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Let’s Plan to Retire in Luxury
I have a great idea. I think you should buy a rental property in 2025. This blog post may help you retire much more comfortably than if you had not read it. I bought my first rental property when I was 24. It was a 3-bedroom condo at Mclaughlin Square, and it came with a…
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A 5-Year View of Real Estate in Durham Region
A few years ago I remember a conversation I had with an investor. The couple were considering purchasing a rental property and our chat centered around what type of property would offer the best return over a 5 year plan. We looked at detached and semi-detached homes, condo townhomes and freehold townhomes. I created a…
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Parents Helping Kids Buy Homes Today
With a career spanning almost 4 decades I have worked with clients as young as 18 and as old as 98. One thing I have experienced, is when a homeowner is in the 65+ range, they start to look at where they will direct their assets. These can be their personal residence, rental properties or…
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Should you Consider a Power of Sale Property?
Looking back at the history of Real Estate in Ontario, I remember a time when there were more homes being sold under power of sale than by happy homeowners. We had a boom in the late 1980’s that ended in 1989. From 1990 – 1991 the market values dropped about 30% which caused homes to…
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How to Hire… Anyone
Recently I was in need of a local company to install some eavestroughing at my home and started my search by asking a few friends who they may know that I could trust. Before we go any further, trust is a big word when hiring anyone… a plumber, electrician, contractor, financial advisor or heck even…
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Real Estate Hacks- Increasing value by $50,000
Is it possible to increase your home value by up to $50,000 by investing as little as $5,000? Let’s take a look and see if it is possible. I have narrowed down a few items that Buyers will pay for when they are looking at resale homes, but first how about we tour a model…
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What Upgrades Pay off?
I met with 2 groups last week, one a potential Seller and the other a Buyer I had been working with. After meeting with them, I reflected on how different the two experiences were when it came to valuing Real Estate. The first was a Buyer who I had been working with for the past…
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How Can I Make $4,500 from a $1,000 Investment?
When I started my career in the 1980s, one of the central themes for Buyers was to work toward paying the mortgage off. I remember mortgage document “burning parties” where a group of friends would get together and celebrate a mortgage being paid off and getting calls from a homeowner who shared that they had…
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Understanding Real Estate by Reading Trends
One thing I love to do is to make predictions. In December 2023 I made some predictions about where the values in Oshawa, Whitby and Clarington would be in May 2024. Let’s review my thoughts and see how accurate I was.The 4th quarter of 2023 was challenging time for Sellers, with values declining and sluggish sales. For…
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How Bank Pre-approvals Help Buyers
I had an experience over the past week that caused me to shake my head a little, like a Rob Ford bobblehead. Actually, this experience has been repeated too many times to count over the past year. Personally, I could frame it as “how to kill a home sale before you get to the starting…
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