Two investors read the same announcement. One got excited. One got nervous. The difference was decided years ago. Two investors read the same news. The first one leaned back, thought for a minute, and said, "Hmm. I think our projects just got more valuable." Then...

The neighbours didn't get angry out of nowhere. Some of that anger was earned, and it was earned by people in my industry. On our first build, the spreadsheet wanted eight. Big mid-block lot. Room on paper. We ran the drawings. Then we ran them again. Black line after...

The province is mostly right about the problem. That's exactly why the way they handled it bothers me. On October 8, the Province of Alberta ordered the City of Edmonton to roll back its infill zoning. On October 10, the Premier went public criticizing Ottawa for...

Edmonton is in a fight over how to handle growth. Most of Canada would trade places tomorrow. I laughed. It was the guilty kind of laugh. The kind you catch halfway out because you know you shouldn't be laughing. This is serious. Real people, real money, real...

I Stopped Buying Lots Four years ago the solo build made sense. The financing window closed. Here's the model I run now. A stranger in a Facebook group asked me a question a few weeks back. He was circling an infill project in Edmonton. Duplex, legal suites, garage...

The margin you're planning to capture by cutting out the middleman? It was never there. I've been in a lot of rooms with builders. Not conference rooms. Truck cabs. Job trailers. Kitchen tables with coffee going cold and a set of plans taking up the whole surface. And...

I caught myself running flip math on one of my own hold properties. Here’s why I closed the spreadsheet, and why the volume builders already told you everything you need to know about build-to-sell.

Vacancy is a design decision made two years before the tenant ever shows up. Someone asked me a question in a Facebook group a few weeks back. "How's rental demand in Edmonton?" I gave him the honest answer: softer than it was two years ago. No spin. The market has...