All right. So just a warning to the listener. Brooke is sophisticated. This is not for beginners. This is not for beginners. Yeah. Okay. Is that enough disclaimer?

Brooke  

I will also say understand the strategy you’re investing into? Are you doing brute force?

Erwin  

These are markets you understand as well.

Brooke  

Market, you understand what isn’t? If you don’t, it’s not hard to get comps for within your network or find a realtor or find a way to to understand that market,

Erwin  

you’re able to reference check the deal pretty easily. Yeah, right.

Brooke  

Yeah. I’ll tell you one thing about the deal. I closed yesterday, I usually ask for the borrower’s ID. And this time I didn’t. So I was a little worried because they were slightly late. And they didn’t call me or communicate with me. So I got a little worried. However, I usually ask for their ID. That’s one of the due diligence you do. Or yeah,

Erwin  

I asked these questions, because I don’t know why he only saw this article three weeks ago about the specific to Epic Alliance. Basically article in the CBC. So this is not me, folks. I’m not making this up and go go look it up here Alliance CBC. They only had one appraiser, Oh, wow. Vast majority, one appraiser that they controlled. Like as a as in like, for example, when when you and I do borrow money, especially when the bank, we don’t have any influence on who that appraiser is. Right? They usually take out from a list of people they trust, right? No one has an evil influence. It’s usually like kind of random, who is what appraiser there is, so that it’s truly independent appraisal, versus what I’m reading on the CBC article was that it was really like one or two realtors. Yeah. But Emily, like the one appraiser.

Brooke  

The difficult thing is sometimes the investors are not in that market. Right? They have a lot of auto province investor. So I’m thinking if I’m in that position, I trust her the market experts. Yeah.

Erwin  

So for example, you mentioned that you do business in Alberta. I imagine you have quality relationships there.

Brooke  

Yeah, a lot of I actually go to Alberta now because of trust or talent. or twice a year, at least now. And I’ll be honest, because this is in the book. Anyways, I’m completely open. I had a deal that went south, it’s in Winnipeg, and I lost 50,000 was my early investment. So I was really, really nervous. That was probably my second or third investment, since I got educated. Okay, so that was really scary. I did fly over there. And so you didn’t see the property before you did the deal? I didn’t. Okay, I didn’t see the property. Did you have it inspected? Well, they inspected it, and when why learned is wrong, the numbers, the numbers made sense, because it’s a property that had to fire, they have money in the buy, and they had insurance money to to start the belt. And number wise, it made sense. However,

Erwin  

there’s other factors, right? So who appraised it

Brooke  

somebody local there, and this is not your not your appraiser know,

Erwin  

who was a realtor? Was your realtor that our realtor? Is there a realtor? Okay, so they controlled all the information,

Brooke  

they can’t hold all the information. This is not a vending deal. This is a GP LP setup. And the deal wasn’t that big. And I thought at the same

Erwin  

time, I managed to lose

Brooke  

50k 50k

Erwin  

Right. Yeah. Because you were an owner, or you lost this is your investment.

Brooke  

The investment because there’s a GP LP situation or right so

Erwin  

yeah, limited loss. Right. Right. Right. Okay. Even worse than if you weren’t an owner. Like yeah, exactly. As we went there, and then heard epical I’ve heard people lost more money on public lands deals where they were the owner, right? Because they’re equity owners. So people need to remember that you can make a lot of money in real estate. But if the property value goes below goes underwater, as in like, it’s gone. The prices drop more than your downpayment, you owe that money. Right? Yeah. Negative return. Yes. Not just loss of your investment.

Brooke  

Exactly. Because that person who was in charge of the project, she was relatively new as well. And I’m a purse, people kind of person. And when I met him, he was pretty humble. He’s Asian. And we can say that only weekend. And I met him when he was with his mom. So he seems like a good son. So personally, I thought he was a really nice person, which he probably is. However, I think they overspent.

Erwin  

Yeah, I think that’s, that’s been part of the message I’ve been trying to get across with some of the past guests as well, this person may not have been a bad person that just failed to execute. Right? Like failing to execute doesn’t mean to mean doesn’t mean you’re a bad person. Just like if you had to steal bread to feed your family. I don’t think that necessary, makes you a bad person. Right, right or wrong. But this person may have had great intentions, just they just failed to execute, which is not uncommon.

Brooke  

It’s not uncommon. However, I was hoping he will come back up. I didn’t hear from him. He declared bankruptcy. And he was a flashy type. He drove a really, really nice, Porsche SUV went to went to visit the property in Winnipeg, a few years back. So there you go.

Erwin  

And that’s a challenge of being an influencer. You know, like, before I became a realtor, I drove a car drove a used Honda Accord. Yeah, if I never became in sales, I would never drive something that cost money.

Brooke  

My first car was a Honda Accord,

Erwin  

anyways, but like, here’s my real estate investing is as soon as I got I switched to BMW, I was doing more business, because they give the image of success. Right, exactly. Yeah. But I’m a frugal person. I don’t like spending on these things. Just the car. I love. I think more than once people understand that their money can make money for them. It makes no sense to spend it on frivolous thing. Exactly. Right. Yeah, that’s fine. I’m a little bit overboard. universitari I’m a little bit overboard. How cheap I am.

Brooke  

Well, that’s also Asian

Erwin  

bowls. But again, like, like, I’m pretty confident I can make consistently 20% on my money in real estate. Right. So why would I want to spend it on something like like, like a Porsche, right, you know, as long as it’s safe, right? So it goes back like the BMW, it made me return. Right? It helped me my business. Exactly. Right. So that to me, it’s kind of like it’s a business expense that actually returned, right? Yes. But if I didn’t have that, I would never drive a vehicle that

Brooke  

expensive. Okay, what do you enjoy, though?

Erwin  

I’m not a car person. So I don’t enjoy those things. I really value consistency, reliability over everything else. Okay. All right. So I do not need flash. And also because I know your Porsche, everything cost more your tires, your maintenance your chain. That’s that’s, that goes against my values.

Brooke  

That’s that’s, that reminds me of something. I grew up in Taiwan. And there was a point in time, if you’re flashy, you might get kidnapped. Oh, my, you know, so like, naturally, I’m subconsciously, I would think why would you want to put yourself out there? Exactly. Same thing with investors. Liabilities, right, right. That’s why we set a corporation. I actually have investors that kept saying, or even new investors coming coming in kept saying, I want everything under my personal name, right. I want to be on title. I think a lot of it is just because you want owning at the same time, they haven’t evaluated the liability, for example, and partly to understand the full picture or the text structure and everything else that that could be the benefit. Yeah,

Erwin  

not uncommon for novices. Yes. It’s just, I always hope that provinces understand like, there’s so much more. Never Never think that you know, everything. I don’t think I know,

Brooke  

I don’t think I do either.

Erwin  

I know, I don’t know, everything. I know. And this to go back like this gentleman in Winnipeg with a Porsche. In my experience, I have over 350 clients, and they almost all fit the profile of the Millionaire Next Door in the book. Right? Humble do not show their money frugal, right. So when someone does show their money, they are an outlier. Okay, from my experience, they are an outlier. And that’s it. That is part of the formula for being an influencer though. So I just think people need to understand that.

Brooke  

Yeah, yeah. All for if it’s something you love. If you’re a car person, probably totally Yeah. Then use your cash flow or use your residual to enjoy what you love to do. Well, here’s

Erwin  

the funny thing like a friend of mine. Lost Ferraris has One doesn’t show up anywhere on social media.

Brooke  

Okay, so many we mutually know. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I think I think I Okay. All right, I get that.

Erwin  

So it’s, you know, again. So I guess my point is if someone shows flash, there’s usually an agenda behind it. Right? Yes. Right. Yeah. Because again, like, why would you want to display that you have stuff you might get robbed? Or the CRA might come to you? About to? Sadly, yeah. Okay. I think we’ve gotten sidetracked. I think it’s worth it’s worth going back to RTOS. I imagine it’s still a big part of what you coach and teach in your business. In your coaching business. Yeah. Who is it right for who is the right investor to get into rent owns,

Brooke  

I think it’s the avatar of me when I started, if you want cash flow, like you mentioned, you might not want cash flow, you’re actively building your wealth. However, I do think cash flow, if you have the ability to do that, for a lot of people, it’s good to have that cash flow to say that, hey, I can have investment income and not having to worry about my work. Not everybody loves their job, some don’t. So that will make sense for people like that. To get started, it is more creative. So at the same time, I don’t think everybody should just jump in and do it. I’ll give you an example. It’s funny that just happened. Somebody called me to say, this realtor suggested that I go into rental home with him, they have a potential tenant buyer, when I hear the profile of the tenant bar, it just doesn’t work out. Because you want to make sure that tenant buyer will be able to purchase at the end, it doesn’t sound like somebody in the end will be able to purchase because this tenant buyer has a pre construction condo, that’s gonna close which is gonna take up their mortgage room, or things like that. And they’re saying, Oh, I heard cuz of Ontario tener la, the tenant will usually take care of the place that sounds like a good idea. However, you have to consider other things not just because I want to get into investment,

Erwin  

right? Yeah, I think for the listener, understand like real estate, in general is very capitalist industry. People are not my experience, most of the industry does not understand rent to own like your regular everyday realtor does not understand regular everyday mortgage person does not transact on a regular basis. Right. So they do not like for you and I we have very different criteria for what they would consider a good rent to own. Exactly right. Because I’ve literally seen this I’ve seen I had a builder send me me rent to own deals. That made no sense, right? Yeah. Like the the tenant is like two years from retirement. So how are they supposed to get a mortgage? From biotech? So like, my point is, even though I believe in the strategy can work really well. Not every opportunity is truly an opportunity.

Brooke  

No, it’s actually quite a lot of work to find a qualified tenant buyer.

Erwin  

Right? It is what do you think the ratio is like one in 10?

Brooke  

A lot worse, I put down my book. So when I started, I was actually looking back in the days it was Kijiji I think now people use Facebook marketplace more. So the media changes. The point is, at that time, I probably talked to 100 people 10 look promising ended up with one. Wow, that was.

Erwin  

So 100 leads 10 are worth talking to

Brooke  

worth going to the next day. I probably talked to so many people at the time. I don’t even remember. And right. I mentioned I live in a small house. So when I was on the phone with the potential tenant buyers, everybody in the House knew what to say. Usually going to talk about on the phone. Yeah, that’s how many calls I’ve been on. It’s very active. It’s just I wholesalers, when they start they have to talk to how many people were same idea and that very first deal I also wholesaled it to somebody else. wholesaler meaning I got the deal. I packaged it, I found a tenant buyer, they found a market than some other investor takeover.

Erwin  

At what point do you present it to other offer? Investors? Do you have the property in mind already, or we’re

Brooke  

usually when I have the tenant buyer, because very quickly, very quickly, they will start shopping. So very quickly, we’ll have to make offers. It’s better to have investors ready already. Right?

Erwin  

Right. Right, because they’re gonna be they’re the ones who are actually buying the property. Right. So thanks for sharing those ratios. I think people need to understand these things, I guess. So don’t just take the first one that comes across.

Brooke  

Also, in the beginning, everybody was talking about their life problems, right? Because their rent to own tenants, they rent it for a while they are divorced or they’re self employed, their credits are hurt. So they want to tell you their life story. Yes, make the connection. However, I used to spend like 4050 minutes and still didn’t get to the questions I want answered. And the end 15 minutes I could get all that I need to stay, if they most likely will qualify or not. So it’s not a total waste, considering how much time I used to spend on it.

Erwin  

All right, so you are, you’re putting in the sweat to earn your wholesale commission

Brooke  

at the time and especially, I was really active when I started till 2017. So remember the market kept going up. And so at that time, a lot of tenant buyers are interested. I don’t see as many people as interested now, at the same time, you know, even investors when the market goes up, everybody was worried they are in too late. So the tenant buyers, same thing they want to get into a house sooner than later. Especially, they hear other homeowners are profiting, right. Yeah. So there were a lot of people out there time looking into it,

Erwin  

compared to now. So even rent to own tenants for like, FOMO

Brooke  

Oh, yeah. Homeowners are emotional. Yeah. So So So

Erwin  

you’re telling me that their behaviour, emotions were the same as homeowners, homebuyers?

Brooke  

They’re very emotional as homebuyers because when they look at a house, they don’t look at the worst house on the market. Like we’re looking for money in the bar different. Yeah. And sometimes I see a property I’m like, just putting a load of money and it worked really well. Great area. They want it to be like a

Erwin  

home. Turnkey show. Yeah. Something we couldn’t be proud of.

Brooke  

Yeah. So stage nicely and just like home,

Erwin  

and then what markets are you looking at? What rental? Yeah, everywhere.

Brooke  

So I’ll tell you every time people ask an Ontario loan, so as far as outside of Kingston, Durham, which I’m done, Ottawa, Toronto, London, Strathroy. Woodstock, so north to bury metal Maitland, so it really doesn’t matter.

Erwin  

No, it doesn’t matter. I’ve heard of all these cities. versus, you know, you have some minimum criteria, do you not?

Brooke  

Yes, in Ontario slightly harder, because they have to have certain level of income to be able to qualify. And, again, we don’t anticipate them to fail. However, if you hold that property, you have to be able to sell it. If you buy a property worse. Yeah, if you buy a property with 300 people in the neighbourhood, how are you going to act six? So yes, all these considerations

Erwin  

give a number for your minimum population, like 50,000 10,000.

Brooke  

You know, what’s funny, sometimes, because we’ve been qualified for so many different municipalities. I’ve talked to so many different cities, as a result, every study is different. So sometimes I’ll give you an example. Gravenhurst, they might consider us only this many people. But if you consider their surrounding, and it’s a good community,

Erwin  

it’s summer versus winter, it’s very different.

Brooke  

So as long as you understand the market, I will say not like 1000. Nope, that’s kind of small. Another indicator, if sometimes they don’t have city service of sewer and things like that, right?

Erwin  

Not because it’s hard to get financing on it or not on city water

Brooke  

also means that it’s not populated enough. Yeah, it’s things like that. It’s not an absolute no, because the city is moving towards those places, too. So it really depends on the market. Right? Yeah.

Erwin  

So again, you’re approaching this sophisticated not just blindly buying anything.

Brooke  

No, you know, how listeners to they just want a simple three rules. What am I supposed to do? Do I buy or not? If there’s, there’s a septic, it’s things like that, however, really do look at the overall picture, like I mentioned, that’s usually an indicator. It’s a smaller community. However, is the city moving in? Yeah, it’s things like that.

Erwin  

Yeah, the last property, we bought the septic we got a huge discount on the entire neighbourhood was was serviced. Just this one homeowner chose not to connect to city boss services. Right? Yeah. And so it was a massive stigma. Well, it does cost money, right. But yet, instead of like 12 offers, there’s only three offers. So it’s so so for us it was opportunity and our climate a tonne of money.

Brooke  

I think that’s an opportunity. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So

Erwin  

then, so yes, you’re right. I love it. I love the point in the traditional financing. So again, it’s not an easy answer.

Brooke  

Yeah. So it depends. It all depends.

Erwin  

So you know, have a good team to make these decisions.

Brooke  

Yeah, I will also want to add something to it. Because I had investor, I think the power teams are there, and you have so many to Power team member, they’re there to advise you, you ultimately still have to make the decision. If one Power team member says no to you, that doesn’t mean that’s your decision. I still think you have to collaborative flee. Make a decision and what makes sense to you. Yeah, like rent to own. It might not make sense to somebody, but it makes sense to me for my journey.

Erwin  

But that’s what I love about this podcast is that, for example, some people get in real estate because they see an ad, they go to a workshop. They’re like what’s taught there, whatever, right? Whatever they teach there might not be right for you. Right, and that’s why like, you know, like some of these workshops are intended for people to go full time real estate investor. So I think it’s good expected information, but 95% of those folks who go will never become full time real estate investors, and probably 80 person I will never buy an investment property.

Brooke  

Yeah, that’s a good point. And also a lot of people coming even to our bootcamp, for example, they want simple answer, just tell me exactly what to do which property to buy. Yeah, it’s

Erwin  

complicated. It’s complicated, especially if you want above market returns, which you and I want. To be a market insider is not easy. It’s, it takes years.

Brooke  

Also, I think a lot of it is just you can, you can decide what you want to do. But it’s a lot of it’s a mindset, right? Really, it’s not, you’re not going to get to it the very next day. However, a lot of people are going to go into different places thinking I’m just gonna get the answer. Get it done the next day.

Erwin  

Can you tell us about your book? Is that a good place for novices to get started?

Brooke  

Yeah, actually, that’s the audience I had in mind. When I wrote the book, he

Erwin  

shot to the camera. Oh,

Brooke  

I haven’t looked at the camera the whole time. That’s okay. No,

Erwin  

no one watches this show.

Brooke  

What’s it called? Financial freedom, the royal way. Why? Because the railway, the railway is because, you know, I work very flexibly, and my parents, my family is in Taiwan. And I think the lifestyle of a lot of people is to be able to travel and have the lifestyle you want. Just like the Royals, you do whatever you want. And I know financial freedom is a term that that’s being overused. However, I think that’s still what people gravitate towards. Yeah, it’s the lifestyle, and also whether we’re away because I’m older compared to a lot of new investors. So if I’m already at the age of the Queen, it’s not the railway.

Erwin  

Age of the King, the current king, she lived forever. So

Brooke  

I don’t mind.

Erwin  

For context you’re sharing before recording, even before the pandemic, you’re in the office once a week was it

Brooke  

once or twice a week is very flexible. It wasn’t always like that. When we started building up the business in Canada, it was a little bit more demanding. However, when I took on the job, my kids were even younger. So I already said, I do have to pick up the kids at three o clock from time to time. So I think even starting then I was already pretty flexible. Right? In a way. Yeah.

Erwin  

So you have a lot location freedom or time from time freedom. Yes, right. Yeah. So I guess when you go to Taiwan, you’re you can still work.

Brooke  

I can still work. However, sometimes our late night meetings, I aim to have all the meetings before 12 o’clock, local time. It could still work.

Erwin  

And then from my experience, like I’ve had clients who had a lot of work flexibility, they were very successful investors because they were to be able to come like, they would be able to come almost on demand. Like I literally had a client who worked in it even remote, but his clientele were small businesses, and you can’t do anything. You can’t shut down their servers and stuff until after five o’clock. So during the workday, he was free to come with me local property. Right. So like a property would come up. I tell him like, Hey, can you come see it? Now? He’s like, Yeah, I’ll be there in 30 minutes. Maybe the first one to offer? And now and now he’s rich and retired?

Brooke  

Yes. Yeah. You know, the funny thing is, it’s how your user time That reminds me, some people probably would just sit around, some people use a flexible time to look at property, build their business, right, or learn some new skills. So I love the flexibility. Ashley, when I started working, my dad passed away in 2017. So I knew I had to fly back on demand, basically. So that’s also another reason I told the company that I wanted the flexibility. And that kind of every time I went back to Taiwan sometimes to extend the trip. So I didn’t know when was his last day. And some people asked me, I don’t quite remember those days, because we were just there. And we were just supporting him at the time. And I really needed that flexibility at the time. So I kind of forced myself having to have enough money to fly back to Taiwan, having to have the time flexibility to go back at the same time.

Erwin  

Are you saying that it was a big trigger moment for you too?

Brooke  

I would think so. I didn’t think that way at the time. However, when you look back how things lined up?

Erwin  

If you could do it all over again. Would you wait for that trigger moment?

Brooke  

Probably not. However, I think I was very lucky. Because I was staying at home for 10 years. So I got to spend quite some time with them. Every time I went back, it was around three months before I took on the job. And even around the time he passed away. I still went back around at least 1233 months every time I was there. Right? Right. Yeah.

Erwin  

Okay, we’re way over time, bro. Thank you for being so generous. I do have I didn’t even ask you but the market that we’re in right now. So you guys coach and mentor a lot of students what are you telling them but this time so again, recording February 2, is now this bad time to be in real estate good time. Where are your students hearing?

Brooke  

So even you and I we’re still investing? I do think we have to look at things differently now. It’s no different than when I Started, everybody was saying the property price are too high, I cannot secure anything. I cannot do anything. Now there’s

Erwin  

the rates are too high. The rates are too high.

Brooke  

Now the rates are too high, the property value went down. Are you getting into take that advantage? Yeah. And we always say here is your strategy first. Second market property is the very last thing you look at. So if this strategy doesn’t work, switch to a different market that could work. Finally, find the property in that market. So you don’t just rush in and say the market is restricting me? Then pivot? Yeah.

Erwin  

Look, thanks so much for being so generous with your time. Any final words you want to share?

Brooke  

Um, we have so much to talk

Erwin  

about. Yeah, we have four hours.

Brooke  

Yeah, that’s right. So reach out to me, I’m really open to talk to new investors, because I think I’m in the position to share and to contribute at this point. That’s why I wrote the book. Because, really, I wasn’t aiming to make any money. So I’m lucky that I’m actually not losing money at all. I broke even a while ago, so anything beyond thanks, everybody, and I’m easy to reach out to any social media. Brooke Shang I’m the only one. Not the only one. It’s just Brooklyn.

Erwin  

br o k.

Brooke  

There’s no EBOKE there is me there is any br o ke s h a n g. Otherwise, there’s broke?

Erwin  

No, no. But yeah, you see, Brock is spelt like Brooke Shields. Okay. Yeah.

Brooke  

That’s why I have the name Ashley. Because I didn’t know too many English names, and she was popular in Asia.

Erwin  

One more time,

Brooke  

well, where can people get the book? Amazon is the easiest way. What’s it called financial freedom, the royal way. And then the subtitle is Seven Commandments. I put a number in there because then people think it’s doable. When you put down number seven, number four, they kind of see their system up. It’s not overwhelming. So seven chapters.

Erwin  

Fabulous. And now for our listener listeners all of this on the show notes as well. Okay, all right, because books gonna send it to me. Thank you so much for doing this. Thank you Ron.

Erwin  

Before you go, if you’re interested in learning more about an alternative means of cash flowing by hundreds of other real estate investors have already then sign up for my newsletter and you’ll learn of the next free demonstration webinar I’ll be delivering on the subject of stock hacking. It’s much improved demonstration over the one that I gave to my cousin chubby at Thanksgiving dinner in 2019. He now averages 1% cash flow per week, and he’s a musician by trade. As a real estate investor myself, I got into real estate for the cash flow but with the rising costs to operate a rental business, it’s just not the same as it was five to 10 years ago when I started there are forget the cash flow reduces your risk. The more you have, the more lumps you can absorb. And if you have none, or limited cash flow, you’re going to be paying out of your pocket like I did on a recent basement flood at my student rental in St. Catharines. Ontario. If you’re interested in learning more and register for free for my newsletter at www dot truth about real estate investing.ca. Enter your name and email address on the right side. We’ll include in the newsletter when we announce our next free stock hacker demonstration. Find out for yourself but so many real estate investors are doing to diversify and increase our cash flow. And if you can’t tell I love teaching and sharing this stuff.

 

 

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