It’s June. The tomatoes aren’t ready. The zucchini isn’t ready. But the lettuce is, and the arugula, and the chives have been good for a couple months, and if you’ve been paying attention there are beet greens and parsley and celery leaves ready to pull. That’s enough. That’s actually the whole point. And don’t forget to use and prune the basil – and cut those tomatoes suckers!
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You have a house with equity. A solid RRSP. A TFSA. Maybe a cottage on a lake, a private investment or two, and possibly a business structure of some kind. You’ve spent years building something real.
And there’s a decent chance your will is either non-existent, embarrassingly outdated, or a generic template you printed off the internet a decade ago.
That’s a problem.
Continue readingIf you’ve spent any time trying to figure out how to grow real wealth outside of a Bay Street mutual fund, you’ve probably stumbled across the world of online financial advisors and independent financial research. Newsletter guys. Paid advisors. Contrarian investors who write multi-thousand-word breakdowns of junior mining stocks and macro geopolitics from their homes in Argentina and Vancouver.
There’s a lot of noise in that world. A lot of hype. And honestly, a lot of outright garbage.
But over the years, I’ve found three online financial advisors who I think are the real deal — worth your attention and worth the subscription cost. I pay for all three. I read all three. And I’ve learned a lot from all three.
This isn’t a puff piece. I’m going to tell you who they are, what they’re good at, what they produce, and who each one is best suited for. Think of it as my honest take after years of reading the newsletter space.
Let’s get into it.
Continue readingIf you own a recreational property in Canada and you’ve been sitting on the fence about Airbnb, this is for you. Not the glossy version. The real one — with the actual dollar amounts, the mild anxiety of handing over your keys to strangers, and the moment your first guests left thoughtful items for the next family and a five-star review and you thought: okay, maybe this works.
One month in. Here’s what I know.
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Most Canadians are sitting on their single biggest financial asset and don’t understand the tax rules protecting it. The principal residence exemption is one of the only true tax-free wealth-building mechanisms left in Canada. Zero capital gains on your home’s appreciation. No matter how big the number.
But it’s not automatic. It’s not guaranteed. And the CRA has spent the last decade quietly closing the loopholes people thought were wide open.
Here’s what you actually need to know.
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Debt ratios in Canada: GDS, TDS, And what rental property does to the math.
Most Canadians have no idea what their debt ratios actually are. They walk into a mortgage appointment, hand over their documents, and let the banker decide whether they qualify. That’s not sovereignty. That’s abdication.
Debt ratios in Canada are the gatekeepers to every major real estate move you’ll make. Understand them and you control the game. Ignore them and the bank controls you.
Here’s the breakdown — what each ratio means, what the lenders want to see, and how owning rental property changes the entire equation.
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Many people with a growing family and some equity hits the same fork in the road.
Do you upgrade and buy a bigger, better house? Or do you buy a cottage?
Both moves can cost roughly the same. Both put you ~$500k deeper in debt. But they are definitely not the same decision.
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Most people still think a side hustle means grinding from scratch — posting content into the void, cold-emailing strangers, hoping the algorithm notices you. That’s the old model. And it’s inefficient.
Acquiring a digital side hustle means buying something that already works. Revenue already flowing. Audience already built. Process already proven. You’re not gambling on an idea. You’re buying a small, operating business — and plugging it into your life as a professional. This is where I am at the moment – professional career is going well, but wanting more. An asset that first pays itself off, then can grow to either pay my wife, or even myself a replacement salary. Something that can grow and give a healthy cashflow, but also increasing its asset value (2-3x net profit).
This guide breaks down every major digital business model you can acquire: FBA, ecommerce, affiliate, digital services, SaaS, YouTube, online education, and KDP. For each one you get the full picture — pros, cons, effort level, AI’s role, and a SWOT you can actually use. Then we’ll talk about where to find them.
Let’s get into it.
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You consume a lot of American financial content. So do I. The podcasts, the YouTube channels, the Reddit threads — most of it is US-centric. And most Canadians absorb it without ever asking: does this actually apply to me?
It often doesn’t.
The tax-sheltered account structures in Canada and the US rhyme. But they don’t match. The rules differ. The limits differ. The tax treatment at the border differs. If you’re optimizing your financial life based on American advice without running it through a Canadian filter, you’re leaving money on the table — or worse, making avoidable mistakes.
Here’s the full cross-border breakdown. No fluff.
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If you’re looking for an advanced RRSP strategy in Canada, you’ve probably already figured out the basics aren’t enough…
My last post on RRSPs got some traction — and some pushback.
Good.
That means people are actually thinking about this instead of blindly maxing their contributions every February and waiting for the magic to happen.
I called RRSPs the golden handcuffs of Canadian retirement. I stand by that — for people who never plan beyond the contribution receipt. But here’s the thing: I’ve evolved my thinking. Because the numbers I’ve run on my own situation have shown me something I wasn’t fully accounting for.
A well-managed RRSP — paired with the right strategy — is actually a powerful weapon.
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