18 – The Marshall Report – Episode 18

Today is Thursday May 5, 2016. This is the 18th episode of the Marshall Report. Welcome to the podcast.

In today’s episode:

1. Coffee with the mayor

2. Why do real estate prices keep going up?

3. Brew Donkey

4. Bully offers

5. Public Art

6. The future of radio

7. Quality of life

8. Hockey stick growth line

9. Neighbourhood factors

10. Dreams

 

Updates

I’ve been really busy with things so I think maybe this week’s podcast might be a little shorter than average. They are usually around 15 minutes long. I never know until I am done how long it is going to be. The shortest was 13 minutes and the longest was 22. Those were the 2nd and 3rd episodes. I didn’t really have my rhythm yet back then.

The podcast has over 400 downloads now. According to the tracking on Soundcloud the bulk of my listeners are in Kitchener, then Toronto, Waterloo, Mississauga and Cambridge, in that order. Those five cities make up more than 2/3 of my listeners. That’s great. Real estate is local. I love this stuff. I love the internet. You always have at least some idea about how you are doing and who you are reaching. The next five cities are all in the GTA too. Seems like there is a lot of interest in Kitchener Waterloo from the BIG T.O. I think we all knew that already.

I had coffee with the mayor. He told me about his trip to Silicon Valley. We talked about the Innovation Corridor, trail initiatives, fire stations and libraries. We talked about beer and traffic and real estate and cities. Just stuff. It was nice of him to invite me over for a chat. I told him he was doing great. I voted for him. He is a good mayor for this city at this time.  At Blackberry, he used to deal with government issues so with tech such a big part of our future and present, he’s the right mayor for the times.

 

Question of the week: Why do real estate prices keep going up?

Real estate is local, but there are a lot of non-local factors driving our real estate market too. I blogged about why our real estate prices are going up here

 

Brew Donkey Adventure

It is fun to do stuff out of the ordinary and it is especially fun if that stuff is in your own neighbourhood. On Sunday, my wife and I joined the first Brew Donkey tour of some of the region’s craft breweries.  You can read about that here.

 

Bully offers

I got my first notice of a ‘Bully Offer’ the other day.  You can read about that here.

 

public artRR Xing

There is a piece of art in front of the building at 144 park. It looks a lot like a RailRoad Crossing sign. I understand that developers have to put some sort of public art in front of their buildings. That’s good, but shouldn’t some sort of committee approve thesis things. Or maybe they do, I don’t know.

That railway crossing art piece seems a little cheeky. Before they went bankrupt, the builders of 144 Park Mady Corporation, applied and won the right to move the last block of the Iron Horse Trail. It really seems to me that this art is the Parthian Shot.

 

Radio radio

A new client of mine told me last week that he listens to this podcast in his car. I listen to more than 20 different podcasts, but I never thought about listening in the car. I listen to podcasts in bed and sometimes when out for a walk. I listen to podcast almost exclusively though earbuds. A few years ago I was working on a bungalow, painting baseboards and walls. I listened to hours of podcasts during those hours of work. Dan Carlin was a great companion for that home improvement project.

I still listen to the radio, in the car. My car is getting kind of old. I suppose if it had a plug, a jack or a bluetooth function I would give up radio altogether too,  in favour of my favourite podcasts, like I have with newspapers and cable TV. But I’m like most people in this regard. I looked it up, the popularity of radio. I was curious. What I found was that most teens and twentysomethings turn to their phones for audio, and most cars are now coming with bluetooth entertainment systems. At the same time, a great deal of listening had shifted online. The number of people who own a radio is decreasing. In most homes, that tends to be a clock radio and the percentage of people who get their news from the radio has steadily declined over the past two decades. On the nasdaq, the share prices of big commercial radio companies is dropping but Wall Street seems to be ahead of the curve this time. A recent American study found that in terms of all audio listening, am/fm radio makes up 54%, CDs and other owned music makes up 16%, streaming audio makes up 15%, siriusXM makes up 7% and podcasts make up only 2%.

My conclusion, Radio is still doing pretty well and podcasts are not going to take its place, streaming audio is.

 

Quality of life

When I was having coffee with the mayor last week, we talked about how the Region of Waterloo became the tenth largest urban centre in Canada a few years ago, surpassing the London area. The mayor must read the same stuff I read. Because next we talked about traffic and decisions that the cities and the region made years ago and how those have impacted our quality of life here. Just try to cross London at 5pm. For that matter, just try to drive out of Downtown Toronto at 5pm on a Friday afternoon. Our traffic is now because of the LRT, but other cities traffic is worse than that, always.

I wonder if I lived in London or Hamilton and had started a podcast if it would be as popular. A bunch of techies live in this town. Early adopters, digital explorers. Geeks, nerds, techies. We have a very high level of university graduates for a relatively small population base.

We always think cities are the same, but really underneath it all cities are very different.

 

Hockey sticks

I had a telephone call last week from a Toronto area businessman. We’d spoken back and forth a couple of times by email so the call was scheduled. I was ready for his questions.

He and his business partners are considering starting a business here and essentially he wanted to know if everything that he’s found by researching the region is true. He’s been to the city sites. He’s been to communitech’s and he’s read my blog.

“Congratulations by the way, on such an insightful blog. You’re doing a great job”.

“Thank you”, I say, “It’s a labour of love.”

“So is it true?”

“Yes”, almost all of it”, I say, “we are boom town. The real estate reporting is a bit suspect and superficial and often the reporters get the geography wrong but otherwise, you can believe that we are doing great. Just wait till the LRT is running next year. Hockey stick growth line.”

 

Call to action

This weeks call to action is to choose a good neighbourhood as neighbourhood’s are more important that houses. You can easily change your house, but you cannot easily change your neighbourhood. And neighbourhoods appreciate at different rates, so it’s important for your longterm financial goals as well. Great neighbourhoods have good schools, are near shopping and entertainment and have a transportation/transit component.

 

Dreams and plans

I will leave you with this parting thought. Dreaming is important, but living is important too. If you can live your dreams, then that is a pretty dreamy life.

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