At the same time, Michael and Scott were still going to school and working long hours to pay the bills. They were in charge of collecting the rent from their housemates and taking it to the bank to deposit in their landlord’s account. One day they made the deposit and quite by accident the teller gave them a copy of the deposit slip that displayed: “deposit $2500, mortgage payment $1200”. That was the moment they knew they were on the wrong side of the equation; If they owned the house then they would be the ones making an extra $1000 or so per month. Their landlord lived out of town and they never saw him after the day that the lease was signed. They knew that not only could they be the ones collecting this money, they would also commit to being the best landlords out there so none of their tenants had the experience they had. Because of their inattentive landlord they were always on the lookout for a better rental property to live in.

Working at the restaurant they met many realtors. They would always ask the ‘realtor-of-the-day’ if they knew of any good places to rent. One day, a realtor suggested that they forget about renting, and just buy a house. The guys thought it was a crazy and completely unrealistic idea. The persistent realtor said she would help walk them through the process. After thinking about it they agreed to the plan. Their first step would be to talk to a mortgage broker and get financing. They talked to a broker and after going over their combined assets, he suggested that they combine their student loans for a down payment; it was the same annual cost as renting! The student loan money would go to housing either way, whether they paid rent or bought a house. They combined income from the restaurant including tips to qualify. That was when they bought their first rental property. It was a mess and needed lots of work. The guys were not intimidated, they learned all they could about renovations through books, volunteering and the big box store training sessions to rehabilitate the property to an acceptable condition.

Word of the guys activity got around campus and many other students wanted to rent from them. They realized that they needed 10 or more properties to meet the demand. And, that if they had 10 of these properties they wouldn’t have to work anymore! They set out to grow the business and replace their job income with rental income. Since they had no more money for down payments they had to explore strategies that accounted for this, which led to their very first investing strategy. It was then that ‘Flip-to-Yourself ‘ was created. Within a couple of years they had grown the business to realize their original income goals. The unique insight they gained was documented; everything they created, from checklists and blueprints to phone scripts was put on paper and used time and again. They didn’t realize it at the time, but they were creating the foundation for a powerful real estate investing system, one that spans geography, age, income, and time. A system that eventually became Keyspire.

Family and friends were now extremely interested in how the guys have achieved this success. So Michael and Scott helped those closest to them first to grow their passive income through income properties. They realized that this ability to have others follow their system and achieve consistent desirable results was very powerful. As they helped more family and friends become successful, they continued to hone their system to be better and better.

The momentum of success was contagious for the community and everyone wanted to find out what was going on. The guys were invited on local TV and Radio shows to showcase their success. They became local celebrities and figures of inspiration, all before graduating university. They realized that the system they developed had to be shared, which led to their first book, The Investors Toolkit. This book led to more publicity and in turn landed Scott on the set of a well-known national renovation show as a carpenter. Michael, a couple years younger and still in school, focused on growing their investing business while Scott grew the profile on Television.

One day on set of that first reno show, Scott was talking to the producers about how he didn’t have a ‘real’ job and therefore had the free time to work on the show because his rental properties provided him the income to support his lifestyle. This casual conversation evolved into the development of the longest running real estate investing show in TV history, filming over 150 episodes, creating over 40 million dollars of wealth for show participants and countless millions for viewers in over 40 counties and 6 languages.

Michael joined Scott on the show as the Project Manager for each renovation, and working together they started to build the powerhouse hit TV show, Income Property. It was around season 2 when the show had gained such popularity that Michael and Scott were receiving hundreds of emails a week from investors around North America asking for help. So many people had so many questions. They realized that a 22-minute TV show couldn’t begin to answer them all; in fact it couldn’t even scratch the surface! As a result, they set out to find a better way to help the growing demand for their system. This led them to build their next endeavor: a continental education and networking organization that could show people their Keyspire system providing guidance and support to people through the three critical stages of becoming a real estate investor: Information, Education and Implementation.

They worked with experts all across Canada and the US to transform their proven system into the most robust learning experience in the country. They developed new tools and software to support the growing member base that was developing. They built new relationships and negotiated exclusive deals for their members. All this while maintaining the personal and professional friendship that was sparked so many years ago while scraping by to pay the rent and daring to dream big. The driving force of their focus and dedication is to help people improve their lifestyles through investing in real estate.

Today the Keyspire organization touches the lives of tens of thousands of people all across North America, adding millions of dollars to the personal wealth of North American’s annually. Keyspire continues to grow and impact lives, forever changing the landscape of North American real estate investing. We are honoured and excited that Keyspire has impacted you.