Mindy: Welcome everybody to the BiggerPockets Money Podcast where we interview Amberly Grant and talk about cash flowing real estate, dramatically increasing your income, and immigration. Hello, hello, hello. My name is Mindy Jensen and with me as always is my definitely bench press more than me co-host, Scott Trench.
Scott: Thank you, Mindy. That um, intro was very uplifting.
Mindy: All right, Scott and I are here to make financial independence less scary. Less just for somebody else. To introduce you to every money story because we truly believe financial freedom is attainable for everyone, no matter when or where you’re starting.
Scott: That’s right. Whether you want to retire early and travel the world, or go on to make big time investments in assets like real estate, start your own business or build a rental property portfolio on a foundation of frugality and um, a few wonderful opportunities over the years, we’ll help you reach your financial goals and get money out of the way. So you can launch yourself towards those dreams.
Mindy: Scott, today’s money moment, stay with me, is strive for inbox Zero. Hold on, I’m I’m getting there. You know how you have that promotions tab in your email? Sometimes it’s easy to get lost in it and rack up some spending. 50% off on Amazon, buy one get one free on clothes, reduced prices and all of a sudden you just spent like $500. If you think about it, you could instantly delete everything in your promotions tab and then never see it and never tempt yourself because if you weren’t thinking about it beforehand, some email saying here’s a free thing or here’s some money off of something shouldn’t tempt you to buy that product.
Scott: I love it, Mindy. I I’ve been running uh inbox zero for the entirety of my time here at BiggerPockets. Josh Dorkin, our founder trained me on that in the first week and I have never looked back ever since. So all of my inboxes are cleaned out personally and and work almost every day, not every day, but almost every day.
Mindy: Josh missed that lesson with me, Scott, and I will say that, um, I’m not a box zero.
Scott: I know you don’t run inbox. I work with you for years. I know that ain’t the case over there. So great money tip for for money for for. Yeah, if you send me an email and you don’t get a response, send it again because it probably got buried.
Mindy: Yeah, and then text her.
Scott: Yes, yes, exactly.
Mindy: Uh, all right, do you have a money moment for us? You can email money moment at biggerpockets.com. All right, Scott, today we’re talking with my friend Amberly Grant and I’m so excited to bring her in. She has quite the story of growing up without a lot of money and then starting out her real estate mogul empire by buying a house in an expensive city and making it work and then repeating the process. And not only did she repeat the process, but if you listen carefully, you can repeat it too.
Scott: Yeah, I I and you know, we’re I I think you’re gonna really enjoy this episode. We’re going to talk about uh some really wild swings and fortune uh for Amberly over a three to five-year period. And some of the numbers sounded unbelievable at first. But then I was like, I kind of did that. I lived on probably around $13 to $1,500 a month in Denver from, you know, not 20 17, 18 19, but from 2014 till 2017 probably um before before things started done that. And I had some some big income swings uh with the opportunity to come here at BiggerPockets. So you know, I just saw a lot of parallels in my story. Literally. Uh, we were on parallel streets, probably one or two streets over and with with one of the properties that we had around the same time. So what a small world. I also, mine was also an up down duplex like hers. So just kind of a cool, um, uh, lot lot of similarities there and um it was great to reconnect with Amberly and hear about the crazy success and and um, wonderful life she’s built.
Mindy: Amberly Grant is a real estate investor who was originally from Canada and now lives in the Denver area. She’s technically Coastfi, but has a full-time job still. She’s also the host of Tuesday FinTalk. Amberly, welcome to the Bigger Pockets Money Podcast. I’m so excited to talk to you today.
Guest: This is so cool. Thanks for having me.
Mindy: Amberly, let’s start off the show by telling a little bit about yourself and how you became invested in finance and investing.
Guest: Well, I have been really interested in this since I was very young. I grew up with a family who didn’t make much money and I got my first finance book when I was 15 years old, The Wealthy Barber, and that changed my life. I learned all about compound interest. If I had saved, you know, $20 a month from the time that I was 15 years old to what 40 you know, I’d have millions of dollars and that just was something I didn’t think was fathom, like fathomable beforehand. So to me it was really um, an eye-opening experience. After that I like, I read every finance book I could get my hands on from like Suzie Orman to Rich Dad Poor Dad, like all those starter ones that you know, back in the, the early 2000s and then, of course evolved into uh blogs and podcasts and things like that. So it was just something that I wanted to not mimic what my parents were going through, which is in their sixties, seventies, not having money, I just I could see that, that, kind of view of life for them and I decided I did not want to walk that path.
Mindy: Let’s talk about buying your first property. What was that journey like? And how do you go from growing up without a ton of money to I’m going to buy a house?
Guest: My family did not have a motto of purchasing property. It didn’t make sense to them for many reasons, they just couldn’t ever figure it out, right? Especially a down payment. We couldn’t even buy a washer and dryer or a fridge when it broke, so like they were not, you know, putting a down payment on a house. Um, when in 2019, um I was with an ex-partner and we decided we were going to move in together. And everyone says, do not move in with someone you aren’t married to, which is really great advice and I would continue to give that advice. Um thankfully the very practical nature that I have, I had talked in advance, you know, like who’s paying what, um what happens if we break up in a year? What happens if one of us dies? You know, we we kind of went through that checklist before buying a property together. Um and so in two 2019, we found a property that um fit my criteria um and a bit of his. His, he wanted a turnkey property, nothing we we had to work on. I wanted to work on it, but decided that was something I can compromise. I wanted a property that I could split up and create in into a duplex so that we could live by ourselves but someone else was paying our mortgage or close to it. Um so I ended up finding a property. Um turn the basement into a walkout one bedroom apartment and started to offer that to actually the fire community um as well as uh put it on Airbnb and for a year we didn’t pay more than $200 towards our property, which was awesome. and then we broke up. So that was my first property.
Scott: And so what happens next?
Guest: Yeah. Thankfully, we were really good to each other. We had already had these conversations, right? What happens with the equity of the place just as one year. So it was actually only, I think we lasted about eight months. Um and then we separated. And so during that separation, we decided honestly, this is a really great thing for maybe people to do if this if they’re in the situation. We decided that on Friday at 3:00 p.m. each of us has to send the other an email saying whether we wanted the property and if we were going to buy the other person out or we wanted to sell it. And we both sent the emails. I sent him an email saying, I will buy you out. Um, and we we had agreed on the buyout would be no equity in the property, just down payments. Um we’ve put 20% down, so $100,000. um and so just down payments. And then he sent me an email saying he did not want the property. So that worked out really well. Um the sad thing for me though was this was February of 2020. I was running an Airbnb in the basement. I think we all know what happens a month later. Um I was running an Airbnb in the basement. I his mom had invested in the property and we were going to be paying her back over three years. So I had to give between the two of them $80,000 before March of 2020 to get the property back. Um which was insane. And then in March, we all know Airbnb, you know, canceled all reservations for the next few months and uh I felt like I was in a pickle.
Scott: And and this was in and um sorry, where’s this property located?
Guest: Denver, Colorado.
Scott: Okay. So you have $80,000. How do you come up with $80,000? And how does the journey progress from here?
Guest: I was, I think in the back of my mind. I don’t know if I was probably prepping to leave the relationship or maybe I was going to buy a new house or something. I had $60,000 in cash that I was just going to, you know, seeing what I would do next with it. Um and then I was able to when we had made the decision to um split up, I ended up like paying them out in early March. So I just put every dollar of my paychecks towards paying them out. Um so I had $60 in uh $60,000 in savings and then like I came up with $20,000 over like a two month period.
Scott: Okay. And and can you give us a a ballpark of kind of like, uh how long it took you to save up that $60,000 in cash and kind of the monthly savings rate that you were able to achieve to to, you know, crank out the next 20 grand?
Guest: Yes. So when we bought the property in February of 2019, we were pretty much topped out. like everyone is when you buy your first property especially. I think I had like $15,000 in savings at that point. Um I was able to essentially get to $80,000 for March of 2020. So that took me one full year to get to $80,000. I had actually left, I I left a job that was making $50, at that point $62,000, um moved to a job that I started making 115,000 and my like total expenses every single, yeah, my total expenses every single month were $1300. So literally every other penny that came in, I just saved.
Mindy: We got to stop here and go back to this giant, Did you say 50,000 to 115,000?
Guest: Plus a 20% bonus, yes. So like it was like 130.
Mindy: Were you in the same field? Were you in college and then you graduated and you went from like administrative assistant to CEO or how did you make this giant jump? because that we’re not going to just gloss over that. Sorry, we interrupt this finance story to talk about finances.
Guest: Yeah. So actually, I had graduated University of Colorado Boulder, um in 2017. I got a job with the company I was working with. Um turns out, I’m really good at what I do. So I was working at this company, making college wages, right? Starting at 52,000 with a guaranteed 2% wage uh increase one year later, another 2% one year later. But at this job, I was known for turning around million dollar projects. So like other PMs who were making 120 a year plus 20% bonuses would mess up projects, then they would hand them to me. I would get back in the customer favor. I would turn the projects around and I would close them and I was making literally 65,000, no bonuses. So I had kept I for six months I had like, I talked to the VP of our company, all this stuff saying, hey, I need a raise to get close to what other people are making so that it makes sense for be to be here. And they kept saying, well, you just got out of college. I say, but then I do these projects. And so it was just back and forth. And so essentially I decided, um I’m going to leave and uh our competitor uh someone from my company had left to our competitor, they knew that I was really great and so they brought me on.
Mindy: Yeah, here’s uh anybody who’s in the hiring business or the employee retention business. Don’t play pay your employees like garbage and don’t pay your star employee who’s turning around projects like garbage, tell her she’s not worth what everybody else is making because she just graduated from college. There are old souls out there. You wouldn’t believe this, but Scott is only 12 and he is running bigger pockets and has been for 11 years. He’s just smart like that. It doesn’t matter his age. He’s actually 13. It doesn’t matter somebody’s age or level of experience, it matters their intelligence and their competence and their ability to get stuff done.
Guest: And I was 29 years old. That was one of my things too is like I’m not just a normal college student. I traveled the world. I owned my own businesses and then I came here, right? So and finished did university in and came to the company. And sure enough, one year later, they started reaching out to me again. They moved my manager in a different position and they’re like, hey, we need like, we need star people back. I’m like, okay, well, no thanks.
Scott: Okay. So so just for some timeline things. In 2017, you graduated from college around the age 25, 26.
Guest: 29.
Scott: At 29. You you’re you you were uh 29 in 2017,
Guest: Correct.
Scott: graduating college. Okay. And then and then you have this job situation, where did you graduate debt-free or were there other financial assets getting you going at that point or were you pretty um, uh, was it, was it pretty neutral, like a pretty like uh uh was there student loans?
Guest: Yeah. Can you give us a snapshot of the financial position graduating college and then how we got to that point of the big race. Yeah. So before that, I had checked with my social security and I had made an average of $15,000 a a year from the time I moved to the United States in 2007 to 2017. So I had done odd jobs, moved overseas, um you know, just did my own business, turned out didn’t work out very well. Um and then in um when I was 25, I decided to go and be serious about university. I went to the Community College of Denver first. Um the great thing about that is I was a non-traditional student, which means that I can apply for uh FAFSA and scholarships without my parent’s income, which it didn’t matter. My parents’ income was zero. Um so I was able to go to university or to Community College and I would make about $3,000 a semester in my pocket from scholarships and FAFSA. Then I decided to apply toCU Boulder even though the price tag ofCU Boulder is $20,000 a year for the business school and I like scared me. Oh my god. I’m Canadian like who pays 20 grand a year for school, right? I said 20,000 I’m like that’s it. Yeah. Um so I also applied to see you um Denver but it was a commuter school and I kind of wanted a, um,CU Boulder has a much better reputation, top 30 universities in the US. So, um, I applied toCU Boulder, got in, got a call from financial aid being like, hey, you actually got the scholarship which will pay for all of your tuition for the entire time you’re here, um which then I probably cried for like three days straight. It was like, oh my god, I did it. So I left uh university with zero debt, um basically zero dollars from my name as well. Uh and then got my first job and literally my expenses at that point were 1200 per month before I bought my house, which then was 1300 per month.
Scott: Okay, awesome. So so so 2017, graduate college, zero still able to save because you’re spending so little. You’re still living like a college student, it sounds like. Um and then we have this house situation that resolves in 2020. Up leading up to 2020 of the next three years, you managed to accumulate 60 grand, which empowers you to make this decision to buy out your ex-boyfriend uh and his mom’s interest in the property um with a hustle on top of that. Um Okay. So the other part of the equation here that is absolutely extraordinary that we have to dive into and get a beat on is how are you living in Denver, Colorado in 2020 for $1300 a month in a general sense. What’s the day-to-day like, what’s your car, housing, all that stuff? Um how are you, how are you figuring that out?
Guest: Actually, every part of my life has a story, right? So my car is a was a 2013 Toyota Corolla. I used to have a company where I did new, um, I would um coach people on their nutrition. I worked with luxury apartment buildings. I’d make food and deliver it to people’s fridges and did like workshops and screening, um like film screening. One of my clients was moving to New Zealand. So she actually needed help. she like been there, needed help figuring um out her apartment and getting it sent. So I helped her out. She had a leased 2013 car. This was in 2013. She gave me the lease for free for one year, it was $137 a month to help her out. Then I bought out her lease for $13,000. So I got a brand new car that she had only driven for three months. I drove it for the next two years, bought it out for 13 grand and that was my car. I still own it today. So that I had gotten in 2014. My house, because my upstairs I live with my partner, my down the downstairs was an Airbnb or a mid-term rental for actually a friend of our community, Mark Troutman who you guys um have interviewed. So he stayed in our basement for a few weeks um with his wife, um Marge and then that was part of like helping us pay our rent or our mortgage. and then um I did the Airbnb thing. my every day, I bike everywhere because I was right on a bike path. That’s one of my criteria for the houses I own is some sort of bike path or public transit.
Scott: All right. So we got we have addressed the almost unbelievable 55 to $115,000 base salary jump and the perhaps even more unbelievable $1300 a month expense load on on a uh living in Denver here. That explains the bulk of the $60, $80,000 cash accumulation. um uh that we that we we talked about there. Um with this foundation, it’s not hard to imagine um one you uh getting very wealthy uh uh over the next several years. So, how’s that right? How does the journey play out and progress from here?
Guest: Yeah, I can’t even imagine like I could not have imagined where I would be today, five years later. Um and I can’t imagine where I’ll be five years from now from what I’ve learned. So uh 2020, bought them out for $80,000 in March. Um freaked out Airbnb went to zero. What are we doing here? Uh it all comes back, it’s fine. life happens. I pivot I pivot really quickly. So when I see things on the horizon, I actually went to nurse rentals right away and never had one vacant day through all of 2020 um for my rental. So awesome. Yeah, yeah, it worked out really well. Um so I just kept switching between mid-term and short-term rentals depending on what needed to be done like with the laws and stuff. Um so that was great. Um accumulated all of that. Didn’t I wasn’t paying for lodging. Um so that was great. Still had my $115,000 a year job with a bonus. Um and so I just started stocking money away to probably buy a new property. I like to say properties happened to me. I don’t like go seeking them. They just like come my way. Um so in January 2021, I had um an agent a real estate agent I had worked with for my old my last property approached me and say like, oh no, he like was just checking in. And then I asked him, like, hey, I have very a specific criteria. Do you ever see these? He’s like, these are never in ember. And I was like, I know. if you see one, let me know. Turns out he had this seller who was like thinking of selling. He wasn’t sure what he wanted to do, but he wanted to get out of Colorado because he was moved to Tennessee. Um it’s a duplex, like a true duplex building. It’s multi-family, uh zone three units. There’s two units on it in downtown Denver. So this one is like Downing and Colfax essentially. Um so right by the the hospital there. Um I again, don’t think I have enough money. not sure what I’m going to do here. Starting negotiating with the seller. Um so I worked directly with the seller on this one. Um and end up getting this property for $711,000. It’s worth at least 750 at the time. Um now it’s worth so much more in downtown Denver. And um this is one address but uh a three bedroom upstairs, uh one bedroom downstairs, completely separate unit. That one I put 15% down. so I had to I came up with $90,000 for that one and bought that one in April 1st, 2021.
Scott: And that 90,000 was just accumulated the same old-fashioned old school way that we just talked about here over the course of a little over a year and a half.
Guest: Yep, literally like a year and a bit later.
Scott: Awesome. Okay. Um and so we’ve got um how to how to how to go? What was the what were the X’s and O’s on this property?
Guest: Yeah, the roof started leaking within 5 days of buying it. Um but uh what I do is with the I moved upstairs. Um I had to do some repairs and kind of flipping of that one, um cosmetic uh changes to that one. So that’s what I did for the next like five or six months. I think it was six months. Um I had friends coming in and out. So like um literally friends of flying to help me do flooring and um the community of of like the fire community would show up and we’d all just do like a work day for my birthday. I invited them to my birthday party which was a work on my house day. Um so I provided food and drink all day, but we got like 25, you know, list of items uh done on my house. Um it’s also an 1885 house um but with new systems. So like very finicky type property. Um I had a a, I inherited the tenant downstairs who I love. He still lives at the property but now he’s moved upstairs. Um so the tenant downstairs um was great. We would hang out. Um he decided to move in upstairs and then eventually I moved out. Um and then uh we short termed the downstairs uh as uh the tenants in order because it’s a primary residence for him.
Mindy: And that is, I want to point out that is a way around the uh, I don’t want to say around to work within the Denver Airbnb laws which state you have to have that you can only Airbnb your primary residence. So now Amberly isn’t running it. It’s the guy who lives there as his primary residence, he’s running it.
Guest: Correct. He is the owner of it, um and I just co-host with him, right? And then we have like a, you know, I I help I’m the owner isn’t for me. And as the owner for Denver, um you actually have to write a letter saying that like yes, the um tenant can use a property as a short-term rental. So that’s what we’ve done.
Mindy: Yep. And that’s a win-win for both people.
Scott: So not bolts. How’s how are we doing on the finances on this? What’s the and how would we be doing on the finances if it was a long-term rental alone?
Guest: So um my mortgage, mortgage taxes and insurance all in is $3,000 a month on that property. Upstairs rents for 3250. so it covers all of that plus like $100 of like incidentals. CapEx, vacancies and repairs, um I put aside a percentage of that because all the, the systems are new, but the old but the home is older, is in that like weird where like I don’t want to put like I don’t need to put a ton of waste but I also don’t want to put too little away. Um and that has a new roof. Um so I put um approximately like I think it was like $550 a month um for that contingency. And then the downstairs, if it were long term would rent for about $2,000. Rent in Denver’s changed a bit, so that was like two years ago. It’s a one bedroom like solo apartment. Um so about two grand. Uh Airbnb, I average about 6500 um a month between, well, 6,000 a month all year long, right? Wintertime, it’s seasonal, less. Summertime, um more, ah, make about 8,000 a month in the summertime.
Scott: Okay, awesome. So so and the and the person upstairs is paying rent to you, and rent Airbnbing the downstairs to get to this 6 to $8,000 a month total income number that you’re just that you’re just describing there?
Guest: Yeah, so I said total income for the entire property is approximately $9,000 a month and then obviously have my expenses after that.
Scott: How do we get to the $9,000 a month? Is that Airbnbing both units?
Guest: No, just the bottom. So Airbnb on average makes about 6,000 and then the upstairs makes 3250.
Scott: Okay, okay. So the bottom units bringing in 6,000, 32 and plus 3250 through the upstairs and then you’re sharing this income with the tenant, I imagine to some degree.
Guest: Yes, exactly.
Scott: Okay, awesome. Um wow, that’s awe, okay. So this this property is hugely profitable and I I think that’s that’s a great way to work within the the rules that Denver has set for for short-term rentals here. So okay, so now we’re really meeting money. We’re continuing to live a $1,300 per month lifestyle, perhaps it’s increased to 1500. I don’t know are we relaxing a little bit. Uh uh at this point uh in the story, Um and we have the two income producing properties, the first property plus now this one downtown. Uh what what happens next? And what year are we at at this point?
Guest: So that was in, I moved out um late um what, 2021. Um 20, yeah. And then um um then I become responsible for another human and it’s not a baby. So we decide that my partner who I’m dating is Canadian. We’ve known each other for 13 years, we were friends for 10. Um we decided that we’re like making this work. So he’s from Vancouver. Um so I’m now commuting back and forth. So I’m like sometimes in Denver like living at one of the properties, sometimes I’m in Vancouver, building this relationship with um my partner, John, husband now. Um and uh that’s time is going on. I’m talking away a ton of money towards index funds. So I’m doing like $800 a month towards index funds because I have like nothing in in um retirement, right? Other than a couple of years of 401K and IRAs which I only learned about like like 2015 or something. So, um, I started putting like tons of money away towards my brokerage accounts and and that’s where all my money is going. I’ve got like a little bit on the side just to like, I don’t know, maybe another property will happen to me. who knows? And um we’re just going back and forth. And so that’s kind of my life. Um my costs start to increase because um as he comes down to the US, he cannot work. So then I’m responsible for him when I go to Canada, it’s the pandemic. He uh works in film so I was contributing towards um his rent during that time just to be fair, um you know, it just made sense. And um so my costs have started to increase at that point. I think I’m probably spending like three grand a month between plane tickets and all the back and forth and, and stuff. Um and then I do that until end of 2022 when we bring him down for six months. Um and then I’m now like responsible completely for filing finances, meaning everything I bring in, um pays for him and for me. Um we move back to Vancouver for visa reasons. Have a baby. Costs now are like insane. I don’t know even know where money’s going, it’s just flying out the window. Um and then we um buy a property in Longmont, which I had intended to consult Mindy, but I was literally two weeks in to uh to like having a baby and this property came up on the street that our good friends live on. I have three friends on the street. Um and so we decided to buy it sight unseen. Um and so uh only had a little bit of money for this one because all my money has been going towards investments for like a year and a half. Um so only put 5% down on this property.
Scott: Okay, so this is an owner occupied single family home. Correct.
Guest: Correct, yes.
Scott: And and and then this brings us essentially to the position that we’re in today at this point. Or was there any anything else in the uh in the story?
Guest: Um well, other than the fact that um three months ago I took over all the expenses of the property of my father who’d inherited it from his um his sister and uh he just can’t afford it. So um me and my little sister have taken that on. Um and then I manage um John’s property in Vancouver. So we have tenants in there in the condo and like the best part of Vancouver in the West end, um that we lived in for a while and we’re never getting rid of that.
Scott: Okay. So we’ve got a property nearby where my duplex was in kind of Southwest Denver. We’ve got one downtown. We’ve got the primary in, sorry in Longmont. We’ve got the condo in Vancouver and we’ve got your dad’s property in um Ottawa Canada.
Guest: Ottawa, Canada. Okay.
Scott: So this five unit portfolio uh amassed over the last three and a half years is is incredible. Um and what’s what’s the overall picture? What is what is day-to-day life uh for for you, your your baby and and your husband? and what’s what’s next? It’s chaos.
Guest: Um I um so like my day-to-day is essentially I do my W2 job. Thankfully it’s work from home. I absolutely love my team um so I do that. I’ve increased my salary greatly there as well. Um and take note other company. Uh and so like I absolutely love it. Um I got six months of Matt leave to through my work so that was a really nice reprieve as well before coming back to a W2 job. I manage all the rentals um except for the, um so then I manage all the long-term rentals, the short-term rentals by myself. um as well as the Vancouver property. Um I oh gosh, what is else stay that day? Um go for bike rides with Mindy. Um we um essentially because my partner can’t work for probably up to the next 24 months. Um he’s responsible for fixing all the properties. So like he goes and makes sure everything looks good. Um, we’ve had a couple floods over the past two years of the properties. So he fixes all that up um learns as he goes, fixing washers, dryers, things like that. So that’s his job for our kind of partnership. Um mine is to bring home the bacon. Um and then yeah, like going for bike rides, hanging out, going to the gym, trying to get back in shape. Um running F talks, I have a, an online community that I’ve run. And yeah, that’s it. It’s a lot.
Mindy: It is a lot. Before we jump into F talks, which I do want to cover, I want to dive into why you can work and John can’t.
Guest: So we are importing him from Canada.
Mindy: You’re from Canada.
Guest: I am from Canada. Oh, you want to know that reason? I was born in the United States. So I was born in California. So I had a social security card, um, I had I have citizenship. So I have two passports. I can go between the two countries freely. Um, and so I could work in the United States and have been working here since I moved to the US in 2007. And then, um, he is only Canadian. So we’re going through a marriage visa for him to be down here and we’re, we just applied for the green card and um, according to Denver, it can take up to 24 months for that to get approved. And once that’s approved or the work permit we’ve asked for, he’ll now be allowed to work at that point. And he likes being like, he loves being home with our kids.
Mindy: Yeah. And I mean you’ve got an adorable baby. I love being home with your kid. Every once a while he comes over to my house too.
Guest: He’s wifi.
Scott: Yes, he’s wifi.
Guest: That’s like literally what he tells people.
Scott: Nice yeah.
Mindy: Hey, if you want to be wife too, come up to Longmont because this city is full of wife people. Um, so he he can’t work for 12 months or it is probably going to be 12 months. Like if his green card came in tomorrow or his work visa came in tomorrow, could he then start work or is there a specific amount of time that he has to be in the country before he can start working?
Guest: Great question. So um the green card has been accepted, as in like the application has been accepted. Denver says for the green card to be like, you get it in your in your um hand. It essentially that’s your residency permit. You are allowed to work at that moment. Denver is saying that will take 24 months. We have applied for what’s called a work permit as well. The work permit is now taking about 12 months to get, so we might be able to get that work permit in 12 months and then he’ll be able to work without the green card. Um, because that’s his like you are allowed to do. He’s also not not allowed to leave the country until he gets the green card or a travel permit which we also applied for. Um, essentially it’s kind of a big cluster we have a lawyer for this. a a gal who’s in the fire community actually because it’s so much to navigate.
Mindy: Yeah, that sounds like a lot.
Guest: And there’s no film here in Denver. So like when he does get to be able to work now he has to figure out what does he do next? So um you know, we talked extensively about the fact that he’ll probably just start some sort of um you know, handyman business here in Longmont because he’s very handy.
Mindy: I can keep him busy.
Guest: Yes.
Scott: Okay. So so just kind of zooming zooming back out and going back to the story. We we talked about the three properties you acquired and the last one being the primary residence. um covered by the income for the other properties and then your um your job income here. Um and your husband had a condo I presume for many years financed at a great rate in Vancouver and that’s why you kept it.
Guest: Uh Canadian financing is different. So Canadian is five-year arms or less. So you have like a 25-year period of your mortgage and then you have to renew it every one, two, three, four or five years um at a new interest rate. And then basically that’s what’s happening to a lot of Canadians right now is they’re getting interest rates that are double what they had originally gotten in the first place. The good thing about Canadian banks is they actually vet people a lot more than um US banks. Um but still, when you’re going from a 2.5 rate, so we went from I think 1. like 89% to 3.85%. Um you know, that that’s a change and some people, he thankfully bought this in 2011. There was only like 20 230,000 left on his condo mortgage. Um so like it’s not a big deal for us to have these jumps and interest rates. So we have to renew again in five more years um as of last year.
Scott: That’s really interesting. I had no idea about the Canadian housing market. We often um get asked uh about from our Canadian friends about whether we’re going to have a bigger pockets Canada-friendly rental calculator. And answered always been next year, next year. Um so we’ll get to it at some point uh for our Canadian friends. Don’t worry.
Guest: I’ll say one more thing about the condo. Um something, one of the reasons we want to we want to keep it is because having a property in Vancouver is such a luxury. Like this condo now costs 550 to $600,000 to buy, right? And it’s just not like it’s so cost prohibitive for a one-bedroom apartment. Like that doesn’t make sense, right? Um so we want to keep it for that reason, but also in Vancouver, uh development is a huge thing. So what that means is uh you know, someone will site the building and say like, hey, we’re actually going to develop an eight-story building or a 16-story building and then they pay out each resident a certain amount of money um based on like what they’re going to make off the building, right? Um in Vancouver, they this specific building, um right before COVID was getting inspect by developers and it was getting inspect for a million dollars of property. So that’s the other reason why we’re keeping it is because if we can keep it and eventually the development’s going to come into that area again. It left and now it might come back. They’re zoning. we can we we saw some surveyors for uh utilities. So that’s the other reason we’re keeping it is because um there could be a very big payout in the next like 10, 15 years from the property. um and that was eight stories. It’s now going to be zone for 16. So that’s great.
Scott: And so what’s next? What’s what’s uh how are you going to um continue expanding um the empire?
Guest: Yeah. Um I’m definitely looking at, you know, always opened. I just uh had talked to Mindy last week and I was like, you know, so we want to have another baby. That’s our next next step. Um so that and then we figure we’ll take on another property right after that. We’ve been fixing up our home. So uh we just got rid of all the popcorn ceilings in it, painted it all. Uh we’ve got a kitchen we just ordered countertops this weekend. Um at IKEA. It’s 15% off right now. It’s not going to be by the time this airs, but um you know, it’s great for anyone in this call. Um so we ordered them this weekend. Um so we got the kitchen going on and then basically our house is complete at that point for the the updates we want to do to it. We we want to replace all the doors there a bunch of things in them. But at that point like it’s in so much better shape than we bought it. Um so then we feel comfortable taking on a new property. And so more than likely we’ll probably do some sort of owner occupied uh property which we want to actually fix up um with two you know, small children. Uh always a great idea. And then and then we’ll rent this one out. Um this one isn’t going to be great numbers, right? It’s a single family home. We pay a lot for it, high interest rate, like not like today is but like 5.85% on this place, so quite high. Um so it won’t cash flow the way that, you know, others have, but we want to hold on to it because we really love the property.
Scott: Awesome. And I love I love the fixing up the property with the little ones because like our 10-month-old is super happy in a 100 square foot room with some choice, you know, like the whole thing done doesn’t really make a difference um at that point, so.
Mindy: Yeah, they just want to spend time with you. Um I can tell you from personal experience that uh fixing up a property with two little ones is the easiest thing you’ll ever do and you should totally do it. It’s It’s uh bring them over to my house when you need to do dusty dusty work because it is it it can be a chore, but yeah, you’ll you can also do it. I mean I did several with two little ones and it’s totally fine and you know, with John not having a job right now, he can bang out that property. Um I teased about Fin Talks and then I want to circle back to Fin Talks because I find this so fascinating. Let’s talk about your Tuesday Fin Talks and uh for so for people who don’t know what this is, what is your little fin talk session?
Guest: Yeah, I also call a little F talk sessions so, um, F talks is a community of people that I started in March of 2020. I readily know from the story, March 2020, I was going through this crazy breakup. I paid $80,000 of money like everything I had towards this property. Airbnb went to zero, like the world’s shutting down. I’m sitting in my room like eating popcorn for dinner, drinking wine. My partner at the time had taken all the furniture out of the house. So I had a couch, a TV, a stripper poll in my kitchen because I didn’t even have a uh I was like, well, I may as well, you know, just exercise and have fun here. I’ve had that since I was 31. I’ve had one in a, in a house since then. um and like a bed. That’s literally everything I had in this property at that time. So uh pretty sad state of affair. I decided, I’ve always wanted to do some sort of financial education for people. I have a lot of knowledge and there’s a lot of people, you know, who could be hurting during COVID. So I decided to start doing um just like daily finance talks on Facebook live. It got a little bit of the following. and then some people had mentioned, hey, we should meet up and like talk. And I was like, great, why don’t we do this? Um Markman OG uh of my talks. So it started with me and five friends. I would pick a topic and we would get on for one hour, everyone drinking like a gossip wine or like a beer um all home in our houses and talk uh about the financial topic. It started to grow and spread. um so at my highest heights of talks, we had 55 people joining every single Tuesday. And then Google was really upset with me for sending out a calendar invite to 300 people every week um and decided I was not allowed to do that anymore. So then I had to change it up to mail chimp and uh now you average about 31 to 35 people. So I choose a topic every single week. I send an email saying like, here’s the topic, here’s why I’m thinking about it. Here are some questions to ponder, jump on the call, let’s talk and it. Um and then that’s what we do. And so people have saved thousands of dollars from you know, having um these conversations about taxes or mental health, meditation, um 401Ks, like like everything, right? Um and we’ve become a really close community. So I then started an in-person meetup for Fin Talks 30 year this past year. Um and so we all meet up in person in Colorado and do like a weekend event and um yeah, it’s really fun. I’ve been doing it since March of 2020 every single Tuesday.
Scott: Awesome. And this is and this is um free to attend as long as you are willing to replace your roof or hang a door or fix the windows uh at one of the properties. Is that?
Guest: You know my style. Um so um yeah, so it’s been free for the past three years. I’m actually changing that up literally like this next three weeks. Um I’m going to make it a very nominal $10 a month. Um, and it’s just paid yearly at that point. Um, and I’m going to see if it survives. It might not. And the reason I’m doing that is I’m actually, it’s been three and a half years that I’ve been doing this. I checked it, it’s 182 sessions that I have done for talks and my life has changed a lot in that time. And so I think this is kind of my test to see if I should keep it going. I also have to pay zoom memberships and all this stuff. So I decided, you know what? Let’s just try this, um and so I’m basically sending out the email literally today. um which is just telling everyone, hey, if you want to join, it’s $10 a month um for a yearly membership. And then if not, then we might just go down to one time a month and I’m going to enjoy my three extra weeks a month uh open.
Scott: Awesome. And and where can people find out more about this about these talks?
Guest: Yeah, Ambergrandt.com/ talks.
Mindy: All right, Amberly, you are a member of the FI community, you are Coast5. Do you have any advice for somebody who is just getting started?
Guest: First of all, find community. So there are so many events. We’re doing a cruise in January, right? So January 27th, Mindy’s joining, I’m joining. We have 39 finance freaks joining this cruise. Um it’s literally like $500. Um it’s nothing. and so go to an event, go to economy, camps, come to talks, um find community because I think the best part of the journey is being able to actually talk openly about finances with people. Like my friends at the gym, now talk about finances because I’m just I’m just going to say it. Like I’ll say what I make, I’ll you know, I’ll it’s not a problem to me um because we’re all in this together to like bring each other up, right? Um so that’s my number one advice. The second advice is if you are, um, I I find a lot of people who are starting on their financial journey, they get really caught in numbers. They get really caught in like reading books and knowledge, but after knowledge action. And so whether that’s buying your first property or engaging even like you know, a a bank for financing for property to see what you can even afford, those types of actions will just get you one step closer to what your goal is and I think it’s really important. And I always like to say build the parachute on the way down, like take that action and see what happens and then you know, you get to pivot from that.
Scott: Love it. I think that’s a I think that’s great advice. Um it’s really hard to take action if no one else is in your in your world is on the same page or you know, there along for the ride with you. And I think that’s something that I think speaks to your journey because you have this I bet you that that community was what allowed you to spend that 1200, $1300 a month, which really I think is the foundation for all of your success over the last three to four years in in addition to creativity and and the the, you know, opportunism and finding these deals and these um that that new job, but that foundation of frugality just meant that there’s no way you could fail. Um really, it’s just a matter of time before you became, you know, uh before you you built uh wealth in some form or other with it. And I think that the community um that you built probably is a big factor in that and helping you to defray expenses in certain certain cases but also just live a a happy, wonderful life at a very low cost uh in the Denver area. So.
Guest: Yep. And like my talk community is so much smarter than I am. Like any problem you bring to them, like they solve it. They got it.
Mindy: All right, Amberly, this was a lot of fun. Thank you so much for sharing your story with us. I think that there’s a lot of things to learn for many of our listeners and I appreciate your time.
Guest: Thank you both. I appreciate it. And we will talk to you soon.
Mindy: Okay, Scott, that was Amberly Grant and that was such an impressive story. Being a member of the FI community, being Coast5, she has all of these fantastic opportunities for two reasons. She’s frugal and she has a lot of courage. She’s frugal in that she doesn’t spend every dime that comes in. She saves it and she has courage to take advantage of opportunities when they present themselves.
Scott: Yeah. I I I think it all it boils down to that spending pattern. $1300 a month in Denver in 2017 to 2021-ish in that in that period, it is possible. You got a bike to work, you got a house hack, you got to make a bunch of smart decisions. But if you can earn a $55,000 a year job and spend 1300 bucks a month, opportunities are just gonna explode in your life over the next couple of years in ways that you can’t predict. That’s the fundamental thing here. You’re piling up the cash and you have every option in the world for another property to buy or business to start or whatever. You have essentially no risk in your life and an unlimited upside um because of that low low, low, low expense load. And to her point community was a big factor in that. So I think that’s the underpinning secret sauce here is the ability, the option and the you know, to sustain a lifestyle of that at that level for an indefinite period of time and then the opportunism to to go after the opportunities that presented themselves one by one to her over the following years. She love the rest of her life um with financial abundance because of that that that uh foundation.
Mindy: Yeah, and you know, Scott, you just said something really funny. You said, uh, opportunities that you can’t predict. That’s what you’re investing for. That’s what you’re saving for. That’s why you’re not spending every dime that comes in so that you have a pile of cash so that when an amazing opportunity pops up, you can pounce on it. And that’s exactly what she did over and over and over again. And we’ll continue to do.
Scott: Probably makes you a really good employee too, if you’re able to find all those things in your personal life, um ways to cut costs and increase opportunity. So not surprised you got a huge raise and has been wonderfully treated by her new company.
Mindy: Exactly. All right, Scott, should we get out of here?
Scott: Let’s do it.
Mindy: That wraps up this episode of the Bigger Pockets Money Podcast. He is Scott Trench and I am Mindy Jenson saying a due Cockatoo.
Scott: If you enjoyed today’s episode, please give us a five-star review on Spotify or Apple. And if you’re looking for even more money content, feel free to visit our YouTube channel at youtube.com/biggerpocketsmoney.
Mindy: BiggerPockets Money was created by Mindy Jensen and Scott Trench, produced by Calen Bennet, editing by Exodus Media, copywriting by Nate Weintraub. Lastly, a big thank you to the BiggerPockets team for making this show possible.
