the deal, and sometimes emotions rise when you’re in the midst of negotiation or problems developing, but never really about a property in particular. I think that’s one of the things that’s helped me be successful in real estate – never getting emotional with the property and always remembering it’s just another piece of real estate. That changed this week when Raylene and I were told in brutal and no uncertain terms that a property we were supposed to be closing on in August was being taken away from us. A few months ago, we placed a fantastic property in Canmore under contract, with a plan to take possession and enjoy it as a second home on a regular basis, since it is located less than an hour from where we live. I ran the movie of being out there with my wife through my “theatre of the mind” hundreds of times, sitting on the deck and watching the wildlife, as we sipped a glass of Prosecco and enjoyed the results of the hard work that got us there. For those of you who attended the MasterWealth Retreat in Banff, you drove past Canmore from Calgary, on your way to Banff. It’s truly a world-class destination, and we had what I believe was an incredible deal on an incredible property. Over 3,000 square feet with what the seller claimed was the best view in Canmore. We didn’t disagree once we saw it. I immediately placed it under contract after seeing it, and the seller entertained a long closing (almost 4 months) because he wanted to enjoy the summer in the mountains one last time before giving the place up. We agreed to that, given we already had a busy summer, and we looked forward not only to using the property once we got possession in late August, but we also knew the value would likely rise well above our contract price over that time. Summer is the busy, hot real estate season in the mountains because that’s when people have time to go there and dream. So all in all, it was going to work out fantastically. Not only did we have a good price on the property, the seller was also going to leave most of the furniture, turning it into a turn-key property for us. This was a great benefit because after having to work at furnishing our primary residence as well as the condo in the Dominican Republic, the excitement of going out and filling a property with furniture, accessories and housewares has definitely lost its shine for us! And on top of it all, the seller agreed to carry financing on the property, meaning I didn’t having to go to the bank and submit to the third degree to arrange financing. The terms were extremely attractive, and made the deal simply unbelievable. Well, a couple of nights ago, all of this came crashing down on us. The seller asked if we wanted to have dinner in Canmore, and since we had never met him face to face, that made a lot of sense. We met with him, at which point he told us he had something difficult to share. The bottom line was that he had changed his mind, and simply did not intend to follow through with his commitment to sell the property to us. He provided a couple of lame excuses and went on about how his morals wouldn’t allow him to sell it, because it was too important to him. I was absolutely dumbfounded. I had never had a seller tell me, after signing a purchase contract and the deal going unconditional, that they changed their mind and didn’t plan to close. The worst part of this was that he wasn’t willing to provide any kind of compensation or allowance for this massive decision that impacted Raylene and I in the worst way. He didn’t seem to realize that he was creating a tremendous inconvenience and potential loss for us. Trying to find a common middle ground, we worked to try and find an alternative property that we could be happy with. But the combination of low price, seller financing and turn-key with furnishings was something unique that would turn out to be impossible to match. It amazes me how some people are so selfish and so self-involved that they don’t even take into account what impact their failure to honour an agreement will inflict on others. Raylene and I have been planning for months now to start spending a lot of time in Canmore, and that’s been taken away from us. Not only that, we’ve been out of the market thinking we had a place, and have missed the opportunity of being able to buy something a few months ago prior to prices rising. This guy is actually from the U.S. and has a great depth of experience in real estate, having run a business specializing in buying foreclosures and properties with bad title. Interestingly enough, this has given him a false sense of confidence that he knows more about the process than I do in Canada when it comes to legal proceeding related to real estate. He bragged endlessly how he had 3 full-time attorneys that worked for him in the past. That’s why he now “hated lawyers and real estate agents”, and said you couldn’t trust any of them. From his comments to me, it’s clear he doesn’t understand how the Canadian legal system works. His plan was to represent himself legally, which I hope he does – it will make for a short legal process for me! After trying to find some kind of way to resolve the situation with him, he’s made it clear that he will simply refuse to close on the property, and will not provide any kind of compensation whatsoever. So, I’m left with no choice but to litigate the situation and allow a court to decide whether it’s reasonable for him to just change his mind or not. All we want is for him to live up to his end of the bargain, and sell the property under the terms we agreed to. Is that too much to ask? He’s not willing to do that, so we’re about to test how fair and reasonable the legal system is when it comes to this kind of dispute. Thanks to this arrogant and selfish jackass, our fall season is going to look a little different this year than what we thought it would. Whether out of intense conceit, or self-deluded belief, he actually had the nerve to tell me that his morals won’t allow him to sell the property, because he feels he would be more hurt by selling it than we would be hurt if he didn’t sell it. Not only does he not seem to understand what “morals” actually are, he wins the prize for being the person with the least amount of integrity I’ve ever dealt with in real estate. However, unless the seller has an incredible awakening and comes to his ethical senses (an event I do not count on), we’ll continue on and I do expect we’ll eventually be provided the opportunity to buy the property by a court. Thankfully, the Canadian court systems aren’t as outrageous as in the U.S., and it will be a matter of time before we are provided relief. Hopefully this will come in the form of a court compelling him to sell us the property, but it may alternatively be an award for damages. This has been a great learning lesson for me, because it’s taught me never to make too many assumptions about any real estate deal I enter into – either about the property, or the other side. Even though this is the first time this has happened to me in hundreds of deals, it has also taught me a valuable lesson not to invest emotionally into a property until you’re the holder of the keys to it. You always have to be aware of the people you’re negotiating with. The seller came off as a very direct, honest and clear person with integrity and ethics. The sad part of it is that I think he actually believes he is not doing something wrong by breaching the purchase contract. There’s some twisted explanation he’s made up in his mind as to why it’s okay to steal the property back from us, after having agreed to sell it in the first place. In any case, I’ll provide updates here as we make progress on the litigation, and I hope at some point in the future to be able to provide photos from the deck of our new Canmore property when justice prevails and the jackass of the year is taught a lesson.]]>