R.E.N.T.S. Podcast

Joshua Laye is the president of the Kamloops Triathalon Club (www.TryTri.org), and shares how mental toughness translates from triathlon training (Joshua recently completed an Iron Man race) to entrepreneurship. Joshua is a real estate investor in Kamloops BC, and can be reached on Facebook or LinkedIn.

Show Notes:

01m:20s – Jon’s bio: 150+ RTO projects, $32M+ private capital raised including RSPs. Jon is the President of the Canadian Association of Rent To Own Professionals.

03m:50s – Jon will work outside RTO framework when structuring deals if they look good. He customizes his approach to the situation.

05m:40s – Jon does everything in integrity due to martial arts background (double black belt). Jon’s experience starting and growing a martial arts gym.

08m:00s – Tenants of Taekwondo and Jon’s core values: courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self control and indomitable spirit.

11m:30s – Real estate investing is not a passive business. More details about selecting a location for Taekwondo club.

13m:00s – Jon’s backgrounders growing up. Jon is very adverse to consumer debt, worked very hard, 3 jobs at a time. Jon took an architecture degree, and shortly after graduating did his first real estate deal as a JV in 2006.

17m:10s – Jon is lured to Fort McMurray by his friend Jeff with very high wages. Jon saved 80% of his wages.

19m:40s – Jon gets more education to replicate the success of his first deal. Download audios to listen to while driving truck, audio books, courses. Decides on Rent To Own as his primary strategy.

22m:55s – There are a lot of slime balls in the RTO sphere.

24m:30s – The origins of the Canadian Association of Rent To Own Professionals. Benefits of membership: credibility, support, ongoing learning, connections.

32m:40s – Jon’s parents and siblings. Jon and Sam talk about being the oldest child.

35m:40s – More detail about Jon’s architecture degree and how expensive it was to complete.

39m:40s – Jon is very adverse to bad debt and explains his mindset around that. Uses a car example to articulate the problem with bad debt, explains his strong background in math. Holidays as a child every summer would be on a line of credit, and then his dad would work hard after to pay for it which seems backward to Jon.

45m:30s – Advice from a “Rich Uncle” mentor was and is invaluable.

46m:45s – What Jon is working on now and how he spends his time. Just spent 3 months in Europe and just got back, he managed to do a couple deals while he was away.

48m:30s – Raising capital and making / growing your list as a deal maker. Get your newsletter going, stay in touch, build your investor list from your newsletter list (10% of readers will eventually invest with you). Jon had a hard time getting a deal funded. 50 people said no to Jon and he had the perseverance to keep going. He paid 6 investors 20% to get $140,000 total when he was just starting out. Jon then got serious about getting capital in place. He now has more money than deals.

56m:10s – Jon got invaluable advice and questions from “Rich Uncle” when he was pitching the first deal, and their relationship got a lot closer even though they didn’t do that deal together.

58m:05s – Even though all 50 people said “no”, they all knew Jon was seriously investing in real estate. Many of them now are investing with Jon now that he is full time as a real estate investor. Being full time adds credibility.

1h:04m:15s – Jon talks about how he manages his deals, and how he is scaling his business by bringing on help. Jon is now free to live away from his properties.

1h:10m:00s – Having the time to invest in real estate when you have a job and kids and a family.

1h:12m:00s – Sam talks about how he manages his time with a young family. Tools, mindset, cutting time wasters. The challenge of shift work and long hours at a job to building a business.

1h:15m:40s – The value of a mastermind group and an accountability partner. Letting yourself down vs letting an accountability partner down. Goal setting and vision boards to...

Podcast Show Notes:

03:10 Introducing Russell Westcott as the foremost authority in Authentic Real Estate Education

06:20 Sam’s memory of Russell’s teaching shattering a limiting belief

08:00 Russell’s comments on Sam’s goal setting (brief audio glitch)

08:20 Russell thinks a good coach should have students that far exceed their accomplishments, and that Sam’s outrageous goal has inspired Russell to up his game too.

08:50 Russell’s recent investing activity

10:30 #JVJedi origin story

12:40 Russell’s use of stories and how he constructs stories to help his audience understand and learn

13:15 The Art of Storytelling

15:00 Using stories to be a leader and show another side of things

16:15 Sam has a made a list of real estate educators, and there was a real gap while Russell was on his multi year break

19:00 The Raising Capital Academy origin story – so many people were reaching out to Russell so he decided to digitize everything he knows, and interview everyone who is currently raising capital,

20:45 Quality Real Estate Education is tough to deliver, it takes a real professional

22:20 Bootcamp giveaway – Top 10 List of Canadian Real Estate Educators

23:30 Is real estate a moral business model? (Profit isn’t a four letter word.)

30:12 After mentoring real estate investors for years, can you pick the people who will “make it” vs those who won’t?

31:52 How to shift your thinking to understand what is possible. “My best investment was a massage table.”

35:25 How Russell is working to be the ambassador of possibility. “You never know what is going to resonate with somebody.” Keep sharing authentically and be yourself, and something might just stick that will transform someone’s life.

38:00 Everyone is so interested in the “how” but the truth is the “how” to invest in real estate is different for everyone. More important is your reason “why” you’re investing.

40:00 Real estate is a hard to mess up, there is no “sell button” which makes it hard to quit once you start.

41:40 The hazard of buying your time back. Dark times will come.

43:30 Real estate investing is a vehicle for fulfilment.

44:10 It’s good to talk about the tough times in real estate investing. It provides support when “real life happen”. If you want to be successful and long term in this business, you need to deal with the tough stuff: bankruptcy, audits, loneliness.

47:10 Russell compelled to bring out the real life in real estate and document them for people.

48:30 How Russell became a real estate educator, and a story Russell has never before told in a public format. “The teacher’s parking lot and watching Opera.”

52:40 Russell loves teaching, inspiring, coaching and presenting on real estate as well as doing deals and his schedule is jam packed!

54:30 Russell is looking forward to the RENTS Bootcamp and sharing his expertise on raising capital, with a brand new presentation just for us in Kamloops. He is also looking forward to learning from Thomas as well, and it will be a great day.

55:40 www.RussellWestcott.com is the best way to reach Russell. His domain name was purchased 15 years ago and the website was only live last year. “You can teach an old dog new tricks.”

Thomas Beyer is a “Christian Capitalist”, a family man, a multimillionaire, and has been a real estate investor for over 20 years. We talked about life, real estate, syndicating deals, raising millions of dollars, and the recovering from the pain of failure. If you're interested in learning how to syndicate large deals, you will be thrilled to learn from someone who purchased over 40 buildings so far in his career.

Show Notes:
00:00 - Intro and Thomas Beyer’s track record.
03:20 - "Thanks for being brave enough to talk about your faith publicly."
04:00 - Thomas talks about the pain of failure.
05:40 - "For us there is only trying, the rest is not our business."
06:30 - How to become a best selling author in Canada.
07:25 - Sometimes you work with partners or employees who don’t turn out as you thought a few years prior
08:00 - Thomas shares how he got to a place where he bought 2000 units. He started buying in his late 30s with one condo
11:20 - Thomas had an epiphany that EVERY building you see is owned by someone. That starts an awareness which leads to the thinking “how can I own that one.”
15:00 - Thomas discovers after buying three condos that you can buy the entire building for half the price of purchasing individual units.
16:30 - The evolution from JVs to Offering Memorandums using Corporations, Trusts, and Limited Partnerships
19:30 - Why Thomas moved to Canmore, it was near Calgary and Thomas needed to travel for his work with IBM. (His son grew up with Sam’s cousin.)
20:50 - Canmore house cost $400,000, ten years later sold for $1M. Real estate did very well there thanks to Olympics. Then the 2008 crash
22:15 - On the topic of the financial crisis, an example of timing being out of our hands came up. The difference between massive success and catastrophic failure can be slim. Being forced to take a 10 year mortgage term at 7% interest was a blessing in disguise.
25:00 - Selling a building in the US - Sold in Denton TX for a large profit.
27:10 - How to raise funds: answer questions. MyREINSpace, Twitter, Facebook
27:50 - Thomas enjoys intellectual debates: abortion, same sex marriage, politics, and of course real estate
29:05 - Thomas believe in “earn, learn, return”, that is why he spends his time helping others with free answers to questions.
29:45 - Debate on overpaid public servants: “20% less salary means 25% more people working”
33:15 - Thomas’ take on putting on seminars and real estate training. (Says RENTS memberships are way too cheap). Thomas was more active and travelling more in the past when he was actively raising money.
37:15 - There is a season for everything. Pruning the portfolio, stretching yourself too thin trying to be in the education / event management business. RENTS meetings should be quarterly for the price, or charge $200/mo like REIN. Story about a networking group Thomas ran when he was in the software business.
41:20 - When is enough enough? Thomas gives his definition of success. Talks about life throwing you wrinkles. 1 house paid off, 1 second location paid off, and enough of an income to lead a good life. Is $1M in portfolio value enough? $10M? Perhaps much less if you choose to live abroad.
45:00 - Thomas chose to not take his company public, and decided to do more smaller projects instead. You can buy 10 buildings a year, or one per quarter, or one a year, or sit back for two years and do nothing. That’s what great about real estate: it’s project based.
47:00 - "People have drowned in rivers one foot deep, on averageTM”
48:20 - Next Saturday will be a great event and there will be lots of stories to share. Oct 6th at Thompson River’s University is the RENTS Bootcamp.

You can get registered for the Bootcamp and a recording of it at

What would you do after 36 years working? For Mel Johnson the answer to that has been real estate investing, volunteering, golf, travel, cycling, spending time with kids and grandkids, and nurturing his 44 year long marriage!

Show notes:

- Mel decided to form a company with his son and wife. - 12:03

- They ended up calling the company MCH (MELCRAIGHETHER) Development Ltd. - 12:20

- They ended up forming 5 shareholders including 2 more of his children.- 12:33

- Splitting the revenue 10% to Mel and Heather and 90% to the 3 Children - 12:50

- The main objective is to get his children involved in real estate. - 13:27

- They also got other options which they have 11 share classes so they could have other investors come in to the company and wanted to do bigger deals. - 13:37

- The appeal of doing a build is a shorter period of hold to earn - 22:11

- Mel talks about what he is afraid of and how he'd overcome his fears - 25:57

- Mel also emphasizes why we just need to be simply authentic and honest with people, he thinks that to be able to be successful in business- personal rapport is really important and Always like the job you are into.- 26:40

- Have a good relationship with the boss and colleagues which you should treat fairly.-26:55

- If you don't have a good boss, life could really be tough. So Mel tries to always become a good boss. - 27:05

- You have to be firm but fair.- 27:12

- Treat everybody the same. 27:14

- Volunteering is also an interest for Mel and his wife because it is like connecting and sharing with people which they find very satisfying. - 27:33

- Volunteering is good for the soul. - 27:48

- Mel also gives advice to people who are asking if the business of real estate is for them.-30:00

- We have to connect with people who have done it themselves, to get some important insights, but probably to make the first deal and overcoming fear is the biggest challenge. - 30:05

- You have to write down everything into steps. so you can identify, do or complete and show progress and get yourself ready to have the resources in place whether it's financing, or the legal advice or realtor have all those people. all the connection that can support you. - 30:22

- "Get the best advice you can and take the plunge" 30:42

Mel's Bio:

- Batchelor of Science in Forestry

- 33 years with Weyerhaeuser in various Managerial roles (Kamloops, Lumby, Vavenby)

- 3 years with Domtar as Fibre Supply Manager at the Kamloops Pulp Mill

- Retired in 2010 at 62

- First Real Estate Investment in 2005

- Have invested in Real Estate Limited Partnerships

- Currently have interests in 4 rental properties, recetly sold 2

- Started a Limited Company in March 2017 to invest in Real Estate and recently completed a build in Kamloops, looking for the next oportunity.

Visit us at the next meeting or view meetings online at www.RENTS.website