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Michele and Special Guest Joel Karlsson Talk About His Approach to Business
May 24, 2022 | Posted by: Michele Cummins
Warning! This is a digitally automated transcript of the show so there will be mistakes throughout - including the spelling of Michele's name!
Curtis Pope:
Well here we are another Saturday morning and it is time for the company's Real Estate Group show with local rock star realtor Michelle Cummings and myself Curtis Pope. Good morning, Michelle.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Good morning Curtis Pope. How are you today?
Curtis Pope:
I am doing well. Of course I look forward to Saturday mornings and my chance to talk to you every week,
Michele Cummins - PREC:
every Saturday morning. Get something to look forward to. But this Saturday is a special Saturday because it's been a long weekend.
Curtis Pope:
It is it's the May long weekend the unofficial kickoff to summer.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Yeah, actually it is and the weather has proved it lately.
Curtis Pope:
Absolutely. It's been amazing.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
I'm in Vancouver actually this morning at my my Airbnb condo I have here and it's been so fun. I've been loving it, but I'm not on my motorcycle so
Curtis Pope:
well. You gotta take the good with the bad, right. But you do have an amazing view of False Creek where you're
Michele Cummins - PREC:
at? Yes, like the circus, Olay pens out there and False Creek and there was a fire a little while ago, one of the buildings in gas town and I could actually see it from here too. So we got that view with the North Shore mountains and you know, right, like walk like a block house walk from Rogers Arena. All the concert games, everything's right here. It's amazing. Great restaurants love it.
Curtis Pope:
And you're one of those cool newer buildings because it's a rounded building. Right. Not your typical square building.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Yeah, exactly. I've got this huge curvature to it as a two bedroom. And so when you walk in all you see is through the windows. It's so gorgeous. It's like floor to ceiling windows. And we've got a balcony and the pool and the hot tub in the sauna makes it so nice, too. It's like your own saw, right hearing your own building. It's really nice. I love it. I try to get out here as much as I can when it's not rented.
Curtis Pope:
And you sent Richard home so you're getting some peace and quiet.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Exactly. Finally, no. We had a lot of fun. We explored a couple new restaurants. We had a friend for one night come over from the island. He's actually realtor from the island, ReMax in Comox. And him and Richard went to high school together so they got like long history together. So that was a lot of fun. So we have a guest on our show today that we're going to bring in in the first segment and I you know when I just go back to this my Airbnb here when I bought this one luckily it was vacant, but the Airbnb I bought in Sasquatch Mountain Resort wasn't was full of junk, I mean, full of old old furniture that was broken junk all around under the dash and under the backpack. Like there was so much stuff and there's no way I wanted to go up and, and spend all that time trying to remove get rid of everything. And so there's a lot of junk in our lives and, you know, material junk and other junk. So I want it we really wanted to bring our guest in to share with us some of the different ways that he does his business. So before I go into that, I wanted to mention a couple events that I have coming up. Because, you know, talking about my Airbnb, Vancouver condo, my Sasquatch one, I've got the Oregon Coast one, you know, that part of my investment portfolio is is short term rental, also long term rental and others. So we have an event this Thursday night, it's via zoom so easy. You can do it from home after the kids go to bed. It's 7pm and about a half hour to an hour depending on the questions afterwards. But I've got a lineup of professionals. We're talking about investments. So we have a webinar series Real Estate series. We do one a month and it's always a different topic. And this month, it's about investing. So we've got a lawyer, we've got a mortgage broker, we've got a financial advisor and we've got a secret special guests that will be there and of course myself realtor and investor. So that is this Thursday via zoom 7pm Please RSVP either from just email me or if you might website or through our Facebook business page. And and you could be part of that we have $100 gift card giveaway that we're giving to those who who log in and are there so lots of good information for you there the other than is a special events for realtors only. It's at a beautiful, amazing listing as mine out on Meadowlands golf course it's actually right adjacent to the golf course and it's got lit 180 degrees of perfectly manicured lawns, trees, the way the sun sets and rises there. It's just gorgeous with the sun beaming through the trees a gorgeous house is from the 70s. And it's so funky and so cool and it's got such a nice vibe and the windows are huge. And so you can just see all the views and the decks and everything. So that is this coming Friday morning we're having coffee and pastries, a little breakfast. So where are your golf hats and and bring your golf clubs for all realtors who listen to our show, please come out next friday for that event at 9am, nine to 11. And we're giving away two tickets to a day of golf plus a cart golf cart rental there at Meadowlands Golf and Country Club. So that's at nine to 11. This Friday, RSVP again on my Facebook business page. And, and you could be part of that. And we of course, you know, love everyone because I know that okay, so those are our events. So now on to our guests. So, okay, our special guests, has been five years in the junk removal business. And he does things very differently than your typical business person or a junk removal company. His name is Joel Carlson. And he's the best from integrity junk removal. And he's got 105 What do you buy?
Unknown:
How many jewels? 125?
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Oh, my goodness. 125 Google reviews reviews. Oh, my goodness. Joe, thank you so much for coming on our show. Michelle, thank
Unknown:
you so much. How are you this morning?
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Oh, very good. Thank you. So Joel, I talking about I've needed it junk removal before, but also, so many of my clients, obviously, and but you don't there's a few junk removal companies out there. But how how? Okay, first question is how did you decide to get into this business? That would be my first question. Yeah, okay.
Unknown:
Well, I'll try to give you a little snapshot. Basically, what happened is, we realized that a couple of my son's had some special needs that, that they were diagnosed with autism. And so then what happened is, as I needed to be closer to home, I needed to figure out a way to stay close to home. So I attempted to try and have a liquidation company. And that didn't pan out. Because we ended up having our entire home, every spare room that I had filled full of items that I was trying to sell online. My wife said, No, you are an amazing entrepreneur. I just don't think you've nailed it yet. So I shifted, pivoted from liquidations into junk removal, and just absolutely found my niche. So it's interesting story, I have pictures on my website to show the evolution of my company. We started with Believe it or not a car and a borrowed trailer. Yes, I said a car.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
There the school of hard knocks or you know, that is so amazing, because that's how such great businesses have taken off and done so well is you you've got such a good discipline and mindset to just really work hard.
Unknown:
Well, the thing about starting a business or small business, at least the way that I looked at it, Michelle is that, you know, to go into debt to start a business, I just, I just I, I was raised by my grandfather for a period of time. And he's just a no nonsense, you know, working really, really hard into his late 70s. So I just, I just I took that mindset. And I said, Okay, well, what's an inexpensive way that I can do this where the client still gets what they need. But as I'm just starting, I can take these small steps. So that's the way we did it. We started with the car. And I used to joke with people all the time. They said, You've got to be kidding. Is that a car? And I said it's a Chevy HHR which is built on a truck chassis. So I like
Michele Cummins - PREC:
to ask you
Unknown:
Yeah, so that for a period of time, and then went from that into a trailer. And then so I did about 300 jobs by myself when I started because you know, you just have to do what you can write and get started and you got to start somewhere. My wife built me a Facebook page, and that was kind of the beginning. And now I'm happy to say I have a half a dozen guys and I have to dump trailers. The other trailers that I had were not dumped so you'd put the items in and then you would have to manually unload them. items a second time. Oh, wow. So I don't do that anymore. Now I have dumped trailers. But but the the most exciting part of what I get to do everyday just like yourself, Michelle, is I get to meet new people I thrive on connecting with people. And second, I get to help people.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Yes, exactly. And,
Unknown:
and I, so that's where I think, you know, we have a similar parallel, you know, you're wanting to end people an absolutely amazing view for the next 20 years for the husband and wife, you know. And same thing for me, I'm wanting to take back their space, whether it be their physical space, whether it be their emotional, or mental space, or spiritual states.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
I have to ask, how did you choose your name integrity, junk removal?
Unknown:
That's a great question. As I said, I, there was a period of time I was raised by my grandfather. And when I look around, I see a lot of people doing things that don't line up with that word. In my industry and other industries, you know, we see scandals with corporations all the time, right. And so I just looked at it, and I've kind of, you know, looked at my life, the way that I've led my life. And I just decided, you know, what, I think that this is the right name, this is the way I do things, I do things, what I say I'm going to do is exactly what I do. There's no variation or shadow or changing from that. What I say is what you get. And so it seems to be a name that people have, have connected with. But if you look on all of my advertising, you'll also notice that there's a small red circle, and it says PS 26. And that's from Psalm 26. From the Bible. And the thing is, is that for me, I have faith. And I didn't know about this particular verse until after I started the company, but then I found it and it's pretty much nails what I do. So it says I purpose to live my life with integrity.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Trust, it's so important integrity. So very
Unknown:
Yeah. So you know, you know I mean and and so I've had multiple circumstances like this where I've done a job for someone in different circumstances and we find gold necklaces or gold bracelets or rings or this or that or whatever. And I always contact them and say hey, look, we found this and just want to let you know can I drop this off? What's the best plan I've shipped watches from one province to another and one of the most interesting things that we found that we thought that would be valuable that the customer didn't realize that had been discarded was a Canadian National grass hockey metal the wife was the one tossing everything out this is at a location in August and and so I come in I do what I do and you know as we're putting things out, we always you know, we'll get into it eventually here but I don't just throw things away. I don't just put things in the landfill and so if you you know if you want to ask me more on that I don't know if you want me to just expand on that what however you'd like but as we were sorting through we've found this item and so I reached out to this guy and the wife was a little bit sheepish should have gone out but you know, the good news is we got it back to him
Michele Cummins - PREC:
that's amazing and I do want you to expand on that when we come back from break i You just throwing away valuable things reminds me and actually Richard reminds me ever every all the time I throughout my many many years ago I've been in Canada since 1998 And when I became a Canadian citizen are my my papers anyways, I used to be papers back when and maybe it was my land status or something but I threw it out and it was really important paperwork and had to go through so like six months or whatever it was to try to get it again. And Richard always reminds me I throw out you know important thing sometimes like my Canadian immigration papers so it's nice that you catch things like that so people
Unknown:
we try we try
Curtis Pope:
so Michelle now you know when you want to get rid of one of Richard's 2700 guitars how you have to do it so that Richard doesn't catch it.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
I'd have to give Joel a hint. I'm really is preferably giveaway giveaway not for like, for sure.
Curtis Pope:
Well, we should probably take a quick break right now. Michelle, if people want more information about what services you provide as a realtor, where can they go? Michelle come in dot CA, we're back with more right after this you're back with segment number two of the Cummins Real Estate Group show with Michelle Cummins and myself Curtis Pope. And of course, we have our guests. We have Joel from integrity junk removal. Now, Joel, if I had some stuff kicking around the house and I wanted to get rid of it, maybe I China Hutcher, some kind of a cabinet. And I called you now I understand that you like to keep stuff out of the landfill. So how does that all work?
Unknown:
That's a great question for this. The examples you use may not be ones that are the best example to talk about. But so basically, here's the thing, right? Our company, our mindset is to, to create the smallest amount of footprint of garbage in the landfill. Right? Now, I happen to have a network that single mums that I work with. And so those single mums actually sell items through Facebook marketplace. So we you can't see it behind me. But there's one of the organizations that we support. I have this expression. It's basically from Abbotsford to the world. And so what we're doing is I'm working with a single mom, she's based out of Pitt meadows, and we have a storage facility and we put smaller, higher end items into the storage facility, and then she's selling them online. And so the way that it works, so just to give you kind of the detail and she gets 45% of the sale of it, and then we have Amani orphan care, which is on my left shoulder, you guys can't see. They're a local orphanage that was started by Kim and Jeff Lee, here in Abbotsford. And they're responsible for over 170 orphans in Kenya. And then I have a friend and my friend, his organization is called Casa alto rifugio. And it's another orphanage in Mexico. And so between these two orphanages, they get 45% and 70 50% of the total amount of earnings that we generate each year. And as I said, 45% goes to the single mom, and then we have a 5% administrative overhead. So that's part one. The second part is we work with about seven different organizations in the city of Abbotsford, as I live in Abbotsford, I like to be able to energize and empower the area that I'm in. So what that looks like is we work with Bibles for missions, we work with Habitat for Humanity, you may not be familiar with Habitat for Humanity. But what they do is they provide low entry housing with the government, they build houses for families that can't normally be able to get into the housing market. So we are able to donate items to them. We work with Bibles, permissions, we work with MCC. And we work with the Salvation Army. And lastly, we work with hidden treasures, hidden treasures, they, they connect with people who are in prison, and basically they find volunteers to go and spend time with the people who are in prison. So we're doing a lot from that regard. And then I have a tendency to just just even in the community in the neighborhood that I live in, just knowing my different neighbors and knowing their kids and knowing their shoe size, knowing their jacket size, knowing their toy preferences, those kinds of things. We kind of redistribute things in that way as well.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
That is and that is so different when you when you know the some of the ways that you do your business differently than others that that is amazing.
Unknown:
So though, that's the side of redistribution of valuable assets, okay, then the secondary side is recycling. So from a recycling perspective, we recycle cardboard we recycled glass jars, we recycle electronics. We recycle paint, we recycle oil, we recycle gas, we recycle drywall. And I'm sure there's a couple other things that aren't coming to my plastic residential plastic.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
And you said you're out of Abbotsford but what other areas do you will you Go to
Unknown:
Sure. So 85% of my business happens in Abbotsford, I have a large client that is based in Surrey, and they send me all over the place. They are a painting and restoration company. So they deal with fire and flood and restoration. And they and once they get everything gussied up, and they bring me in to take out all of the all of this stuff, that doesn't work, right. But I work with mission. I'm in mission, sometimes I'm in Chilliwack. But as I said, 85% of my businesses here in Abbotsford, because I have a beautiful wife and I love to come home for lunch.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Haha. And on that my husband trying to call me right now. So, Richard, okay, I'll call you later. Sorry to interrupt our flow here.
Unknown:
No problem.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Because I send them home. Joe, I wanted to ask because you went from starting with a car and now of course, you've you've I've seen you around town and and, and and you've got your logo, and you've got, you know, your branding on on your vehicles. And you've got a half a dozen guys who work with you now, who obviously have the same mindset as you and hard as you goals as you passions review. But what who is now your target customer? Like? Who should hire you, who should call you who needs you? And who's
Unknown:
super great question. So one of the demographics of people that I feel are overlooked, and not treated as fairly as they should be as senior citizens. And so I have a special rate for senior citizens. And then I also have had the experience of working with people when they passed away. So working with their families in order to, you know, basically clear out the state, as well. But I do work with with mental housing, and some of the other organizations that are senior facilities, they asked me to come in and help because you know, maybe their parents have either passed away, or they changing the furniture that they have, or they're downsizing, I do a ton of downsizing, where we get people where their children have grown up, and now they're like, well, we've got this house, of course, you know what the markets done, pricing has gone up in, you know, 30 to 70%, in the last six to eight months. So a lot of people are maybe leaving from here and relocating to a different province. Or as I said, you've got the downsizing thing. So basically, you've got people that are kind of 5067 years, they're probably not interested in breaking their back anymore. So they're gonna hire us and know that when when we come in, we do things entirely differently. You know, AI, forgot fluorescent lights, we recycled fluorescent lights, as well as the ones from people's garages and stuff like that. So yeah, so that's, that's one of the areas. I do have. Sometimes young moms and stuff like that, Oh, that's very important. I want to mention that as well. I have a tendency to do one job for free per month for a single mom or someone that's in an emotional or mental state, that they're not able to have the wherewithal in order to have the finances to do that.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
How nice. Yeah, we
Unknown:
just, you know, I just I just like, you know, just saying my own story, my story, my wife passed away in 2008, I raised two boys by myself for 15 months, my boys were 11 months and 22 months old, when my wife passed away, and so if you flip that on its head, and you change that to being a single mom, well, single mom, she's got to get those kids out the door for school, she's got to be available to them and stuff like that. But then she's also got to find some kind of an income in order to keep carrying on. And unfortunately, sometimes that's a really difficult balance, right, because you have this heart that the mother has, but you have this provision that's required, and sometimes they don't match. And when they don't match, you need to have people in the community in ways that allow that to happen.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
You know what, having said that, I want to I want to give back in in a small way as well, because I think that's so amazing. And I want to encourage your integrity and what you're doing for others and anybody listening to this show if you call Joel and need some junk removal done, then I'd like to pay for up to $250 Have your junk removal. So that's my offer for any listeners today. And I'd like I'd like to offer that. So Joel, be in touch with me if somebody calls you about that, so I can pay for my portion. For sure
Unknown:
that sounds really awesome. That's, that's really, really kind of you. And that's, it's just great to see how you have a reflect your hurt reflects, when you when you see something like that. And, and that's great, right? It's just, you know, we all, you know, one of the things as we've gone through COVID In the last couple years, like this is one of the things for me, I had people calling in, they're like, Hey, I would like to get these items removed. And so I just say, so just tell me, what's, what's your status right now? Oh, I've been laid off, oh, my hours got cut back, oh, I'm actually not working, you know, these kinds of circumstances that were directly related to COVID. Right? Or people, I've even had people they've lost their business, like their business is gone. Because of COVID. Right. So I, I was trying to communicate with people along that lines, you know, where are you at, you know, and then you know, just to give you an idea, when I talk about seniors as well, the senior, I have a special rate for seniors. So I have a minimum, okay, my minimum, I will not get in my truck with my team, my guys have WorkSafe we have business liability insurance, $2 million business liability insurance, we won't get your truck and go to someone's house for less than $125 plus GST. Makes sense. But if you're a senior, it's $99. An hour is our minimum, right? Because I just think it's the right way to do business. Right? I mean, if I was a senior, I would want people to treat me with that kind of respect. And for whatever reason, we don't value seniors. And I think that that is a crime in our society.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
That's so right. And that thank you so much for doing that. Thank you. It's really and I agree with you there. Hi, I wish we had more time. But you know what I really, is there anything else you wanted to, to to tell our listeners before we move into some change new listings? And in the show?
Unknown:
Yeah, for sure. So if you have a lot of items that you're looking to get rid of, or you're not sure, or maybe you've never even had junk removal, and you've sold your house, I've done a ton of move out. So if you're listening, and you've sold your place, and it's like ah but the subject say I gotta get this back 40 cleaned up or whatever it is. Our company, we've done massive jobs, and multiple, multiple multiple trailer loads of jobs. I've worked with hoarders I've worked with seniors, I've worked with young, you know, Gen Xers, it doesn't make a difference. Or to me millennials, it doesn't make a difference. If you want someone to come out, and to just give you a free estimate, or maybe just give you advice on what are the items that could be possibly recycled that you don't have to get paid pay someone to take them away. Reach out to me, I'd love to help you. Our company. As I said, we've been in business for over five years. We're based here right in downtown Abbotsford. And we have over 125 five star reviews on Google business.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
And you can really listen to this show on country 1071 att dot coms website or on my website at Michelle cummins.ca. To find information for Joel. And again, integrity junk removal if you google him, and thank you so much, Joel, thank you. And the three new listings this week is a commercial building and business for sell. And this is a well maintained fabulous restaurant in the heart of Agassi as gorgeous building completely renovated inside and out just in the last few years. And this is a fantastic opportunity to get in to the main core of Agassi. And it's $1,850,000 Call me if you're interested in that commercial space. And then I thought basement entry in haptic on hassock islands and it's got an above ground suite. It's priced at 1,190,000 and it's a 6200 square foot lot and the house is over 2600 square feet and then a brand new property seven acres I should say brand new to the listing just hit the market and it's a log rancher with a full walkout basement. It's got four stall barn with automatic waters. It's got a sand riding ring. It's got an inground pool. It's got a huge clean workshop. It is gated It is wonderful. It's beautiful right in the heart admission 2,825,000 for this amazing, beautiful log rancher with basement and then I wanted to end the show with our quote. So the Oh before the close though my art and listing in East Abbotsford, we had an accepted offer subject to the sale of and it, it's falling through. So this beautiful gem is going to be available again. So if you're interested, have a look at the drone video and information on that one. And our quote is, some days you have to create your own sunshine. And that is unknown. Who who thought of that one, but you know it's true. Some days you have to create your own sunshine.
Curtis Pope:
It's funny because I've been saying that for years to my wife. Well, not that exact statement, but I say sometimes you got to make your own sunshine. Oh,
Michele Cummins - PREC:
there you go. It's Curtis hope, quote then.
Curtis Pope:
Well, you know, I'll take partial credit for it, but it's not really mine. Now if people want more information about your listings, or maybe the services you provide as a realtor, where can they go? Michelle cummins.ca. And join us again next week when we will talk real estate in order to unlock your real estate potential on the show where real estate is maximized. Thanks for listening
If you missed last week's episode where we replay our Conversation with Mark Podolsky, please go take a listen! It's well worth it.