Two Mistakes Canada Made and How I'm Investing Now

As many of you are aware, I worked as a clinical psychologist for over 30 years before my retirement. I’ve also been a real estate and equity investor for over 45 years now. In Canada’s attempt to negotiate a trade deal with the US, we broke two fundamental rules when negotiating any purchase, sale or contract.

Rule 1: You learn on the first day of buying or selling anything. When someone approaches you, you must be able to walk away without hesitation. Saying no, without a counter, is a mighty leveraged position. It’s mandatory if you want to get the best deal possible.

The US President came out and said, “There is nothing Canada has that we want or need. We don’t need them to build cars, give us lumber or energy. We don’t need them.” Score one for the US. He walked away.  How did we react?

We ran after them. Our previous PM went to Florida and was rebuffed by the President. We continue to give in to the US, demonstrating the fact that we can’t or won’t walk away. We gave back a 1-billion-dollar digital tax tariff just so that maybe they would talk with us. We told everyone we NEED a deal.

The second rule is quite simple. Have backbone and strength.

With all the talk of elbows up, it is doubtful any of our fearless leaders would even go into the corner to get the puck, let alone have their elbows up. We are weak in leadership. America knows this. They will only stop when they have extracted every drop of anything they believe will benefit them from us. They will also continue to brag about it. Canada faces not only economic destruction due to our failures, but also worldwide shame. We will never get a deal with the US now. It is over. We are the sucker in the card game but don’t know it yet.

So, as an investor, what am I to do? Please note that I am not a financial advisor. Do not make any changes to your investments until you speak to your advisor.

I asked AI to analyze our book and use it to evaluate companies, considering tariff and currency risk. I then worked the list to find these investments. I started buying them last week and will continue through the last week of July. I thought it would be good to share. Remember, I have a bias toward real estate, so that is the area I focus on.

I continue to buy and hold Goodfellow Lumber, BTB.UN–Reit and Vital Hub. I also added:

DRR.UN It’s a very small, thinly traded Canadian Apartment REIT that owns 15 buildings in the US. They are undergoing a strategic review that reminds me a lot of ERE.UN, which we held until most of that was sold off just recently.

Morguard Apartment REIT. Highly undervalued, 60% of apartments in the US, 40% or so in Canada.

Canadian Net REIT. Holds real estate that grocery stores and other essential Canadian companies need to sell their goods—nice dividend, somewhat boring and undervalued. Tenants are responsible for and pay for all property issues and costs. (furnace breaks down, taxes, etc.)

If you haven’t already read it, you need to understand the concepts in our book, which I now use with AI to invest successfully. It’s all about survival and increasing value. Now has never been a better time to invest like a honeybee. Bee well and talk soon. Hank