Why Canadians Should Invest in US Real Estate: Trends & Strategies
In this episode of the Wisdom Lifestyle Money Show, host Scott Dillingham dives into the shifting investment landscape for Canadians, highlighting why many are turning to US real estate amid economic challenges at home. Drawing from charts shared on social media and Statistics Ca…
In this episode of the Wisdom Lifestyle Money Show, host Scott Dillingham dives into the shifting investment landscape for Canadians, highlighting why many are turning to US real estate amid economic challenges at home. Drawing from charts shared on social media and Statistics Canada data, Scott explains how foreign direct investment has been flowing out of Canada since around 2015, with a significant uptick in outflows to the US by the end of 2023. He attributes this to factors like the recent capital gains tax inclusion rate increase effective June 25, 2024, which taxes two-thirds of gains over $250,000 for individuals and all gains for corporations, prompting investors to seek more favorable environments. Scott shares personal anecdotes, including his own experiences with tenant issues and rising mortgage rates, to illustrate how Canadian policies like rent controls and lengthy Landlord and Tenant Board backlogs—currently averaging 6-8 months—are deterring domestic investment.
Transitioning to US opportunities, Scott contrasts Canada's restrictive lending and foreign buyer bans (extended until December 31, 2026) with the investor-friendly US market. He emphasizes easier eviction processes (typically 2-4 weeks), flexible rent adjustments, and lower property costs, where solid homes can start around $110,000 for mortgaged purchases. A key focus is on Debt Service Coverage Ratio (DSCR) loans, which qualify based on property cash flow rather than personal income, allowing up to 75% loan-to-value with rates as low as 6% in late 2025. Scott recommends markets like Ohio for cash flow (e.g., Cleveland and Columbus), Florida for Airbnb potential, and Texas for executive rentals via platforms like PadSplit. He also touches on using RRSPs for down payments through services like Seaport Credit and setting up US banking with institutions like Comerica Bank.
As of November 2025, US real estate markets show resilience with median home prices around $428,700 nationally, up 4% year-over-year, driven by job growth in states like Texas. Scott urges diversification to mitigate risks from Canada's economic pressures, including population growth strains and policy hurdles. This episode provides actionable insights for Canadian investors eyeing US properties, blending data-driven analysis with practical tips for getting started, from entity setup to negotiating seller credits for better rates.
Key Takeaways
- Investment Outflows from Canada: Since 2015, capital has increasingly left Canada for the US, accelerated by the 2024 capital gains tax hike taxing two-thirds of gains over $250,000 for individuals and all for corporations, per CRA guidelines.
- Landlord Challenges in Canada: Rent controls limit increases (e.g., from $1,400 to $1,460 over years despite market rents at $3,000), while 6-8 month Landlord and Tenant Board delays hinder evictions or sales, unlike swift 2-4 week processes in the US.
- US Lending Advantages: DSCR loans focus on property cash flow (minimum 1.0 ratio) over personal income, with 25-30% down payments, rates from 6-8.5%, and no need for US credit or jobs—reserves of 3-12 months often required.
- Market Recommendations: Target Ohio (Cleveland/Columbus) for low-cost cash flow properties; Florida for lifestyle/Airbnb rentals; Texas for mid-term executive leases via PadSplit, amid strong job growth and population influx.
- Practical Setup Tips: Use Comerica Bank for free US accounts without a US address; leverage RRSPs via Seaport Credit (net worth-dependent); request up to 5% seller credits to buy down rates, saving more than price reductions.
- Diversification Benefits: US markets offer lower entry costs (e.g., $110,000+ for mortgaged homes), Section 8 government-backed rents, and growth potential, with national median prices at $428,700 in Q3 2025, up 4% YoY.
Links to Show References
- LendCity Mortgages (for US Lending & Strategy Calls): lendcity.ca
- Statistics Canada Net International Investment Data: www150.statcan.gc.ca
- Seaport Credit (for RRSP US Investments): seaportcredit.com
- Comerica Bank (US Banking for Canadians): comerica.com
- (00:05) - Introduction to Investment Trends
- (03:25) - Shifting Investment to the U.S.
- (04:59) - Challenges in Canadian Real Estate
- (08:14) - Personal Landlord Challenges
- (09:14) - Reasons to Invest in U.S. Properties
- (10:12) - Understanding U.S. Lending Practices
- (15:49) - Insights from Canadian Economists
- (18:10) - Interactive Q&A Session
- (21:34) - Recommended U.S. Markets for Investment
- (27:59) - Final Thoughts and Next Steps
- (35:33) - Conclusion and Farewell
Transcript
Introduction
Welcome to the Wisdom Lifestyle Money Show. I'm your host, Scott Dillingham. The show is designed to help Canadians invest better in Canada and the United States. We are the North America-based mortgage financing lender and provide education to both countries.
Discover how you can become a better investor and access the financing you need. First, I'm gonna share my screen here because I wanna show you guys something. So this is a Facebook post from Erwin Sido.
So he found this chart online. I'm gonna show you as well. I found a chart as well. So this chart, what this represents is Canada's investing dollars, okay?
And whether the money's coming into the country or the money's coming out of the country. And honestly, guys, this is one of the main reasons why we started doing the US lending is because we see the writing on the wall.
The Core Idea
So I know it's really small. Maybe I can zoom in here a little bit.
Yes, I can. Okay, so you see on the very left of the chart, there's the bar graph is below the line. So below the line means money coming into the country. So you can see in 2014, money was flowing in.
So the investors globally thought Canada was the place to invest. So since that, probably around 2015, because it's kind of in the middle there, you see the bar is on the upper line. So the upper line represents money leaving Canada, okay? And you can see what it was like during COVID, right?
It peaked, but it came back down, right? As COVID ended. And it does go in cycles, right? You see the up and down and up and down.
Deep Dive
But more than ever, investors are leaving. And I got to say, since the capital gains tax as well, that's going to be coming out at the end of the month.
It's totally against corporations. They don't have any buffer, right? So when your personal name, your first 250 of the capital gains is taxed the old way. And then above that, you're taxed using the new capital gains.
But for corporations, from the end of this month, they are taxed all in the new way. They don't get a buffer. And so what that's causing investors to do is to leave. Now, if you look, so I have another chart.
So this chart, I did not find the source. I just found the Facebook post, but it lists the source there. So I could probably look that up on the site. But I actually found Statistics Canada, which is showing as well, all of the countries.
Practical Steps
So this is Canada's net international investment. So what that means is people in Canada, where they're starting to invest their money. And you see, and it's not showing all the other countries. Well, actually, let me rephrase that.
It is showing all the countries, but it's grouping it into the light blue. You can't see any other countries' individual influx of dollars, but you can see United States.
So United States is the dark blue line. So you can see here that money is just moving to the states. And this is only up until the end of 2023. So this does not reflect anything in 2024, which we can see 2024 had a large jump based on this chart.
And then also we're not showing any of the capital gains. So if you guys look back to this link, I think that you'll see and you'll find that tons of investors, once this chart updates, the money is going to be leaving further.
Key Takeaways
Okay. So as this webinar is about why you should invest in the states, I first wanted to show you where the money is going. So the states is very, very friendly for investors.
They want that money. They encourage it. And because of that, things like lending is very, very easy. Canada, for an example, has a foreign buyer tax ban.
And not only that, it was supposed to end. So it first came out for two years and now they've renewed it for years. So what they're ultimately saying, at least in the real estate market, is we don't want your foreign dollars here.
Okay. So that obviously affects our country.
Resources
And I love Canada. I still invest here. I'm still going to invest here. So I'm not saying don't drop everything, go to the states.
I'm not saying that. I'm just saying look for other options.
Okay. So what I'm going to do, I'm going to copy this link into the chat.
So I'll paste it there. So everybody can check that whenever you want down the road. So you can see, and I'm very positive, once it updates to the capital gains, that things are, you're going to see that graph skyrocket again. And so for any of those who are just joining, today I'm actually working from home.
Introduction
So I'm in my home office. So it's not the office, but just wanted to, you know, get this going anyways. So there's multiple things that are going on in Canada that are restricting investment as well. So I'm going to make this all geared towards real estate investing.
And as you guys know, the landlord tribunal in many provinces are very challenged. I'm even going through a situation myself. I'll share it here in a moment, but there's backlog. Now I've heard they're getting better.
So we're between a six month to an eight month backlog that I'm hearing, but there's things that a tenant can do to delay things further. So I'll just share my story of what's going on.
So I got a property. I've had it for years and I've always had the variable rate mortgages on it. And when I first signed up this tenant, I did sign below market rents. It was actually 400 bucks a month below market rents is what I leased it to them for.
The Core Idea
And I did it on purpose because my property manager, he came to me and he said, Scott, you know what? These tenants are so good. They're the best tenants I've ever had. They're going to take care of your property.
They're going to do the renovations. They're going to do gardening. They're going to really take care of it like it's their home. That's just how these guys are.
But they can only pay this much. So again, it was 400 below market rents.
So I rented it for $1,400 a month. It should have rented for $1,800. I believe this was 2015, 2016. Now market rents on the home is $3,000 a month for this property's location.
Deep Dive
So I'm already losing because of that. But then anyways, I have the mortgage.
I've always gotten variables. So the mortgage comes up for renewal. So now it's renewed into these higher rates that everybody is concerned with and rightfully so. But now it doesn't cash flow because I've accepted a lower market rents from day one.
And we have increased the rents a little bit. I think it's up to like $1,460 now. But it still doesn't cash flow when you factor in property taxes and all insurance.
So I'm like, you know what? I'm just going to sell it and I'll redeploy my capital into another property or into the States, whatever.
Practical Steps
It doesn't matter. I'll just sell it because it's a weak property.
It's what investors do, right? If it doesn't make you money anymore, you get rid of that investment and you buy another one. So I tell the tenants I'm selling and the tenants are like, you know what?
We're not moving. So I spoke to my lawyer and what they said was, if I get somebody to put an offer on this home and buy it to move forward and then I have to submit the claim to tribunal to get these tenants out. Now, if that process goes too long, like the six to eight month waiting period and the buyers back away because they can't take possession of the home right away, then I have to restart that tribunal process with a new buyer. So I don't know if you guys have ever, well, I'm sure you've bought and sold, right?
We're all investors here, but nobody is going to say, oh, I'll buy your home in nine months. You know what I mean?
Key Takeaways
It doesn't work like that. They want it in a month or two. So these guys found a loophole that they can pretty much stay there forever and stop me from selling the property.
So it's quite unpleasant. I'm trying to figure out some different solutions, but my point here is, is this type of thing does not happen in the state.
This would not be acceptable. You need to sell the home. You need to move into the home, whatever. Two to four weeks is the average.
And I'm hearing the maximum is two months and then they're out, right? And I just don't want to kick people out, but it's like at the same point it costs money, right? So the landlord tribunal issues that we have here are not going on in the states.
Resources
S. properties to your portfolio, right? You're going to diversify and you're going to actually reduce your risk because you're dealing with more landlord-friendly rules. So Ali in the chat put, yeah, me too, except I'm moving in with an N12.
I may be homeless July 1st because the hearing is September 11th. Yeah, like it's crazy. You just never know what's going to happen. So landlord tribunal is absolutely one of the most important reasons why I would suggest, you know, picking up something in the states.
Another reason is rent, right? So let's just go back to my example, right? I started renting to these guys at $1,400.
It's below market rents. My mortgage went up. If I'm in the state, I can go to the tenants and say, sorry, guys, I need you to pay $3,000 or you have to move because my mortgage payment went up and it won't cash flow unless you do. In the states, they don't want to pay.
Introduction
They go and then you put someone in for market rents. It's as simple as that.
But in Canada, same thing. I can't. I can't raise those rents like that, right? You have to, like Ali's doing, right?
Moving into the property. There's obviously other strategies too. But in the states, these rising interest rates do not affect people like it does in Canada. So I think that is a super important thing to know.
Another thing that's really neat in the states is just their overall cost of the building and the materials. Even though it's in US dollars, right? So dollar for dollar, we're paying a little bit more for materials. The fact that they have full houses that you can get, I mean, I don't recommend buying the cheap ones, but I mean, you can get like a nice house that doesn't need work for 50 grand.
The Core Idea
I mean, you can't really do that here. Now, again, those 50 grand properties might not be in the most prestigious neighborhoods, right? I wouldn't recommend it, but it's still an option, right? So you can still get low costing real estate that does cash flow depending on the market that you're looking to invest in.
And then the other major, major thing is the lending. It is completely different over there. It's more of a common sense approach.
So let me give you an example. So in Canada, when we're processing an application for an investor, the lender is using the client's personal income. They're also using the rental income of the property. Now, generally speaking, the lenders, they don't use 100% of the rental income.
They want to target around half of the rent. Okay. Then we've also got a stress test, which makes all the payments artificially high. Now, I will say with the rising rate increases, the reason why there hasn't been so many foreclosures is because of the stress test.
Deep Dive
Okay. So I think it has some merit, which is useful. And I can see it, right? Because people are renewing, but they can still pay their payments.
34. The stress test changed there depending on the year when you bought your home. And rates are now around there and even in the fours, like five-year fixed.
We've got a lender. We're doing one right now.
59. So they're coming down. So where I'm going with this is, you know, you're not going to see a ton of foreclosures. But we saw this stress test, which artificially limits the borrowing capacity of an investor.
Practical Steps
So it limits your rental property. And then again, the government, the candidate says, we only will let you use 44% of the total income on the application to be used for borrowing purposes. So they're not even using all of your income to qualify you. So they're using half the rental income, they're using stress test, and they're using 44% of your income to go to debt.
Now, keep in mind, these are A lenders. B lenders do allow elevated debt ratios. But with B lenders, there's fees and there's higher rates. So in the States, it's very common sense in the way of how they qualify you.
So what they do is they literally look at a property's cash flow. And if it cash flows, they move forward.
So it's very, very simple. And the links, you know what? Pull it up here so you guys can see it. I'm going to share my screen in one second.
Key Takeaways
But if you go to the investors hub, we actually have the calculator in here for you to use and to work with. So you just go to USA Investing on the left here.
And hold on here. No, sorry.
It's under cash flow calculators. Okay.
And then there's the calculator. So just for fun, I'm going to open it up and we're going to take a look at this.
Resources
I want to show you. So just take a second here.
So this is the calculator. So we literally put in the property's value, the loan amount, and the LTV. So generally speaking, it's 70% LTV if we're going based on rental income. Or you can go to 75% LTV if you're confirming your income.
So they do give you that option for better loan to values, but it's not necessary. Okay. So then they look at the property's rental income that it generates. And then they look at these expenses.
So they factor in property taxes, hazard insurance, which is the same thing as home insurance here. HOA is homeowners association fees. Those would be similar to like a condo fee over here.
Introduction
And that's it. And if the property has a DSCR, which stands for debt service coverage ratio of one or above, we even actually have lenders that will go below, but I don't recommend that because it's not a strong investment. I would look at at least one or above, but a DSCR of one or above means the whole property covers itself.
You're good to go. As long as your money is not from funny sources, they will absolutely move forward with you. There's no Canadian credit that you have to prove you don't even have to show them a job. You don't have to even have a job.
They'll move forward because they know that the property is going to cover itself and you're good to go. What they will do though is they'll ask for reserves. So depending on the lender, the reserve will be anywhere from three months to 12 months. So what the reserve is is like kind of just repaying the mortgage interest and it's held in trust at the title company.
And actually, let me rephrase that. Not a lot of lenders do actually have to prepay. Some of them, they just want to see that you have the reserve. But some of them do want a small prepayment there and they'll take your payments from that and you're good to go.
The Core Idea
So there's many, many reasons here, but I think fundamentally, and just to touch on this too, I'm going to try to get the video, but I was at an event speaking about US lending last week. Benjamin Tal was there. He's Canada's lead economist with CIBC and his whole presentation was how all the money is leaving Canada and what Canada can do to stop it, right?
Because that's the thing. You don't want this to happen for a long period of time or it will really negatively alter our economy. But there's even like the Canadian retirement fund. So I didn't know this, but there's some retirement funds in Canada through the pensions, directly through the government and through third party providers, they invest in real estate.
We see it on the commercial end, actually. So behind the scenes on some of the commercial deals, they're actually the lenders is the pension funds. And they do that so that way their pensioners, their assets are secured to real estate and then they make the interest off the real estate to pay them, right? Because they might lend out commercial real estate at six to eight, but they might offer an investor one or two percent annual return, something like a GIC.
So that's usually where we see them. S. single family properties instead of Canadian properties. So even the large pension funds are saying, let's invest over here.
Deep Dive
Things are better over here. So when I see that personally, it just makes me think, OK, you know, we have to diversify. I actually am in the process of moving money there. I don't have a property in the state yet.
I have my entity set up. I've got my bank account.
I've got all that stuff. But we're moving over. There's a platform where you can potentially move your RSTs. depending on your net worth and you can invest them into real estate in the states.
So I'm actually leveraging my RSPs to do this. But yeah, so that's going on. Obviously, once I sell the weak cash flowing property, I'm going to invest those funds there too. Now, I want this to be a little bit more interactive.
Practical Steps
We went over multiple reasons why investing in the states is good. Is there any comments or questions that anybody has? If so, drop them in the chat. I'll answer them and then we'll go from there.
We're just going to wait. Give you guys a minute.
See if anything comes through. So Ali, are you saying you're looking to hear more about the RSPs?
I know you're typing. So, okay.
Key Takeaways
So Arlene and Ali. So it's called Seaport Credit.
So you want to look up Seaport Credit. You want to set up a call with them. In fact, if you guys send me a message through the Investors Hub, like just look me up under the members and send me a message, I'll get you the direct introduction to the guy. There's different net worth requirements and things that you have to have as an investor to determine how much of your RSPs you can use for down payments.
So it will be a different figure per person. But yeah, it's amazing.
S. bank accounts with?
Resources
So I opened with Comerica Bank. They're quite local to me because I'm in Windsor, which is a border city.
So they're right across in Michigan. The reason I chose Comerica Bank is one, the account is free. So you don't need to maintain a minimum balance and it's completely free.
So I like that. S.
S. address.
Introduction
Okay, so I don't. Well, I mean, I do now, but I didn't then because I got my Detroit mailbox thing.
So I've got the address and whatever. But they might, I actually don't know, they might not even use that address as your physical address. So anyways, Comerica Bank, they've got locations all over the place and they did it. So Glenn, Amy is also asking, Glenn Brash is who I set this up with.
S. business bank account.
Okay. Moyo is saying, you talked about DSCR loan type. How much down payment is required by the lenders.
The Core Idea
So there's two programs for that. 30% down is the standard program where they're basing the approval strictly on the property. And then we can go down as low as 25% down.
But that's the confirmed income. So they're going to look at your Canadian income. They're going to look at your debt ratios. They accept much higher debt to income ratios than Canada does.
So it's still quite easy. But yeah, that's the minimum. And we have a ton of lenders.
So that's like across the board. I will share that minimum lending amount is 75. So do keep that in mind because we do have investors that do want to buy those 50 key properties I talked about. But they just can't get a mortgage on it.
Deep Dive
So we'll refinance properties in Canada so they can buy those ones cash. But if you want a mortgage, you've got to be buying around 110. So then with the 30% down, you meet that 75k minimum.
S. markets look good from your perspective?
So here is where I want to buy. I like Ohio for the low purchase price and strong cash flow percentage numbers.
Sorry, guys. Just need to do that. Okay, so I like Ohio for that purpose. Again, cash flow, low purchase prices.
Practical Steps
I like Cleveland in Columbus in Ohio. There's some places you got to avoid like Toledo, right? Toledo, lots of people are leaving Toledo. Vacancy is going up so you don't want to you don't want to be there.
So for Ohio, my strategy is cash flow. I really like Florida for the Airbnb style market and the lifestyle market. And what I mean by that is say you buy an Airbnb and it's vacant, you can use it yourself, which I like, right?
Because Florida is beautiful, right? S.
So I really like that. And then Texas, there's a lot of business opportunity in Texas in the sense of jobs and major corporations opening up there. So for Texas, I would do something like a pad split. So think Airbnb, but it's for executives.
Key Takeaways
So pad split will rent your rooms out of your property, but they rent it to executives on a midterm basis, but they're paying short-term rent. So you kind of get a, I don't want to say a better tenant, but the fact that they're longer paying short-term rents because a lot of the people that do pad split, their employers are helping the sponsor or their employers are fully paying their rent.
So I really like Texas for pad split. So again, my perspective is cash flow. That's my personal choice of what I like to invest in.
So your markets might be different. The ones I've just stated might not be the highest appreciating and that type of thing. And that might be what you're looking for. So just take what I'm saying with a grain of salt and do your own research because again, my investing goals are different.
Okay, so Nadi is saying the down payment minimum is 30%. Is that what you said? Yes, that is exactly, that is exactly it. And then Moyo is saying, and what is the interest rates for the DSCR?
Resources
So there's two things and I'll share, I'll share this with you. So rates, the lowest is 6% right now, which is actually really good. In fall, the lowest was around 7%. Okay, so it's actually come down over there.
5% without any credits. So in this state, you can, you can buy down your interest rate, which means you're sort of prepaying a bit of the lender's profit. So because you're doing that, the lender gives you a better deal on the lending. Okay, and you can do that with any mortgage, whether you're refinancing, doing a purchase, whatever.
But what I would recommend and what I educate and coach all of our clients is you want to ask for a seller credit. And you can go up to 5% of the purchase price. So you say to the seller, I'm going to offer you, I'm just making up numbers here so we can see the math. But let's say I'm going to offer you $100,000 for this home, but I want $5,000 cash on closing.
Okay, it's better to ask for the seller credit if you're going to use it to buy down the rate than to get a lower purchase price. Because if I finance the home at $95,000, I might save $10,000, maybe $15 a month. But if my rate's coming in at $7,500 and I use the seller credit to buy down my rate, and now I can get $6,000, you're going to save $100,000, $150 a month. So it's going to be much more worth it to have that lower rate.
Introduction
Right? So not only are you saving on the monthly payments, but you're saving on the interest. Okay, so always ask for seller credit.
Try to get both. Try to get a reduction in purchase price and the seller credit, but it may not always be possible. Okay, so Amy and Kip is saying, can we share your banking contact information? So Glenn has asked me not to publicize it.
I don't know why. I mean, if I was a branch manager, I would want everybody to know, but I can send it to you separately or I can have Jillian send it to you.
That's fine. 5 to 10 with three points and 30% buy down.
The Core Idea
So it does depend on the location. Absolutely. Ali, portfolio loans do tend to be a little bit higher in interest rate. Yeah, because I know you guys are working on that larger portfolio loan.
So the thing with portfolio loans is there's less lenders that do them and they kind of do price them a little bit higher than an individual loan. And the reason for doing that is they know you're going to save a ton of money on closing as a portfolio loan than if you finance each property individual. Because if you finance each one individually, it's, right, you'll have closing costs on every single property.
So you're spending so much money. So the portfolio loans, they tend to price a little bit higher on the rates, but you're saving a ton on the closing costs. So all in all, I'm sure if we ran dollars and cents, it would be cheaper. Um, now one thing to keep in mind too, Ali, is I would ask Aya, like, is it open right away?
Is it open after two years? Is it open after five years? Because in the States, the maximum is open after five. So, if the rates are coming down and you're in that product, as soon as it becomes open, we can swap lenders for you.
Deep Dive
So, um, that's kind of, uh, how that works. Any other questions, guys, before we, we get going in again, I do apologize for those that were not here right away. Our main guest is a realtor in the States and he was going to do a deep dive because he also invests in Canada and he was going to share even more examples and from his perspective, um, but he had a medical emergency so he wasn't able to join us, but we do this landing all day. So I figured I would, uh, I would hop on here, but any other questions before we let everybody go?
I'll leave you guys with one final thought. If you're, interested in buying in the States, how it works is we generally review the property first. So we'll run it through one of the lenders pricing and, uh, sorry, nice.
My phone's always freaking. Um, we run it through the lenders pricers and we have many, many lenders. So we, we check them all and we'll say, okay, here's what this looks like with this lender. Here's what it looks like over here.
We think that this will be the best lender for you and we kind of price it up front. So that's kind of like the pre-approval as we price the property, analyze the cashflow and let you know what this looks like. You don't need any documents up front. Then if that goes good and you put in an offer, we'll give you a pre-approval letter so you can submit that.
Practical Steps
And then regarding documents, it's literally at that point then we do an application and then we send in like your IDs. Um, there, there are some basic things, right? They're going to want to see proof of dump payment, right?
Just like Canada. Um, but in Canada, it's reverse. You kind of do all the documents up front and then, um, you get your approval. But over there, you get approved first and then they want the documents.
So it's, it's backwards. And I, I know, I know I get a lot of investors that are confused about that, that process. Uh, but over there it's property first.
So just remember that. So that's what we're presenting to the lender. And we're saying, here's the property.
Key Takeaways
Um, do you like it? And if they do, then we get the paperwork. Uh, so Amy and Kip saying, what are my thoughts on purchasing in Detroit? Being that it's right across the water, I know it's very attractive over there.
Real estate pricing is cheap. And I got to say, like, I really liked the improvements that Detroit has done in the past recent years. Um, they lost a lot of government funding a few years ago because their population dipped below a million. So in the States, if your population's over a million, there's a ton of government incentives and extra funding that a city gets.
So when Detroit's population shrunk, they lost a lot of that funding. And it was really, they were in the slumps for a long period of time, but they've really revitalized and they're getting private investments, uh, in the downtown poor. And I mean, I don't know if you've been there recently, but it looks much better and nicer. And there's so many more things to do than there was before.
Um, yeah, at least saying that the downtown looks stunning. Yeah, it just, they've completely redone it. so, so now people are moving back, right? Which means the more people that move back, then there's more funding and the more it's going to grow.
Resources
So I really like the trajectory of where Detroit is now. Um, you just obviously want to be careful the lower income areas, just like any town, but, but Detroit, it's a big city. It's, you know, more of a problem. Um, but in low income areas, there's, there's more crime, right?
There's, there's violence, there's guns, drugs, right? So you just want to, uh, be careful and try to focus on, you know, not the low income markets, but buying something for one 50 in Detroit would be considered like pretty nice neighborhood.
So that's, that's the cool thing. Uh, in comparison is that you can get absolutely cheap properties for, for good areas with good cashflow, that type of thing. Um, and then Amy saying, do I recommend any realtors? So I don't have a, strong Detroit realtor referral.
Yes. Um, I've, I've tried and spoke to a few. There is a company that I can introduce you to. And what they do is you let them know what you're looking for.
Introduction
And they find properties off market. They've actually been doing this for 10 years and they've helped over 500 investors find properties in Detroit.
So they'll find off market properties. They fully renovate it. And then they sell it to you based on an appraisal value. So it's not like you're buying it for some outrageous price.
I mean, you're buying it completely turnkey property management in place. Um, if you're open to that sort of thing, I can let you know, they don't have any fees. I mean, they get their markup from, cause they're doing the work, like they're doing all of that stuff. So they're making a little bit of money on sale, but again, it's, it's still supported.
Um, so if you want that connection, I can give you that today. And then as I work on building a realtor relationship, I can let you know that. And then I just says, will you do section eight and do trade?
The Core Idea
Oh yeah. We do section eight anywhere. The lenders love section eight because it's guaranteed rent from the government. And, uh, not only that, it's generally higher than average market rent.
The, the government generally pays top, top tier, the rent. So section eights are great. The lenders do not discriminate about that. Again, you just want to be careful if you're doing a section eight is the property in a good location, right?
That's the number one question. Um, so I see Amy and Kip and Arlene talking about getting the info on Detroit. Do you, I know Amy means, you know, she wants that contact. Are you saying Arlene that you want that contact as well?
Because I'll message you the details right when we're done here for the U S, uh, turnkey properties in Detroit. It's waiting for your spot.
Deep Dive
Okay. Perfect.
Okay. And then Ali's saying, Oh, maybe that's what I need to tell. I want to turn the properties of section eight and want to switch more over to section eight.
Yeah, that won't. Let me, let me rephrase this. Having section eight rent versus non section eight rent will not change your interest rate. However, if your section eight rents are so much more massive than regular rents, and that changes your debt service covered ratio higher, then you can get better interest rates.
So it may help with your rates, but it may not. Um, okay. So I'm going to just take some notes here because I don't want to miss. So we've got to send, I'm just going to write down everybody's name.
Practical Steps
Who's looking for that contact in Detroit. Hey, and then for you as well, Ida, perfect. And there's no like affiliation guys. They don't pay me for giving out his name or anything like that.
It's just, I know them from doing it and we do work with some of their clients for, for lending. Okay, perfect. So I will get you guys in contact with the boy tech or James. They're the ones that run, uh, and sell it.
Okay. So yeah, it's going to be a boy tech or James that reaches out. Um, I can get everybody's email address cause you're all members of the hub.
So I'll pull that up. I'll get your emails and then I'll introduce everybody, uh, via email and I'll let you guys connect. But I do appreciate you guys. Please let me know or my team, if you're already working with them, if there's any questions at all.
Key Takeaways
And at the end, this recording will be there. If you want to see it, you can see the comments as well. And at the top within the hub, it says book a strategy call, um, with somebody on my team. So if you're interested in this or you want to sit down and talk further and make sure that this makes sense for you, then that's available for you as well.
Uh, and I just think she knows that perfect. So then, you know, that's great.
So I'll, I'll scratch you off the list. I, but that's who I would, uh, give a call to.
So awesome. Well, you guys have a great day. You were, you were fun to chat with.
Resources
I appreciate that. And, uh, looking forward to seeing you guys soon and watching everybody grow together.
This is, uh, so exciting. Have a great day guys. Thank you so much for tuning into the show today. If you found value, please follow the show and read it five stars.
It would mean the world to me. And lastly, all the resources that we spoke about are at the bottom of the show notes. Looking forward to seeing you on the next episode.