Is This Market The Next Investing Frontier ?

[00:00:00] Welcome to the Canadian Real Estate Investor, where host Daniel Foch and Nick Hill navigate the market and provide the tools and insights to build your real estate portfolio.

[00:00:42] I know that it's a great Lord down here, the late Lord down here. Saskatoon is one of the topics of discussion today. Saskatoon also known as the Paris of the Prairies and is known for that because of its eight bridges

[00:01:01] that span the South Saskatchewan River. In a few minutes we will be going to speak with a local real estate legend who resides in the Paris of the Prairies and they're going to tell us about the opportunities in the province and what's going on on the ground there.

[00:01:18] Exactly. Before we do that, just for a reminder, my name is Nick Hill. I may mortgage agent and a real state investor. I'm joined every Tuesday and Friday by my dear friend and co-host Daniel Foch who is also

[00:01:30] a real estate agent and a real estate investor. And then before we get into the interview section here, I wanted two things. One, we've got a one just kind of reminder and now it's been for everybody

[00:01:42] as well as you know we got to go over some of the good statistics that are coming out of Saskatchewan right now. So I'll do the reminder and then we can get into the statistics.

[00:01:51] Reminder is the Dan and I are going to be in Calgary for the Stampede. That's right. Get up Tuesday. Get up. Get up baby Tuesday. For you for acting that I'm here earlier. I've just been

[00:02:05] waiting to say it for so long. And I'm going to say it a whole bunch of times Tuesday, July 9th, Dan and I will be there in full Cowboy gear. Dan's been begging me he's like we got to find

[00:02:16] a mechanical bowl on my carolax dude. Come out and see us. There's already over 100 people RSVP. So very exciting. I think there's people from Toronto that are coming, people from Vancouver. She'll be a really great time. So that was the one announcement.

[00:02:32] Whatever you do, don't water your lawns and anticipation of us coming because that's illegal in Calgary right now. There are water-made broke. Yeah. Like their water-made broken. You can like only have showers and drink water. Seriously, I'm not joking at all. There you go. We'll

[00:02:47] likely we don't have any lawn to water in Calgary but maybe have a couple of waters when we get there. So yeah July 9th, see you there, links in the show notes. Check it out, get you up.

[00:02:57] So now we're going to cross the border to Saskatchewan again and talk about the population of Saskatchewan which is just 1.23 million as of April 2024, which is it's a big increase from 2023, about 30,000 more people so you've got like a small town moving to Saskatchewan every year.

[00:03:18] The population increased by 0.5% over the previous quarter, eighth in percentage change among the provinces. It's interesting because as we said, the inter-provincial migration that we've covered a lot on this show specifically to certain provinces, giddy up type of provinces have been crazy and again going back to Saskatchewan

[00:03:40] in general it just seems to be overlooked by a lot of investors and I think we might be trying to fix that, at least offer our own investment thesis. Bordered by to the West Alberta to the North

[00:03:55] the Northwest territories and on the East by Manitoba to the North East by none of it and to the South Montana and North Dakota Saskatchewan and Alberta actually are the only land-locked provinces in Canada. Montana is a vibe too, like because of John Dutton,

[00:04:17] yellowstone baby. Right. So residents live primarily in the southern prairie half of the province while the northern half is mostly forced to and sparsely populate it. Roughly half live in the province as large a city, Saskatoon or the provincial capital, Regina. So 50% of the population in Saskatoon or

[00:04:38] sorry Saskatchewan lives in urban areas either Saskatoon or Regina. Other notable cities include Prince Albert, Moose Shaw which one of our members from our courses do in a cool deal in Moose Shaw. New Yorked in Swift Current, North Battleford, Esteban,

[00:04:54] Weber and Malph, Furt is that right in Malphurt there's a those hard to read I don't know why and the border city of Lloyd Minister which we've talked about before although I think we made some mistakes when we're talking about it because we are just ignorant trontonians.

[00:05:11] Sorry about that by the way. Yeah, yeah we were working on it. Actually before I was on a Saskatchewan focus podcast when I was out there called The Anicto and I want to give a shout out to those guys

[00:05:22] because they were awesome and we neither risk a coordinate time that timing very well given the different times zones and so they were very forgiving about my difficulty in booking and I

[00:05:34] felt like such a Tony Toronto in I kept actually standing. You better do better man. Yeah that's it Tony Toronto is a living in the stick strength drive pickup trucks that's what I heard. On that note

[00:05:49] as well as another event announcement we are out launching an event with actually the amazing person that we're having on this show so that is going to be a September launch so stay tuned for

[00:06:02] hoping to have any and all investors, real estate professionals you name it to come out to that event. Yeah and I think like once you listen to this host you'll realize like we're really leveling up our

[00:06:15] host game. No offense you're existing hosts but like we just keep adding hosts of this caliber right? Like they're you know we got the awesome group of in Calgary that they've grown this to the

[00:06:23] biggest meetup in the country. You've got the biggest wholesaler in the Calgary market one of the biggest lenders, burr focused lenders sponsoring this event. We're so grateful to have and then we just onboarded a ton of amazing hosts in the GTA market these meetups are really

[00:06:39] really getting momentum if you want to get out there see touch and feel what's going on in the real estate market right now and actually do deals and meet with other investors like there is a

[00:06:47] lot happening a lot and there's a lot of really really cool really qualified people at all of these events right now so I'm just so fired up about it that's me being and you know I don't really get fired

[00:06:59] up about anything like I don't really like I just kind of monitor and never really but these meetups I've been really inspired by the by what's going on with them. I really have yeah and I completely

[00:07:09] agree man it it's every day you know just seeing the numbers on the meetup grow and you know having having access to people like Carlo you're gonna be hearing from in a few minutes and and her

[00:07:21] network within these investment markets across Canada it's really cool so before we get into the interview let's just quickly touch on Saskatchewan's economy and then I want to look at a little bit

[00:07:31] of house prices, Dana and Emwood Ivan the interview so you know if we look at historically Saskatchewan's economy was primarily based off of you probably guessed it agriculture with wheat being even the

[00:07:43] precious symbol on the province is flag that's how important it was to them and still is you know they were working on increasing diversification outside of just agriculture so forestry as we said

[00:07:55] kind of the top half of the province is forested heavily fishing there are a series of rivers and lakes in Saskatchewan and of course hunting they only make up less than 10% of the province's GDP

[00:08:07] and I goes back to 2018 beef cattle production is the only exceeded by Alberta which again was probably pretty obvious from most Canadians but Saskatchewan produces the second most beef cattle and that is

[00:08:22] turning into a larger part of their GDP dude wasn't there an episode of a fellow stone where the cattle went into Canada that happened I'm not that happened actually totally did it was

[00:08:34] Saskatchewan and it was like the county's like the the mountain's I think like yeah these belong to Saskatchewan man anyway another industry that everybody knows we're pretty bullish on I do

[00:08:46] really enjoy my red meat so that's that's one that I like a lot and bullish being the operative pun word here yes love but mining mining to me is like look tiff macham came out a couple of days ago

[00:08:59] and said Canada's an productivity emergency it's not the first time a central banker has mentioned this the only way like quite literally the only way out of this issue that we're facing as a country is

[00:09:11] too diversifier economy and to double down on the resource economy that we have and mining is a major industry in the province of Saskatchewan as well as I think there's a largest exporter of potash

[00:09:23] and uranium so potash being I think it's a fertilizer and uranium being a theme in James Bond movies is what it's primarily exported for I think oil and natural gas production is also a very important

[00:09:41] to Saskatchewan's economy so classic over time yeah I mean you see they've got all these these resources and again like that will eventually be noticed and what is also noticeable right now is the affordability of their housing market just probably what you want to hear about considering

[00:09:58] this is the Canadian real estate investor podcast so whether you're buying or renting the cost of living in Saskatchewan are significantly lower than most of the provinces Dan let's go province for province here and I chose these ones because these are no one as other more affordable

[00:10:14] markets here from a provincial level so this is a province and then their average home price as of May 2024 yeah so the average home price is by province is Manitoba 370 1000 new Brunswick 338000 Saskatchewan 328000 and Newfoundland and Labrador 306000 and in regards to what you mentioned

[00:10:38] about the affordable housing but also in these other parts of the economy that are that fair better in in recessionary environments people one of the things so for those of you don't know this I went out and did a presentation to the Saskatchewan realtor's association last last I

[00:10:55] sort of in the boat this time last year I think September till birthday last year and it was great I loved it I really love meeting everybody shout out to Saskatchewan huge fan and the Saskatchewan

[00:11:05] realtor's association but what I learned was in my research that I was presenting to this group people Saskatchewan like if you go back and look at every single recession in the past 100 years

[00:11:15] people move to Saskatchewan during recessionary periods oh yeah so and so to get you on calling right well I mean it like you know it seems like you see this huge inflow of people probably chasing

[00:11:27] that affordability lower bottom line but better job market right more affordable cost of living so it has all the makings of a place that you could go for refuge from a bad economy yeah really

[00:11:37] really interesting stuff Dan I mean you know we have seen the Saskatchewan housing market in a bit of an upper trajectory again at average house price as at 320 thousand that's a 1.1% increase from the

[00:11:49] previous month so getting fairly into the weeds here the province did record 1841 sales in May of 2024 and that's actually up 12% from the previous month now funny little anecdote here for for the people that live in the more expensive market Saskatchewan broken all time price record in May of 2024

[00:12:11] get this Dan with the benchmark home price climbing to a whopping 340 thousand dollars so yes that broke records in Saskatchewan now let's compare that to the national average sole price of 699 thousand 170 dollars call it 700 thousand so literally half right yeah that's wild and I think

[00:12:35] you know there's a lot of opportunity here I was just browsing like unreal 3.ca looking at some deals as well it's funny like I said all these condos as well like because I'm just like

[00:12:45] yeah I'm gonna buy far away maybe condo makes sense and you know we talked about the missing middle a lot on the show but like feels like half of these condos are in like 3-4 story building so

[00:12:54] I think we found the missing middle it's in Saskatchewan but yeah lots of opportunities there's deals hitting the 1% rule actual birds and less bears to enter the making a really compelling

[00:13:05] place for out of province investors to look at as well and and as we get into that one of the things that's really really worth mentioning here is that Carla is our resident expert in the realist

[00:13:14] dot c.a.course for getting people set up in the Saskatchewan market so one of the features that we offer in that course is that we are connecting people with local experts boots on the ground who have

[00:13:25] experience you can find the best deals you can source the best deals help you set up an actual business of investing in real estate so that you can not fail at being a long distance investor

[00:13:37] you can set up the proper business to start investing in a market that's far away and so if you like which she has to say and you want to learn to invest in the Saskatchewan

[00:13:46] market we would love to set up a call with you and chat about if we can get you in as a fit for the realist dot c.a. program there's a free program as well we do free webinars you guys know

[00:13:57] we love giving away free information so check out realist dot c.a. sign up for the free group give us a shout if you want to book a book a call for the paid group yeah yeah really well said

[00:14:07] then super stoked when Carla agreed to not only come on as a podcast guest but to also join the course and you know very humbled and flattered to hear that she'd been a long time

[00:14:20] listener and was very excited to get involved with us so you know Carla has decades of experience in ownership in both property management and real estate brokerages owning building them real estate investments for herself and her clients she's worked with clients across the country

[00:14:38] whether you're a local investor or an out of province investor she has service every type of client and we were lucky enough to have her on today to get her insights so Dan without further

[00:14:48] do let's bring in our dear friend of the show and now partner Carla Brown. We are back with another exciting interview on the Canadian real estate investor podcast today we have somebody who will be beginning in our sphere with the meetups in September and a

[00:15:09] market that we've talked a lot about on the show one that I'm I'm I've expressed that I'm bullish on simply because it hasn't really been inflated like any other market in Canada seems to be a pretty balanced landlord and tenantsist good opportunities and huge potential growth in their

[00:15:28] economy so without I guess without dragging people along too far I'm talking about Saskatchewan and today we're joined by the lovely Carla Brown who will be hosting our meetups in Saskatoon

[00:15:43] starting in September and Nick and I are going to go out and help launch that very excited to do that very excited to meet the wonderful people of Saskatchewan and hear about all the good things going

[00:15:52] on the ground there so Carla thank you for joining us could you give us a quick little introduction on what you do I know you do many things in the real estate space so if you could maybe

[00:16:02] just give us an idea of what you're what you're working on today and who you are and where you are in Canada okay thank you thanks for having me Nick and Daniel in the podcast I'm super excited to be

[00:16:16] here I've been a fan for a long time of your many many episodes myself Carla Brown I own a property management company here in Saskatoon Saskatchewan real property management professionals and I also currently hold a role with our national franchise or organization the charwood

[00:16:36] Pacific group as the SVP of integration going back many years you guys are much younger than than I am but I've been around playing in all kinds of things real estate for about 30 years

[00:16:48] and started out in the real estate like in the real estate office and our real estate office then branched into mortgage brokerage when mortgage brokerage wasn't cool it was pretty much the back

[00:17:00] of the alley that you got a mortgage in when you're trying to sell what is your well it's certainly certainly a lot cooler than what it used to be when you couldn't get a mortgage at a in traditional

[00:17:11] financial institution you would maybe look at a mortgage broker and so we we knew that there was such synergy between those two industries and that I guess the consumer also needed needed deserved choice rather than just walking into their bank they needed to be able to see what

[00:17:28] their options were and real estate back then wasn't as I guess maybe as complex as what it is now so sometimes you know obviously getting financing is a lot more complex for some than others

[00:17:39] and having a mortgage broker that knows their stuff is definitely helpful and then I saw such a need and Saskatchewan for very customer based strong property management I guess by strong property management I like to refer to it more as asset management where I really believe in

[00:17:59] we're here to maximize the R investors properties of their investments and we do that by making sure that we're providing good strong homes to tenants and all the stuff that goes that goes along with that so those three industries between real estate mortgage brokerage and property management

[00:18:17] I think that they're so linked together which ties into my role with the franchise or but I like anything real estate I've just totally being entrenched in for as many years as I

[00:18:28] have been believe in what the real estate asset can do and how that is so important from whether it's just homeownership or from an investing standpoint. Yeah it's you know it's great to hear such a

[00:18:42] well-rounded breadth of experience and you're right I think each one of those disciplines really lend it hand to the next one and you know it's kind of that that old outage of jack-valtraids

[00:18:57] master of none which is which is frowned upon in a lot of ways but in real estate I really feel like jack-valtraids is its own role in a sense because you really are an aggregator of people in ways

[00:19:10] and you can go find each one of those masters in their own discipline but you know PM for me in real estate yes property management project management but it really is people management

[00:19:22] and currently you've seen have done a really great job at that over the last several years that you've been in in the business there you know I think one of the things we really want to

[00:19:32] really want to explore in this episode is the province of Saskatchewan specifically your market Saskatchewan and and and some of the the challenges but more so the opportunities that lie within that that city and and that province so what would you say some of the biggest opportunities

[00:19:54] that you're seeing maybe in the province if you want to speak to that and then we can kind of zone in on on Saskatchewan specifically what would you say some of the biggest opportunities

[00:20:04] maybe not even real estate specific we can kind of get there but what are the big opportunities in Saskatchewan right now? Well for opportunities since Saskatchewan I think are all over first of all I've Saskatchewan is unique where there are our smaller bedroom communities I think

[00:20:22] are still very very strong and we've seen a lot of other provinces where people have moved out from like small town into what the bigger centers are but if you grew up in a smaller center

[00:20:34] in Saskatchewan there's a good chance you want to stay there as long as there's opportunity for employment so we see them I guess kind of looked over a lot of times and so there is definitely

[00:20:45] a market there and then when I move specifically in Saskatchewan there's so much opportunity to densify here where we're we're way behind the equal when it comes to from a municipal standpoint and provincial standpoint on legislation to allow people to to densify as they have been doing

[00:21:05] in all of these provinces on the outside of us but we're just getting to that point now where our municipalities are saying no we need to do this we we have a housing shortage however we're

[00:21:16] going to solve this and so now we're seeing we're seeing developers going in and they're not just building or so there's not selling lots they're building a purpose built which they weren't doing

[00:21:27] widely before so whether that be you know a multiplex we're seeing a lot of people going in and saying okay now I'm gonna build a house so I'm gonna put a sweet in the basement and oh I can now

[00:21:39] put this this auxiliary dwelling on this property as well so how is that all gonna work and we're just on the cusp of seeing that come alive it's just going through and I know it's it sounds easier

[00:21:52] let's just build another property on this lot then what it really is there's a lot of things that have to go into it obviously and you guys are probably very well versed in that but as far as

[00:22:00] opportunity we have all of we have employment here we have lots of resources that are bringing people here we have tech here we have like a really strong tech community in Saskatchewan a specifically

[00:22:13] here in Saskatoon that a lot of people don't even know about some tech development that's going on and of course then we have schooling as well like we have a university's in both Regina and Saskatoon

[00:22:24] that will always drive that investment market as well there's but I would say if I had just really stress it it would be the densification there's opportunity here for investors to

[00:22:36] come in or a local investors to do something more with the lots that that just the simple lot that's there and to my understanding like the ownership of land in the two different cities and

[00:22:48] Saskatchewan it makes Saskatoon a little bit more opportune for that like given I think Regina has a lot of legacy landowners a lot of older land bankers who have a lot of older parcels then large parcels whereas I think Saskatoon has a little bit more private ownership and

[00:23:04] ability to kind of take some of those are you seeing like smaller land assemblers or owners or infill developers actually making an impact on the market and being able to earn good returns

[00:23:16] in the market today there yes and I'm glad you touched on the differences between Regina and Saskatoon they are there when I had my real estate company that I owned with my partners we had

[00:23:28] offices in Regina Prince Albert, Moose John and Saskatoon and Regina and Saskatoon being our two bigger real estate offices and we would do a presentation in Saskatoon to our realtors

[00:23:42] and then we would drive two and a half hours to Regina and do a presentation and we would have to have totally different spin on it the mentality in Regina as a government city it is it is very different

[00:23:53] Saskatoon is very entrepreneurial a lot more they're not as risk adverse they're willing to take those those steps and look at different types of opportunities where Regina hasn't typically done that so we do see a lot of things happening here in Saskatoon and then it'll build try it

[00:24:11] in in Regina but in saying that I think there's opportunity for both I know developers that are in both markets and doing quite well yeah fascinating so Carla you know a lot of the stuff that we

[00:24:26] talk about and teach Dan and I both being from the GTA me growing up in Vancouver those markets have one thing in common that's extremely expensive real estate and I guess low cap rates you know

[00:24:40] not great returns on your investment but as we go further out you know we have that drive to qualify drive to the quantify mentality that being said we've seen a lot of inter-provential migration and not even people actually moving but people even just taking advantage or optimize

[00:25:00] not inter-provential migration and investing in those other provinces so what are some of the things that an outside investor say someone from the GTA if they were going to invest in Saskatoon

[00:25:16] what are some of the things that they should be aware of you know not being a local there but wanting to invest in that and real estate in that community yeah if they're going to invest in in real

[00:25:27] safe here and honestly I have an Ontario investor call our office at least once a week so this is something that's happening all the time we actually have an investor coming in on Monday go looking at

[00:25:39] buildings but we really stress that it's important to try to to understand that you're going to need a team of people so investing outside of your own backyard I think is very common place now

[00:25:49] it certainly wasn't years ago people got their first investment property that was in the neighborhood over to them so they could drive by at every day but they need to be very reassured that who they're

[00:25:58] dealing with understands the market here and because I have seen investors get burned where they're just handing money over to somebody that's come out to Ontario and done a great presentation and they

[00:26:09] really really really burnt because they had no idea where they were actually buying and what kind of tenant they were looking at so I always say to investors okay what what feels good to you like what

[00:26:18] you're looking at investing who do you see living there because if an investor buy something and all of a sudden they think they're in their vision they're looking at servicing the student population

[00:26:29] and now you're moving in you know seniors that might not be the right prop that might not be the same property we need to understand how they're what they're seeing as their vision of investing

[00:26:41] and then we can start looking at the properties I will introduce them to different realtors in our market that specialize in what they're looking for whether it's single family townhouse condo where they're starting multi-plex whatever they want to start their investment journey here in

[00:26:57] Saskatchewan and then they're going to need the rest of the power team so they need a property manager obviously they need a realtor they're going to need a mortgage broker who understands investing

[00:27:08] in our province if they don't already have one they're going to need some if they don't already have an accountant in the air then I can make recommendations or they might have one coming in

[00:27:17] so they need to talk about they need to talk to people it's not enough just to find a realtor because unfortunately I know realtor's my whole professional life has been working with them

[00:27:28] most of them do not understand really understand the rental market so we need to be able to tell them you know what the activity is currently in the market there what we've seen in the last

[00:27:39] couple years what we think that might look like in the future and what kind of demographic that's going to attract and there's a lot that goes on into it it's not just a matter of you know pulling

[00:27:50] rents out of thin air or taking a quick look on rent faster rentals.ca and seeing what a two-bedroom townhouse is going for if there's more to it than that when you try to analyze a rental and

[00:28:02] we can give them that information so I say you know what are you looking for let's talk to a realtor let's pull off the MLS numbers that you're interested in let me do an analysis for you

[00:28:13] and then you can really start shopping they don't have to come here like they they can but they don't have to as long as they they have these people that are working for them and they really

[00:28:23] they really dig into it I mean technology allows us to show a lot of things without them physically being here we've taken possession for a number of our out-of-probents investors and we certainly

[00:28:33] can do that if they don't want to make the trip when they're investing amazing I can hear your phone ringing already from Ontario listeners here they're going to be calling you for for deals

[00:28:48] let's let's talk about some of those those deals that you're that you're seeing maybe and maybe some of the strategies that you're working out we again we've talked about things like the burst strategy I think Dan and I had a controversial episode early on that the burn method

[00:29:04] doesn't work in Canada anymore and you know I think we were we were writing some cases that doesn't work in Ontario anymore but I think we were wrong in the sense that it does work in

[00:29:14] parts of Canada for sure the burn method the 1% rule all these kind of legacy real estate investing principles that it really worked for the last 20 years and you know the greatest bull running history

[00:29:25] but they're not really working in some of the major markets but they are working in Saskatchewan so tell us what kind of deals you're seeing what kind of strategies are working for your clients and

[00:29:36] and your investors. You know similar to you know looking at the the densification I think that the renovation part is is big I think there's a lot of stressed buildings that definitely could

[00:29:49] someone could be able to do very very well if you're coming from out of province that that you know involves a whole nether set of people to work with so that's again why it's really important

[00:30:00] to develop a relationship with you know that people like within my office and your real tourist that you're making sure that you're getting the vendors and the trades that you need in

[00:30:08] order to work on those buildings but a lot of them are you know in order to cash fly would say minor things that need to be done a lot of time because we're seeing a lot of demand in the rental industry

[00:30:20] so as long as we're able to what a safe home I never recommend you know a peg on a lipstick type of strategy before you're when you're moving people in we're trying to get a safe home for tenants

[00:30:34] but sometimes you don't it can be very cost effective to do that if you're doing that out of province you definitely want to have some strong relationships I'm you know I'm a strong believer

[00:30:43] in by and hold I'm in property management so obviously I believe in the you know the legacy of what that real estate asset can do over time and also being here in Saskatchewan we've never seen

[00:30:55] a point in time where we haven't seen prices prices increasing for the most part even though we don't see like super spikes like in spree seeing other provinces we're seeing this very steady you

[00:31:06] know way of investing so that's probably the one that's nearest and nearest to my heart but I think there's all kind of strategies that will work in Saskatchewan the deals that we're seeing

[00:31:18] for the most part are buy and hold but I will back that up we're seeing a lot of people now looking at some of the smaller multiplexes and we have a lot here and quite a few that are on the market

[00:31:29] and I think those ones are going to bring in some different strategies strategy people in in order to to take over them and that's that's that's really interesting to me actually because I think that's a different way for us to get more inventory on the market that is

[00:31:46] that's good for tenants good quality properties one of the things we spoke about before we kind of got into the recording was you know I've always been of the perspective that some of these

[00:31:57] more affordable markets are as a landlord like if you're renting to people you're where you were I think competing with home ownership really as like the primary competitor to renting but it seems like you've observed that there's a trend towards people just choosing to rent

[00:32:15] or you know it's not house prices like in in Saskatchewan I don't think it's house prices alone that are making it unaffordable and so with interest rates still being high people are choosing

[00:32:26] to rent simply because it's the better financial decision or whatever it is and this is a trend we've observed in other markets and Canada you know over the last 10 years is this something that you're you're seeing take place in the urban areas in Saskatchewan and something that you

[00:32:42] expect to continue like just that you'll have a growing tenant pool simply because of the pure financial decision and what does that look like from your perspective yeah I would go back you know eight ten years ago definitely people rent rented a property because I couldn't afford

[00:32:58] to buy a property and it was just this natural way of thinking in Saskatchewan that you grew up and you rented and then you saved money and you bought a home and that is definitely not what we

[00:33:08] see now the people that have migrated from other provinces didn't have that mentality right they were coming here and they were choosing to rent because they wanted flexibility they didn't want the commitment the long-term commitment necessarily being here in Saskatchewan in that property

[00:33:27] we see a lot of the seniors and I'll call them seniors but they're not even really seniors or longevity longevity has changed so much over the years right we're all we're all going to live

[00:33:37] till we're over 100 now so what is a senior but we're seeing people in their 50s and 60s looking to downsize but rent their other property and possibly rent their new property because

[00:33:49] now they want to travel more and they want that flexibility they don't want to have to worry about what's going on in the property and the younger generation as well so I have a 26 year old son

[00:34:00] who is not looking right now to buy a property he's very happy renting and he said they got why why buy a property when something goes wrong I can call my landlord I don't know how long

[00:34:12] I'm going to live in Saskatchewan maybe I want to move to Toronto maybe I want to move to Calgary they just want this flexibility so the choice is there we still see a lot of tenants that are looking

[00:34:21] for home ownership and we're we're really happy to help them along that journey like how is it that we you're renting a property you want to own a home okay what do you need to do to

[00:34:30] qualify how do we help you through that process of what you need to do to get to that point in order to purchase because I'm I'm I'm a firm believer in all aspects of the real estate industry I

[00:34:40] think I've already stressed that I believe in in the whole the whole journey of someone's life and that's that could be different things at different points I'm not sure if I'm totally answering your question Daniel but the the other thing as far as the tenants coming in

[00:34:54] and not just from out of province we have a lot of industry here that is attracting tenants from all over the world we work with the relocation company that is bringing high end executives in all the

[00:35:04] time primarily from Australia and because they're they're coming to work at different different companies here so we do see and none of them are buying they're all they're all renting if you come any

[00:35:17] it Australia and if you're coming over from Europe it's just natural to rent that's something that's so common in in those countries and that's flowing off here as well so I see a very strong

[00:35:30] market for tenants both in mid and high which is primarily where I specialize in not just where people can't afford a buy house yeah it's interesting like I think one of the things people

[00:35:42] discount quite a bit is the impact of non permanent residents or new Canadians in some of these smaller markets like everyone knows that the majority of population growth and immigration ends up

[00:35:58] in the greater gold and horseshoe and Ontario right in southern Ontario but as a percentage of our existing population it's not that big whereas when you measure it as a percentage of its total

[00:36:09] population in a place like Saskatchewan it ends up being far larger and it's that magnitude that percentage difference that really makes the impact I know I was looking at the numbers from a government of Canada website that says minister Miller issued statement on international

[00:36:26] student allocations for provinces and territories and I believe Saskatchewan is forecasted to see one of the largest growths in international student populations outside of the the territories I think of like a 10 10 percent increase whereas provinces like Ontario and BC are expected to see like

[00:36:44] 47 and 62 percent decreases and so I guess the the question that I have for you in this regard is and the bank of Canada even acknowledged this in in their Q1 monetary policy review is that

[00:37:00] population growth seems to be driving rank growth in a lot of these markets are you seeing a lot of population growth from international students coming to study in the Saskatchewan market and then what is this sort of life cycle of one of those non-permit residents look like in

[00:37:15] in a market like Saskatchewan do they tend to stay and be in the job market I know when I was out there I spoke with a lot of people who were in the logistics industry doing some like doing

[00:37:24] trucking and or and or agriculture and they stand they just end up staying in those markets because they're not home that often and they're it's very affordable place to have a you know part-time

[00:37:34] shelter let's call it right or part-time like a rental you know that you really only use a couple days a week so what are your thoughts around that in population growth is it a trend that you see being playing a

[00:37:42] big role in Saskatchewan I wouldn't say it's a trend we've seen but I think it's a trend we're starting and we're going to see and the reason why I say that is that I think Saskatchewan still has a small

[00:37:55] tellem feel so it's getting bigger but you have to remember like Saskatoon is just over 300,000 people and we you know we complain about driving from one end of the city to the other imagine that

[00:38:07] you know I I work out of Vancouver a lot so you know the the concept of what we think is it is a city but I think when people come here they find their their find their home the you know communities

[00:38:19] important no matter who you are and so they come here they go to school it's small enough that they can actually find a place where they're they're feeling that this is their community and as long as

[00:38:29] they're going to be able to find employment in whatever field that they're they're in I think they're very likely to stay and even we'll some of them go back like the international students yes but we do see

[00:38:41] some that are just staying here there is lots of opportunity in Saskatchewan whether it be you know in the medical field whether it's in sciences whether it's in tech we have a lot here I

[00:38:52] we we are very much a hidden gem that and I think I said this to Daniel before we started we seem to just fly under the radar and nobody really picks up on it until everyone's still how we

[00:39:02] poke our head up and and do something great but we have a lot of opportunity for for people to come here newcomers to Canada as well as international students and I think that once you make people

[00:39:15] feel like this is their home they're going to stay yeah on that no kind of could not agree more than I've been talking you know before we even got connected with with you Daniel and I've been talking

[00:39:25] about Saskatchewan as as a hidden gem for for long time I actually came up with a really great name for for a fun that we may start there at one point investing in Saskatchewan playing in simple

[00:39:36] planes you know maybe it's not as good as I thought but you know I think from I think from from a growth perspective from an industry perspective there is so much do there and you know

[00:39:51] I want to rewind to your to your son that you brought up there because he fits the profile of so many people the day and a nice beat to right I'm young I'm ambitious I want to get into real estate

[00:40:01] I want to get into the housing market you know I look at this as a wealth generator I can't do it where I am so where do I go and do it and you know I just had two friends invest in Winnipeg and

[00:40:13] we help them do that because they both rent in Toronto have no ability or or horizon time horizon that looks like they're going to be able to buy something here so they went to a more affordable

[00:40:25] now with something like that what advice would you give to people like your son or people like our clients or people that are in these more expensive areas of Canada that want to

[00:40:38] put roots down or maybe not even roots but investing roots down in a market such as Saskatoon what would your what would your advice to them be and and and what kind of process would you have them follow

[00:40:51] yeah that's a that's a great question because if you you are you know your younger um you don't maybe know all of the ins and outs or not talking about you know a um armature investor I

[00:41:03] guess I would say that they need to start they need to start talking to investors they need to start you start talking to people like yourselves Nick and Daniel and get involved and you have

[00:41:13] resources for them to join and the ability to get to get into places where they can be talking because a lot of times we're going to find that those even though they are coming in they may

[00:41:24] still not feel comfortable doing it on their own so they need they need you know a little help and coaching along the way or maybe they need a partner to to get involved with and that's where

[00:41:33] you're going to find those people and you know I just got finished talking about the new cameras coming to Saskatoon and making this their home and and a community and I truly believe that the investment world is its own community investors and landlords love to hang out with

[00:41:48] other investors and landlords I mean it is like it's very true yeah it is because they're so passionate about what they're doing and they want to be able to share that with somebody they can

[00:41:58] relate to so as a young investor young soon to be investor or aspiring investor I would say get in contact with with you guys and you guys can point them to some of these places that they can get

[00:42:10] some of the resources they feel a little bit more knowledgeable no one wants to go into something feeling they don't know what they're doing so you and you guys can help them with that I know that

[00:42:19] wow yeah appreciate that yeah feeling that's a pretty strong pitch for the meetup communities as well like I think you know one of the things that we've really seen take off in in sort of this

[00:42:29] post pandemic world is people have this really deep desire to just connect with like minded people that they've been almost disconnected from like we don't we we lost that sort of organic way to meet

[00:42:41] other people who have similar interests as us for a period of time then I think the meetups have really kind of served as a great opportunity for people to do that where you know you get rooms

[00:42:53] full of people who are real estate professionals or property managers investors owners etc and you know we may like you know some of the smaller markets we have people saying oh you know like

[00:43:05] everyone in monkden already knows each other like there's no point for a meetup it's like well there is because you know yeah because it aggregates you to into one centralized place and you're

[00:43:14] going there to nerd out about real estate for you know two hours a month and then you're gonna go back home and not really think about it as much as you should be if you want to be an expert investor

[00:43:24] you know and then every month that kind of keeps you current with that regularity of just checking in and touching base with other people in the industry and hearing what's happening in the industry

[00:43:33] hearing how it's changed since last month and so we're really excited especially for for markets like Saskatchewan to put together meetups and get the community together and create bridge points or opportunities for people outside of you know like for Ontario to have referral

[00:43:48] partners and key groups that we can connect them with within Saskatchewan so if anybody is interested definitely the Saskatchewan meetup group is up the meetup links are always in the show notes

[00:44:01] so make sure you check those out and we'd love to see you all there in September when neck and I come to help Carla launch the meetup in Saskatchewan yeah gonna be very say Carla we're

[00:44:12] going to definitely have to get some tours of some good deals out there I'll be coming with the list I'm sure but as we kind of get to the to the top of the show here or at the end of the show

[00:44:23] here Carla I do want to ask you a few more questions just about again having that wealth of experience across those different facets of the industry you know property management is

[00:44:35] something that a lot of people almost brush off right it's a little line item or I can handle it or whatever it may be little did they know that that property management is is in some cases

[00:44:47] a maker of break right you put that wrong tenant in well you know congrats the next six months to six years your life we're gonna be full of headaches or you know you buy the wrong property

[00:44:57] or you don't fix that one thing that you should have last time that someone pointed out talk about some of the most common mistakes that you see investors make on the property

[00:45:08] management side first of all they don't realize they can have property management I find that a lot of people don't even realize that exists when you're a small to medium size investors so

[00:45:18] they think they're just buying their first investment property and a lot of investors will tell them unfortunately you don't need property management and it you might not you know a lot of people are

[00:45:28] very successful self managing their own properties but I also have seen a lot of disasters in people self managing their own properties so I would say that the two biggest mistakes that I probably

[00:45:41] see people do is first of all they're emotionally attached to their investment and for me this is a business I am here to protect you and that property that's my job that's what you're paying me for

[00:45:55] I can take the emotion out of it it's not to say that I don't have a heart I do I work with tenants day in and day out but bottom line is rent is due you have to pay and then the second part

[00:46:08] so we don't have to get to that conversation is I see them make a lot of mistakes in the screening of the tenants they listen to stories there's a lot of professional tenants out there and they don't

[00:46:20] make stories tellers yeah they don't back check you know our office we have we literally have a scorecard for every and every tenants my staff has pushes that tenant through that scorecard

[00:46:31] and they have to match and if they don't it's it's a no go and that sometimes investors don't get that well you've had 10 applications on a property why is my property filled I'm like because none

[00:46:41] of those tenants are quality tenants that I believe are going to be in your tenant in your property and for the long term you know helping to increase the value so I see the tenant screening

[00:46:52] part huge and then just them not not being able to separate that that property is is not an emotional asset it is a money making asset and that's how I look at it. Bob that yeah couldn't agree more

[00:47:10] any uh it's kind of is there anything that you want to leave us with my baby maybe tell us where people can find out about you I I can almost guarantee that we're going to have people reaching out

[00:47:23] because I think there is an enormous amount of opportunity in in Saskatchewan Saskatoon in particular maybe especially over the course of the next five or ten years and if you're not investing in real estate

[00:47:33] with at least a five or ten year horizon then stop listening to its podcast and go invest in crypto or something so tell us where people can find out a bit about you and maybe kind of just

[00:47:46] a quick outline of all the services you you provide again because I know that you you do extensive work in different fields so kind of maybe we'll wrap with that just just a quick quick piece on

[00:47:58] what you do and where people can find out more about you. Yeah so my primary business is property management I have a ton of connections when it comes to the mortgage brokerage in real estate

[00:48:08] field but I don't actively actively work in those in Saskatoon and I because I work on that franchise or side I do have connections across Canada. Real property management is a national organization so I can connect to other property management companies across Canada. My company here in

[00:48:25] Saskatoon is real property management professionals you can find us on all socials, RPM professionals is our handle on all socials. I'm on LinkedIn so you can also find me there, Carla with the c.brown

[00:48:40] with an e. I'm sure that you'll you'll link it or spell it out to them to show notes there and yeah I'd love to hear from you honestly if you were thinking about coming to Saskatoon or coming into this

[00:48:52] Saskatchewan market reach out we do we do market analysis for people all the time. I'm a true believer in giving people the education and resources that they need to make a smart decision so even if you're

[00:49:04] coming here and thinking that you're not going to entertain property management yet I fully respect that because I also know that life might change for you and you might look at that later on and so

[00:49:14] helping people make smart decisions is something that's near and dear to me so send them my way I would love to be able to help them out and I guess if you're listening here in Saskatoon I hope

[00:49:24] I hope I see a bunch of the investors out into our new meetup that's starting in September 2020 for Amazing amazing anything else damn nothing quick good as I actually really appreciate the insight yeah thanks so much Carla we will we chat with you

[00:49:44] and hopefully we'll be seeing you even sooner yeah thank you very much you guys I really appreciate spending the time with you the Canadian real estate investor podcast is for entertainment purposes only and it is not financial advice Nick Hill is a mortgage agent with premier mortgage

[00:50:01] center and a partner in the G and H mortgage group licensed number 10317 agent license M21004037 Dino photos are real estate broker licensed with rare real estate a member of the Canadian real estate association the Toronto real estate board and the Ontario real estate association