A few years ago, owning this home felt impossible. This week, we moved into our family’s dream home. To make it happen, I sold a large portion of my $ZSP position to fund a healthy part of the purchase price. Was it luck? Naw, absolutely not. And that’s an important thing to drill home. This was years in the making. Years of night shifts (since I was 18, thank god no longer cause I can’t do it anymore!) Years of sacrifice. Years of discipline. Years of living below our means and consistently investing, month after month. The market rewarded that discipline, but it all started with showing up to work and sticking to the plan. Was it hard selling investments that have done so well? Absolutely, and I had a lot of back and forth arguments late at night with myself laying in bed trying to sleep lol. But this is exactly why I invest. Not to stare at a bigger portfolio forever, but to create options and improve my family’s life when the right opportunity comes along. I didn’t sell because I lost conviction in $ZSP. I sold because my investments had done their job. The best part? Even after the sale, we’re still over $700,000 invested, and now moving forward we’ll continue buying $XEQT every week as we rebuild the position over time. With the new house, we won’t be investing quite as much each month as we were before, but we’ll still be investing a meaningful amount. That’s the beauty of building a portfolio over time. Once it reaches a certain size, your investments begin doing more of the heavy lifting alongside your contributions. Compounding starts working for you in a much bigger way. Investing isn’t about dying with the biggest account balance, and I needed to remind myself that. (A lot) It’s about using your wealth to build the life you’ve always dreamed of. For us, that dream is this home. Where our kids will grow up, where memories will be made, and where all those years of sacrifice finally became something we can walk through every single day. Here’s to the next chapter. read more
Kar and I dive into a wide range of investing topics—from our reflections on attending BlossomCon 2026 in Toronto and strategies for selling shares in retirement, to why spending more time researching stocks doesn't necessarily lead to better returns. We also discuss dividend-focused portfolios, credit card points, and using leverage responsibly when investing. A huge shoutout to Blossom community members Ronan, Diana, Levi, Max, and RandomYaapping, whose posts we featured in this episode. We also mention several other fantastic creators, including Rayne (25andInvested), Kyle, Conroy, Catherine, and many more. Thanks for helping make the investing community such an incredible place to learn and grow together! 💬 Which topic did you agree (or disagree) with the most in this episode? We'd love to hear your perspective in the comments! Enjoy Episode 13 of Financial KarMoe with @karyungtom and Moe! 👍 If you enjoyed this episode, please Like, Subscribe, and share it with someone who wants to become a smarter investor. https://youtu.be/OO5d_Qo0ae0
It’s crazy how many people think that it’s pointless to invest $100/month. But ask yourself: 1)Isn’t it better than 0 2)letting your money grow instead of letting it sit idle in a normal savings account. 3)Forming a habit of consistently investing. Just start even if you don’t want to be millionaire !!! So how can you start ? There’s a simpler way to build your portfolio using these 3 types of ETF. Canadians can buy these in an RRSP (saving the 15% foreign withholding tax which you will be charged if you invest in a TFSA)account while Americans can buy in a ROTH IRA or a 401k savings account. 1) Foundational ETF’s: these own the entire market 1) $VTI -Total US market 2)$VOO- S&P 500 3)$VT-Global stocks 4)$VXUS- International stocks 5)$BND- Total bond market 🟢These are best for first investment, retirement accounts, long term wealth and beginner investors. 2)Growth ETF’s: These are for increasing long term returns 1)$QQQ -Nasdaq 100 2)$VUG- Large Cap growth 3)$SCHG- Growth stocks 4)$SMH- Semiconductors 🟢These are best for higher growth, younger investors,tech exposure and 10+ year horizon. 3) Strategy ETF’s: These are for targeting a specific goal 1)$SCHD - Dividend growth 2) $VIG - Dividend appreciation 3)$GLD -GOLD 4)$VTV - Value stocks 🟢These are best for Income, Inflation hedge, Sector investing and portfolio customization. The good part is you can even start with as low as 100 dollars a month ! Invest watch your portfolio grow with the power of compounding!💵💵. Becoming a Millionaire is the side effect of consistency in investing! Happy Sunday ! 😎Hapy investing!🚀😎 Disclaimer: Not investing advice ! Please do your own due diligence before making any investment decisions !read more
"Investing $50 a month isn't enough to make a real difference." This single thought keeps millions of people broke. They think if they can't drop thousands of dollars into the market at once, there's no point in starting at all. So they spend that $50 on takeout and coffee instead. Here is the truth: $50 builds the habit. The habit builds the discipline. The discipline builds the portfolio. You don't wait until you have a massive stack of cash to start investing. You start small today so you can have that stack tomorrow. $VOO$QQQM$XEQT$SCHDread more
What I always loved about this platform is the supportive spirit , willingness to help, selfless knowledge sharing and the constructive feedback loops. This week I saw an ugly side I didn’t like and I’m going to speak out about it! It’s the lack of empathy and the dancing on the misery of others. I can understand and appreciate when someone celebrates winning big, but what I can’t stomach is the glee, gloating and cheering when a name someone believed in gets cut in half. Mocking a losing position isn’t educational, giving people constructive feedback on how to understand what went wrong is. Every single one of us has been on the wrong side of a trade and the market humbles all of us eventually. Please remember kindness is free, but is a real compounder. Let’s all do better blossom, the market is the real enemy 😊 read more
Why I Started Investing at 50 There are a lot of conversations in this community about ETFs, dividends, total return, asset allocation, and building wealth. I love those discussions. But this morning, sitting at a picnic table overlooking Arrow Lake with a coffee in my hand during my second week of summer vacation, it reminded me why any of it matters. I didn’t start investing until I was 50. Would I have loved to start at 20 instead of 50? Absolutely. But I can’t change that. What I could change was making the decision to start and I’m glad I did. Since then, I’ve learned more than I ever imagined, met some incredible people through Blossom, and built a portfolio that’s working quietly in the background while I spend time with my family. That’s the goal. Not staring at stock prices all day. Not checking your portfolio every five minutes. It’s building a life where your investments support the moments that matter most. I’m also really looking forward to meeting many of you at the Blossom event in Vancouver on August 22. It’s funny how an investing app has introduced me to people I genuinely look forward to meeting in person. If you could hit pause today and enjoy a quiet moment like this, would you say your financial journey is helping you build the life you actually want? Why or why not? read more
or actually just lucky? 🤔 That's exactly why benchmarks exist. Well, not exactly, but one really good reason. A benchmark is simply a measuring stick. It's the standard you compare your portfolio against to see whether you're adding value... or just catching the same market wave as everyone else. So why bother using a benchmark? Firstly, performance... Are you beating the market or just enjoying the bull run with everyone else? Or worse yet, are you TRAILING your benchmark? Secondly, the RISK you're taking (this is more important in my opinion than performance) .... Did you EARn those returns... or did you white knuckle your way there with twice the volatility of your benchmark? Or worse yet, do you have twice the volatility for worse than market returns??? 😬 And thirdly, benchmarks are great for some accountability.... If you're paying someone to manage your money(which is very unlikely on blossom), are the managers earning their fees or just buying expensive versions of the index? For us DIYers, this encourages us to be accountable to ourselves for our active decisions and portfolio construction. Here's an analogy I've used before. Think of benchmarking like a track and field race. A sprinter doesn't finish a race and say "I felt pretty fast today, I did great." The sprinter would compare their time to their personal best, the world record, the qualifying standard of some sort... Something like that, right? Otherwise, that number is meaningless. Investors must do the same. One of the best known pieces of benchmarking comes from the SPIVA Scorecard, which has repeatedly found that most active fund managers fail to beat their benchmark over the long term after fees. That's why benchmarks matter. They help separate skill from luck, from a well built portfolio to a buffet of low quality holdings and in some cases low quality high risk!! Now for the fun part... We all have to have some fun with this like of topic. Vanguard's S&P 500 fund $VFV has returned about 86% over the last three years in CAD... roughly 23.1% per year, compounding and a standard deviation of 12.1 over 3 years 🤯 That's an INCREDIBLE run. Anyone with that return should be so happy. The FTSE World Index had a return of about 79% over the last 3 years or .... 21.1% per year, compounding and a standard deviation of 12.7 over 3 years 💥 That's still phenomenal growth! And that's similar to some all in ones in Canada like Vanguard's $VEQT and iShares $XEQT So before celebrating that one stock that doubled or all that covered call ETF 'income' you received, ask yourself ... Do I have a benchmark to know how I'm doing? If I do, did my portfolio beat, match or trail my benchmark? And... what extra risks (ie higher beta and volatility) did I take to get there? Because beating your market is impressive, especially ones like the S&P 500. And if you don't have a benchmark, maybe now is the time to have one 😁 Happy investing guys!read more
It took me 15 years to hit 100k. Subsequently, it took me 4 years to hit 500k. I’d love to know what first popped into your head when you read that. For me, I would automatically think that this person’s earnings power must have increased significantly. That would be the obvious answer. But it couldn’t be further from the truth for me. I actually didn’t even earn an income for 2 out of those 4 years. So, aside from compound interest (🙌🏼), what made the difference? Awareness. Comprehension. Determination. But mostly TIME. For those first 15 years I worked hard. I worked all the overtime. Sometimes working illegal amounts of hours. I made stupid amounts of money and when I finally got a day off (sometimes after 3 months straight), I spent it ALL. Something changed when I took my first maternity leave in 2019. It was the first time in my adult life, that I had an opportunity to slow down. To get away from the grind. To be able to think about something (anything) other than progressing my career. I used that opportunity to teach myself something new. Arguably the most important life skill I’d ever learn. Money management. I invested in myself. I learned how to budget. I learned about the stock market. I started making educated and conscious decisions about money. So, the biggest difference between those two periods of my life was, TIME. Not earnings power. But having the time to learn important life skills that I never previously had the time for when all I did was grind. I know a lot of people will say they don’t have time to learn about investing and honestly, I GET IT, because I was that person! But my advice to those people now would be this: Make time. Step away from the grind and take the time to understand your finances. It’s arguably the most important life skill you will ever learn. Step away from work now (even if it means using a week of vacation), so that you can step away from work later. It’s the best gift you will ever give yourself. Most people think they need to grind harder, but maybe what they really need is to press pause for a second. Other factors that contributed to my portfolio growth: - Bull market - High risk tolerance - Growth stocks - Market timing - Employer match program - Stock Based Compensation program - Increased savings rate - Reinvested dividends - Luck 🍀 read more
If holding 9,000 stocks in one etf is lazy, then i’m lazy AF $XEQT is my favorite ETF, and it makes up over 30% of my portfolio. 🩶 If you’re not familiar with it, $XEQT is an all-in-one equity ETF, meaning… Instead of picking individual stocks, buying one share gets you exposure to thousands of companies across Canada, the US, and international markets. It’s 100% equities, so it’s built for long-term growth. $AAPL, $NVDA, $GOOGL, $META… you get the idea… I love it because I’m lowkey kinda lazy. I really don't want to spend hours every single week trying to rebalance individual holdings myself. Think of XEQT like going to an all-you-can-eat global buffet. Instead of going to ten different restaurants to get Canadian, US, and international dishes, you just walk up to one table and load your plate with a bit of everything. Maximum diversification, minimum effort. 😌 What’s your go-to ETF right now? Drop your favourite in the comments! 👇 read more
As per usual, we are gonna toss $MSTE under the bus here yet again. now most people know the breakeven chart. if you dont ill quickly jot it down here: 10%down = 11% BE 20%down = 25% BE 30%D = 43% BE 40% = 67% 50%=100% 60% = 150% 70 =233 80 =400 90=900 100=🍚🫛 We all know this or should, compounding works both ways. this idea only gets us half way to the problem. because your money could have been somewhere else. This is the opertunity cost, the divergence between stratagies. since inception $MSTE has a -61% return (we will call it 60) so your thinking great! only need 150%.... Compare that to a much simpler shut your brain off kinda stratagy ($XEQT ) since the same time period has returned 27%. That doesnt seem like much.... but the real gap is 229%. Bench marks are import. assesing opertunity cost is is important. you dont need to compare to other people. but you should stress test against simpler stratagies. sorry mste crowd, I use mste because it is one of the most wide spread investments on the income side. It has also shown to be pretty volitile to say the least.read more
I've reached the point where I genuinely don't understand why so many people still do all of their banking with the big banks. I've now convinced 4 coworkers move their everyday banking over to Wealthsimple, and every one of them has been happy with the switch. For me, this isn't an ad for Wealthsimple—it's more about questioning whether the traditional banks still offer enough value to justify sticking around. This has simply been my personal experience. When I was with TD, I struggled to find any real advantages over an online bank. A few things I've noticed: • Customer service: I've had a much better experience. Quick responses and no headaches. • Chequing account: My cash earns 2% interest instead of sitting at 0%. At TD I either had to keep $6,000 parked in the account to avoid monthly fees or pay around $30/month. • ATM access: I can withdraw cash across Canada and around the world, and my ATM fees are reimbursed. • Cash deposits: I've deposited cash multiple times through Canada Post using nothing more than a QR code in the app. For the average person, I just don't see what the big banks offer anymore that justifies the fees, minimum balances, and low interest. And this isn't only about Wealthsimple. I've heard plenty of positive experiences from people using Tangerine, Simplii, and EQ Bank as well. Online banking has improved so much over the last decade that I think many Canadians are paying more than they need to for banking. Are you still with one of the big banks? If so, what's keeping you there?read more
$DRAM not giving that 100% return in 3 months like people thought? That was speculation. Gambling. We have to call it what it is. Next up everyone will call it a long term play, and hey they may prove me wrong, but thats a gamble too. One that may or may not pay off. sector etfs are sector specific, very hard to time, and often come at a time that the market is topping and the fund companies see the money to be made off people like you and me. Blossom is full of hype, people makeing large amounts of money from very niche ideas. understand where you sit at the table when eating with hyenas.
Cars are for transportation, not status. A paid off car should be the new status symbol... We need to normalize keeping a paid-off vehicle until the wheels fall off. That Honda or Toyota doesn’t become a bad car just because your neighbour bought something newer. Driving a car for 10–15+ years can quietly build more wealth than most people realize. My wife and have 2 vehicles. 1) 2016 Ram 1500 (paid off) 2) 2005 Ford Taurs (I bought for $2250 10yrs ago...and still drive to this day) We dont have the fanciest cars...but we are Millionares. I'd stick with the latter for now...maybe a really nice sports car when we hit 5 million invested in our 50s (projected) What are your thoughts on vehicles?read more
I know its not eveyones bag to vote on a community poll but this year alot of people voted for @nettspend. I know I did. Congratulations Jared! You are an inspiration on this platform. A photo from this year and last.
Earlier this month my wife and I celebrated 8 years of marriage. In those 8 years we lived a pretty standard Canadian life while increasing our wealth slowly overtime with smart money decisions. • No kids ➜ 2 amazing kids • $0 invested ➜ $941,000 invested • $0 net worth ➜ $1.7 million net worth A few things about us: • Roughly 90% invested in index ETFs, 10% in individual stocks. • We drive 2 paid off vehicles. • We shop mainly at No Frills for cheaper groceries. • We bought out first home in 2021 in a lower-cost area. • We've been mainly living on one income for the past few years because investments is making more money than wifes salary. • We didn't receive an inheritance. • We paid off student loans after graduation. • I'm a police officer, been one for almost 11yrs. (started at 21) • My wife was a teacher and now primarily stays home with our two young kids. There was no lottery ticket, no lucky break, and no get rich quick scheme. No doctor or lawyer salaries..just consistent saving, regular investing, and giving compounding time to work. If our family can do it, yours can too.read more
Last week, I had the privilege and opportunity to speak with a fund manager whose name and fund I can’t share because I haven’t gotten permission and don’t want to be exiled to Cuba. His firm specializes in fixed income, and with that alone I didn’t think this conversation was going to be that valuable. But of course, being the naive brat I am, I was wrong. And to my surprise, I learned quite a bit. Now, the whole meetup was originally planned by my brother-in-law, who’s been doing construction work at his property for a few years, where I even worked as a labourer back in 2022. But it wasn’t until this year that I asked for his contact and whether we could set up a time to talk stock. And even with a full calendar, he made space to have a quick chat over coffee. And chat, we did… for nearly 2 hours. I wanted to briefly share some of the interesting lessons I learned from this conversation (some obvious, some interesting). Because even if you’re not a fixed/passive income investor, there’s always something to learn from a different perspective. 1. Bonds aren’t just a way to hold short-term cash This is a more obvious specific insight I got from the talk. But near the beginning of the conversation, we started by talking about fixed income. (This is also his specialization so I figured it was worth including regardless.) And I’d say about 10 minutes in, he brought up fixed income via bonds as a core strategy and explained the ins and outs. Bonds, of course, are another asset class and they can be used as a short-term cash holding, but also as a core holding. For example, if you’ve read The Intelligent Investor, you’d be familiar with the different bond portfolios that are still talked about today (like 60/40). And that’s essentially the same thing. It also doesn’t just have to be government bonds. You can play with the risk profile of different types of bonds (corporate, government) to create a different end product for a portfolio. And there are entire industries built on this alone. Bonds can be a way to mitigate volatility, give some predictability to a person’s returns, etc. And even though I don’t think I’ll be using bonds in this way anytime soon, I thought it was interesting to learn about. 2. Insurance companies are superhero businesses He obviously didn’t say this line. But he did spend a good time talking about insurance companies and pension funds, and how they extraordinarily deploy capital. An insurance company takes in premiums, does some math on how often they need to pay out in claims, and invests the rest into bonds, stocks, etc., to earn a return. And that’s literally the entire business. Which you may already be familiar with. For pension funds specifically, he talked about how they act almost like an alternative fund manager, investing in bonds and equities. But also buying physical infrastructure (like CPPIB buying Ports America) which acts like fixed income, paying distributions. Now, I thought this whole part of the conversation was interesting specifically because it reminds me a lot like my $BN investment. Brookfield is a large asset manager with many different investment avenues, using capital it gains from distributions to deploy across different sectors to maximize returns. In other words, Brookfield is essentially a glorified pension fund. 3. Every investor has a different strategy, different approaches, different wants This is an obvious takeaway from the conversation, but I think it’s especially important given Blossom’s unique history with “strategy battles.” I’ve had my fair share of arguments with people on certain strategies because some of them do seem irrational. But the reality is that people are different and their takeaways of that strategy can be too. Or not even that, their goals and approaches can definitely be different. Him being an investment manger in finance obviously knows this better than anyone, since finance as a whole is just hearing someone’s perspective and wants, and applying that to a strategy they’re comfortable with. Definitely worth remembering for the future, even if you disagree with people. 4. Investing has so many different strategies and just sticking to one can limit you I’m a big proponent of honing in on one thing. Because I believe focus is what creates great return (not just financially). And he said for me that it’s good I’m interested already in a strategy and want to pursue it and learn from it, etc., but finance and the investment world is so large that there are plenty more strategies out there to learn from. I don’t think he said this as in “have 13 different strategies at once,” but more be open minded as you grow in your knowledge because there may be a different strategy you like in the future. He was into options and derivatives for most of his career, and only recently shifted to fixed income. Hence why he shared this lesson. Your opinions will change, so be open to change, essentially. Technically I’ve already put this into use, because I have experimented with swing trading and obviously, I’m now holding a large bond position. But it was a great reminder nonetheless. 5. AI is, in fact, changing the job market (especially finance) Now, possibly the most interesting takeaway from the conversation was our talk around AI. Which I was very interested in hearing about from someone in the industry, as someone investing in AI. I just asked him whether all of the headlines saying “most entry level white collar jobs will be gone within a couple years” are true. And whether finance will be hit hard specifically. And to my surprise, he said yes. At his firm specifically, he said they’re not firing, they’re just not hiring as much. And specifically not hiring entry level work which can now be done by AI. He said in the past all the entry level finance-specific jobs would be “slave laboured” for the admin work as a way to learn the basics of the industry before advancing in their career (similar to the legal industry). But now there’s no need for them because of AI. His firm is also building an agent to help with their specific offerings, and he said plenty of other firms are likely doing the same and that’ll lead to needing less specialized employees as well. He also said that with AI being used to sift through job applications too, grads are going to have a hard time landing interviews. However, to combat this, he said that showing true curiosity and differentiating yourself to employers goes a long way. And if you can be personable and interested in the industry, that’s incredibly valuable amid the growth of AI. Overall, I really enjoyed the conversation and I’m very grateful he took the time for it. Because learning a new perspective from an expert in the field is always worth it. And to end this post, I’ll just say what he said to me when we finished our conversation: “I like to talk, Jacob, so with everything I said, keep what’s valuable, and bin the rest.” Happy investing, folks. read more
Are you getting sick of constant stock price updates on Blossom? My feed is filled with the same 20 tickers and a snap shot of it up or down and in a rare case, some supposed reason why. Are you posting up days? Why? Are you posting down days? Why? The reality is, constant stock updates are the investing equivalent of weighing yourself every 5 minutes. Drink a glass of water. You weigh yourself. You poop, you weigh your self. 🚨🚨🚨🚨 $AMZN is down 1.0% today!!! 🚨🚨🚨 $VFV is up 1.2% today! 🚨🚨🚨🚨 $SPCX is up 5... now 6, now 4, now 3.. Okay... and so what? Investors shouldn't be tracking price movements like I see on Blossom every day. Stop. It's UNHEALTHY and leads to INVESTING DISORDERS. Unless you're buying or selling today, that number is futile, vain and meaningless. What does it do? It likely grabs your attention and engagement on socials. It's likely creating an emotional response in you. And in the worst case scenario, it encourages you to confuse market ACTIVITY with PROGRESS and SUCCESS. The biggest danger is never that the market is moving... it moves every second the markets are open, year round, for all eternity. The biggest danger is YOU moving. There are countless studies on investor behavior and what makes the average retailer perform so badly. The studies show that checking stock prices every day makes it EASIER to panic, chase performance, sell low, buy high, and convince yourself that random market noise, future expected returns, analyst predictions etc is somehow meaningful to your investing success and you need to act on it. The market has rewarded PATIENCE for over a century now. Patience is a quality we all need and can improve upon. Your algo REWARDS your market anxiety with MoRE market anxiety creating content... So be careful what financial junk food you consume and what voices you surround yourself with . Your health and wealth are not rewarded buy consuming such content regularly. Stay safe out there investing friends 🙌👊read more
Choosing your first ETF is like asking the internet what is the best pizza. Thirty seconds later you're in a battle in the comments... someone is yelling 'JUST BUY $VFV!!!!!' and another swears by an all in one like $XEQT, someone else says bonds are for dinosaurs grandpa... and somehow you're even more confused than when you started. (We all know the best pizza is a white pizza with mortadella and pistachio 😂) In my latest video, look at $VFV, $XEQT, and $XBAL, explain who each ETF is actually built for, and reveal the beginner mistake that causes investors to switch ETFs at the absolute worst time. And here's the TLDR or spoiler .... The "best" ETF isn't necessarily the one with the highest expected returns... it's the one you won't dump after your portfolio takes a 50% punch to the face 🙃😆 So, what do you think is the best investment for beginners? https://youtu.be/RDHggrJKbssread more
while AI stocks are down right now and inflation is up, we all have more red than green in our portfolios.... BUT SOMEHOW my dividends stocks fighting for the way up $O is up by 5.72% for past month $ENB is up 0.29% for past month $JEPI is up 0.68% $SPYI is up 0.06% $MAIN is up tp 6.11% for past month I know its not a crazy growth, but its still nice to see those green lines up 💚read more
My portfolio is up over 150% all-time: I've picked stocks like: - $PLTR at $8 - $AMD at $100 - $NBIS at $80 - $RKLB at $25 - $SOFI at $7 - $META at $100 - $TSLA at $185 - $AMZN at $100 - $GOOGL at $135 However, I've also picked some bad stocks like: - $NKE at $70 - $DUOL at $250 - $FUBO at $20 (adjusted to today's price) - $PYPL at $50 (although I pretty much broke even on this one) - $OTLY at $20 (adjusted to today's price) I have made plenty of mistakes along the way and continue to learn and grow from each one, so I don't make the same mistake twice. I've been studying the markets, psychology of money/investing, the legendary investors and their processes, and much more for 4 years now. I know that isn't a long time in the grand scheme of things, but I also paid a hefty chunk of change to learn directly from someone with nearly 20 years of experience in the market. I learned what made them successful, but I also learned more from the mistakes they made so I didn't make those mistakes myself. If you're a new investor and have any questions for me, feel free to send them below. I will try to get to all of them and answer them to the best of my abilities! read more
If you rent, you've probably heard your whole life that you're throwing money away and just paying your landlord's mortgage. As a pure money decision it can go the other way, and renting often comes out ahead, as long as you invest the gap between your rent and what owning the same place would cost. There's a point where that flips though, and it has nothing to do with what the housing market is doing. That flip comes when you run out of registered room to invest in. While you still have TFSA, RRSP, or FHSA space to fill, putting the difference there is hard to beat, because the money grows sheltered from tax. Once all of that room is maxed, your next dollar of investing goes into a regular taxable account, where the gains get taxed along the way. A home gets a tax treatment a regular investment account doesn't. When you sell your principal residence in Canada, the growth in its value comes out completely tax-free under the principal residence exemption. So once your registered accounts are full, buying stops competing with a sheltered account and starts competing with a taxable one. The tax-free growth on a home can pull ahead of that. None of this means you should buy the moment your TFSA is full. Owning still costs more than people expect once you add property tax, insurance, and upkeep, and renting keeps a flexibility that's worth real money if your life isn't settled yet. So "rent and invest the difference" is at its strongest while you still have tax-sheltered room to put that difference into. Personally, my wife and I are renters filling our registered accounts first, and we'll buy in the future when we know where we're going to live. If you want to see how it shakes out for your own rent and place, I built a rent vs buy calculator on my site: https://smallbirdfinancial.ca/tools/rent-vs-buy/. If you rent, have you thought about what changes once your TFSA, RRSP, and FHSA are all full?read more
