"Inspired to Invest" Podcast

How To Build A Real Estate Portfolio Successfully!

• Serena Holmes • Episode 54

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How To Build A Real Estate Portfolio Successfully!

Can a 15-year-old's spark of interest in real estate lead to a multimillion-dollar empire?

Welcome back to "Inspired To Invest". Mark Gonneau is with us from Toronto for episode 55. To watch rather than listen, click here.

Mark is a multi award-winning real estate investor, who turned his teenage curiousity into a portfolio worth over $70 million and 250+ doors.

Hear the captivating story of how Mark and his brother, despite their father's reluctance, managed to buy their first property with the help of a friend’s father. From selling their initial investment post-graduation to Mark's unexpected detour into chiropractic care, this episode is a masterclass in perseverance and strategic thinking.

Mark opens up about the hard lessons learned over two decades of real estate investing, offering invaluable insights into navigating economic fluctuations and the importance of a stable financial foundation. 

Discover how Mark has managed to balance professional success with family life, and why he believes creating a lasting legacy is more significant than material gains. You'll also get a raw look at the challenges of eviction and the inefficiencies of Ontario's landlord-tenant board, illustrating the necessity for landlord education and community support among investors.

As we look to the future, Mark shares his vision for scaling his Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT), HoneyTree  and the benefits of passive investing. 

Learn about the motivations that drive him, from improving the world for future generations to balancing his professional and personal life. This episode is packed with actionable wisdom, whether you're an aspiring real estate investor or a seasoned pro looking to expand your portfolio. 

Don't miss your chance to connect with Mark and explore potential investment opportunities that could change your financial future.

To connect with Mark, go to @honeytreegrow on social & online.

Thank you to Honeytree REIT for bringing us this month’s episodes of “Inspired To Invest”. To learn more about them, go to honeytreegrow.ca online & to make your investment, go to: https://invest.atlasone.ca/offers/HNYTRE/about

“Inspired to Invest” is proud to support the Beyond Success Program, a not-for-profit financial literacy program for students, launched by More To Give & MAK Investments. Find out more at @more2give.ca.

Join us again on Jul. 10 to hear from a dynamic real estate investor who is with us to share relevant real estate strategy you can rely on when you need to think ahead and learn how to pivot.

Thank you for tuning into “Inspired To Invest”, hosted by @serenaholmesrealtor & remember, "when you invest in yourself, the sky's the limit!"

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To connect with our host, Serena Holmes, go to https://www.linktr.ee/serenaholmes.

To buy a copy of The Accidental Entrepreneur, go to https://www.linktr.ee/serenaholmesauthor and for a free copy go to https://serenaholmes.exprealty.com/ask/f813c4efdfaead4980a467b614d73604 

And, for everything related to real estate and real estate investing, please make sure you've subscribed to @serenaholmesrealtor on YouTube & other platforms. We also have a page dedicated to this podcast on Instagram and Facebook @inspiredtoinvestpodcast where we preview guests each week, highlight their episodes, top takeaways, tips, quotes and more.

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Inspire to Invest podcast, where we're sharing stories from real estate investors and how investing has changed their lives. This episode of the Inspire to Invest podcast has been brought to you by Honeytree REIT and PropertyCastio. Hey everybody, welcome to Inspire to Invest. I have Mark Bono here with me from Toronto. He is an award-winning real estate investor who began investing at the age of 24, while he was still a student, and since then he's invested in all various forms of different real estate, not only in Canada but also abroad, and he's currently the owner of 250 units across 40 properties worth more than $70 million. So just a few units.

Speaker 1:

He was the top 10 investor in Ontario in 2008, 9, 11, 14, and 15. And he's also play of the year in 2014 from the Real Estate Investment Network. He is currently focused on helping professionals and business owners grow their nest egg and their wealth by investing in value-add real estate opportunities. He's also the co-founder of Honeytree Real Estate Investment REIT, which focuses on boutique hotels and multifamily. So thank you so much for taking time out of your day to be with us here.

Speaker 2:

Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1:

Cool. So obviously you got started fairly young, so how did this get on your radar when you're still a student?

Speaker 2:

The longer version of the story is the first time I went out looking to invest in real estate, my brother had to drive because I didn't have a driver's license yet. He was 16, I was 15. And we were looking at pooling the money that we had together to see if we could invest in something we grew up in Muskoka and so basically, if you can imagine, I mean back then of course there was no MLS online, there was no internet at the time, so it was the books that would come out every Thursday to the real estate brokers, brokerages, and so imagine a 15 and a 60 year old kid coming into a real estate brokerage asking about buying some real estate. Yeah, they were kind enough to give us sort of an outdated book and let us go take a look. We looked and basically decided very quickly that while we might be able to afford a bush lot, there really wasn't much that we could do with it. So we kind of shelved that for a few years.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, that's really interesting. So I guess, in terms of your first acquisition then at the Wrightville date of 24, what was that?

Speaker 2:

And then how?

Speaker 1:

did you kind of leverage that to scale into other things?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so that was a property here in Toronto. I was actually still a student and so before I so, my brother and I decided we were going to try to tackle this real estate thing again. And of course I mean, we're not from a real estate family, I'm not even quite sure how we got this into our heads but we decided we were going to try and tackle the real estate thing again. So we looked at, go out and take a look again. We ended up finding a three bedroom semi that we ended up buying, which was an interesting story, and we ended up buying that. And of course, I remember calling my dad up the next day and saying great news we bought a house. He said, hey, hey, that's fantastic. And and like any 24 year old kid at the time, I said so all I need you to do is co-sign on the mortgage. My dad, my dad says I'm not going to do that yeah and I said what do you mean?

Speaker 2:

he says, mark, I've never been in debt in my life. I've never had a mortgage. I'm certainly not going to start with you yeah and to which I said well, craig's dad is going to co-sign the mortgage, yeah, well. Well, that's good for Craig, but I'm still not going to co-sign a mortgage for you.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And then I said, but we've already bought the house. Dad says, well, you should have thought of this sooner. Yeah, yeah. So so that was the first. So I ended up calling my brother and, like I said, he's a year and a half older than me and he had recently graduated and called him up and said, hey, do you want to invest in a house? And he said, sure. So he ended up going in on the mortgage and we all Craig, me and my brother all chipped in 10 grand for the down payment on what was a $229,000 semi in Toronto.

Speaker 1:

Wow, which is probably worth like 1.5 million today.

Speaker 2:

Oh, easily yeah. So then where did?

Speaker 1:

it go from there, like when you finished university, did you go directly into real estate thinking that it would become what it is today, or did you work somewhere else for a while and then, you know, come back around to the concept that this is something that you wanted to do.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I mean we, we ended up selling the house when we graduated, which was the plan? Um, it wasn't the plan was. I mean we thought we'd get a couple of classmates in there. We'd be in there for the the three remaining years that we had in the program.

Speaker 2:

And so when we graduated, I think we had 18 different uh people roll through that house over over three years, cause, of course, students are just so, so mobile. But we sold the property um, I went and played in the real world uh, I actually am a chiropractor so bought a clinic and was was doing that and paid off some student loans and then, a few years later, started investing with uh, with my brother yeah, interesting.

Speaker 1:

You're not the first chiropractor turned real estate investor that I know interesting.

Speaker 2:

I'd like to meet the other one.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I can definitely introduce you. They're actually a realtor at Rec now, so maybe you know them kind of through the grapevine and stuff like that. But yeah, definitely some parallel there. So obviously you're working as a chiropractor now. You've kind of got this business underway. So where then did this $70 million portfolio come from? Because obviously that's like a gotta be a big journey, right, yeah.

Speaker 2:

So I mean, my brother and I started and we started buying student rentals and townhouses and we sort of looked at it, as we were buying the student rentals for cashflow and the townhomes for appreciation, we sort of did like buy a student rental, buy a townhouse, buy a student rental, buy a townhouse. And so we started doing that buy a townhouse, buy a student rental, buy a townhouse. And so we started doing that and then graduated from there. I started buying some, some duplexes and then ended up buying some multifamily buildings, kind of took a break about a decade ago actually took a break when I sold my my clinics, gave away my clinics, but when I stopped with the clinics, took a break. When I sold my clinics, gave away my clinics, but when I stopped with the clinics, took a break and, yeah, sort of retired.

Speaker 2:

At that point I had a little over probably a little over 100 doors under my belt and the plan was to basically retire and live off of those. And then my current partner, dave kind of we were introduced by a mutual property manager said that we should. We should sort of meet up and see what happened. He wanted to partner up right away. Admittedly, I resisted for the first few years because I still didn't wasn't planning on getting back into the real estate world. But eventually after a couple years I started seeing people that I was ahead of sort of catch up and surpass me in terms of the number of units and the size of portfolio that they had. I guess I'm a little bit of a competitive person. So I decided to get back into it, so started back in working with Dave and some other partners and we went out and we bought a number of multifamily properties and now hotels.

Speaker 1:

Yeah awesome. We went out and we bought a number of multifamily properties and now hotels yeah, awesome. So I guess, were you focusing your portfolio primarily in the GTA at that point in time, or were you looking outside as well?

Speaker 2:

So initially it was actually Simcoe County, Barrie and Aurelia that we started, then moved down into Hamilton. From there, actually, I went out west to Edmonton and then even Northeastern BC.

Speaker 1:

Nice. Yeah, I'm always curious because obviously the price point in Toronto is high and it's by the highest now that it's ever been. So I'm always curious to see if people started here, if they did kind of go outside of their own backyard. When you look now at the growth that you've had and the experiences you've had, what would you say are some of the biggest challenges and obstacles that you've faced, as you have?

Speaker 2:

Interesting. I mean obviously these past year and a half, with the current interest rate environment and just the economic environment in general, this last year and a half has certainly been tough for a lot of real estate investors. Anybody who's had any sort of construction projects on the go, anybody who's in sort of variable mortgages or private financing. Variable mortgages or private financing I mean I've got a number of projects on the go where I've seen the interest rate go from 7% to 14% over the past year and a bit and obviously that affects your cash flow and it's fun to have a completely empty building with a $40,000 a month mortgage.

Speaker 2:

So there's certainly that. But at the same time I mean I've invested in northeastern BC, which is an oil and gas region that when I first started investing there I was getting phenomenal cash flow. The price point to rent in the area was amazing. Then the bottom sort of fell out of the oil and gas market.

Speaker 2:

And then we were facing 30% vacancy and rents cut in half. So I've seen a lot of sort of ups and downs. I mean, I've lived through what was the gold rush of 2020 and 2021 when it came to real estate and saw property values appreciate significantly, and that posed its own problems from a standpoint of I was out there trying to acquire properties when everybody was just going crazy over them.

Speaker 1:

So, it's.

Speaker 2:

I've been through a lot and it just happens when you've been doing this for 26 years, 27 years, so what would you say are some of the biggest lessons that come out of that?

Speaker 1:

Because obviously I think what we're seeing now is a lot of these companies that started, and maybe just more in their infancy, because it's been in the last, say, three to five years or something and some of their folding and you know there's a lot of distress happening and stuff like that. So when you did experience something like interest rates doubling, going from seven to 14, or like going through that oil and gas um bus kind of in like the 2015-2016, like how did you manage that to overcome it and then come out successfully on the other side?

Speaker 2:

so I think the main thing I mean. A smart person once said real estate is a get rich slow play, and the the thing is is to take it slow. Um, a lot of the people right now that are having difficulty are the people that tried to go too fast. They didn't have the financial resources, the financial wherewithal within them to be able to survive. I've sold a couple of properties in the past couple of years in order to generate additional capital so that I can pay mortgages and pay lenders and pay construction and all that sort of stuff. If I didn't have that base where I had a number of properties that have been paying off their mortgages for the past 10, 15, 20 years, then it would be very difficult for me. I don't like selling the properties, but I also know that to sell a property today to free up an extra 100,000 will allow me to make an extra two, three, 400,000 on the current properties. So it's uh, that's the biggest thing is is go slow.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, I do understand what you're saying. I think that that's something that I've directly seen with some of the active investors that they scaled way too fast.

Speaker 1:

And in some instances, you know, raised money on debt as opposed to equity. It's not sustainable. And then now a lot of the access to that kind of lending has disappeared due to different reasons and now they're, all you know, just walking that line right. So anything could kind of topple them over. But flipping to the more positive side, when you do look at your experience over the last two and a half decades, what would you say?

Speaker 2:

you um, wow, these are different questions than other podcasts I've been on. I mean, I'm proud of the fact that I've been able to do this and still have a great uh balance with my family and being able, like I mean, the whole point of doing this is not so you can try to make as much, as much money as you can. It's not so that you can drive the fancy car. I mean I've driven the fancy cars, I they. They get boring. I mean it's fun, but at the same time yeah, but at the same time. I mean, you're not going to drive a Ferrari as a daily driver. I didn't buy the Ferrari. I rented the Ferrari when I was in Italy. It was a blast, but I drive a 10-year-old Jeep now. I do. I do this for my family, I do this to so I can have to spend time with my family. I mean, starting the REIT was something that I didn't have to do, but I did it because I wanted to really pass on that legacy to my kids and potentially, my future grandkids and kids.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, and I think that's what it's all about. Like, a lot of people talk about return on investment, but at the end of the day, it's really the return on time that I think matters more than anything, and you know, obviously, if you kind of leave that legacy for your family as well, then that's just the icing on the cake.

Speaker 1:

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Speaker 1:

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Speaker 1:

Inspired to Invest is proud to support the Beyond Success program. In today's complex world, it's absolutely crucial for our youth to learn how to take charge of their financial future. We believe that every young person deserves access to accurate, practical financial information. Designed to bridge the gap, the Beyond Success program leverages a comprehensive educational bootcamp to equip young minds with essential financial literacy skills. At Beyond Success, it's not just about teaching financial literacy. It's also about fostering a foundation for a prosperous and empowered future. Join us Together, we can build a brighter financial future for the next generations. Join us Together, we can build a brighter financial future for the next generations. Join us Together, we can build a brighter financial future for the next generations.

Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, welcome back to Inspired to Invest. I have Mark Bono here with me. He is the co-founder of Honeytree Real Estate Investment Trust and I think he's kind of touched a little bit of everything. He's here still today, so I think that speaks volumes. One of the things that I really love to ask real estate investors on my show is what's the craziest thing that you've experienced as a real estate investor?

Speaker 2:

Oh, the stories I could tell.

Speaker 1:

The top two if you can narrow them down.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, well, I mean. So one is one that we finally are just coming through the other side of right now, which was we bought an 18 unit building in Hamilton in January. We closed it January 11, 2021. There were a couple of individuals in that building that's, let's just say, had some some dependency issues Put things, so they did not pay rent from the day that we bought the building. They were actively dealing drugs out of the unit.

Speaker 2:

They single handedly caused a lot of other tenants to leave the building, working with landlord tenant board to try to get them out, yeah, taking months and months and months.

Speaker 2:

Finally, after about a year and a half, we had we finally had a judgment against them and in order to have them evicted, only to have the individual who was on the lease pass away from an overdose which you think would actually help the situation, because they're dead and their next of kin signed documents to to have us take over the unit, only for one of his friends to claim to have been a a occupant of that unit. So then we had to start the process all over again to have his friend evicted the entire time, not paying rent the entire time, inviting all their other uh, addict friends into the building again dealing, dealing drugs out of the building, um, all sorts of of nastiness going on. Yeah, it wasn't until january 24th 2024 that we were finally able to to evict them and get the sheriff to get them out. And we're now, uh like, and of course we had to renovate the unit top to bottom, everything right down to the sub floor. Yeah, I mean, it was just a disaster.

Speaker 1:

The way it was left, wow yeah, and I mean, it really begs the question, like why the LTV? Not only here, but there's a lot of other places, you know, they obviously really sway towards the tenants and I think, just in these extenuating circumstances, that there should be done, there should be something in place that allows you to escalate a situation right, like this isn't just a general circumstance, like it's a health and safety issue, like there's a lot of different things, and I just really believe they're a couple of times a week.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, I mean it's crazy. I just think, as a property owner with reasonable notice whether that's like three months or even six months like you, should really be able to take control of your property and do what needs to be done. And yeah, I feel like that's why I've kind of stayed away from Ontario, me personally, but you're a brave soul.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean the landlord tenant board is broken right now there's no doubt about it in Ontario is broken right now, there's no doubt about it in Ontario. I mean we can talk about how there obviously is a continuum of rights and it shouldn't be all completely on the landlord, it shouldn't be all the completely on the tenant as well. There are lots of other jurisdictions in Canada that have strong landlord tenant legislation but don't have a nine to 10 month wait to get a hearing, that that are able to get in there quickly and make a decision quickly that can be fair to the tenant or the landlord, depending on the circumstance, or preferably both, fair to both. But the main thing is is being able to deal with the the issue quickly and effectively.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, no, I can agree more Now. I assume that somewhere along the way you probably got some coaching and education and mentorship. Maybe you can speak a little bit to that and as well, like maybe what some of the best advice you've ever been given is.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean, I was a RAINN member for God, 15 years probably. So that's where I I got most of my education and when it comes to this, uh, a lot of it was self-taught, but a lot of it came from rain and, of course, all the other people within rain. I mean once you've been there, for when you, when you were there as long as I was, as I say, like all the old, all the old guys not that we're old and not that we're all guys, but all the old people, that people had been around a while. They're all out in the back of the room. They're all outside of the room talking, sharing stories, sharing best practices, not actually inside the room. So that certainly was where I got a lot of information and a lot of help from just other investors.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. Is there anything that any of them passed down to you in terms of nuggets of wisdom that you hold near and dear to you today?

Speaker 2:

I can't really put my finger on any. I mean, obviously there's lots of nuggets that are shared over the years, but uh. But like I said, the main thing is is is just treating it like a business and and going slow um, not not going so fast and then getting caught.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, no, I think that that obviously makes sense when it comes to lessons. Is there anything that you know you wish you would have learned sooner? That maybe would have changed a decision that you made when it came to an acquisition, or or something that you did along the way?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean you can always go back and say I could have done it better, but that's I mean, as I say, I mean hindsight's 2020 yeah, but at the end of the day, I mean I've I've done quite well. Could I have done better? Yes, of course, um, but at the same time, could I have invested in Amazon stock when it was six dollars? So, like, yeah, like you, you can always do better, but I think what I've been able to accomplish is obviously quite good, and I also know that I, despite I mean despite my age I still got a long ways to go, and we're we're scaling quite large right now in terms of with the REIT and being able to acquire larger and larger buildings and really build a much more robust business around the properties.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, no, I think that's great. Now, obviously, you just touched on one point at least to my next question in terms of what's next for you. So you know where do you want to take the REIT and do you have a particular financial freedom number in mind? You know you talk at one point about number of doors and things like that, but would it be you know the size of the rate, the volume of cashflow that you have coming in? Like what would you say you're reaching for?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, I mean I don't. I don't have a specific financial freedom number because, quite frankly, if I wanted to, I mean I didn't even have to get back into real estate. I mean I had enough properties that I could have just been satisfied with what I had. I guess, and and admittedly, some days I wonder why I am still going with this and why I am working hard at it. But, like I said, I'm doing this for future generations. I'm doing this for my kids.

Speaker 2:

I'm doing this for my future grandkids. I don't have specific numbers in mind in terms of I want to hit X number of doors or I want to hit X number of assets under management. In a way, those are kind of irrelevant. I mean, right now I want to make sure that I keep good balance with my family. I want to make sure that I'm able to attend hockey practice with my son or figure skating or dance with my daughter, yet still have a business that is top-notch both in terms of what we're able to do for the investors but also what we're able to do for the guests and tenants.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's great. Now, just speaking to Honeytree being a REIT, can you talk a little bit about the benefit when that comes to being a passive investor in a product like that?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I mean, the reason why we chose to set up the REIT in the first place was it allowed us to scale much more, because it allowed us to actually bring in outside investors other than just sort of close friends and family. We knew what we were doing was able to generate some great returns. This allowed us to allow more people to participate in things that they wouldn't normally participate in, whether that's a multifamily building or what we're doing right now that's quite unique is the hotels. So if you're a passive investor because I mean this is the thing, I am a passive investor in other REITs and I have been throughout my whole process, despite the fact that I've also been an active investor in building my portfolio you don't have to be one or the other. You can definitely be both. The passive investments allows you to use registered funds which you can't really use as an active investor. The passive investments allow you to diversify, whether that's into other geographic areas or whether that's into other property types.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's awesome. Now, one thing I always like to ask guests is what's a quote that inspires you? Obviously, the name of the podcast is Inspired to Invest, so I like to know what motivates my guests.

Speaker 2:

Again, I don't really have a quote. I would say that, uh, that inspires me, but certainly I mean my kids inspire me, they, they inspire me to, to basically try to make their world better.

Speaker 1:

Nice, yeah, I love that. Now, for anyone that wants to get in touch with you to learn more about opportunities that you might have, what's the best way for them to reach you?

Speaker 2:

Best way to reach me is email. So mark M-A-R-K at honeytreegrowca and. I'm sure you'll have that in the show notes as well.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, we'll definitely include that below. Thank you again for your time, for being with us today and, of course, for anyone that's watching. Make sure that you like, comment and subscribe if you've enjoyed this episode, and also follow along at Inspired to Invest Podcast on social, and remember, when you invest in yourself, the sky's the limit. Thanks again. Thank you to Honeytree REIT and PropertyCastio for bringing you this episode of Inspired to Invest. The views represented on this podcast are for general information only and does not constitute investment or other professional advice or an offering of securities. The host, thank you.