I have a rule of thumb that I follow with houses in the middle range here in Winnipeg. If I pay $100000 for a house, I want to rent it out for a thousand. I can stay pretty close to that, but generally that means fixing a few things on a house to get it ready to rent. People who are on...

Winnipeg has plenty to offer when it comes to rental properties. The vacancy rate is 0.8%. Finding properties that cash flow is easy in some areas of the city and difficult in others. Easy cash flow can be found in the North End and Point Douglas areas, but you have to be very careful there...

Looks like Ontario is moving towards the Manitoba model that we here have been dealing with. I don't see how it will get rid of Ontario bedbugs, because we have them here too. What it ends up causing is a situation where landlords are not interested in improving or maintaining their buildings...

Some agricultural land in Southern Manitoba is considered some of the best and is being purchased by Europeans. 500 acres is a little over 3 quarter sections. You could rent it out easily if it is cultivated and in southern MB.. You would have to do some research into what the land is good...

Why do you want to certify a cheque? I ask for the damage deposit and first month rent in cash. After that, personal cheques are fine. If you run a credit cheque or ask for a bank statement when you do the application, I don't see the point of certifying a cheque. Nik

Whatever you do, you may want to consult a lawyer's advice and have them help you draw up an agreement. Can you provide more details of what it is that you are planning? Nik

Hey Gerry, Still have my "day job". It's hard to do both, but not impossible. If I can continue to do both, I will. My pension benefits and health insurance etc, are pretty valuable to me. I would have to be generating a pretty good cashflow to replace that and my wage. My motivation to...

Welcome here! The first step is to educate yourself by doing some reading. Real Estate Investing for Canadians for Dummies was the first book I picked up and it was a great intro. After that, there are a number of other good books including ones by Don Campbell and the Peter Kinch book on...

Oh, I see. Any time I have tenants paying utitlities, I have them pay it directly to the utitility company. If it is their responsibility to pay the utility, then they should pay it. I would explain the situation and then tell them the bad news first. Then assure them that you as the...

Seems like that is the cost of doing business. Not sure what your issue is. Is it having to pay that large amount all at once? If you owe it, you owe it. You might be able to work out a payment schedule or something so that you aren't hit all at once. Try and find that out. Other than...

I think doing something like that is a personal choice, and not a critical form. Personally, I would caution against giving out personal info to neighbours. You may end up with a cranky neighbour bugging you about every little thing your tenant does. Rather, screen your tenants well, and make...

Have you looked into those new construction numbers? Are you really going to be able to build for $78.26 a square foot???? Nik