How economic development is impacted by a city’s zoning and official plan

May 28

Why realtors should also own their own rental portfolio

By Bruce Firestone | Business Coaching , Business Models , Entrepreneurship , Ideas , Investing , Real Estate Investment Coaching , Sales & Marketing

I can think of many reasons why realtors should own some rental properties, not least because, if you represent or coach investors the way I do, one of the first questions they’ll ask you is this: “Do you walk the walk or just talk the talk?” If you have your own successful portfolio, well, this […]

May 26

What’s holding back the economy?

By Bruce Firestone | Architecture , Business Models , Design , Entrepreneurship , Finance , Ideas , Investing , Real Estate , Real Estate Investment Coaching , Sales & Marketing , Urban Economics

In a ground-breaking study[1], University of Chicago Booth School of Business economist Chang-Tai Hsieh and University of California at Berkeley professor Enrico Morerri reported that restraints on new housing prevented people, especially young talent, from moving to or staying in clusters of innovation. They found that such constraints: “lowered aggregate US growth by 36 percent […]

May 24

How much term insurance do you need?

By Bruce Firestone | Business Coaching , Entrepreneurship , Finance , Life Coaching , Real Estate

As readers of this blog will already know, I am not much of a believer in life insurance–it’s costly and its financial returns are low. Still, if you have a family to take care of and debts to pay (like, say, mortgage balances), term insurance might be a better choice. For a healthy non-smoker in […]

May 22

An official plan for the 21st century

By Bruce Firestone | Architecture , Design , Entrepreneurship , Finance , Ideas , Investing , Real Estate , Urban Economics

The city of Ottawa has an ambitious goal–to craft an official plan (OP) that is suited to a modern 21st century economy and get buy-in from the community for something that is substantially different from anything that has gone before… Not an easy task. As part of this effort, I was tasked, as host and […]

May 13

Is it OK to ask?

By Bruce Firestone | Business Coaching , Entrepreneurship , Finance , Firestone Institute , Ideas , Investing , Life Coaching , Sales & Marketing

Young clients of mine refused to meet with me last week to learn about how they could rent a house for free or close to free (via an augmented tenancy) and they said, “No we just want to rent!” No wonder they’re poor. Are they stupid for saying this? Maybe. But I think not… it’s […]

May 05