Random Updates May 15

- I have a meeting with my so called financial adviser tomorrow. I am primarily self directed but I have 100k with him in non registered account invested in 4 DFA mutual funds, Canadian core equity, US core equity, Intl core equity and global real estate. I am looking to get into more international and emerging markets so I am looking to rebalance. I am even considering dumping all my funds and replacing them with more dividend growth stocks. Anyone have any thoughts on this?


- Haven't checked my credit scores in years so i decided to get an equifax report. The result 764 !!! thought i would be in the 800,s.. grrrrrrr. Its still good but i want better. Main prob is I have no debt, no car loans, no mortgage to pay bills on. Well I guess that is a good problem to have.

- been looking to downsize my home. Home is worth about 1.35 million with no mortgage and i just have much too much equity in there not working for me. Thinking even if I downsize to place 900k to a million that would free up 300k to invest after fees. Tough call, Family loves the current house but you gotta do what you gotta do me thinks. Problem is my parents would be very against me selling and I dont want to tick them off too much as they are in the process of making a trust and will!

-Been looking into investing into a microbrewery and bottling startup. I have been burned on deals in the past but this time around I am doing my due diligence this time. Had 3 accountants , 2 lawyers  and multiple others check out the business plan and numbers back and forth. Minimum investment is 100k and its a forever hold pretty much. They hope to turn a profit in year 2 and years 2-5 outlook looks rosy. But who really knows really? The whole team is quite experienced as they own a couple other successful pubs/restaurants and I had good vibes from them. Its a tough call for me really. I like the business and if it hits i will be be looking at 20%+ returns for a long time. Gonna meet with my lawyer next week and run down the numbers, legalities and make the call then.

- I have been asked to manage my in laws finances. I have steered her in the right direction on a few real estate deals and she has alot of trust in me. To me its a big burden. She is 60 and has 200k in cash with little income. She wants the money to last. At first i sent her to a a couple of financial advisers but she did not trust them at all. I tried to steer her toward the fixed income route of gics and bonds but she wasn't impressed by the returns 2-3.5%. I informed her about dividend growth stocks and REITs which she is quite keen on the returns 5%+. I do not want to take her down that route without her learning more about all the investments. The current plan is 100% Canadian stocks -30% REITs - 30% Banks - 20% telecoms - 20% energy. All dividend stocks with avg yield goal 4.5-5%. Any thoughts from you guys would be greatly appreciated. I tend to be overly careful when dealing with others money much more so than my own cash. I prefer her to go a safer route with like a 60% bonds gic mix 40% dividend growth stocks/REITS with an overall 3.6-4.0% total yield but she is not happy with that return.

- Started the blog and everything is all new to me. So much to learn, getting around to things slowly as I have so much on the go. I have to focus on the direction I want to take the blog as I am just going with the flow in the meantime. Got my twitter up and running which was easy peasy.

- Money Sense Magazine ! So I took my kids to the library last week and they were milling about. I grabbed a few magazines and one was money sense. I read it from cover to cover.. Was my first time reading that publication, I found it quite interesting. Its a great Canadian perspective that covers all aspects of investing and taxation. I found it so useful i took out the last two years publications. I have since read half of them cover to cover and i just signed up for a 2 year print subscription. This is my first ever paid magazine subscription, also comes with free ebooks for my ipad. total cost was 48$ for 2 years which is pretty cheap.

- TD bank web broker service- I have been a long time e-trade user which later was absorbed by scotia bank Itrade. I was never really impressed by them and their research is awful and I relied more on public research than theirs. I then jumped over to TD web broker to get their 300 free trade promotion going at the time. Wow I am impressed, The research on equities is awesome. So easy to use and its my go too now. Also their customer service is awesome. Direct help, no holding times and very helpful. I have made 4 calls to the help line and all were handled better than expected. TD also does free investing seminars at their busier locations which I appreciate.

- Gotta go my wifey is upset I spend so much time on the computer lately