Millennial, Personal Trainer, Moving To Edmonton and Full-Time Real Estate Investing With Vince Lee
As the year winds down, it’s been challenging for many, especially those who over-leveraged, those who gambled on the market going up forever, growing too fast, too soon, spread too thin, poor systems, and poor oversight.
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We see this everywhere in different industries, too: growth stocks, cryptos, and so on.
Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX has been arrested.
The S. Korean gentleman responsible for the Luna coin is hiding in Serbia; Elizabeth Holmes of Theranos has been sentenced to jail.
Please be careful out there.
When I took courses in Commercial Banking, I realized banks don’t get rich by making bad loans, nor do they under lend.
For example, if a business needs a one million dollar loan to survive, the bank does not end $500,000 to reduce its risk and watch the business fail and lose its loan.
They lend the whole amount or not at all.
In these challenging times, we’re seeing even more coaching programs being offered and more capital-raising offerings, AND I’m hearing lots of rumours of failing portfolios.
Lots of red flags out there, so do your due diligence and be careful.
I feel these times are the time to be greedy AND picky.
For Cherry and I, that means we’ll buy another property in the near future as that fits our goals for growth and control.
In my extensive experience, the best investment is one that’s well researched, supported by the best power team in the business, and based on economic fundamentals that one controls, as I trust ourselves over anyone else.
I want to take a moment to thank everyone who’s supported Cherry and me…
From sharing our YouTube and podcasts with those you care about to our staff who work so hard so our clients are taken care of to our clients who trust us in guiding them in their journey towards financial peace and sending us referrals.
Thanks to you, our registered charity, the Hamilton Basket Brigade, was able to donate $10,000 worth of winter wear to the school kids of Hamilton, Ontario.
As is our way, Cherry and I love value and efficiency; hence we purchased directly from a manufacturer wholesaler and received a 20% discount since we’re a charity.
The winter coats we bought were about $45 each, and the winter boots were about $40 for brand new with tags; quality stuff.
In total, we provided four schools with 142 winter jackets, 20 winter boots, 160 hats, and 50 pairs of gloves as the need is great.
My friend Nancy, a school administrator, told me they receive a couple of refugee families per week from Ukraine, Syria, and Afghanistan.
Some kids do not even have a fixed address and do not live with their parents. It’s incredibly sad out there, and I encourage everyone to give however they can.
And to all you investors out there and those who haven’t started, the need to invest has never been greater…
Health care is on the decline, senior care is on the decline, rents have skyrocketed, and the demand/supply mismatch for real estate has never been worse.
We all have a problem to solve to ensure our family’s financial well-being, and my team and I at iWIN Real Estate are here to help.
If you’re not already on my email list and receiving invites to our webinars, meetups, property tours, and mastermind lunches… well, that’s just silly.
On my website is my free book, “The Canadian Real Estate Investment Playbook,” and you can sign up for my free newsletter along with 10,000+ other hard-working Canadians learning the latest truths about real estate investing.
Simply add your name and email address on the right side of https://www.truthaboutrealestateinvesting.ca/.
In 2023, I plan to double the amount of educational content we produce, as we love to help.
We will start hosting meetups and tours East of the GTA as well as we’ve expanded thanks to coach Stephen Phillips of HGTV fame, who joined the team in 2022.
2023 will be an amazing year for many AND a terrible year for those who invested wrong.
My forecast is for our clients to kill it as they always have since 2010, thanks to our repeatable systems and best-in-class power teams, and that’s the truth about real estate investing.
Hopefully, you will join us or send someone you care about :).
https://www.truthaboutrealestateinvesting.ca/
Millennial, Personal Trainer, Moving To Edmonton and Full-Time Real Estate Investing With Vince Lee
This week is a lovely story about a young Millennial who started his journey in his passion: health and fitness.
If you’ve seen Vince Lee in person, he’s jacked and looks like a personal fitness trainer. Unfortunately, it’s hard for personal trainers living in Toronto to get by.
Thanks to his supportive partner, shout out Chewy and the Trust Your Talent community, shout out Tim Tsai, Vince has been able to create a side hustle in real estate investing, specifically rent-to-owns, scaling to larger and more projects. He’s also moved the family from expensive Toronto to more affordable Edmonton, Alberta.
Vince’s story is a good one and reminds me of why I invest so hard, so I can afford to keep my kids close and living in Ontario.
Congrats on Vince’s success.
Please enjoy the show!
This episode is brought to you by me! We don’t have sponsors for this show. I only share with you services owned by my wife Cherry and me. Real estate investing is a staple in my life and allowed me to build wealth and, more importantly, achieve financial peace about the future, knowing our retirement is taken care of and my kids will be able to afford a home when they grow up. If you, too, are interested in my systematic strategy to implement the #1 investment strategy, the same one pretty much all my guests are doing themselves, then go visit www.infinitywealth.ca/events and register for our next FREE Online Training Class. We will be back in person once legally allowed to do so, but for now, we are 100% virtual.
No need for you to reinvent the wheel; we have our system down pat. Again that’s www.infinitywealth.ca/events and register for the FREE Online Training Class.
This episode is also brought to you by www.stockhackeracademy.ca, where everyday real estate investors learn the best practices in stock investing to earn cash flow in about 15-30 mins per day from their mobile phones. After real estate, Stock Hacking is the next best hustle, as you’ve heard from many past guests on this show. Among our students last year, 31 trades were shared with them. 30 were profitable for an over 96% success rate and 12% return on capital. I will be giving free demonstrations online, very similar to the one I gave my kid cousin, a full-time musician who just made a 50% return in 2021. Past, of course, does not predict the future, but if you’d like a free demonstration, go to www.stockhackeracademy.ca in the top right and click FREE Demo. At the demonstration, I’ll have special bonuses. We do not advertise publicly for all my favourite listeners, and I only have two more demos to give in the next few weeks.
Don’t delay www.stockhackeracademy.ca, what I consider the future of side hustles with real estate so unaffordable for many.
To Listen:
Audio Transcript
**Transcripts are auto-generated.
Bruce (Erwin’s son]
Hello, and welcome to another episode of truth about real estate investing.
Erwin
Hey everyone. Oh, that’s first by the way, as the year winds down, it’s been a challenging one for many, especially those who over leverage. Those who gambled on the market going up forever, or market going up folks who grew too fast too soon spread too thin, poor systems poor oversight. list goes on and on. We see it everywhere too, in other different industries. For example, you know, SPK Sam bank when freed of FTX has been arrested in the Bahamas, the South Korean gentleman and responsible for Luna coin is hanging out in Serbia. Elizabeth Holmes of Theranos has just been sentenced to jail. Very interesting documentary on Netflix if you haven’t checked it out. So do please be careful out there. Back when I was taking courses in commercial banking, banks don’t get rich by making bad loans. Nor do they Underland. So for example, if a business needs say, for example, a million dollars to survive, the bank doesn’t just lend, say 500,000 to reduce the risk, because the risk of the business fails and that one that $500,000 loan is loss. They lend either the whole amount or nothing at all, or they make that loan contingent on someone else loaning up the rest of the money. Because no one no one wins in making bad loans. In these challenging times, we’re seeing I’m seeing even more coaching programmes, more coaches, offering programmes more beginner coaches entering coaching. And I’ve seen more capital raising offerings. And I’m hearing lots of rumours of failing portfolios. I don’t know anything’s confirmed. Again, these are rumours. But like the saying goes, when there’s smoke, there’s fire. So I’m being cautious. As always, there’s lots of red flags out there. So as always do your own due diligence. And, you know, maybe have an expert set of eyes help you with that due diligence. And just be careful out there. I do feel these times are the time to be greedy and to be picky for Chennai. That means we’ll be buying another investment property in the near future. Not sure whether that’s going to be you know, I’ve been having friends tell me I need to get in more commercial more. So I don’t know what we’re going to be buying. But we plan on taking advantage of this dip and buying soon. And my extensive experience, the best investment is one that’s well researched, supported by the best Power team in the business based on economic fundamentals. That one controls control is huge. for carrying out we trust ourselves over anyone else with our money in our investment. Onto another subject. I want to take a moment to thank everyone who’s supported cheering I am sharing our YouTubes or podcasts to those that who care about to our staff who worked so hard this year, so that our clients and you know, attendees of our conferences, are taken care of thank you to our clients who put their trust in us and guiding them in their financial journeys towards financial peace, especially for sending us referrals. We love referrals. A common question I get about Sherry, is she able to take on more clients? Yes, Jerry’s company is taking on more clients. They just hired a new accounting manager in order to handle more volume. Thanks to all of you, who had just mentioned my Sunday listeners chairs, YouTube watchers, my YouTube watchers. I almost have 2000 subscribers. I guess it’s nothing to sneeze at. Yeah, I have more YouTube subscribers than I have podcast listeners. Anyways, it’s thanks to all of you, and especially our clients in the day, it’s our clients that pay our bills and help us fund our charity. Charity, I have a registered charity. We call it the Hamilton bash brigade. The charity was able to donate $10,000 worth of winter wear to school kids in Hamilton, Ontario, as is our way for charity and I love value. We’re very frugal individuals. And we love efficiency. Hence we purchased directly from a manufacturer or wholesaler we received a 20% discount since we’re a charity. The winter coats for example, we bought these are adult sized winter coats, we were paying about 45 each 45 for $45 Each and winter boots. Also they are adult size because we’re going into high schoolers. So these kids are not small and winter boots, for example, around $40 for a brand new pair of boots with tags, and these are quality items. In total, we provided for schools 142 winter jackets, 21 pairs of winter boots, 160 hats, 50 pairs of gloves, as the need is great. My friend Nancy, who is a school administrator in Hamilton and one of the high schools shared with me that they receive a couple of refugee families per week from Ukraine, Syria, and we’re at a place where we just fought a war Afghanistan. Some kids do not even have fixed addresses as they do not even live with their parents. It’s incredibly sad out there. And I encourage everyone to give however they can. We’re done for the season. So feel free to give to your local school church, your local charity, donate your time, whatever it is, there’s a lot of meat out there. And all you investors out there who haven’t started investing the need to invest has never been greater. Anyone didn’t notice healthcare is on the decline, senior care as well as on a decline, rents have skyrocketed and the demand supply mismatch for real estate has never been worse. We all have a problem to solve All to ensure our family’s financial and healthy well being. Health well being is to be taken care of my team and I are here at Iwan real estate are here to help if you have not already gotten onto my email list and receiving the invites to our webinars, meetups, property tours and mastermind lunches. Well, that’s just silly. On my website. There’s my free book became real estate investment playbook. You can sign up for the book for free, you can sign up for my newsletter along with 10,000 plus other hardworking Canadians. Learning the latest truth about real estate investing, simply add your name and email address on the right side, www dot truth about real estate investing.ca. Again, that’s www dot truth about real estate investing dossier in 2023. My plan is to double our amount of educational content we produce as we love to help. To be honest, I think it’s a public service that we need to be done. As we need to crowd out the less qualified who are putting out content, we will start hosting meetups as well. We are expanding as well. We’re going to begin hosting meetups and tours east of the GTA, for example, Oshawa to Kingston as we’ve expanded thanks to add the addition of coach Steven Phillips of HGTV fame, who joined our team in 2020 to 2023 is going to be an amazing year for many. When people look back 510 years from now they will definitely no hindsight being 2023 This hindsight being 2020 2023 was an amazing year. It will also be a terrible year for many as interest rates are going to be elevated for a while. And for those who invested wrong. My forecast is for our clients to kill it as they always have since 2010. Thanks to our repeatable systems and our best in class power teams. And that is the truth about real estate investing. Hopefully you will join us or some someone that you care about. Again, that’s www dot truth about real estate investing.ca. This week, we have the lovely story about a young millennial who started the journey in his passion, which was health and fitness. If you’ve ever met or seen Vince Lee in person, you know he’s jacked. He looks like a personal fitness trainer. Unfortunately for personal trainers living in Toronto, it’s hard to get by thanks to a supportive partner shout out to chewy and the trustor town community shout out to them say Vince has been able to create a side hustle and real estate investing specifically started in rental owned he scaled us since this scale to larger and more projects branching out and strategy as well. We think we mentioned some of our short term rentals and even small apartment building investing is also moved the family from the expensive Toronto area to the more affordable Edmonton, Alberta, which is to me it’s unfortunate that we lose some of those talented events from our area to somewhere else for affordability reasons, but Vince’s story is a good one. It reminds me of why I invest so hard so I can afford to keep my kids close, living close to me. Which means living in Ontario slash GTA. Congrats to Vincent success. Please enjoy the show. Vince, how’re you doing?
Vince
I’m doing great. How are you doing?
Erwin
Way too overworked. But what’s keeping you busy these days?
Vince
More. So my real estate investing business trust your talent is an organisation that I’m part of. And I just had a newborn on August 23. And so the biggest bulk of my life right now is being a father. So that’s that’s where most of my time is going and then it goes into my business and then and then into treasurer talent Academy.
Erwin
Pull my busy busy. Congratulations on being a father.
Vince
Thank you. It’s different, or girl girl, her name’s Mira i What’s the background on that it’s a Japanese name. I’m Chinese, but it’s a Japanese name. It means I thought it really well because it means the future. And so I see her as the future because as you know, we’re on this path towards financial freedom and wasn’t taught this in, in school wasn’t taught this through my family or friends and really had to learn it the hard way. And so I want to I set the future because I it’s a unique name, by the way. And also, I see her as an opportunity where she’s the new generation in my family where, you know, living life a lot different. And I don’t even know if she’s gonna end up going to University of anything, but she may I’ll let her make her own decisions and choices and but it’s really teaching her that she can she can really do her own thing if she want it to whatever she wants to do. Fantastic.
Erwin
And before recording you mentioned you’re from Cape Breton. You don’t even know if like for someone from Cape Breton.
Vince
I am definitely a half newbie. And if I drink enough, the the accent does come out.
Erwin
Are you kidding me?
Vince
Really? It does. It does. So I would drink some water to
Erwin
make this happen. You went to town I had been in town ever. What was the last time you were in town?
Vince
Well, I moved. I moved to Edmonton six months ago. So last time I was in town was back in September for a conference there. What I’m hearing there I mean, you know, I can travel when I can when I want to at the moment not so much just because of the fatherly duties. I’m kind of strapped at home and my boss and my second boss now is not giving me any vacation time so rarely at home most of the time. But yeah, I’m from Cape Breton Island. I grew up in North Sydney Nova Scotia. That’s where I was, was where I was raised. I was like A small time boy and I grew up proud being the the Asian guy or the Asian family in town, I did have a little bit of racism there too. But it wasn’t really I didn’t think of of it as racism more so than ignorance. And it never really hindered me because I just thought it was just how people’s opinions or thoughts and I just kind of fit in with that and went on with my merry way. And but I made the move. And I was really excited to make the move out into Ontario because there wasn’t many opportunities growing up as a kid. And I guess, more small minded, if anything, and no offence to my own people there. But people don’t really think outside of the box. And so when I moved to Ontario was when I kind of started seeing more opportunities or different types of people and different views. And that really opened up my mind to really seeing more potential on things I could be doing out in Ontario. The opportunities were different.
Erwin
What was like the career path your parents had for you? Back in Cape Breton,
Vince
typical Asian parent, what do you think? Lawyer Doctor somewhere in the healthcare, some kind of professional field that has a bit of title under the name
Erwin
primary in Halifax? Or like in Toronto or New York? Like what were the toronto, toronto? So the plan path for you was to to go to Toronto
Vince
then okay, yeah. And ideally was going into like a bigger school like Toronto University. I like to say I’m one of those failed Asians, I was never good at school, I was actually really bad. I was not like an a PA student, I think, if anything, c plus two a B student horrible at math as well. So was not my strong suit. I’m not good at math. And even to this day, I’m not good at math. However, it was the fact that my trajectory was to do well in life. And that was what I wanted to do was to do well, and that was what was ingrained. And now I, I went to Toronto, I went to school at York University instead. And I graduated from Kinesiology, I actually did seven years of education prior to university was college, and I did health and fitness from there. So I wanted to stay somewhere in the health industry, at least, at least a sense of success of anything in the health industry, I was not really a doctor, but I was a kinesiologist. And I was working towards becoming a physiotherapist. But that was that was kind of where my roadblock started. And I wasn’t really making ahead in life, you know, I was making probably 30 to $40,000 a year, living downtown in Toronto. And what kind of bothered me too, was the fact that my partner, she worked at the bank, and she didn’t really go to school for that she just kind of got hooked up from one of her associates. And you know, one thing led to another, she just moved up the chain, and climbed the corporate ladder. And she’s like, you know, making 60 70,000 to 80,000. Whereas I was stuck at 30,000, and then up to $40,000. And I’m like, I studied seven years for this, and I’m working my butt off. And this is my passion. You know, this is my dream job. This is what I wanted to do. And I’m only making $40,000 a year. Whereas my partner here, didn’t go to school for this, she just kind of got the job. And then she’s just climbing the corporate ladder, and she’s making all this extra money. And I’m thinking, wow, like, that’s not fair lifestyle fair. And so she worked a lot of hours, and I worked a lot of hours trying to make ends meet. And we were together and, you know, got to a point where, you know, you’re not getting built, you’re working. And the same thing every day, you’re really busting your butt off. And you’re not really getting ahead in life, you’re not making the money that you want. You’re literally just scraping by paycheck to paycheck. And I remember like living in my little apartment in Toronto, and it used to be like cockroaches and like random bugs that I would see. And it kind of was disgusting. But we live there. And we couldn’t afford to live anywhere else. And so we just had to make ends meet. And I didn’t know there was another option. I didn’t know there was another way of doing things. I just thought you had to go to good like go to school, get good grades graduate, and then you would find a good job and job ideally with benefits. And then you would work till you’re what 6570 And you retire from there. That was the path that I was on like most people, but
Erwin
doesn’t work. So I changed like oh, you’re down the real estate path.
Vince
So what changed was when so as I was saying I was working there. I think I was working for about four years I worked four years at the time and first year was pretty good. Second year I started wondering how much more longer do I have to continue doing this third year I was like okay, is the same thing as the first year and second year and I wasn’t getting paid much more until the fourth year. That was about the time I kind of hit my I would call it you know, you heard a midlife crisis. quarter life crisis bit Sure. Mine was a quarter life crisis. I didn’t know that was even possible. So I hit my quarter life crisis that at about 26 my personal life was falling apart and I made my Bob asked excuse of why I didn’t see my friends or families for so long because I was working to be successful really. And so I haven’t seen my friends and family for about four years, I just really focused put my head down and worked hard because that’s what you were told to do. And to the point where I work myself to not being able to even see my own partner who I see only at nighttime, I see her at nighttime, we watch a little bit of TV go to sleep, and then we wake up and do the same thing over again. And so on the fourth year that our relationship was really getting a hit. And she was probably the only person I was close to at that time in life, because I haven’t seen anybody else for the longest time. And she was my only support my only communication with with a real person. And what happened was me and her, we were going through a rough patch. And she’s like, you know, this isn’t working. We thought we were gonna break up and you know, I was thinking like, maybe I should start seeing other people and I kind of started seeing somebody and it was just just to fill the void, really. And then we realised like, okay, like we’re about to break up at this point. And I had a moment when I was going to work. This was when it was like, I think it was sometime in June, back in like 2017 2018. I was heading to work and sunny, it was sunny like morning, six in the morning, I’m going to meet one of my clients one on one training. And to give you a little context of my client, he basically broke his back. And he was working as a contractor and fell off to stories. So he He almost broke his back and he’s almost paralysed. So his job was literally trying to kill him. And so I was training this guy, he’s probably one of the most negative people you’ll meet, and me and him were good. And I quite understood what he was going through because this guy, you know, his entire life is kind of upside down at the moment, he would use me as a punching bag. He would, you know, just say like Vince, you know, life’s not fair. You should treat me better, like things like that. He jokes around a lot. He always does that. One day, I was coming into work to meet him. This is the time I was going in in the morning to meet him. And I get up to the clinic. After writing the TTC, which you know, TTC is probably one of the most depressing places the public transit of Toronto, depressing place ever, especially during the winter. I was going to work and you know, I had the music blasting my ear and I was just trying to drown out my depression because that was what I was facing. I was going through a depression in my life. I was feeling so hopeless, I was lost. I was confused. My life was in shambles. I didn’t know who to talk to. I just kept everything to myself. And most most Asian guys do that as well, because you want to keep pace. You know, a lot of people show sign of weakness. And that’s what I was doing. And I got to the clinic, I started walking up the stairs and the moment I met I met eyes with my client. He started like throwing some jabs at me like Vince, why are you late at six o’clock? He should be on time. Like, hey, at 6am What should I pay you for and and the clinics open right at this time the clinic is open, it’s alive. And there are you know patients coming in and our clients coming in and out. There’s massage therapy, chiropractors, physio treatments happening, this is all the morning crowd, my my bosses, their managers, supervisors, they’re everything’s operational at that time. And I’m going into clinic, trying to put on my happy mask with a big giant crack in the middle of it. And the moment he started using me as a punching bag, I was just like, No, not not today. And I started throwing back jabs at him. And literally, like, as a professional, I was throwing down with this guy in the middle of clinic. And to the point I was like, go find a new trainer, like literally dropped the F bomb on him just completely broke apart in the middle of clinic. And I was like, Holy crap, I’m actually doing it. Like I’m actually saying, and it feels so nice to say it. But I’m like, I gotta hold myself back because it was my job or something’s gonna happen. But it just kept on coming out. It just kept on spewing. And right at that moment, I was like, Oh my god. This is my entire career that I just lit up into flames. And I’m like, Okay, I gotta really, really got to get my stuff together, because I’m probably gonna get fired very soon. And there’s, like, what am I going to do? Am I gonna live on the streets? Is my partner going to be the one that’s supporting me the whole time? Like, how am I gonna find a new job, like, all these thoughts started coming into my head, but I knew I didn’t want to work anymore. Because if I just found a new job, it’s going to be the exact same thing. It’s just me working at a place that I’m not going to find fulfilling. And I was thinking like, even if I was getting paid 50 bucks an hour, I’m not going to be making enough to survive and live a comfortable life in Toronto. So I actually went to the back of the room that at that moment, and I was I was just sitting on the computer in the office and back. And I was just pondering my life like what did I just do? Like what just happened? I’m recollecting all my thoughts and pulling my composure together. I’m on the computers searching up 26 year old don’t want to work what to do. And that was the first time I was introduced to passive income. That was the first time I was introduced to the word buyer, which stood for financial independence retire early. And then passive income, financial freedom came about. And then I started thinking, okay, so there are these people who are on this path to financial independence. And I’m I’m only learning about this. Now, I’ve never been taught this and never thought that this is even a possibility. However, people are finding ways to do it, whether it’s through real estate investing, whether it’s to stock trading, or to investing to I don’t know, any kind of vehicle that you can think of, but people are making it work. And so that was the turning point in my life that really sparked that light bulb moment of, okay, there are people figuring out how to hit financial independence and financial freedom. And so the question to me was, how do I do this? I don’t have any money. I don’t have any qualifications as as an agent or as a mortgage broker. So how do I do this? How do I start? Where do I start? So I started looking for solutions or looking for answers and start reaching out to people and seeing how they do it. Start watching podcasts like this, that gives people some kind of spark and hope that if there is a possibility, there’s different options that you can do. It’s not just one track minded, there are ways to do it. And so that day I went home, it was very humiliating. By the way, it was very shameful, like, what happened, I felt so embarrassed of everything that just like, I can’t even believe that I did it. But I went home with my tail tucked in between my legs. And I just said, you know, this is what happened at work today. I like lost my mind. And I just want to tell you that our relationship is not doing well, I’m not happy, I’m very depressed, I don’t even know what I want to do anymore. However, there’s something that I want to do, which is I want to go on this path of financial freedom. And that was when I started talking to my partner chewy, about financial independence, financial freedom, and there’s a way to be able to do it. But we got to really put our foot into it and make it a commitment in our life if we want to do better in ourselves. And I knew at the time, my time was very, was very strapped because I knew I was gonna get fired. And I was like, we got to do this, like, as soon as possible, I gotta fire my boss before she fires me. And so then, as we started looking for solutions, that was kind of when I, you know, I ended up going, going to this workshop, a three day workshop, and went there and quite sceptical. I wasn’t sure exactly what I was getting into. I didn’t know anybody that was at that workshop. And I was, I wasn’t sure if they were just trying to scam me or steal my money. However, I knew that. If I didn’t do something, my life would be exactly where it is. But if I’m willing to do this, it’s not it’s not pretty, but at least it’s better than what I’m doing now. So I took the leap of faith, and I jumped into professional training, I got myself a mentor. And that’s actually where I met Tim and Ray, who’s my mentor, and they really showed me the light on what could be possible. And
Erwin
this sorry, this was rich dad, the euro. Yeah. It was it was called that at the time,
Vince
right? Legacy, it was called legacy at the time. Oh, okay. Okay, so. Okay. Yeah. And I don’t even want to say it was legacy that that helped me get to where I was, it was the people that I associated with. That was people that helped me get to where I were, where I am today, my, my coach and my mentor who had taught me everything that I need to know, to be able to think a little differently and think outside the box. And so that was when, like, what was getting started, I think within four months, when I first got my my first real estate investment deal, like within four months after getting education minute, not having my own money starting it was the fact that I knew what I was doing. And then people that I took the same education with, they knew exactly what I knew. So they knew how to structure the same deal. Or and I was like, Well, I don’t have any money. You have the money. But you know, we have the same deal here. Let’s do a joint venture. Let’s do a 5050 split and let’s make this happen. That first deal, right in the same week. Then I had a second deal tied up right up right after. And I’m like, Wait, did you put any money in? No, that’s the thing. So yeah, 50% of the deal for doing what? For bringing a deal together, putting my knowledge and education together. Okay, right. Like that. That was the only value I brought to the table because I physically did not have money going into the deal. So what I brought to the table was the deal and my knowledge and what I’ve been taught, right, I’m sorry, the Who was your partner, another investor that was in the class with me, okay, they didn’t want to do the work. She didn’t have their first deal yet. They didn’t have their first deal. Okay, okay. First deal, right. And I was taught also at the very beginning by my coach and mentor and they’re like, you know, you never use your money for one deal. If you have a deal, share the wealth. You have your money, but your money with somebody else’s deal because someone else is gonna put their money with your deal. So you always have deals going back and forth. No more Like, that makes sense. Well, regardless, I don’t have money to put into other people’s deal. I need other people’s money to put in my deal. That’s the only way I’m going to work. And so I brought in the deal. And actually that taught me about this first deal about this first. Yeah. So this first deal. The thing is, it was a cookie cutter for the second deal. Also cookie cutter, the third deal,
Erwin
but the first cutter, but not everyone, not everyone has training. Yeah, don’t please tell me about it. What was it?
Vince
Yeah, that first deal. I think we were making $1,000 cash flow. And that was that was after a 5050 split. It was a lease option deal. That was my first strategy that I’ve learned ever in real estate investing. It was a lease option deal. And so that lease option deal, basically gave me the confidence. And I’m like, Oh, I can really do this.
Erwin
I’m really sorry, for apologies for listener doesn’t know what a lease option deal is. Please explain it.
Vince
Okay. Yeah, sorry about that. So lease option, or the street term is called rent to own. So it’s a, it’s a programme to help individuals who are looking to get into homeownership that can’t qualify for a mortgage, for whatever reason, it could be for like, let’s say, lack of downpayment, maybe they haven’t saved up enough money, maybe they have some credit issue. And the credit isn’t at the best outstanding position to qualify for mortgage, sometimes they’re just new to the country, and they don’t have established credit, or they have the money and the credit. But they haven’t lived in the country long enough, or they don’t have employment history. So there can be multiple factors that may be holding them back from being able to qualify for a home. And so somebody like myself will come along and be able to structure a rental deal, where I come in with basically the tenant who’s looking to buy a home. And the deal that I put together, which is the rent to own or lease option deal. And then I find an investor who’s willing to put the money down and qualify for the mortgage. And so when I tie all those things together, we have a programme to help that family assist them into homeownership in the next two, three, or even four years. And the goal is to ensure their success in homeownership, which I think, given our current time, right now, today’s economy, I think rent to own is, is really taking a light on because that people are starting to recognise Oh, this programme actually started this new programme called rent to own. And I know it’s not new, it’s been around for a very long time. But people are starting to recognise there is options for them to get them into homeownership. And I often like to say, as well as turning renters and homeowners and homeowners and investors, because you’ve started already establishing that relationship with them as well. So but hopefully that answers the question of rent.
Erwin
Oh, no, I have more questions. Like details? What was the first property? What was the property?
Vince
This was an Ingersoll, so we were working with the family and they were basically Hey,
Erwin
are you like yada yada, yada, a whole bunch? I went education and put the deal together. You didn’t mention that you’d like went to Ingersoll? Yeah.
Vince
So the numbers made sense in Ingersoll and that was the family that was looking for a home. And so they were from Ingersoll. And so for me, it didn’t really matter where the location was, as long as the numbers made sense. And the deal made sense. That was why I ended up doing it there. Even though I lived in Toronto. I was still renting and but I ended up helping a family. Get into homeownership prior to even me being in homeownership myself. Okay, good.
Erwin
I’ve heard of Ingersoll at least so between Woodstock in London? Yeah. So what was it? Three bedroom house? What was it?
Vince
Yeah, so three bedroom house. This was a family and he was a regional manager for furniture store, a family of two or sorry, a four. So mom, wife and husband and then two daughters, and they had a dog. And the reason they couldn’t get into a home was simply because behind us regional manager here, right? They do make he makes really good money, whilst also making good money, but they couldn’t get into a home. And the only reason why they couldn’t get into home, what was it down payment or credit, it wasn’t down payment or credit. Actually, they did have a little bit more down payment. But it was the fact that they bought four Cadillac cars, one for each one for each family member. So wife had a Cadillac, the husband had a Cadillac and the daughters both had a Cadillac. So that’s why they couldn’t afford to get into a home. So part of the programme was to help them pay down their cars, and then to buy them the time so that they can get into their own home. And so that’s why these trips to the rental on deal with them.
Erwin
That’s the first I’ve heard of the hot water before.
Vince
It was it was a it was a great experience. And as an investor, my investor who was working with us we made really good returns on it so right couldn’t complain on that deal.
Erwin
And for the listeners benefit putting together a deal is not easy. You have to go find the tenant. Yeah. Then you have find the house and the house is over an hour drive from you. Yeah, So
Vince
funny enough, like, Yeah, I had to I did drive to that property. And I did drive to see the family as well when I first started, but you’ll, you’ll soon realise that you really don’t need to see the house, you really don’t even need to see the family in person. You could relatively do everything will resume. These days,
Erwin
you’re talking about 20? I don’t know if zoom existed back in 2018. It did.
Vince
It did. I just didn’t know that I could do it. For virtual, I just wasn’t comfortable yet. Because it was my first deal. And I’m like, Well, I’m just nobody over the phone. And it looked like a baby. I didn’t have beard at the time or anything that’s like, literally looked like a baby. And I was like, Who’s this guy that’s going to trust me, and he’s a regional manager of a furniture store. And he’s looking at me like, Okay, can I even do this for him? But yeah, exactly. You know, I was really just doubting myself in my ability, because I wasn’t sure if I could do it. It was it was my first deal. I wasn’t sure this is even legit, and like how possible it was. And I was doubting my own competence. But that was the thing. Once I tied everything together, I was like, Oh, this really works. Like it actually really works. And so that that’s what I mean by cookie cutting. Because once I did that one time, I just repeated the same thing for the second time. And I repeat it for the third time and on going forward. And each time that I did it, I got better at it, it got a little bit faster, got a little bit more systems in place. And that’s why I said I, I do it’ll resume now because I don’t even have to see the property. me seeing the property doesn’t bring any value to the table. Because if I go there, I don’t know what I’m looking for in terms of the foundation, or if there’s any problems with the drywall. Like, my goal is let’s get a inspector who who’s a professional at that and leverage his abilities. And he can just drag me up the report. And I’ll look at the report to see if it makes sense. All right, I’ll ask a realtor to help me find the home because what am I going to do one MLS and look for a home for them? Like, no, let’s get the religion I helped me look for a home. And that way I can structure everything together with with the inspector and or and if the house makes sense, let’s buy the home the family and as long as the family likes the home themselves, and we’re good to go.
Erwin
Are these regular realtors and home inspectors that you’re using?
Vince
Well, a lot of them we’ve built relationships over time. And with realtors, it took some time to find one that actually made sense. And that knows what they’re doing. The first realtor that we worked on, not so well. But you know, we just have to remind them that we’re the buyers, not the tenants, though the tenants are going with you to look for the home, we are the one that are going to buy the home. So as long as the realtor is really on point and they know what the relationship is like. I think that’s that’s why it’s important to know that where they stand and where we stand in that aspect. So yeah, I wouldn’t say the regular realtors, I look for realtors that are a little bit more investor friendly. And the they know that they may have to think a little bit outside of the box as well. And as long as they can think outside the box. And they’re open for that. Those are the people I want to work with fabulous. So it depends. It depends.
Erwin
Okay, so tell me what the thing is hold property, do remember how much it was, ah,
Vince
I think it was around the 400 range. It wasn’t that expensive. And we sold it to them at a higher value, obviously for the next three or four years. And we locked in a new purchase price in the future. Despite by the way how the economy is just going crazy right now. I think right now, it’s probably going at like seven or 8%. Right now. We locked it in at about four or 5% at the time. Appreciate Oh, four or 5% appreciation per year. So for the next three or four years. And so when actually we exited out of that house, I think it was last year of September when we exited. And so they were like the tenants were like just laughing because the houses were so much more expensive. And they got it locked in at this price. We’re okay because we’re we’re looking at okay, this is a business for us. And we have a happy client right there. We still made our money that we were intending everything was agreed on and we honoured the price. And everything worked out really well. Right. So we rented it for the rent was a little bit higher that there was a bit more premium rent on that. But they I knew they could afford it. And there was also an option consideration as well, which is an additional amount that we were putting aside for them every month. So that was part of our cash flow as investors and pence. I think the cash flow was around like $2,000 a month was the total rent, the total rent, I think it was like almost 4000 Almost. That was the total the total mouth. Yeah, so not exact same the exact numbers but I’m just giving some ballpark numbers right now. But that’s what I remember from
Erwin
and then based on the rent, how much do you factor in for the to go towards the down payment for the house?
Vince
That depends. So that depends for them. We were aiming for about I think it was more than about 15% I believe it was. However, when they actually went to qualify for the home, they actually didn’t need 15%. So they actually had a little, a little bit more money saved up at the end of the day. And funnily enough, they used all the money to buy furnitures at the end. So
Erwin
they sell the catalogues. Do you even know how to stop the Cadillacs? Oh, yeah. Well, for the same way, it’s not gonna really turn over and buy New Orleans.
Vince
Yeah, that’s what happened on that first deal. So that was, that was really an eye opener. I didn’t know something that like that would be possible. It was it was crazy. It was just really like, Okay, I managed to make this happen. And I didn’t mean use my money to do it. So different perspective of looking at it
Erwin
will get you to put the hustle together to put the deal together. Yeah.
Vince
But it would have not been possible if I didn’t know what I was doing at the time. That was why I say like education was what brought me into the light of being able to make it possible.
Erwin
Did you collect the lease option fee upfront.
Vince
So the way that the rental home works, and just for the audience, the way that the I guess the cash flow, or the money works on this deal, you do get three sources of income. So there’s an active part, there’s a passive part, and then there’s an equity part at the end when you sell the home. So for them, they put a bit of a deposit upfront. So that was roughly about $10,000, that they put up front. And then there was their monthly amount that that is basically our cash flow. So the passive income from the cash flow from the 4000 rent, yeah. And then when we sold the home back to the family, that was the additional amount that we made, which was the spread of how much the cost of the value of the home in the future. So we made money off the back end as well. And so that’s where are all three streams of income being received this?
Erwin
Right. So even if you did, like 20%, down, you’re earning four to 5%. Price Appreciation per year. Yeah, yeah. times five, you’re making 20% of your money just on appreciation. Why have cashflow while you have? Why do you collect the 10? Grand up front? Yeah, yeah, if everyone works out, well, it was great.
Vince
Yeah. And that’s the thing, right? Like, I mean, if you don’t know how to do it, and you’re trying to put this all together, you could put yourself at risk, you could put your investors money at risk, you could put the family at risk. And I wouldn’t recommend people who don’t have professional training, just try to structure any type of deal if they don’t know what they’re doing. Like, you got to really take care of people’s, you know, the money and the family that you’re working with, like, these are real people. And these are live people that you’re taking responsibility for. It’s not something that you joke around with, especially if someone’s giving you the life savings, for example, it’s, it’s a real thing that you got to handle.
Erwin
I agree with you more, because you’re dealing with the property, which is your asset, the tenant is almost like your asset, because like your customer, correct. And of course, you have your investor and put the money. So everybody’s gonna be taken care of. Yeah, so that’s a great first deal.
Vince
And, you know, I want to say that I did have a lot of support along the way, like, it wasn’t just me doing it all, figuring it all by myself. Like, aside from the education, I had my mentor there guiding me all the way through, because anytime signing documents, and like the paperwork, like trying to understand all these paperwork, I was quite lost. But I had a lot of help from from my mentor. And also my partner was there as well. So my partner was played a huge factor in getting these figured out. And as I mentioned, I’m not good at math. So even crunching the numbers, I realise it’s not even about understanding math, but you can do everything on a spreadsheet if you want it to. You just punch in and go. So for the listeners right now, if you’re bad at math, don’t think that investing is all about math. It plays a role, but it’s not the key factor of financial success is just a part of it. Makes it a little bit easier. But
Erwin
yes, I’m checking numbers.
Vince
Yeah, yeah, exactly. So I had I had people checking my numbers, my mentor checked the numbers, my partner’s checking the number and everything made sense. And we just went with it.
Erwin
And then is this your primary business putting deals together? And then I’m guessing you’ve invested some in some of these as well.
Vince
Yeah. So I think fast forward from there. When I first started, most of my deals were acquisition mode. So I was out there actively acquiring properties and putting deals together and finding and raising monies for my properties. And then fast forward to today, like 2022, there’s a bit of a transition in my portfolio, because a lot of my deals are starting to mature. And I’m able to pull out a lot of equity. And finally, once in my life, I actually have money to reinvest in the the passive investor. But getting started, I think, when I was starting first and foremost, I had to be very active, and start raising all of it and doing all the work by myself. And then now I’m trying to transitioning over on the passive side where now I have the active income. And all this income that I’m utilising now is going into the passive side and I’m getting other people to invest with me and for me investing with other people. And then making sure the deals that I’m investing makes sense to me. And so I say it’s trust and verify. So in the last like three and a half years. I wasn’t just actively investing in creating deals and Lisa options, I was also still getting myself educated into more different strategies, learning how to do creative financing, learn how to do multi units and learn how to do short term rentals. So I can open my horizons on different strategies. Even if I’m not the active investor, I can now basically be able to have money from somewhere and tie up a deal and treat the deal as if it was my own because I’m looking at it like, oh, okay, the numbers make sense to me. I’m verifying the deal, despite me trusting you or not, as long as I trust you, and I verified the deal now. Okay, let’s make the deal happen. Make sense? Right. So and still the money’s not all of it coming from myself, sometimes I may borrow money from a private investor, I become the bank. But now I become the joint venture on the deal. So it kind of goes, money just kind of flows through me now as as the individual the personal value or worth of being able to put together and that’s, that’s really the magic of it. It’s quite awesome.
Erwin
Do you have a preference for investment strategy? Now? Are you doing Oh, are you doing a little bit of multi bit of short term rental but a rent to own?
Vince
I still really enjoy lease option, I think lease option, to me really a spirit of going seeing the families succeed. But I did get more into creative financing like private lending and whatnot. Sorry, you’re lending your funds. Yeah, I’m lending a lot of money out to and then of course, backed on hard assets that I believe in. So the deal makes sense to me. I’m willing to lend privately to you for the deal that you’re working on, even though not directly on the deal. And as well, I got private, sort of a private, a lot of mock teas that I’m working on as well out in New Brunswick. So there’s a few deals there. Currently a move I moved to Edmonton, as I mentioned, and we’re working on
Erwin
you mentioned that before we were recording, yeah. So
Vince
So now, yes. For the audience. I moved to Edmonton recently from Toronto. And while I’m here, I’m actually looking at a lease option deal in Calgary. So I’m in Edmonton, so it’s a three hour distance, that everything’s done over zoom, by the way, so I’m not driving to Calgary to do that. Let’s say you love this work from home business. Yeah, it’s nice. It’s quite relaxing. Let’s just say like that. And then we’re looking at a home in Edmonton as well for short term rentals. We’re dabbling a little bit in the short term rental in, in Edmonton us walls just to see how that goes. So it’s nice. So I’m quite diversified in that aspect to different real estate strategies that I’m working on. Fantastic. Yeah.
Erwin
Explain why did you move from Edmonton, Toronto? Very different segments
Vince
in Toronto’s Edmonton?
Erwin
Sorry, what? Why did you make the move? Because in the last quarter, I think we’re probably gonna see for a while, something like 20,000 folks from all over Canada are moving to Alberta. Super exciting. And then before we’re before we’re recording, even though you are from the East Coast, it seems apparently I was reading in the paper that less people from the East Coast are moving to Alberta. Yeah. You know, people right. You know, people that have had done previously made the trip people from maritimes has moved migrated to Alberta to do work in the oil sands, for example, that sort of stuff.
Vince
If you ever come to Edmonton, you’ll see, you’ll see a lot of people that who have moved from the Maritimes, to the Edmonton area, they usually have the Newfoundland sticker or the Cape Breton sticker on their on their car. So and you see it all the time in Edmonton. And it’s really cool to meet other fellow maritimers here. But at the time when I was growing up and living in Toronto, and when I was working a lot of the friends that I had in the East Coast, I guess some of them didn’t go to further education. Instead, they started working and blue collar work in town, I guess. A lot of them not even moved to Alberta at the time. They basically travelled there to work and then travelled back home. And I believe that work schedule was about working two months and then going home for a week and then working another two months. And then going home for a week that was kind of like a like a typical schedule. So a lot of people that I knew work in Fort McMurray on the oil rigs, and they were actually in the in the oil rigs themselves. But they made really good money they were making like anywhere from $200,000 and upwards. I know some people that are working on the oil rigs in the ocean from the Newfoundland side. I think they were making up like $300,000 and more. But then you got to wonder money. You gotta wonder is worth it because you’re only coming home every two months for a week and then you go back to work. And then you come back for a couple for like a week and then you go back again. So the schedule, you got to really factor in like okay, what am I missing in my life if I’m, if I’m spending all this time on the oil rig, and then you got to wonder how dangerous these positions are. Because you never know what can happen in these positions. They’re quite dangerous there and heavy and it’s very lavoris. Right. But yeah, so to answer your question, a lot of the people I’ve seen in Edmonton, there’s a lot of people that have moved to Edmonton, so a lot of my old high school or elementary school friends currently live in Edmonton, but I haven’t met up with them yet because I’ve been I’ve been here for the last six months now. And I just talked to a friend on Facebook and she’s like, Oh, I’m in Edmonton, too. And I’m like, No way. We’re in Evanston. She’s like, Oh, I’m in the metal area. I don’t even know what the metal area is yet. But she told me, she’s in Edmonton. So, you know, once I settle down a little bit more, I think I might end up reconnecting and rekindling. Some of those relationships are rare. But I moved to Edmonton simply because it was, it was kind of part of my plan in life. Because when I first started this journey back when I was 2627, by the way, when I was 27, was when I hit financial independence, I quit my job at that time. And that was when I fired my boss. So I did fire my boss before she fired me. So but at the time, we were talking about how we wanted to structure our life, what do we want to do for the next year, the year after, and this was obviously before COVID, we didn’t know COVID was going to happen. So the plan was back in 2019, into 2020. We were gonna get married, and we wanted to get married and Santorini. So we were, we were planning out our, our wedding, me and my partner were planning a wedding. And after we get married, we wanted to buy a house. And then after we buy the house, we were gonna like start family. So have a kid, that was the three year plan that we had on the agenda. And then as you know, 2019 happened and COVID happened. So we’re like, well, the Santorini plan is not going to work anymore. However, we’re still sticking to our plan, we’re still working on portfolio and, and instead of spending the money on a wedding, we just reinvested all the money to grow a portfolio. And so that’s what we did.
Erwin
And she was okay with this. She was okay that you blew up the wedding budget on houses.
Vince
It was fine. Like she’s on the same path as me. And she understood exactly what we were doing. And what was that? Wait, how did
Erwin
you get her on board, not many people would be on board with blowing the wedding budget on buying investment properties.
Vince
She was on board with me because she actually jumped into the education with me. And she was my only she was my only support. She was the only person that was there to believe in the thing that I want it. You have no idea how lucky you are. And I hear this all the time from people because it’s hard to get your other significant other on this path because you’re like, it almost seems like you’re crazy. That’s what it sounds like. And yeah, so she she was on board with me. She’s literally my my b&b partner we call in bed and business partner. So that’s what she is
Erwin
always supposed to right and better.
Vince
We basically said, you know, cancel a wedding with Asian weddings. The reason we chose that Turini was because we told our parents, generally with most Asian weddings, your family is inviting like everybody. And there’s, you don’t even know who’s at the wedding anymore. Like it’s all strangers. for yourself. Or your parents. Exactly. We chose your friends, they invite their friends. Yeah, it really it is that’s exactly what it was. And that’s why we chose Santorini. Because we said guys can invite whoever you want, won’t pay for your plane ticket will pay for accommodation. But if you invite anybody, it’s it’s your responsibility. You pay for their ticket, you pay for everything else on their end, or they pay for themselves. Yeah. But you know, the wedding never happened. So we reinvested the money for real estate properties. And as the year was progressing, really, okay, maybe COVID is not going to clear out anytime. So let’s, let’s just put the wedding on hold, who cares about the wedding. And that was when my partner came up with the idea of in loping, so that was a first time hearing about moping where instead, if we’re going to, we’re going to get married, let’s just travel the world and buy a tuxedo and a dress. And then we’ll just take pictures at different parts of the world. And then that will be our wedding instead. So that that was the second plan on on the bucket list. However, COVID really didn’t die down, like COVID kept on going strong for the year after. And it’s even to this day of 2022. It’s still around, it’s like, lingering around. It’s still around on the table, but we wanted to start a family. And as a woman, for the women listening on the call. Sometimes they’re thinking about their biological clock, they’re like, Well, I’m not getting any younger, I gotta get get this done. So we’re like, well, let’s, let’s start a family then. And so we were people were telling us like, it’s gonna take you a year you should you should start trying like as soon as possible because it’s gonna take some time. And so we’re like, Okay, let’s start trying, let’s let’s start making this happened. And everybody told us not gonna happen overnight. You’re gonna have to work at it. And everybody likes me. Everybody lied to me. It happened overnight. Sounds like Sam like now. Well, okay, we have a baby on the way. And so now we have to find a house ASAP. And so this was when all the prices were skyrocketing Ontario, like actually, even Ontario right across the country, the prices were going up, and we made the decision to move to Alberta and this was before everybody was going to Alberta. So we’re like, you know what, let’s go to Alberta because cost of living is a little bit lower. And I could definitely make my money run a lot further if I ever wanted to. travelled back to Toronto. I have a lot more money to allocate when I’m living there because cost of living was lower. Right? And so tell us how much lower What were you renting in Toronto before I was renting in Toronto. However I was living in I actually got really lucky on the rent that was at so I was in 700 square feet apartment began. This is Yong Yong and Sinclair. So wasn’t wasn’t a bad location, and I was paying a little 1500 a month. That’s cheap, very cheap. However, the fact though is, if I was raising my baby in that place, it wouldn’t make sense. Yeah, but you know, yeah, people have been been through worse, but I didn’t want to do that. Yeah, because I knew I had options on the table. This was already when I was doing financially well. And if I could choose, I would I would continue renting. That was what I would have done. We were actually planning to rent and we were looking for a place to rent in Toronto. We were looking looking for more of a home like maybe a townhouse or you know, what’s that called? Like? A two story apartment. That’s like, like, a lot, like a lot. Okay,
Erwin
a lot of our styling for a stock condo or something like that. Yeah, something like that. Yeah. Okay.
Vince
So we were looking for it. And we’re like, if we rent it somewhere like that, you’re already looking at like 2500 to 3000, maybe more every month. Or we could buy a house. Or maybe we can rent a place in Edmonton. We looked at different places. We thought about New Brunswick. We looked into Vancouver and we’re like, well, Vancouver is too expensive. New Brunswick doesn’t have anything there. There’s no food. There’s no anything. There’s no. It’s like in the middle of nowhere. Saskatchewan. In the middle of nowhere. Manitoba was in the middle, no matter
Erwin
how many more people you want to offend. What did you end up choosing?
Vince
And so we looked at, we looked at our bird and we’re like, Well, my partner is from Calgary. And she’s like, well, I don’t want to I don’t want to go Calgary because my
Erwin
Okay, yeah, because it’s nice. So,
Vince
yeah, Calgary is really nice. And they have a little bit more of more, I guess, amenities there and restaurants there. Yeah. And we’re like, let’s move to Calgary. She’s like, No, my family’s there. I don’t want to live close to my family. Okay, it was like, okay, so where’s the other option? Well, there’s Edmonton. And I’m like, Well, I’m missing gets really cold. It’s like, last time we went there was like minus 40. However, if it’s minus 40, during winter, we can always go on vacation, if we wanted to, we have extra money to allocate, let’s let’s use the money to go on vacation, then. That makes sense. And so we decided on Edmonton as the the final location of where we want to stay. And so that’s why we chose Edmonton as, as our, I guess, home base now.
Erwin
So we moved to Edmonton. And then limited, you got a house you renting,
Vince
buying a house, we were going to structure a rent to own for ourselves, but it didn’t make sense. So we didn’t end up struggling to rent a home for ourselves. Then we thought about House hacking. And we were thinking, okay, maybe we can, we can buy a duplex. And we can do a short term rental on one side, and we’ll live on the other side. And then we looked at it, it’s like, oh, it’s not worth the work in the hassle. So we’re like, Yeah, let’s just, you know, screw it. Let’s just bite the bullet. Let’s just buy a liability for ourselves. And we’ll just buy a home and we’ll pay for it. But we can afford it. So let’s just do that. And so we ended up just buying a house to screw it. Let’s just buy a house.
Erwin
So why don’t you buy three bedrooms? Something?
Vince
Yeah, so three bedroom and video contacts. I was under 700 square feet apartment. Right? This was a 1700 square feet home, not including basement. So the amount of free space I have now is not even comparable. So I’m like, okay, not even not even joking. This is like a huge, huge upgrade in my life. And I have this beautiful home and pretty much brand new and I’m raising my kid in this house now. And then, as you know, I’m living from Toronto moving to Edmonton. I have to buy a car because I can get around. So then I ended up buying a car too. So I was like, okay, I can afford to buy a car. This was my car too. Then we got a car. Awesome, like enjoying 31 years old and I bought a house bought a car. start a family. It’s kind of hard to believe for most millennials nowadays because it’s things are so expensive now. Right.
Erwin
And I’m sure people will fall behind you as well, where you’ll see more people in Alberta in the Eurasia group.
Vince
Yeah, yeah. They’ve been expanding the soil in Alberta in Edmonton, where I live anyways, the city is in the centre of a giant road around the ring. It’s we call it the ring around Edmonton. And the ring has been expanding on their their lanes so they’re they’ve been opening up new lanes to accommodate the new population boom. So which is awesome because if Edmonton is growing I’m they’re growing with it, which is awesome. Amazing. Yeah, happy. Pretty happy.
Erwin
Happy for me. Awesome. So then you see a lot, but you see a lot of deals like especially because of the year and they’re pretty active community of like Tim seems very rare. They seem extremely legit. Yeah, I know, I know all your friends there, they seem extremely legit in terms of in terms of investing, as soon as you guys invest in each other’s deal, so you must. So you see a
Vince
lot? Yeah. Well, that’s, that’s the benefit. I mean, that’s the benefit of being part of a community who’s active, who’s been educated, who have the right mindset, and who’s thinking of growing and succeeding as well. Because really, there’s no win and lose, it’s more like Win Win, like, how can I help you to help me help you because now we can work together to grow and to share the not even just our wealth, but sharing our resources, sharing our knowledge, because I’m not going to know everything. But I’m sure I can find somebody that knows what I need to look for, if I need it. I’m not going to have all the money in the world. But I know there’s people that I’m working with that have extra money sitting around that’s willing to invest. Very, very, but that’s your deal
Erwin
looks like, looks like Yeah, yeah. And
Vince
even if you were, for example, like let’s say you’re in Ontario, just because you’re Ontario, you you’re not going to know everything about Ontario. And if you are looking to invest into other places, like different provinces, or if you’re planning to go to the states, if you know, people who are, who are actively engaged, they’re actively investing there, that knows that market better than you, right? You have somebody that’s ready to go, right. And you could be the same person in Ontario, who knows the Ontario market. So if I needed something like, oh, we jump to you?
Erwin
Right, right. And you share values, you’re, of course, I’m destined, you’re all protective of your reputation within the community as well,
Vince
for sure. I think the reputation, my mentor always says, you are only as great as your last your last deal. Honestly, honestly, the truth, right, and it’s not about the money. It’s about the relationships that you built and the reputation that you’ve created. And if anything, it’s it’s always thinking about how you provide value over profit? Is the profits, just the byproduct of what you’re gonna get? What kind of value are you actually providing to the people that you’re working with? Because that’s, that’s where the real thing is amazing.
Erwin
Now, what’s your what’s your current deal that you’re working on?
Vince
So the current deal, I have a few Maltese in New Brunswick. And then I got the short term rental that we’re looking for right now. And then the lease option deal that will work in in Calgary, that’s probably the bulk of it. And then I made, I think, two private loans, just in the last four months. And so I got those data just leveraged out recently. So that’s pretty much everything that’s on my plate right now. And in terms of my own personal business,
Erwin
right, so you have your hands on a bunch of things, how many hours a week, are you working?
Vince
Funny enough? It’s not as crazy as people think. Even going back to a lease option deal, you’re, you’re probably spending total it does take like maybe three months to put everything together. But in total hours spent, you’re probably spending about 10 to 15 hours in total, putting everything together. It’s just making a few phone calls here talking to a few power teams over here. And you know, just putting some of the numbers together here and all accumulative like on a lease option deal, you’re probably looking at 10 to 15 hours in total. Something with multis, it may take a little bit longer, because there’s ongoing moving pieces that are consistently moving and progressing. So
Erwin
there’s renovations that are always going on. Yeah, exactly. So
Vince
that that probably takes a little bit more time it takes time to stabilise the portfolio in terms of novelties, but it’s not as what people think of it, it’s not like, you know, you’re like pulling out your hair unless you’re going through some really big, big problems in your in your portfolio. But in terms of hours, I mean, you’re really just allocating time where needed. And remember, we’re not looking to do this to buy ourselves a new job, we’re doing this the buyer sells more time. And so how you decide on allocating your time and even if anything, is creating a system around the processes that you’re doing it so that way it becomes more streamlined, just like the lease option deal. My first deal probably took more than 10 hours to put together because I actually had the drive there, meet the client meet the realtor, look at the property that probably took a lot more time but now it’s like okay zoom call, one hour call zoom call with my mortgage broker one hour call and and then talk to my relative another hour call. So it’s like it’s not as time consuming as you think it is. Awesome.
Erwin
So Ashley, can you tell us about your Calgary rent to own I’d love to have something to compare against Ingersoll
Vince
this this property that we’re we’re still in the process of putting together this one is $400,000 property that we’re aiming for.
Erwin
Oh, so inflation didn’t happen.
Vince
So we’re still in the process of getting the deal structure. So we do have a family and she’s from India. The reason why she’s looking to get into rent to own is that they are currently living with their parents and I guess they’re trying to be independent and live on their own to have them like a kid. On the way I think, and basically they’re they’re looking for a way to actually buy their own home, but they’re not in the position because they don’t have the downpayment saved up, and credit scores, perfect that no problem with credit score at all. So their their main reasons that they don’t have the downpayment, that’s the main thing that they’re lacking. Now, basically, the husband is the one who is looking to qualify for the home on his own, because he’s the one he’s the breadwinner, and family, he makes the most money. However, we’re planning to factor her income as well. So with her income comes into the picture, we’re looking at maximum, I think, like $430,000 as a home purchase price. So actually, sorry, home purchase price would be less than that, because that’s the appreciate. That’s what we’re selling the home back to them at 454 50 Max 430 is what we’re aiming for four days, the maximum that they will be able to qualify for at the end of the programme. So the house that we’re looking at would be what’s the value of it today? Probably, I think we’re looking at like 375 or something around that price point. And then the appreciated value after the three years would be able for 50. Max. Hopefully that makes sense for the audience.
Erwin
Are you taking any money upfront?
Vince
We are so we’re looking at $10,000 upfront. And the cash flow, we’re not sure yet because we don’t know what the price of the home is going to be. But we’re still working
Erwin
with you have a some sort of benchmark for rent, though.
Vince
The rent are probably looking around. So if it’s around 375, we’re probably looking at 1800 $2,000 Just as rent on its own just rent, not including the option not including anything else is just the rent on its own.
Erwin
Got it. And then once you know what the what’s what’s know what the host is going to be Ben, you’ll factor in, Yeah, unfortunately goes towards the down payment.
Vince
Exactly. Well, we got to factor in, we got to factor in our cost of carrying the mortgage as well, because we’ll be carrying the mortgage, the interest rate may be a little bit higher for us as well, because of obviously, what’s happening with the economy. So depending on what the interest rate that we’re getting at them, we can really figure out what the what the rent should should be sitting around for them as, as the renters of the property. The numbers aren’t set yet. We’re still working in the process with with our mortgage broker. Right now, once we get the numbers finalised, the next step is getting him into talking with the real estate agent. Amazing example. Yeah, Nothing’s set yet everything’s still up in the air. But I think things are really progressing slowly through the process.
Erwin
And what do you see going forward? Like? No, these are pretty rocky times. We’re recording this late November 2020.
Vince
This is a good question, because nobody knows what the future holds.
Erwin
I’m sure you already are Yeah.
Vince
Yeah, so of course, I’m always adjusting pivoting and just changing with the times, despite the fact that interest rates are going up. I mean, property values gone down like crazy, which is perfect time for anybody, if you make if you actually calculate the numbers, and it just makes sense, despite the interest rates are up. But you got to think about it like, Okay, I thought about like, Okay, if interest rates are going up, prices of properties are going down. Do you think maybe that there may be foreclosures coming up, maybe during the recession, as things get a little bit harder may be a good opportunity for investors who are educated to take hold of opportunities that are presenting themselves. And I always say, as an investor, we’re there to solve problems. And when a recession does happen, and if and if and when it does happen, I don’t know if we’re living in one right now. Or if it’s just gonna get worse from here. When that recession happens, as a problem solver, there’s gonna be a lot of opportunities are presenting itself. And if you are not prepared for these opportunities, then you’re missing it, you’re missing the boat. And one day, down the road, people are gonna say, well, Vince, you got lucky you are there at the right time at the right moment. And you took advantage of of the recession. I’m like, No, yeah, definitely. I was there at the right time. But you were there, too. What were you doing at the time when I was doing it? And the biggest difference would be the fact that I was prepared. I got myself educated, I got the skills, I got the knowledge, I got the right people around me have all my ducks in order. So when I need anything I can I can always reach out to somebody to prepare myself for when those opportunities present themselves because it’s fair game, anybody and everybody has those opportunities, equal opportunities, but it’s really, do you see the opportunity? And if you do, do you know how to act on? Because if not, you missed it. That’s the sad reality of it. And I don’t want to, you know, punch anybody in the gods, but that’s just the truth of it.
Erwin
So is the truth about real estate investing events? I actually think it’s a great way to end in the interview. where can folks follow up with you if they want to follow on your journey?
Vince
Oh, yeah, so you can always follow me on on Instagram. It’s the only events you can also find me on Facebook is the only Vince and also take a look at trust your talent is trusted.
Erwin
Literally, it’s the only events because the only a few go to LinkedIn and type instantly. Too many. So you specifically it is type in the only Vince Lee is the
Vince
only Bensley, I’m the only one.
Erwin
Like type that you can
Vince
also find me at trust your talent on Instagram, we’re really active on that as well. So it’s trust, and then you are and then talent. So you find me as as well there and a lot of stories and students to connect with as well. But you can find me on Facebook as well. I’m very active on Facebook, don’t hesitate to reach out, I’m always open to a conversation. No matter where you are in your journey in your life. Sometimes it just takes that one conversation to really change the perspective of what you believe in what you see the world. And I think it’s not just about how, how to do something, but also who you know about doing something. Because once you meet that person, they may give you a different perspective. And you’re like, Oh, I never thought of it that way. And that might set you on the right path and what you need to do, right?
Erwin
So speaking right paths, have you staved off the bad dad bod.
Vince
I still have a dad, I still have it. I bought
Erwin
whatever buddy. You gotta be the most jacked guy in your group.
Vince
Remember, it’s no different than financials, health and fitness is no different than financial, you don’t have to be, you know, like, you don’t have to be like an accountant or a lawyer to be you know, well versed in it. You just need to understand finances and you need to understand how money works to be able to create financial success. Same with the dad bod. If you want to learn how to be healthy, you got to learn it. You don’t have to be a fitness trainer or a kinesiologist you just need to know how it works. And nowadays, I look at labels before I buy any food. I’m looking at it like oh, yeah, that makes sense. Like okay, before I buy it because it’s innate and needs part of my lifestyle. So when I buy properties, I do the same thing. I’m like, I’m looking at the labels and Okay, does this make sense to me before I buy it? It’s the same idea. Amazing. So
Erwin
FYI, folks, you’re running events, and he’s jacked up because he’s jacked. All right. So because you can’t tell him or zoom that he’s Jack, but he’s Jack. All right, Vince, thanks so much for doing this. Congrats on your success, man. Happy to hear you. Yeah, yeah, let me know next time you’re in town. I got to make one of these. One of Tim’s events. didn’t raise it. Yeah.
Vince
Thanks so much for for all your support and happy having having me on the podcast as well. She thanked
Erwin
him for that.
Vince
Every weekend. Thank you. Take care. Have a good one.
Erwin
Before you go if you’re interested in learning more about an alternative means of cash flowing like 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 were 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 your pocket like it did on a recent basement flood at my student rental in St. Catharines. Ontario. If you’re interested in learning more but secure 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 what 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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