Jennifer: I really like the idea of you can take it anywhere and US dollars are always on the list of what's taken first, whether you're in the Caribbean, whether you're in the states.
Sarah: REITE Club nation. Welcome, I'm Sarah Larbi and I'm here today with Laurel Simmons, my wonderful co-host, and we are going to have an amazing podcast. But before that, Laurel, what is new and exciting in your world?
Laurel: As we are recording this, it is the end of February, beginning of March. I'm starting to see signs of spring, like tulips and all kinds of things coming up. That's just like I'm optimistic that the sun's gonna actually stay up one day and not snow. What about you, Sarah?
Sarah: You know what? I bought something in Hamilton last week. We're gonna do a conversion, bringing in some students working on the resort and the retreat. Lots of stuff going on, but from May to September, basically like May 14th, I think I'm taking everything off until labor day.
Looking forward to that and otherwise I'll say there's lots of really interesting things. With The REITE Club specifically our website is changing and growing every single day. Our events as well, there's tons of them. People that are listening can just go on our website.
If you go to thereiteclub.com/events, you can actually see all of the amazing events. Some are virtual. Many are virtual. There might be some in person down the road, feel free to take a look at that, coast to coast right now we have options for everybody virtually lots of different topics and anything new with the website that you'd wanna share for today.
Laurel: There's more content going up all the time. Sarah said lots of events, so we have lunch and learn, focus on meetings. We have national events and we have regional events. There's something for everybody, right? Just something for everybody. You can go in and watch, listen to our podcast, you can watch some of our events that have been recorded. Just go in there. There's lots of information and we're seeing more and more people come.
Sarah: That's great. Jennifer and Stephane Brouillette are real estate investors with a portfolio of about 20 doors in Canada, vacant lot, two US properties and acquiring more every day they are located in Sudbury and share their journeys along the way on how they got started, how they scaled, what they're looking at now, you know what they're doing to be able to pivot in this crazy market. It is a great podcast, lots of insights, lots of information. I hope that you guys enjoy it. Let's bring them in. Jennifer, Stephane. Welcome. How are you guys?
Stephane: Very good. Thank you.
Jennifer: Great. Thank you .
Sarah: I'm excited because it's always great to meet investors that we haven't met before and I haven't met you before.
I'm super excited to learn about your journey. It sounds like you've had a very successful one so far. Let's take a step back to see how and why you got started in real estate in the first place.
Jennifer: Do you wanna start, or would you like me to start?
Stephane: In about 2011? We decided that we wanted to explore getting into real estate investing and Jennifer worked with a fellow that was also a real estate agent and an investor at the same time. We sat down and had a few conversations and we decided that it was something that we were prepared to try and give it a shot. We bought our first property.
Jennifer: To open that up a little bit more. I was on mat leave with our third baby. I knew I had no more mat leaves coming. We both worked frontline jobs at that time. We were both shift workers. We had three small kids, one baby, and we wanted something better.
We wanted something more. We knew that the schedules that we were working, weren't very conducive to raising a family. We wanted to figure out a way that we could change that and create some freedoms and some options and some opportunities as we went. Like Steph said, I worked with a guy who was a real turn in investor, and I was really interested in what he was doing because we knew that real estate was a good idea.
It was all very long game stuff. Like it was like if we do something now, we didn't really realize that it could benefit us right now. It was all gonna be like a long game, like way over there. It's gonna do something better for us. We had a couple of really interesting conversations with my friend who was the realtor back then.
He introduced us to a mortgage broker who really understood leveraging and really understood refinances and equity. That for us blew open the doors to how we could do this because like everybody else, we were making decent money. We were also spending decent money because we didn't really understand how to do it any other way.
In 2011, we actually had a ton of equity in our house. After some conversations with the mortgage broker, we refinanced and we were able to purchase two properties . We were hoping that it would create enough cash flow, that I would be able to leave my job and focus on our family and be able to rely on the income coming in from the buildings to supplement.
Of course back then it wasn't enough money but it created a really great structure for us and a really great baseline because we didn't know what we were really doing. We knew that it was good. That's how we got started.
Laurel: Sarah and I talked and all of us at the REITE Club, a lot of them have been doing it for quite a few years and they've forgotten the beginning, like when they started and there's a lot of others who are just so scared to get started, but sometimes it's paralysis by analysis.
They're always looking like there's never enough information to actually do it. You guys jumped, you did it right.
Jennifer: We did.
Laurel: How long did it take you to do that? To go from the first sort of inclination that, oh, there might be something here to actually buying your first property to invest in your first property.
Jennifer: I remember we started having that conversation. It was like February of 2011. I remember it was still winter. It's been winter up here for a long time, but it was still winter. I knew that I was going back to work in may and that was when my mat leave was over. So it was like we've got this equity, we ended up, we purchased a fourplex. It closed in April and we purchased a five plex that closed in October.
Laurel: Wow. You went right. Your first property was a multi.
Jennifer: Yes.
Stephane: Yes.
Laurel: Most people, not everybody, but most people tend to buy a single family home. Because they think that's the way to do it. Why did you choose to go into the small multifamily?
Jennifer: We had done a little bit of research and again, talking with the realtor that I was friends with through my job back then, he explained that whole concept of cash flow coming in. Rents from different units you could afford, then if a unit went vacant for a bit, the other units would cover the rents and it still wouldn't cost you anything out of pocket.
That kind of spoke to us and made a lot of sense. Not to discourage the single family market, because there's a lot of good stuff going on there too. We've added a few to our portfolio since then, but that for us was a really great, a great start and we're jumpers.
That's something that sometimes we jump when we don't really even know what we're doing, but we risk managing it the best we can. We definitely found taking actions. Better than not taking action. We learn on the fly and go as we grow.
Stephane: The Sudbury market was at the time multi-families was the best place to get in and Jennifer said one unit being vacant still provided us somewhat of a security net or security blanket so that we wouldn't have to pay the full mortgage if we had a vacancy.
That's where we started.
Sarah: That's awesome. I think it's also important to mention, like you also had a good team. It sounds like almost from the beginning with a good realtor that really understood things, a mortgage broker that helped you unlock money, which not everybody has. I think, you bring to the table, the fact that you're able to manage risk, like you said, it's non analysis paralysis. We can take action. That's how you got to, to where you are today. Then you learn along the way, right?
Jennifer: Yep.
Sarah: You grow along the way so much more, I think, than any book or podcast or anything can provide by actually being in there and doing it.
Jennifer: That's really exactly how it went for us. We jumped not really knowing what we were doing, but knowing it was a good idea and we could learn the parts we didn't know about as we went.
Sarah: Can I ask, like how do you guys split the investment tasks? Are you both doing everything together?
Is one person doing the management one, person's doing the acquisition? Like how do you guys have that set up?
Jennifer: We don't manage our own stuff. That for us was the biggest piece when we first got in. We didn't realize at the time that you could be a landlord, but not be active in it. Once we had that conversation. We were like, oh, that's exactly what we wanna do. We wanna be investors, we don't wanna be landlords. We didn't wanna deal with tenant issues. We were both working shifts. We had three small children. Like what happens if something goes in the middle of the night, we're not in a position where we can deal with that.
We didn't want to. The beauty was we were introduced to property management and back then it wasn't mainstream like it is now. There weren't a whole lot of options and opportunities. For it up here, but there was a company that we started with and it took us a couple of years to realize that we didn't really align with each other and we didn't fit.
That had given the market enough time to grow a couple of newcomers that saw that there was a need for those kinds of services. We added a new property management company to our team in 2013 in Sudbury. We've been happily married to them ever since. So it's been it.
Sarah: That is awesome. It's interesting to see cause sometimes your team changes over time too. Sometimes this person has to be updated or upgraded if you want, or, sometimes they start off amazing and then things happen. Same thing with contractors, sometimes you use it.
Jennifer: For sure and that list changes all the time, right? Like a referral list or a trade list. We're always adding and moving and adding and moving. But just to get back to, you were talking about how we handle it together? So we're pretty lucky. We're fairly complimentary. I'm the gas pedals, Steph's the break.
That's how we work. He really likes looking for deals. I really like organizing all of the different pieces. Once we find something and connect with everybody who needs us to sign or talk about the financing. It seems like I organize and stuff is like the doer. It fits us really well.
Sarah: Awesome. Now you've got, I think 20 doors, a vacant lot, two properties in the US. Are you still financing everything yourself or did you bring in joint venture partners or money partners along the way? How did that work out?
Jennifer: We did the first two, the two originals were our own money.
The equity from our house like that, that came from us. In 2020, we joined a mentoring group. We had gotten to the point where we had at that point. The two buildings in Sudbury and a single family house that we had started off as a fix and flip, it ended up being like a BRRRR.
We just held onto it as a rental. And we wanted to grow, but we didn't really know how, because we were out of money for the down payments. There has to be more people like us out there. That is our investors and get how this works, but keep going. Social media was really exploding back then with Facebook groups and all of these different connections.
We joined a mentoring group and it blew our world right open. Not so much the content of the group, but the connections that we made and that kind of introduced us to OPM using Other People's Money and how to do it properly and organized and making sure that it's a win-win strategy and that the exit was clearly planned before you even really got into the deal.
Our last five deals have been with OPM. In differing degrees. Some have been full OPM. Some have been like piecemeal together and partial. It's really opened up our investing game and it's really growing our Portfolio.
Laurel: I think that's really interesting that you talk about other people's money because what a lot of people don't realize is that when you go to the bank, that's actually other people's money.
It's not your money, regardless of where you go it's other people's money, right? You didn't put that money in the bank again, the bank gave you a mortgage or wherever you go for a mortgage. I think, focus on the fact that you went to these facebook groups and the mentoring and you, it was the connections that were really important.
Jennifer: Oh, for sure.
Laurel: That's what we found in our real estate investing company. You can have all the properties in the world and all the rest of it, but you need the connections. You need your network because if that person doesn't know something they might not know what you need, but they might know somebody who does have what you need.
Jennifer: That's been exactly our experience like our network in the last year and a half has grown so significantly and it's grown us at the same time. It's just like this really awesome circle of info sharing, connecting and growing. Real estate in our opinion is a huge game. There's tons of room for everybody to share information and be successful.
Like I know there's a lot of people that don't like to share and I get that sharing's pretty individual and I get that, but we're like sharing all the secrets, cause there's lots of room out there, for everybody to do what they wanna do and be successful at it.
Stephane: What's funny is a lot of people that I work with and I share our real estate journey with think, wow, you must be really smart and so on and so forth.
We're pretty smart, I would say. But the thing is in expanding our network, we surround ourselves with subject matter experts. People that know a lot more about certain things than we do. That just helps our success just bloom. That's been one of the things we've really worked on.
Jennifer: That's what brought us to you guys, right? It's just different connections we made. This is where the road goes, so we're happy to walk it and have conversations and share in the hopes that somebody else will benefit from it. Because I know how much we love listening to other people's stories. And applying it to what we're trying to do.
Sarah: Absolutely. I know there's all lot of great stories. There's a lot of great success and you guys are an example of a successful couple doing it. But what are some of the challenges that you could share? Because ultimately, it's not all what it seems to be on the surface.
There's definitely a mental toughness game at some points in the journey, whether it's, problems with contractors or problems with tenants, or, what are some of the challenges, if you don't mind sharing that, that happen to you along the way that somebody can maybe learn from.
Jennifer: There's so many and like you said we've all had things go wrong and things and struggles and bumps in the road.
Sarah: I dunno, what do you think's the biggest challenge?
Stephane: One of the things, we're part of a mentorship group. There's a number of people that we've really connected with. One of the things that I find tough is you can call it, keeping up with the Jones' syndrome. Having to try to keep up, or you get to a point where you feel like you're stalling out and you have to make another move, but you're only limited by your OPM and you don't really need to make deals.
That's one of the things I've found a little bit tough. Trying to hold back the reins a little bit and wait for the next ideal, not necessarily unicorn, but the ideal.
Jennifer: The next good deal for us. It's about staying in our lane. Cause I know every time we have a conversation with somebody in our group or in our network, that is doing something amazing right away, Steph is oh God, we should be doing that too.
Should we be doing that? Maybe we should be doing that too. And it's no. Let's look at it and see where we are and does it fit what we're trying to do and where we're at. We laugh about that kind of stuff. Lots where it's, you know what, let's be really excited because they've got something great going on and if it fits for us then we can move to, and if it doesn't, then that's okay.
We can still be happy and ride out whatever's going on in our portfolio at the time and wait for our next turn to do something with. In terms of tenant challenges and contractor challenges, we've all been there, right? Renovation projects that are over budget and take too long that was our biggest challenge with a single, our first single family house that we bought.
It was supposed to be a fix and flip, and it was a really great house in a nice area that had tons of character and that we knew we could fix up. We did too much and it took too long and we went way over budget. And then by the time we were finished, The market wasn't doing what we needed it to do to sell it for what we needed to sell it for.
We sat around and went, oh my God, like we did that all wrong. Like, how are we ever gonna fix this? And then my dad said, just, he said, can't you use it as a rental? If you've ride it out for a while until the market improves or adjusts, he said, in the meantime you have somebody else paying the mortgage.
At that point, I was like, do people even rent single family houses? I didn't even know. So we called the property manager and I said, this is where we're at. And she went, oh my gosh, like I could rent a single family home faster than any apartment, any day of the week. And eight days later, a lady signed a lease and we were getting more rent than I ever thought we would get. Just click it. He clicked. It turned out to be just a jewel.
Sarah: Do you still have that property today?
Jennifer: We do.
Stephane: Absolutely.
Jennifer: Frigging right.
Stephane: It's a gem. Yeah.
Jennifer: Yeah. That turned into a real gem in our portfolio for sure.
Sarah: Is it cash flow?
Jennifer: Oh, the best, that's actually the best cash flow we have right now.
Sarah: It's funny how just hanging onto real estate and not panicking. Because once you sell, you've realized your loss and all your profit.
Jennifer: That's right. We're trying and we're at the school, right? If there's no need to sell it, why is the market gonna grow it on its own?
Any improvements we put in we'll come back eventually. We've got somebody in there paying the bills and creating a little bit of cash flow for us every month. For us it's a really great scenario.
Sarah: I wanna ask you guys, because obviously the elephant in the room right now in this day and age is just the lack of inventory and the lack of deals and the greed, I think from some people just trying to like lists.
Even multi-families are just insane.
Jennifer: I know it's ridiculous. It really is.
Sarah: Thoughts on that? Are you altering or pivoting your strategy or doing anything there?
Jennifer: Oh yeah, we pivoted a long time ago. Like we really, we looked around, said Bri and realized that, and this was already a year ago that the numbers here weren't doing what we wanted them to do because the market was growing so quickly and selling prices were so high and rents hadn't caught up yet.
Nothing really made sense on paper. We headed east out to New Brunswick, there was great cash flow out there. We were willing to roll with the slower equity build because those markets weren't quite as hot or growing as quickly. We had refinanced our portfolio in Sudbury because the markets were so great and the timing was actually perfect for us.
We picked up 10 more doors in New Brunswick and those are just kind of clickity clicking along, just lovely on their own. That kind of remote, investing's a little bit of a challenge some days just because it's further away. I know here in Sudbury, we're not managing our own stuff, but the property managers are literally like a phone call or a text away.
It doesn't, I don't have that kind of working relationship yet with the PM company we're with in New Brunswick, but they're great. They're taking care of business. It's just different.
Laurel: There was a question about working with your team in New Brunswick, because your mortgage brokers need a lawyer in the province you're in, that's standard.
There are a lot of people that you can use virtually here, but there are certain things that must be down there. For example, there's no point in having a renovation company in Sudbury, right? You have properties in New Brunswick. How did you go about finding that network again?
Cause you're basically starting over from ground zero.
Jennifer: Yeah. Again, like we had such a great network of people that we had met through different mentoring groups that we've been a part of and different Connections of connections, that were a little bit more dialed into that market than we were.
We had a couple conversations with different property managers and what our expectations were and the services that they provided. We found one that fit fairly well. It's been a great experience. Like it's got its challenges, like everything else, right?
Couple of tenant issues, a vacancy that's taking a little bit of time to fill some renovations that are taking a little bit longer because that market is just so saturated with investors. Right now, it's taking a little bit more time to get things done, but for us, it's just extended our timelines a little bit. It hasn't changed our strategy and the cash flow out there was really, we couldn't find it anywhere else. The buildings are solid structures. They're healthy and they're rented. We're pretty pleased with how that worked. That market started to catch fire.
We noticed the price points were shifting fairly quickly. We pivoted again and we started looking at the state's last summer and that's where we're shopping right now.
Laurel: That was going to be of course. My next question is if you've gone to New Brunswick and things are starting to come on fire, then you're now you've moved into the state. Again, you have to start with a whole new team, right? Because well, everybody because mortgage brokers and agents in Canada, can't serve you in the US and lawyers. Everyone, even real estate agents, is all different.
Jennifer: Yeah, you know what? It was different. And really our second US purchase was really different because we used US financing for that one. That brought in American lending and American financing and how all of that works, which is very different than how it is in Canada.
That was a huge learning curve for us and so many new connections. It's really incredible the amount of time that I spend on zooms and FaceTime calls and, just having these conversations like this is who we are, this is what we're doing. Some conversations continue and others don't and that's okay.
You know what? You have to try on a lot of pairs of shoes before you find one that fit really well. We're happy to take our time to make sure that we find people to work with that fit. What we are looking for .
Sarah: Where in the US are these properties?
Jennifer: We have one single family home in Detroit, and we have a single family home in Tampa, just outside of Tampa.
Sarah: What are your thoughts? Cause, I think, with all the economic uncertainty and everything that's happening right now, I think it is important to diversify potentially in a different currency and a different country. Any thoughts on that or comments on.
Jennifer: We really like American money, right? It's transferable just about anywhere. It's always sitting in a better position than our own dollar and I really like the idea of it. You can take it anywhere and US dollars are always on the list of what's taken first. Whether you're in the Caribbean, whether you're in the states, whether you're in Mexico, wherever you are, right.
The American dollar is cash is king. We really like what the American dollar does and yeah, and the cash flow that it's created in the two buildings that we have down there right now it's putting us in a really great position that we're looking for our next one.
Sarah: Very cool. Stephane, are you seeing these properties, ahead of time? Are you guys making offers sight unseen on these properties and maybe just walk us through the process cause you know, a lot of them are not necessarily driving distance.
Stephane: Since the pandemic has come around.
We're doing everything virtually, travel is completely noble. We're having to deal with realtors over the phone. Jen makes the links with the realtors. We basically give 'em a criteria of what we're looking for in the property. Jen runs the numbers to make sure that everything fits and we do our due diligence.
We make sure that we have an adequate property management place. The insurance is good and so on and so forth. It's a good area. Case in point when we bought the Tampa property about two or three weeks later. That series on Netflix came out as selling Tampa. It was really neat and it was, it's just been a journey of trying to stay ahead of the curve, where rather than chasing a secondary market, you want to be on the leading edge of where the markets are gonna be catching fire.
Jennifer: We feel like we time Tampa. Just to get back to what you were saying, Sarah, like our home inspections are all done virtually, so we're buying them site unseen, but we've got people walking through that are showing us what they're seeing. We know what we're basing our decisions on.
Laurel: The Tampa area in Florida, that's where you're focusing on or did you go to any other places in the states?
Jennifer: Actually we're working with a realtor right now in Jacksonville. That area really interests me. It's a bit of a distribution hub and there's lots going on by sea, by rail, by truck.
There's lots of cool stuff. I think it's a really interesting market. We're seeing what we can do there. The price points are still pretty appealing. There's decent cash flow. We're happy to take a look and see if we can find something that fits what we're trying to do.
Sarah: Is that in Tennessee or is that Florida? I feel like there's two Florida. North Florida, cause I think, the other thing too, just like looking at Miami or Florida just in general is, like a lot of those markets just because they were fairly open throughout the two years that people have flock towards there.
Then I also started investing and just looking at the price points, a year ago versus even today in many places in Florida, It's definitely gone up, there's all, every single market, I'm sure there's still some opportunities to be found. The next part of the podcast is lightning round. So we are going to go through four questions. We're going to ask each of you the same questions and you're gonna give us the first answer that comes to mind. Are you ready?
Stephane: Ready.
Sarah: Question number one. We'll start with Stephane on this one. What is the best advice that you have ever received from another investor or at a networking event?
Stephane: Start as early as possible. When it comes to real estate investing, one of the things I hear is a common mistake that real estate investors say. I wish I would've started earlier. Or other people say, is it too late to start?
Sarah: Great. Jen, what about you?
Jennifer: You know what I can't be creative, but that's cause that's it right?
Start earlier as early as you possibly can. That's the key.
Laurel: You know what they say the best time to invest in real estate was 20 years ago. The second best time is today. Question two. What is your favorite resource for real estate investing? And it could be anything, book, training person, event, Facebook group, whatever. What's your favorite resource?
Jennifer: This is like a shameless plug, but I love what the right club puts out. I really do the lunch and learning is my favorite. I can put them on, I can get my stuff done and still listen. And those RWAs are my new favorite thing. I can't wait to get us into one of those.
Sarah: All right. Very cool. Number, or actually Stephane, do you have a different answer?
Stephane: No, I like social media. I like watching different podcasts and stuff like that, but yeah, no social media is probably my favorite go.
Sarah: Question number three. What is the attribute that has made you most successful? Who wants to start?
Jennifer: I think we're flexible and I think that makes all the difference. You know what? Just because it doesn't look exactly like we thought it was supposed to look doesn't mean that it's not gonna work amazing. We've learned that over and over again, as long as we're okay. Bending when things need to be banded too. If that makes sense.
Laurel: Yeah, sure. The tree that bends doesn't break. If you, this sounds cliche, but it's true, you guys are bending and flexing and that's what makes you successful.
It's people who just keep going and refuse to change. They're the ones that run into trouble. Good for you. Question number four, what do you typically do on a Sunday morning? Stephane, let's start with you.
Stephane: I like to make a big breakfast. I don't have a chance to cook all that much during the week because I'm at work and I'm on shift work. I don't have the ability to cook all that much, but I really enjoy making a really big breakfast for everyone in the house on Sundays.
Laurel: Jennifer, what about you?
Jennifer: I like to sit with a cup of tea and not talk to anybody.
Sarah: That's nothing wrong with that. Sounds good.
Jennifer: That's my perfect Sunday morning is a cup of tea and just by myself and I wait for breakfast.
Sarah: That is amazing. I love that. I usually wait too. They're not the chef either. Awesome. Jen and Stephane, where can our REITE Club community reach out and find out more?
Jennifer: Right on Facebook, Jennifer Hansen Brouillette is my page. It's most of the handles, it's my stuff. Stuff is on social media, but mostly through my pages, we both like to answer the messages. We both like to answer the questions that are asked, but on Facebook, it's Jennifer Hanson, Brouillette on Instagram, it's @investorjenBrouilete and on LinkedIn it's Jennifer Brouillette.
Laurel: And you know what, for people who are listening, I think we should spell your last name.
Jennifer: It definitely doesn't sound like it's spelled, so B R O U I L L E T E.
Laurel: Good. Thank you.
Sarah: Amazing, Jennifer, Stephane thank you guys so much for being on the show and really appreciate your insights and you being part of our community.
Jennifer: Thank you so much for having us. It was a ton of fun.
Laurel: Sarah, wow they're a really amazing couple aren't they? They really are enthusiastic and they've got lots of stuff going on and they, it sounds like they've learned a few lessons along the way, too.
Sarah: Absolutely. One of the things that rang a bell there is just taking action and not having that analysis paralysis, but being able to pivot.
I love their story about that one property that they wanted to flip, and then they realized that they couldn't get their price and now it's their best. Cash flowing property. And it's probably been doing the best in terms of return on investment for a property that originally they thought they had made some mistakes on.
Real estate it's forgivable over time. Obviously, if you sell you realize your loss, but keeping it and pivoting and being able to create a different exit strategy, I think was key. Any takeaways on your end, Laurel, that you wanna share.
Laurel: I think again, very similar to what you're saying, but it's the flexibility that if this didn't work, then there's a plan B and let's go do that.
If this market isn't right, we'll let us go to another market and okay. That market's kind of saturated, let's go to another market. That's how we grow our portfolios. If you just always do the same thing in the same place with the same people. You're not gonna really grow. It's just the more you get out there and talk to people, meet people, network and explore other areas. The better, your chances of your portfolio growing.
Sarah: Absolutely. Don't forget to keep growing, but also to customize your life along the way, club nation. See you all next week.
DJ: Thanks for listening to the REITE Club podcast, where the focus is on helping all levels of real estate investors advance to the next level and help you customize your life. Be sure to tune in next week at thereiteclub.com/podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you get a few seconds, please rate the podcast wherever you listen. It helps the show get noticed by others like you, and we truly appreciate it. And don't forget to subscribe.
- Log in or register to post comments
- ARNEL-LLEMIT-1637316866's Blog