Hey Kevin,
I've had good experiences with the following Edmonton-based professionals.
Real estate agent
Andrew Barrett
Realty Executives Progressive
780-920-1759
[email protected]
Mortgage broker
David Niven
Managing Partner
Licensed Mortgage Associate
The Collin Bruce Mortgage Team
Ph
7804362511
Fx
7804362510
www.collinbrucemortgageteam.ca
Accountant
I go out of town for my accountant but we communicate by email.
Everett Duerksen, CPA, CA Chartered Professional Accountant
Phone 403.405.0034
Email
[email protected]
(Disclaimer: any professional is about fit... you will need to assess if they are the right team for you!)
Comments:
- Our Realtor, Andy, has been working with us for a number of years. He has a good sense about market value and understands the legal suite development process
- David Niven, our mortgage broker, is awesome. I've tried other REIN-promoted/sponsored-advertised Brokers and the service was really patchy and the qualifying process incredibly ugly and complicated. Collin Bruce team is awesome. I wouldn't consider a different broker at this point.
- As far as accountants go, Everett puts together a great coherent financial package. I had to go back a couple of years this past financial year to trace back cash invested and was able to do so with the information he provided.
My caveat with accountants in general when it comes to real estate investing is that this business is not nearly as complicated as some of the slow-walking accountants on stage would have you think. Pretty well any CA or CPA will be familiar enough with SFH investment real estate transactions that they could handle simple returns (if you own in your own name
without JVs). Before complicating things with corporations and holding corporations and joint ventures, the real estate transaction itself is very simple and covered in introduction accounting courses. Everett deals with a lot more complicated transactions for us with some JV and a holding corporation, previously.
A good group of professionals is critical but you need to be a little bit careful that you are still making more money than your professionals. If you hire "nothing but the best" and allocate every single task down to the bookkeeping and pay 14% of gross revenue to property management, you
will have a negative cash flow asset. (If you are investing in SFH and not 100+ unit multi-family). A part of the "returns" you make as a smaller investor are just refunded time chasing the mythical creature sweat equity.
You are an experienced investor, you will know the right balance!