Jeff Murray from Atlantic Canada and Erik Doyle from Ontario provide some insights into the current real estate market.
Alfonso: I'm really super pumped for this next panel. We're going coast to coast and we've done this several times over the last few months with our community. And again, one of the best things is that it's hot. Throughout this pandemic, we've been able to go across the country, talk to different people, get their opinions, and it allows us to maybe prepare and get ready for things that are happening or will happen in the markets that we work in.
Tonight from Atlanta, Canada, we have Jeff Murray, the President and owner of Canada Homes for Rent and the largest, fastest growing property management company, offering everything from property management, Airbnb setup and operation, just to name a few. So, we're going to get to talk to Jeff from the Ontario market and specifically the Southwestern Ontario market from Elevation Realty, Erik Doyle.
Erik and his team specialized in residential and commercial properties. They work with so many real estate investors, myself as well. My first ever duplex conversion, they helped me find and work on that one as well. As well as rent to own our other side of the business and flips. So, super excited to have these gentlemen on here tonight. Can you guys hear me? Are we loud and clear? We all get to go.
Erik: Perfect.
Alfonso: Awesome. Thanks so much guys. Right on. So, I guess we're going to keep it really simple questions and answers real simple. What can you share with us today, The REITE Club nation? What do we need to know about the markets that you're working on?
And then once you let us know that maybe give us a little bit of a crystal ball. So, we're going to go out East. It's a little bit later out there. So, we're going to go to you first, Jeff. What can you let us know about your specific market? Because a little bit of a crystal ball moving forward?
Jeff: Things have changed immensely in probably about a year and probably since the last time I was on, it's changed. I was always one that never told anybody to come out this way for appreciation. And two years ago, I said that and it's making me look a little foolish right now.
For one example, a client bought a 24 unit building for $1,030,000 and sat on the market for probably a year before he bought it. This was two years ago. He just closed and sold it last month for 1.8, almost 1.9, like ridiculous. Things have come in like waves and I recognize some names that are tuning in tonight.
I've had an opportunity to talk to some and they're current clients of mine, some of them and everybody's vying for that same type of property where they can purchase and invest in and refi and continue to move on. And it's becoming a little more challenging right now because there's not a lot of stuff on the market.
The stuff that is out there is that the pricing is a bit high. People are taking advantage of the fact that there's a lot of people out there looking right now. There's a lot of pressure on us because our clients are paying that. That's the easy part, buying the building making money this year and next year in the years going forward is the challenge.
We're certainly up to it. Luckily, our rents are moving in the same direction as our real estate game. I'm seeing rents increase up to 30% in some cases and sometimes more. We just listed a three bedroom unit today that the owner was, oh, like managing his own unit up to see that we were moving some rents in the right direction, thought that we could probably do something for him. He had currently rented it for 700. We posted it for 11. And we had I think at least nine applications. And it will likely rent before the end of the week.
Along with all of this is the other positive thing is that vacancy rates we're probably under 3%. I bet I don't know the exact stat on it for our way right now, but we're certainly looking really good. So, our rents are coming up. Vacancy rates are staying down. Real estate itself is at an all time high. The real estate agents out here are just, they're doing everything they can. Contractors are few and far between. Earlier they were speaking about meeting three quotes and that sort of thing. And that's great.
When you're talking and dealing in Atlanta, Canada, New Brunswick, when there's not exactly contractors, you're not tripping over them. Okay. They're really hard to come across. It is difficult to try and get all those prices that you want. There are not people just standing there wanting your business because there's a lot of business out there for them.
So, it's certainly a time in which we have not seen in recent years. But it is positive. People are making money and then they wouldn't be out here buying if they weren't. So, that is certainly something that we're excited to see. Yeah. That's kinda what we're seeing right now.
Alfonso: I know I'm putting you on the spot a little bit with vacancy rates, low, a lot of demand, there's a lot of rumblings everybody's talking about Q1 and Q2 of 2011. Some of the questions coming up, the economy turning and maybe the COVID taps running dry from that kind of stuff. What's your quick prediction? We're not going to hold you to it, but you have a prediction.
Jeff: I'll tell you exactly why. The thing is that when people invest in New Brunswick and in Atlanta, Canada for one reason there at least they should and that is consistency steady. We don't really see the COVID thing happening. Yes, is it active in New Brunswick? Sure to a certain extent. It's certainly not what it is and the rest of Canada and that, and I'll speak on Nova Scotia a little bit as well, because it's still, is it active? Sure but it's not. It's not affecting us. It's not when I was going through my rent collections, there was fear all over the place.
Everybody was worried. Clients were worried. Everybody was worried because it was unknown. The federal government did a good thing to a certain extent. I'm not going to get too into the political side of things, but they gave people money and that went a lot further in Atlanta, Canada than it did in other parts of Canada. $2,000 in New Brunswick takes you much further than $2,000 when you're living in the GTA or wherever. So, that helped immensely. I didn't have any more rent collection issues in April and March and May that I would have in October or September of 2019. Okay.
Nothing of that nature. We're currently going through a quote, unquote, a second wave again. We're not seeing any sort of rent collection issues at all. What we are seeing is people moving here in astounding amounts, like whether they're buying houses, whether they're renting apartments they are moving here in droves and it is going to continue to happen as COVID has made people realize that especially the ones that are working from home that likely may continue to work from home are going to come into New Brunswick cause it's a nice place to live, right? It's a cheaper place to live.
I don't think this trend is going to stop this train anytime soon. I think it's going to continue. The oil business being in the tank in the west has really helped bring people back home. So, there's a lot of folks that are from out this way that moved out when oil was going through the roof and making crazy money, but now they're moving back now and they're taking those maybe middle of the road jobs that 10 years ago, they wouldn't have thought of taking because that money was available to them at West.
All of these things are really starting to affect the way a business is right now. So, look, it's hard to say what next year is going to bring, but these types of trends are hard to look past as we see things changing throughout the country and throughout the world. And again that's why.
Alfonso: Those are fantastic insights. And I really liked that. I want to touch on that point of people moving back home or moving out east. I haven't gotten that far East has always been a goal of mine. We have a few properties that I haven't actually physically visited, that ocean air, we get that little breeze, that fresh fish.
People are going to be working from home. Why not? When, one of the most beautiful places in the country. And yeah, of course that's going to drive in those droves. Amazing, and not underscoring, the importance of working with somebody that has that experience like yourself.
You're saying, if you don't have time for those three contractors, you already know in your mind more or less what that push should be. If you're assisting, helping a landlord, you don't maybe need the three, but you know that you need that expertise to say, hey, this makes sense, this doesn't make sense or this is why or no, this is in the ballpark, so, awesome.
Jeff: We've always taken that route anyway, because at the end of the day for us, we haven't grown our company to as large as it's become in the period of time that we have by taking people down a road that they don't need to go down. My motto is that we don't. And this company off of you buying one building, we run it off of you buying multiple buildings, noting multiple units. We need to make sure that we're guiding those folks into that area. .
Alfonso: Awesome. Yeah, for sure. And that's why we always appreciate the time and effort that you make to enlighten our REITE club nation. Like you said, you work with a lot of the people that are investing out East in part of our community and helping them out. Huge asset guys, if you haven't spoken to Jeff we're going to put up his information at the end of this chat and you can definitely find him on the REITE club community as well too.
He's got his info up there. Thanks so much, Jeff. And I'm going to go over to Erik now a little bit. I'm going to ask you the same question, Erik. Yeah. What can you share with us? The REITE club nation today that we should know about the markets that you're working in. And then the second part of that question, what's your crystal ball?
Erik: As soon as Jeff started talking, I basically thought he was just talking about Ontario. Cause we're seeing exactly the same things here as we are out East. We're seeing gigantic markets. That's very hot. It's increasing double digits year after year, like St. Catherine's just for instance, 15% increase. Like for the past five years, there's a ton of buyers and the inventory is down 80% since.
Alfonso: Wow. Let's expand on that just a little bit Erik. When you say the inventory is down for those of the REITE club nation, how, when whatever, everybody knows inventory, when the toilet paper was running out, but how does that look for real estate?
Erik: That works for real estate. The amount of actual houses that are able to be purchased is down 82% of last year.
Alfonso: Awesome.
Erik: I mean that's just creating like a basic law of supply and demand economics 101. We have a ton of interest in purchasing houses and we do not have that many houses on the market. And that's why prices continue to increase. We're also seeing with the COVID that people don't have to work in Toronto anymore just as Jeff was saying.
And now they're just moving from Toronto. They're moving into like tertiary markets, secondary markets, Hamilton Welland, St. Catharines, Niagara Falls, just because they can work from home and they don't need to spend $1.5 million on a house anymore. Basically, we are just seeing an extreme amount of demand for investment properties, especially, I'm consistently losing. Offers a hundred grand over asking, which is very frustrating, but that's just the way the there's just the way the market is currently. And that's where we're basically headed the same way for south Ontario. As Jeff said.
Alfonso: Yeah. And maybe I know you work with an indefinitely, you and your team has helped me as well, too, for our duplex talk a little bit, maybe on the rental side. Some of those investors that have either secured, or even in the last little while now and now are renting out and, just trying to pump some cash flow out of those rental units, how are they finding like the supply demand on that side of things from actually renters versus and what they're doing out there.
Erik: Okay. I'll just use your duplex conversion as an example. People that are doing duplex and versions are posting up for a three bedroom top floor unit 2,100 and they're getting multiple applications. There they have really no problem at all. Filling the rental units. Vacancy is below 3%. It's about 2.2. I believe don't quote me on that, but it'll be around that area.
People that actually have the properties now are seeing gigantic appreciation just because the prices keep increasing. Like just for example in Hamilton, it's gone up 20% since January. It'd be nice to purchase a property in January and then have your down payment back and forth years up.
Alfonso: Yeah. That'd be pretty nifty. Yeah, absolutely and I'm not quite at that 21, but just under that at 22 grand for that upper unit. So, yeah, definitely on par and a lot of interest in that mid. That was probably right. I think Canada day was the first day that the tenants moved in as well, too.
Again, I'll ask the same question. I asked Jeff, people are talking about Q1, Q2 of next year, the proverbial sky. It's always coming, but what are your thoughts moving forward?
Erik: I would probably reflect Jeff's thoughts. I do not see the market slowing down at any time. There's just not enough houses for the amount of bars that we have in Southern Ontario. Again, just basic supply and demand, Economics 101. If we have so much demand for these houses and no houses, the prices are going to continue. Yeah. That's my crystal ball.
Alfonso: Like you said, so awesome info. And yeah, I can't thank you guys enough for sharing your info. And I want you to hang back here just for a second. Erik, you guys, aren't just talking about it and we appreciate the time that you are here in the REITE club.
You guys are actually doing something about it. You guys are actually hitting the streets. And I'm doing a street tour. I want to pass you a little bit to talk about the October 24th, this Saturday as well as the November 28th street tours that you guys are doing. Yeah, I'll pass it to you to go over that a little bit.
Erik: Perfect, we're doing a virtual street tour just because we were capped at 10 people and we're finding it very hard for sellers to let us like 10 people inside their home, just because of the COVID thing. So, we moved that into online, to a virtual street tour. So, how it's going to work is I'm going to be going around to four or five properties. They'll be mixed between duplex conversion flips. It might be a triplex immersion there.
If I find a really good one and we'll, I would just basically walk through the house, explain the process behind it, answer questions the whole time and kind of the strategy and the market of that current. So, that's this Saturday at 10 o'clock and the link I'm assuming will be sent out.
Alfonso: Yep, absolutely. We're going to have that link in there. And guys, you can actually contact Erik directly as well, too at erik@elevationrealty.ca and there's Jeff's info jeff@canadahomesforrent.ca. So, guys that wrap up the market update, make sure you get the info for those street tours as well as a wealth of knowledge. Again, about the power teams and working with people that are actually investing in the markets that know it better than anybody else.
Definitely, Jeff and Erik are perfect examples of that. So, not only was the panel on fire, like the chat box was on fire. There were so many questions, inspiration, and amazing stuff. So, all those questions that we didn't get to guess where they're going, see that big round blue circle there with an "f" in it. Most people know that it's Facebook. It's a Facebook group we're getting on there. Just go to The REITE Club. And it's a public group to get on there. We're almost 500 members in the group.
If we can get over 500 tonight, I'm gonna make a promise. I will personally carry on your promises. I will personally do a giveaway if we get to over 500 by midnight. I will personally do a giveaway. Make sure you get on the Facebook group tonight, if you haven't already, we're going to all the questions that we couldn't answer, that we couldn't get through there was so amazing. Just so little time out there and yeah, we have a whole bunch of stuff coming at you guys. Sarah, I'll give it off to you to walk it down.
Sarah: Sure. Absolutely. And if you guys are podcast listeners, don't forget to register for our podcasts, download it and leave a rating and review, please, if you do, that's awesome. That is my fun everyday. I'm like, can we get any new reviews? And I'm really sad when we don't. Please leave a rating and review. It makes my day. We've got Sandy MacKay, October 23rd. We have Kayla Andrade, October 30th for the upcoming podcast, some really great stuff there. And also don't forget the Saturday, Claret on St. Paul exclusive open house for the REITE club community.
This is strictly for us, for our members. It's from 11 am to 1 pm in Niagara Falls. Also the Saturday Elevation Realty Street Tour in Hamilton. And we've got the REITE club community virtual events on October 28th with Francois Lanthier and Daniel with some virtual networking. November 4th, we've got the investor forum on the fifth.
We've got our next one hour REITE club event with George Dube and Tim Tsai. So, lots of things for guys, there's lots of dates here, but check out our calendar of events and don't forget to check our emails when we send them. Cause you'll be able to see all of our events and what's coming up next. All right, Laurel, we'll talk about the REITE club community.
Laurel: Don't forget, go on over. If you haven't joined, go over to TheREITEclub.com, sign up, become a member it's free. We have forums. You can connect with people. You'll see lots of new stuff we're unrolling over the next few weeks. Come the end of October. You don't want to miss it. Get in there, talk, chat, learn things. Even some of the questions I've seen here about, oh, I don't know how to, who do I lend my money to? You just go into that site and you'll find people who are looking for deals, who have deals, who have money, who want money. There's all kinds of things going on.
- Log in or register to post comments
- ARNEL-LLEMIT-1637316866's Blog