In 1988, newly licensed realtors at the Guelph and District Real Estate Board were required to attend an orientation session held at our boards local headquarters. Not being one blessed with the ability to retain details, only two items from the days proceedings remain with me. First and foremost, the day was an early reminder of the importance of getting to the point. Anything that takes three h...Read More

In February of this year the Globe and Mail published a critical report on the real estate sales industry, focusing in particular on the behaviour in the overheated British Columbia housing market. Two major areas of focus contained within the report were ‘shadow flipping’ (re-selling a property before the buyer had even closed on it) and multiple offers on a single property. The forme...Read More

If you google prayer of the procrastinator poem you’ll come across a poem that we have framed and displayed in our office. For those of us – myself included – who are proponents of investing in real estate, the poem serves as a not so gentle reminder that obstacles that we think we face today (pick your favourite – too late, missed my opportunity, real estate bubble, over ...Read More

Very very early in my career and many times since, my father, who preceded me in the family real estate brokerage, would say to me: take notes, someday you may want to write a book. Save for these articles, I have yet to heed his advice. Having had the fortunate opportunity to observe the habits of professionals for almost 30 years now, some recurring themes begin to emerge. And while my observati...Read More

As a self diagnosed sufferer of a mild form of attention deficit, I find that I very seldom take the time to sit down quietly with a book and read. Unfortunately, that leaves me on the wrong side of the Mark Twain truism: the man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read. It is not that I dont like to read, I do. Rather, I seem to be easily distracted by virtually anything e...Read More

Looking for a long-term home? Here are a few questions you should ask yourself before buying. Buying a home can be an overwhelming process. Relax. Yes, buying a home is a huge commitment – but if you ask yourself a few key questions, you can increase your likelihood of ensuring that you buy a fantastic home that you’ll love for decades into the future. If you plan on buying a propert...Read More

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, In the market for some high end real estate? In January, Hugh Hefner listed his home – better known as the Playboy Mansion- for the tidy sum of two hundred million dollars.(The impact, is better felt when expressed numerically as $200,000,000.00).As a luxury home in Guelph sells for considerably fewer zeros, I cannot claim to have any insight into what a $200,000,000.00 home might offer in...Read More

My wife started a family tradition when the kids were quite young. Each New Years Eve, we would sit together, and jot down on our respective pieces of paper our personal goals -resolutions if you will- that we had for the coming year. Twelve months later we would repeat the process with the added amusement of reading what we had written the previous New Years Eve. The cramped jar has become a tes...Read More

A friend of mine, recently purchased a vacation property in Florida. It is good to have such friends, willing to bare the burden of expense and provide an excuse for folks like me to pay them a visit. I havent visited his home in Guelph for years, but I jumped at the opportunity to fly south and spend a few days at his second home. It would be rude after all, to decline. Travel, has always been a...Read More