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Michele talks Crypto, Land Assemblies and French Baking?
January 25, 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 is Saturday morning it means it is time for the Cummins Real Estate Group show and of course with me is local realtor Rockstar Michelle Cummins. Good morning, Michelle.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Good morning. Curious how are you define Saturday?
Curtis Pope:
I am doing well. How about yourself?
Michele Cummins - PREC:
I'm very good. Thank you. So I wanted to ask you, have you done like a dream vision board ever?
Curtis Pope:
No, you brought that up a while back and I still haven't done
Michele Cummins - PREC:
it. Well, I was gonna actually have some girlfriends over and we were gonna do it like last week. And then one of them one of them got sick. So we pushed it off to today and then somebody else got sick, pushed it off till next weekend. And I'm like, Don't anybody else get sick?
Curtis Pope:
That's it. Maybe this is the problem. Maybe this this whole project is cursed. You need to start from scratch.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
It's not good. Putting off your dreams and your goals and your vision.
Curtis Pope:
That is true.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
No, but it's it's crazy how everybody seems to be sick. Everyone I know seems to just be getting sick and over being sick. They're about to get
Curtis Pope:
well, let's not let's say I don't want to get sick. So let's not do you know, don't curse me.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Well, you know, tis the season it is winter. Yes. The cold and flu season.
Curtis Pope:
Absolutely.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
So do you have any investments in cryptocurrency?
Curtis Pope:
I barely have any investments that aren't in cryptocurrency. How can I afford anything in crypto? Oh, Curtis, my investment is my home.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
And that is the best investment. My my actual pops as I call him, my dad, he has he he's always such a like, forward thinker. Right? When they came it came out you know, he's little here little there. I mean, not much. But you know, and I chat with him about and this that I've never done it because Richard's like No, no, we don't want to get into that. And so but you know what, I was chatting with a mortgage broker and saying, you know, what's up with this cryptocurrency and buying real estate? So because you know, we haven't seen it really in our area. But, you know, cryptocurrency, you'd be interested, people have used it to buy real estate, but not in the typical sense that you think that they're just going to buy property and oh, here's my cryptocurrency account or whatnot, or transfer it to the to the seller, I know, what they usually do is sell their cryptocurrency, you got to find somebody to buy it. And then with the deposit the money in their account, and then they use that money, obviously the first real estate so it came from it, but it's it's not what they actually used to buy real estate. But she warned to make sure you have a proper paper trail of when you bought it, and what the value is. And when you sell it, don't sell it before you have documentation. She says a lot of people have made that mistake. That's been a huge for people. And this mortgage broker and advisor, who is Jessica Oates of Dominion Lending gave me this advice the other day, she said otherwise, the bank can't see where all your money came from and approve of deposits into your account is not good enough. They actually want to see where did this money come from that you deposited in your account, so you have to have proof of when you sold it. And you should have proof of when you bought it as well. Always keep a paper trail in everything in life.
Curtis Pope:
That's good advice. That's really good advice. Yeah.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Don't kill the trees, but please keep a paper trail. So okay, so I wanted to chat about, you know, unfortunately, their death. It happens in our lives. It isn't inevitable. If you live you, you will eventually die.
Curtis Pope:
Speak for yourself. I'm gonna live forever somehow.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
I'm glad you're keeping this lighthearted.
Curtis Pope:
I haven't quite figured it out, but I'm gonna do it.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
The Tree of Life or what's the hat? There's got to be some secret potion.
Curtis Pope:
That's the fountain of youth. I'm still looking for it. That interview. I heard it's in Florida somewhere. I'll have to go down and have a look. Yes.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
So what happens when a party to contract involving real estate dies? Well, what happens when an individual buyer or seller dies prior to the completion of a transaction involving real estate you wonder what could happen? Well, at common law, its contract may be discharged or set aside on the grounds of frustration or an under unforeseen event renders the contracts physically or commercially impossible to fulfill courses considered whether the death of a party to a contract for a real estate transaction amounts to frustration of the contract, but has held that the contract will only be frustrated if there's some personal aspect of the deceased that was central to the contract. So here you hear you hear that, in a 1996 case called butterfly or Butterfield versus Tata state, the deceased had entered into an agreement with the plaintiff to jointly purchase a property and share the mortgage and maintenance payments. The executor of this deceases estate refused to fulfill the deceases obligation under the contract. Well, the British Columbia Court of Appeal held that the estate was obligated to pay the deceases share of the purchase price of the property and to share mortgage and maintenance payments. These were financial obligations of the deceased that were not something that only he was capable of performing personally. So given the the case, in most other cases, if a seller or buyer dies prior to the completion of a real estate transaction, then the obligation to complete the transaction on behalf of the deceased falls to their executor, and is not extinguished by reason of such death, there may be a delay to the completion of the transaction while an executor or administrator is recognized to administer the diseases of state such a delay may be particularly problematic if the transaction is part of the land assembly, as the entire land assembly and redevelopment process could be stalled. And I have few land members right now. And I'm working on another one Chilliwack putting that together and there, there are multiple, there's eight in one, there's three and another there six, and another, you know, there's think seven in another one. So there's multiple owners and you know, you never know this, this can be an issue. So best to be prepared and know what may happen. So in British Columbia are beautiful province here. One way to minimize the delays caused by the death of a seller is to apply to court on an urgent basis for a limited grant of administration allowing the applicant to deal specifically with the land under contract, rather than any other aspect of the deceases. State, the provincial the provisions of the wills estates and succession act, give the courts the jurisdiction to grant this type of relief. To obtain a limited grant like this, the applicant must show that there are special circumstances that such an appointment is necessary and that it does not prejudice the interests of the beneficiaries of the deceased estate. So this is why you would always want to speak with a lawyer on your behalf, you always want to be very communicative, communicative, you want to make sure you let them know, everything that's happening, don't hold out any information that you may think, oh, you know, some people just don't know that the more you talk, the more you say, the more things are revealed, that could help you, especially when you're talking with your professional, so talk with your lawyer, if anything like this should should come up or if there's a possibility of it. But if you didn't know, in who knew that this is the wills estates of and succession act, you know, was available and, and this, this could help in that state. So I thought I would give that advice and on when we actually, we're gonna go on a break in a little bit. When we come back, we're going to talk about how every stage of real estate development adds value. And there's quite a few stages and very interesting information. Even if you aren't that kind of a mindset, good to know good information here on our show. Now, if you have all our listeners, if you have and Chris course, yourself as well. Now, if you have a local business, or you're an entrepreneur, I am actually wanting to help and support our local businesses on entrepreneurs. Anybody in commission sales such as myself, as I understand commission sales, or in charge of growth at your company. If you wanting growth whatsoever in what you do, and what you are helping this world with, and you're sharing with this world, then contact me I would love to help you so just wanted to put that out there. Do you know anybody in the either early stages of growth
Curtis Pope:
I'd have to think about probably I just off top my head. Nothing's coming to mind but I'm sure I do. Oh,
Michele Cummins - PREC:
yeah, no, I know exactly it's like go through your contact list and go okay who who like from A to Zed and and look at the who may who may need help so and I put it out there because you know, I have a lot of contacts in and I'm, I always see them thinking okay who who can I help? Who can I support? How can I share you know, help each other out? And and so definitely if anybody knows anybody feel free to reach out either social media I got my Facebook business page, Instagram, LinkedIn but mostly Facebook business page and Instagram is where I'm at or Twitter whatnot, but I'm not on Tik Tok yet. Well, I am but you know, I haven't done any videos yet.
Curtis Pope:
Well, I mean, there's got to be something there. I've seen some tic TOCs of, of like real estate agents, like you know, you know, falling into swimming pools and stuff like that because about a bad day.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Falling in you mean jumping in, I would just jump in. Well,
Curtis Pope:
this is true, the bowl, some jump in. So I'm just kind of keep walking and faceplant into the pool.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Jessica owes the mortgage broker I mentioned earlier with that advice about cryptocurrency she actually has Tik Tok. And she she does real real she does. Little videos she said she was going to do a next week. I forget what it was about. It was going to be a funny one something about, obviously, mortgages. Something about you know what they should? Oh, oh, the interest rates are good. They're talking about going up on the 26th of this month. And what should I do? Should I lock in, they're going to go up 8%. And it's, it's I think, never go up 8% All all at one time, like that. But these are chatting about that, and we'll see may talk about it in June, they're gonna do it and in October, probably a quarter percent each time. And usually that's all they go up at a time. They don't go up drastically fast. But there is word on the street that it might go up isn't the point six when they meet? So we'll find out next week on the show.
Curtis Pope:
All right, well, we should probably take a break. Now people want more information about what you do as a realtor, where can they go? Michelle come and start seeing we're back with more right after this. And we are back with segment two of the Cummins Real Estate Group show with Michelle Cummins and myself Curtis Pope. No, we've already teased we call that a tease in the biz, our topic for the second segments, we should probably get into it.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
How every stage of a real estate development adds value. That's the one last one. So there are typically four distinct stages in a real estate development project. So if you're in the beginning stage, you're in the second stage third or fourth stage, or maybe you're just in the beginning stage and jump to the fourth stage or you're going into the fourth anyways. At each stage, a developer must decide whether to spend their time and money and take on the risk to increase the property's value or monetize their investment and sell to another group of investors. If the developer chooses to see the project through to the fourth stage, a fully developed project like commercial properties often sold to an income producing property operators such as the REIT or IE it that is, let's look at how each stage adds value to a development project. As mentioned on the first session of the we, I have a few land assemblies, it's at the beginning stage, I've gone in and had the power meeting, which is a preliminary assessment, meeting with the city that the properties are in and see what the best use is bring that to the cities, they've internally looked at it with all their areas such as planning department, engineering department, and, and and the like. And then they have the meeting all together. And they they they all speak about their specific parts of the development and what it looks like and how they either agree with it or they'd like to see some changes. And then of course, they will send you an official letter usually two to three weeks later. And therefore you've started the first process of the development stages. So stage one land baking in banking, did I say baking?
Curtis Pope:
I think he did say land baking but you know, maybe you're hungry.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
I'm just gonna say I haven't had my breakfast yet.
Curtis Pope:
Maybe you need a croissant or something like that. I don't know.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Oh young. The core Cafe makes extremely wonderful ones. He was a French Baker comes from France and he and he brought in this little small little bakery little business coffee shop and bakery and he makes they're so good anyways,
Curtis Pope:
now I've got completely sidetracked thinking about French baking. It's true. We do not have the greatest attention spans on this show, just so people know.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
I'm going there after this. Okay, Cedros land, same game. Here we go. The land bankers pursues and buys undeveloped land, they believe will be attractive for developers. When the market conditions are right. The land banker sells to inland packager, the lands banking stage and the redevelopment stage are the same act except that the land banker usually has Greenfield so undeveloped land, and the redeveloper has brownfield previously developed land that is not currently in use by me. So stage two, land packaging the land packager improves the land values to conceptual land planning, zoning changes, financial schemes or other paper enhancements like title insurance, accurate surveys or environmental studies. Stage three is land development, the land developer buys the land with the paper enhancements from the land packager and improves the land to sell a finished building pads to a building developer. This usually involves the construction of infrastructures such as roads and utilities and common improvements such as stormwater retention ponds and recreational facilities. A good example of land development stage our master plan community developers who construct the roads, utilities and recreational amenities and then sell building lots the home builders stage four building developments, the building developer buys the finished pads, the land developer, and then does the vertical development by constructing the land the building improvements. During construction, the building developer may also attempt to lease the building so the finished building can be sold to the developer, the building operator, home builders are a good example of building developers. from an investor's perspective, each of the stages will have its own risk and return profile that is highly dependent on the particulars of each individual development project. development project cash flows are irregular by nature and don't usually pay out consistent distributions to their investors. And last, an investor is willing to tie up their investment for the length of the development project, they may prefer to get their development exposure through a more comprehensive investment vehicle that bundles real estate development exposure with other asset classes that do pay regular distributions. So there, there those are the four stages, but and as I always when I'm putting together land assemblies to sell to a developer is for either all these stages or second stage is, is I let all the owners know that you could build up the equity and the value of your property by doing some of these steps yourself. In essence, you could develop your own land, either sub divide, or have that per meeting, put in the application for the rezoning going through all the engineering and environmental studies and doing what you have to do following the city's guidance on on the zoning and do it yourself. It takes some time, it takes some money. But the end result is you'll make a lot more if you develop it or get it to that higher stage yourself. There's different different steps, different developers and of course, what they're willing to pay. Depending on how far along your property or land assembly is. You don't always have to be land assembly to sell to a developer, you can have a large enough parcel yourself, or it could just be a simple subdivision, and you have the width and the depth to be able to do that. So there you have it. All right,
Curtis Pope:
cuz yeah, land assemblies are interesting, because you can see when they would be there, come on you just down clear brick road, from radio station, there's a whole bunch of houses coming down. And obviously they're going to be building, you know, multi units and things like that. And I imagine it was probably tough for developer without the ability to get land assemblies to put that all together.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Yes, it is. Sometimes it takes a long time to put them together others it's pretty swift, but but there's a lot To end there's we and we need the development. So especially if you have older houses maybe that, you know, they have seen better days. And there's not a lot of value in the structures on the on the land. Those are perfect, perfect opportunities for redevelopment and land assembling. So talking about, you know, building developing, there is something called passive housing. Do you know that
Curtis Pope:
I know about passive aggressive housing lots is my house, nevermind.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
So there's the Passive House. I had a project a couple years ago, and I actually spent a couple years really learning it and looking into it. The project didn't take off. But I am so excited because the one passive house that actually the first one in the freezer kind of Valley, actually is in Maryville, the five corners in Langley, and it's right on the property of Princess in the pee the bed and breakfast there. I don't know if you know it that little in I've heard of it. Yeah, they do weddings and everything. So they built a passive house there. And it took them a long time. But you know, there's one but Canada's Ken Sobel power is a tower. on the East Coast, it's certified as the world's largest residential Passive House. It's an A to retrofit. And, and this just came out so excited. So building a building standard that is truly energy efficient, it's comfortable, affordable, and is ecological at the same time, like Passivhaus is not a brand name, but a construction concept that can be applied by anyone. And that has stood the test of practice. Passivhaus buildings allow for heating and cooling relative energy savings of up to 90% compared with typical building stock, and over 75% compared with average new bills. And in terms of heating oil, Passivhaus buildings are less than 1.5 Liters per square meter of living space per year, far less than typical low energy buildings. Similar energy savings have been demonstrated in warm climates where buildings require more energy for cooling than for heating, I, if you don't know about what passive housing is, and you're really interested in low cost living that you can, it's pretty much off grid, it can be awkward, you have enough solar panels, you have the right stick, type three windows, you're facing the sun a certain way, like there's certain things that the house is constructed like in an enclosed environment controlled environment. It's really pretty quick, actually a candy and it's just really exciting stuff. So that's a whole the first big building that's retrofitted in Canada. Very, very neat. And but I want to talk about my new listings because listings are so hard to come by there is nothing out there literally is out there on the market for a certain amount of days. Because you know, we always wait to look at any and all offers for you know, at least seven days of activity on the market. And that is the way these two listings are of mine. Just a heads up to everyone but I have a new listing on Cherry Avenue in mission is a three bedroom, two bathroom, 6000 square foot lot flattened, fully usable houses of 1992. It's a 2300 square foot house, the basement partly unfinished. Its walkout is a basement entry. So of course you walk out of the basement in the back yard. And we're looking at any and all offers on the 27th at 6pm. They should be in. So if you're in the market, have a look at it. It's on listed at $950,000. And then I've got one in Agassi with mountain views all around and this baby was built in 1969. It's a 10,000 square foot lot. It's four bedrooms, two bathrooms. It's off pine wood Avenue, and it's almost 2200 square foot house. totally cute and renovated. We windows and everything. It's got AC it's got vaulted ceilings, it's adorable. And that one's on for 975,000. And we're looking at offers for that one on the 25th at 4pm. And I've got a quote of the week.
Curtis Pope:
I would hope you would it's kind of our thing.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
It is our thing. Oh, and you know what? Okay, we're gonna surprise the listeners next week. You're gonna come up with a quote of the week What do you think
Curtis Pope:
it's about my turn? Yeah, it's been a while since I've done okay, I'll dig around see what I got.
Michele Cummins - PREC:
Yeah, yeah. Okay. So let's what I got for it is integrity is doing the right thing. Even when no one is watching. And that is CS Lewis. And amazing, right. I love is obviously books converted into movies. I've read and watched Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Love that one miracle near Christianity. Love that one. The Screwtape Letters. The great Divorce and he's got so many I'd love to sit down you know when they say Who would you like you know if anybody in the world you could sit down and you know, discussing with who would you want he's one of them. I love to sit down in a corner of some pub somewhere with a Guinness and have a theological discussion with with him.
Curtis Pope:
That would be an interesting conversation for sure. Oh, fun. All right. Well, people want more information about you. Maybe they want to sit down a pub have a pint of Guinness and talk real estate. Where can they go to get information about
Unknown:
you, Michelle coming that's the end. And join
Curtis Pope:
us again next week when we will talk real estate in order to unlock your real estate potential on the show real estate is maximized. Thanks for listening
If you missed last weeks episode where Michele and Curtis talk Assessments and Tax, please go back and take a listen - it's well worth it!