KGCI: Real Estate on Air - Taylor Shields - Nova Scotia's Instagram Realtor

Episode Date: May 28, 2024

The real estate biz is drastically changing. And modern real estate success can't be learned in some old course manual. This is everything they never told you about real estate, where industry leaders expose secrets to success, contemporary lead generation, and how to dominate social media. All moderated by your host, the real estate goat and queen of social media, Kerry Solvei. Welcome. I am your host, Carrie, and I have a very special guest on today. Her name is Taylor Shields, and she is a realtor with Remax Nova, which is based in Halifax, Nova. And I'm really excited to have you on, Taylor, even though we just went through 45 minutes of technological difficulties. That was interesting. That was interesting. We are realtors and we can adapt.

to the technical difficulties. Right? Yeah. It only took us like 45 minutes. 45 minutes and three panic attacks, but we're here. I know, right? So, okay, let's get right into it. Taylor, you're doing so well.

I follow you on social media. I really like your content because your content is very unique. You have a very quirky personality. I don't know if you know a lot. lot about me. I coach social media and AI. One of the main things that I teach is authenticity. And like, you are the best example of authenticity on social media, which is why I wanted you on today. So good for you. Keep that up. And anybody listening, if you want to know what authenticity looks like on social media, go and check her out. I will be tagging her in all of these clips as

well. Thank you. So you're originally from Barry, Ontario, eh? Yeah. So I moved to Nova Scotia when I graduated university. So I went to McMaster. I have a sociology degree. I love Hamilton. I love Ontario. It's it wasn't like I need to get out of here. I need to move somewhere. It was what else is there? What else can I? experience in Canada that's I can move to and then as you know like Ontario it's not like I'm like an ocean goer by nature I just it just happened I moved out here and then now I realize like oh I can have that small town Ontario feel without living spending a million dollars you know or I'm 30 minutes from the ocean without living in Vancouver for an unobtainable price. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So it's very, yeah, very kind of, I moved here for, I think I was only going to be one year just to see what it was like.

And then now I'm here and I'm like, oh, my gosh, why would I move away? Yeah, yeah. So we're going to get into more about actual Halifax and Nova Scotia a little bit later. But how long have you been licensed, Taylor? So I got my license in October 2019. So I kind of was at the beginning. Before COVID happened, I was a realtor for like five months, six months, still had my bartending job. And then COVID happened.

And I remember my last shift was before St. Patrick's Day when the bars were like, n'uh, locked down in Nova Scotia. We had our Atlantic bubble. And we were Nova Scotia and P.I, Newfoundland, New Brunswick was so shut down. And we had very low cases of COVID because of that. But I lost my primary source of income four months in to getting my real estate. And as you know, I think the typical realtor doesn't sell their first house for like six months or four to six months, something like that. If you're lucky, you're set up and you get it right away.

That's great. But it was a hard choice. It's like, okay, I don't have a choice right now. I go on the serve and I whip is cracked. I become a realtor or I sit around on SERP for X amount of months and not know what happens. And right when COVID happened is when everyone from Ontario who could work from home now realize that they could cash out, make $500,000, could buy a house outright in Nova Scotia and work the same job. Yeah.

So my sales went from absolutely nothing to, oh, you're from Ontario? I'm from Ontario. I want to move. And it went. Yeah. Yeah. I can imagine. I was watching all of the residents in Ontario once they figured out that they could work remotely. Just taking off to different parts of Canada. I think the biggest ones were out. I had a couple of friends move out east and then a couple to Alberta. But I've never even been out east. I've never been out east before, which is. crazy. I hadn't been out east until I moved here. I didn't, I truly didn't think about it. Like, I think in Ontario, you think about if I'm going to go visit Canada, you probably think you're going to go to Vancouver, honestly. But I think that when COVID happened, Nova Scotia like amped up the advertising and people realize we're the cheaper coast. Where it's at to get the most bang for your buck and you're still on the ocean?

I think that Vancouver sees a lot of foreign investors and people just scooping up these properties that stay vacant. But in Nova Scotia, it's such a hometown feel and things like that. We don't have as much as that. Yeah. So the prices at the time weren't as crazy. Now, I'll probably get a little bit of hate for being the realtor endorsing Ontario people. to move here because now that's why the prices are higher. Yeah, it was bound to happen.

Yeah, it was bound to happen. Yes. So you, your thing is, I've read somewhere that you love working with first time home buyers and like, is that a real thing? I just think it's so much more fun to be able to enter in on the same. like level of this yeah this is like a daunting this the world is a little weird right now how do we navigate this and i think of like if i do something with like i'm setting up a business account with a bank or i'm setting up anything truly i'm hiring a contractor i'm hiring someone i want that

person to make me feel like i'm doing something good so when i i think at a first time home buyer, I want to show them that like this is like a fun, cool learning experience for everyone and that we can do this together. Whereas when I find you have a more experienced buyer, I got their aunts a realtor, their cousins are realtor, their friends bought four houses and has their input on it. Whereas I can really go through it and like just say like this this is fun. Like, can you imagine, like, the first time you bought your most expensive item, how much fun you had going to buy it? Yeah, and it, I think it could be fun. Yeah, it should be fun. And I really like that approach. And it really comes across in your social media.

Like, okay, can I tell you, I did a photo shoot with my team. I think it was back in, like, 20. 2018, maybe 2017. And it was in a really nice house, but the washroom in this house, it wasn't even a photo shoot. We were just there for a meeting. He's a developer and he had this really extravagant home. And the bathroom was literally all granite, like floor to ceiling granite. And it was really busy. So it was like crazy.

You know what I mean? Yeah. And I'm like, let's get a picture in the bathroom. And there's three of us at the time. And they're like, what are we going to do? I'm like, easy. I'm going to sit on the toilet with a magazine. You're going to lay in the bathtub.

And you're going to, I can't remember what the other one did. But it turned out to be like, yeah, it turned out to be like the best shot I ever had with the team. And it blew up. People loved it because like, I think I captioned it like, you know, when you, you know, your open house is dead. when you know what you mean and it just like yeah it just really blew up and it's you got to have fun with your you got to have fun in business and you have to have fun with your job or else what the fuck are you doing right well like i think it's a general consensus that we're all

sick of the showy realtor that makes a million dollars we're sick of it like it's your ego is it's almost like okay i'm finally approved. I've been saving out my whole life for this and it's an awesome experience. But then I have my showy realtor who all I see is literally bragging on Instagram. Let's be honest. Show up and is Maserati. Am I going to feel intimidated? Probably. I've never thought about that before. Yeah, like I try to make it a welcoming experience. Like it's, it's easy to say when you go through a house and oh it's a 30 year old furnace that sucks i can't afford that but then you have your your realtor show up in a range rover you might feel a little inclined to not express like hey like i'm concerned

yeah that's so true like that's why i yeah like i kind of just make it as if like i get instagram but i also wanted to be like we're real people we're humans like we have other things going on besides being a real estate agent it's not we're always we're not always on the up and up right i know i i feel like on social media people show you the very small percentage of their life that is perfect and it's like the tip of the iceberg and you have no idea what underneath the surface like underneath the water and it's it could be a complete shit show down there and it's what people want to put out there. And not every day is going to be Christmas.

Like, be Christmas every day. You're going to have rough days as a realtor. And, okay, I got a question for you. Yeah. What's the longest you've worked for, because you work with buyers. You love first time home buyers. I work with buyers, but I choose not to when I can.

Yeah. But, yeah. So what is the? longest that you've worked with a buyer for what's the longest time period that you've worked with a buyer two years should i um yeah but i'm also i just i i don't know i just know they're going to come back you know i just so i've had uh i guess i had two buyers when i first started out so it would have been I guess the summer of 2020, who we had accepted offer. We had all this.

And it was a time in the market where it was just the kind of beginning of COVID. So they didn't know, like, as a buyer, you don't terminate. That's your best shot ever in 2020 summer. And then they thought, okay, the market's going to change. And now it's 2023. The market, they never saw a decline. And now they're back. they've stayed with me on social media, I guess.

But I've never, I don't think I've ever, I've only, I guess, lost maybe like one buyer because we didn't see eye to I on the market, which happens. Not everyone works together. But I'll pretty well stick with it forever. I kind of think, I don't know. I make the time. I'm not, I don't have children. I don't have any other obligations. So like compared to another realtor

who has a, I guess, a family commitment can't be driving all around. Especially in Nova Scotia. Your first time buyers look upwards to like two and a half hours outside the city. So it's not like, oh, you're in Ontario, you've got just Hamilton. Even that is a pain in the ass

driving around in traffic. It's same distance, right? I'm shooting straight down the highway for an hour, but you're driving in town for an hour, so what's the difference? Exactly. Yeah, so it's just, I'll wait, I'll wait for that paycheck.

I really don't care, you know? Like, if I don't wait with them, someone else is going to wait with them. Yeah. And I want to show them that they're not a paycheck to me. They're, I'm happy if they get a house, you know? Yeah. I love your enthusiasm, and I really like your attitude about all of this.

This is really good because now you've been in real estate. So you 19, 2020. So like five years, right? Four. Yeah. Before. And I feel like this is the time four years is when realtors who are doing business and pretty consistent in building their business properly start to get a little bit jaded,

impatient and negative. And I love that you are not getting like that. I think that is just keep doing what you're doing and keep the attitude like this because, yeah, it can be tough. It's tough out there for realtors. So let me ask you, what's the number one thing that nobody ever told you about this industry before you got into it? I think it was that you can be whoever you want to be. I thought, I think when I started this, I had a lot of stigma. Like, you're too young.

You don't even own a house yourself. Yeah. How the hell are you going to sell out? My Instagram, it was, you have to go and delete this. You have to do X, Y, and Z. And I think I pretty well did the exact opposite. I did what I thought I was looking for. And I think at the time, when I got into it,

It was a good time. I think a lot of new realtors now saw the COVID crazy. And truthfully, probably do think it's an easy job because I am, I'm very positive. I act like it's fun and it's a good thing to do. But behind the scenes, obviously, both you and I are probably pulling our hair out every other day on our laptops, 24 hours a day, which people don't see. They see like, it's fun. It's, you get to go through people's houses. but it's not.

I think it's, it's not. It's, it's, if you, if you're determined to not be discouraged by lulls, if you can get through a lull, you can get through it. And I think I've had people,

like now they're in their second year from last year. They did $100,000 last year in their first year. My first year, I did like $60,000, and I thought I crushed it. They're doing, and 100 in their first year, I think that's amazing. And now they're not busy and they're quitting.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, Go ahead. No, no. It's just like you just like you ought to stick with it, right? It's like you just understand that if people can't afford a house, that's the time also you need to be saving too as a realtor.

Exactly. And I feel like, you're right, realtors get into this business. I'm trying to have the light not hit me. Realtors get into this business because they see what we're all putting out there for everybody to see. They're not seeing how actually, how hard it actually is. The majority of realtors, some of them, some of the biggest realtors in our industry made like $700 or like $5,000. their first year. Like that, like it was a nightmare their first year.

And now you have the realtors getting into the business during COVID. And let's be honest, what happened during COVID, it was free to borrow money. So when it's free to borrow money, that moves everybody's timeline up, right? So if they were going to make a shift or a change in homes in the next three years, they're now going to do it now while it's free to borrow money. So their SOI that should have spanned over the next 10 years all bought houses in their first year. And they think they're like, oh, no, we can't easy. I'm going to make a million dollars.

And all of a sudden, after COVID, they think they're failures. And they get really discouraged. And it's like, no, you just never built your business. You know what I mean? Exactly. Because because those people, they're not. going to repurchase for five years, let's say, three to five years. Yeah.

So that whole time you should have been building your sphere of influence like you're saying. You simply did it because you were simply too busy working with the people buying right down and there. Absolutely. You don't have it. Yeah. And then I see like a lot of new realtors, the main thing they're doing is just making a logo, making a color scheme, making a logo and just,

the photos about like girl there's a little more to it yeah girl I if I knew what I know now back then I probably would have waited like five years to even build branding and a logo because it doesn't matter

yeah you mean like it does matter but like what's really important when you first start is figuring out what you need to do every day to generate business that's what you really need to figure out. So like that brings me. So what do you do for prospecting? Like what does your prospecting look like?

Well, at the beginning, it was like truly 100% social media. It pretty well still is. I get most of my business from Instagram. I just had my last two transactions were from Ontario from a realtor who follows me on Instagram referred me a buyer who wants to buy an investment property Airbnb in Nova Scotia thought that another person was just like I just obscure online made from Ontario and I call them up hey you're I know exactly where you live and we connect like that um but truthly it's it's Instagram. Someone messaging me and say, like, you know what? I actually feel comfortable talking to you. And I guess now when you reach the four years, it's just repeat referrals at this point. But I guess at the beginning, when you have nothing going for you and you have no money, you have no extras, the most free thing you can do is Instagram.

Right. You know? Thank you. And do you know that there's actual realtors out there. there still that don't think that you can get business from social media. And they tell me that. And I'm just like, and I'm just like, I run 95% of my business on social media. Like, you don't know what you're talking about. Like, you don't know what you're missing. And I'm not knocking any of the other prospecting methods.

You know, door knocking. I liked it the one time I did it, but it's very time consuming. It took me. Everybody loved me when I knocked on their doors. So I had to go in their house and I'd spend like half hour and they're talking to them. And at the end of the day, I've hit six houses. Like how great is that, you know, use of your time? I said that to a new agent in the bullpen yesterday. I said, think about it. There's, let's say seven houses in a call to sack. It takes you an hour and a half to hit those seven houses. In that hour and a half, I would have spent five. minutes on Instagram and my Instagram has 27,000 people that view it a month. So your time in is five minutes for your hour and a half. And I'm reaching way more than you can reach just by doing that door. I understand it. I get the old school mentality of connecting with your community.

But I connect with my community by volunteering, by not. harassing them at their place that they live. Like, I personally don't want someone to knock it on my door. Do you? No. I have two giant dogs. I, if I see people coming, I'm like, please God, do not ring my doorbell. Like, or else it's just going to be other.

They're grabbing them. The baby's napping. Grandma's eating her lunch. Leave them alone. Unless I Unless I'm doing a community event and I'm inviting them to my open house I'm inviting them to something I just don't like the solicitation

And I know it works for people and people will argue Hey I get listening from it and that's great You're 70 You make me laugh This is great This is so much fun This is what I needed. I don't like it.

I hate it. Yeah. No, I get it. Now, you're not, I asked you this before the podcast. You're not using AI yet for anything substantial, but like we need to talk because I coach social media, but I also coach AI. And one of the things that I do teach is complete automated workflows for video. content creation so that you can do your seven platforms you know your seven platforms or seven posts in a matter of literally like five minutes so we got to talk um yeah so i've only used the i've only

use chat gbt twice to write a write up and to be honest the write up sound like i was a novelist It was amazing. Yeah. I couldn't have came up with it. But other than that, I don't really. I should. I really like using AI for the listing descriptions, especially in neighborhoods that I don't, that I'm not from.

So like, I could be familiar with the neighborhood, but like, I don't know it's history. I don't know, like, the features of the neighborhood. you plug the neighborhood into chat GPT, and it will literally tell you everything that's good about it. You don't need to know anymore, which is fantastic. And let's be honest, like, location is a huge selling feature, so that that will come in really handy.

You know what I used chat GPT for the other night? I had to write a, I couldn't get a hold of my lawyer, and I needed to write a non-compete and confidentiality agreement from my coaching program. Yeah. To give somebody access to it so that they wouldn't fucking steal it. And it did it literally in five seconds because I know how to prompt it properly. And then I sent it to my lawyer the next morning before I had them sign it.

And he was like, oh my God, this is perfect. Do you want to draw? So do you think that people actually read that the novel we write for the listing descriptions? I will as a realtor in certain cases because like I don't know what kind of MLS system you guys have out there but ours for my buyers everything's on concierge nothing is automated like I approve every listing that they see because the last thing you want to do as a buyer agent is send people garbage so because I'm on um concierge where I have to approve all the listings if they're looking for something

with a second kitchen or you know something specific that's when I'll read the I'll look through the remarks right but I imagine people do I think yeah I get it gets to a point though it's like I'm on like line 18 it's like oh my God

just go to the house right like yeah Albert I'm I'm lived here. It's like how much can you really just get in there? I know.

I agree. No, I know. It's good. It's not. Okay, so social media, guys, very, very important. I don't care what your broker is telling you is a game changer for your business, right, Taylor? Yes. And I will say my broker tells me.

has told me not to post certain things and I have and here we are I sometimes I sometimes like I'll post pictures in my pool and people will be like because I'm in a bikini and you can't wear you're not a real person who swims yeah and that's a thing and like you know something about me is I'm always creating my video by my pool in the summer I'm working by my pool in the summer. So like that's as real as you can get. Like I'm sorry if you know, you're uncomfortable looking at me in a bikini, but like you shouldn't be because it's fantastic. Yeah. And arguably, if I'm a male realtor was by the pool, would anyone even say anything? No. Right. Exactly. It's such a double standard. Huge. There's a lot of the,

the hot realtor, the blah, blah, blah, realtor getting business. Well, we're the ones putting ourselves out there. Sorry. Yeah. Like, we got to do freaking something with this male ladder here. Like, I know. Can't help. Sorry.

Have you, how have you, have you, have you had any weird experiences with men in this industry? And I'm not talking about clients. I'm talking about other. realtors because like I feel like every woman has to a certain degree, especially myself when I first started. The older men, some of them would really like talk down to you and just like, really like you you don't know what the fuck's going on, which was awful. I actually think it's the older women in my industry who act as if I.

I don't know what I'm talking about. Truly, I just, I think the males are kind of like, get the, I don't know if it's even genderized, but I find I think it's more cut throat with women, truly. Like, I felt like part of the reason I left my last brokerage was because I, I don't see competition in other people. I see the competition is with myself. So, yeah, it sucks if I don't get the listing, but I'm, I'm happy for them and I'm happy for the seller and if they get what they want, awesome.

That was my approach. Didn't agree. Fine. But I find that the women realtors will almost just do whatever it takes to undermine you, your experience, show, like talk about your Instagram or your profile. Whereas, like, truly, like I said, the only competition to me is me. Yeah. Like, beating my own sales.

I don't care what you do. Yeah. Of course. But, like, what can you do, truly? So, like, men can be creeps and you have to protect yourself, especially with buyers you've never met. You have to be safe. Yeah. What you really have to protect yourself against is other realtors.

Like, going. Undermining you, talking to your clients, XY, like. 100%. I can I tell you that I had such a hard time when I first got into the industry. The first seven years, I felt like I was constantly being judged because we're talking 14 years ago. I was on Instagram. I've been using social media as prospect.

my entire career. Yeah. That's why I have so many followers now, right? And that's why my whole business runs on it. But I, it was more clicky, the brokerage that I was with and more competitive. And there was so much hate and negativity towards me. People in my same office. Like, forget about other offices and it got a little better the older that I got but not by that much and that's why I finally moved to EXP because when I realized there was an environment that didn't have any competition whatsoever I was like holy fuck this is a no brain like sign me up because you got to remember like 14 years of that You know, if you are, if you're, if you're decent looking at all at a younger female realtor,

you're, this is going to happen to you, you know? Oh, like, yeah, like it's, it's kind of like I, I obviously couldn't have the intelligence to do what they're doing. And I do understand now that, yes, experience does mean something. And I think on my first year, obviously, you're making posts about why it's okay to use someone new versus someone experience. Now that I'm a little more experienced, obviously, as a consumer, I would prefer to choose someone with 14 years experience over a one year experienced person. Yeah. Does that mean that person and I will click better or that person is a better human being to handle the biggest transaction of my life? possibly not arguably the the realtor who is the bully the bully agent who gets the job done

doesn't see you as you first time home buyer that's saved for freaking 10 years to buy one house like yeah they're nice to you but being the bully you know where their heart lies money Yeah. Or even they're like they've turned cynical and jaded after so many years and they don't even enjoy the process anymore. I, you know, that's why I, so I had a team and I prefer new agents. Yes, it was a lot of work molding them, teaching them, mentoring. But guess what? They were freaking hungry and they were willing to work and do what it took. The agents that had like seven, eight, five to seven,

eight years experience were joining my team after being an independent agent because they didn't want to fucking work anymore. Yes. No? So really, I feel like in terms of hiring other realtors, I would definitely, I'm,

I'm pro a new realtor. Like, I'm definitely, because they have no, about habits. They're not exhausted from the market. They're not doing by the book. Everything is by the book. They're not calling around. They're not being dicks. Like it is what it is. Yeah. Yeah, 100%. I love it. Yeah, no, I agree. It's not a, it's not a, it's not some industry where I feel like, you know, on International Women's Day, I see Women, Realtor Post, like, happy,

International Women's Day, I said, I actually think we work in like the least supportive industry probably out there. Like I don't see other women realtors like, yeah, like we pop up. Like we love Kathleen Black. Like we love, we love those women. But you probably didn't love her when you were working with her for when she first started out. You know what I mean?

100%. 100%. Okay, so let's talk a little bit about Nova Scotia. So give me an idea because I'm not familiar. What is the base price for a detach? Like what can somebody buy their first home at what price point? So like if you're looking like just in Nova Scotia generally, you can work from home. You don't care about being in a city.

you can get an awesome detached home, like on a plot of land for like $300,000. Hmm. What about Halifax? Halifax, you're looking at like $5.50, $600. That's still really good, though. It is. It is. But so I think what happened was at the, so when COVID hit, Nova Scotia was at like under a million.

We didn't have a million population in the whole province. And then from once COVID hit, 2021 to 2022, we saw an increase of like 28,000 people and brought us to a million. And out of those 28,000 people, 20,000 moved to Halifax. So Halifax started off with, we started off with that 350. price point and everyone was like first time buyers had a chance. Yeah. And all the Ontario. Sorry.

God love you. I'm one too. Moved. I am moved here. And those 20,000 people, we were already in a seller's market with no inventory. Needed homes. And they had the money. Like Ontario, you're coming.

You sold your house. Let's say you sold your modest house. Modest house, 700,000. Like, cool. You have 400,000 extra cash in your pocket. You bought a $300,000 house. You're rolling in it. Right.

Here, here, people don't have the equity to begin with. Yeah. So I guess, Nova Scotians, Hallegonians, especially, are a little stigma, especially to me, like whenever I promote Ontario buyers, I'm from Ontario, move here, because truly us Ontario people jack the prices. Yeah. And it's just we increased by 20,000 people in one year. Lumber prices went up because of COVID.

No houses were being built. And now we're here with Nova Scotians dreading Ontario people. Mm-hmm. I have a, I have a, so I have a TikTok. and it has 65,000 views, and it's called Why You Should Move to Nova Scotia. This is your sign to move to Nova Scotia. It has so many views because all the Nova Scotians are commenting.

Yeah. Don't move. Yeah. I'm here. I know. It's because it's a deal here. I know. It leads for somebody in Ontario, somebody in Vancouver.

It's 100% a deal here. So, okay. Where is the best place to live in and around Halifax? Actually, the entire province. Let's just do the entire province. Which area, not for price, but I'm talking for lifestyle price, potential to make money down the road, culture, everything. So I think if you want like culture, like the same type of.

So Halifax is, to me, the biggest small town you will find. So it has half of Nova Scotia population. We have almost 500,000 people. And we're at a million in the whole province. So our most populous is in Halifax. It still feels like a small town, though. I grew up in Elmville, Ontario. It has 2,000 people.

And I moved straight to Halifax. And it feels like that small town, you know everyone's mom. They call them mom's house. I'm going to dad's house. You know everyone. And there's amazing restaurants. We're on the harbor. We're right on the ocean.

But again, you're still spending $600,000. So people here think it's expensive. But if you are not confined to caring about living in a city, then there are so many spectacular places you could live. Like for an investment property, I would buy in Windsor or Truro. You can get a four unit, a four unit multi-unit for under 300,000. You can get a four-unit building for under 300,000.

And what are the average ones? I sold one, let's say a thousand bucks each. If you're in a small town, it can be cheap. It can be cheap. Like, but your mortgage, let's think about your mortgage. In Halifax, if you buy a multi-unit, we have less than a 1% vacancy rate. And the average rent, I think right now is $1,700. And that's on the lower end.

And that's in Halifax. So you can pretty well guess if you're going to buy a rental or an investment property in Halifax because of the vacancy rate, you could, it sucks to say you can probably charge whatever you want. Unfortunately. We have those blockages now where we don't allow, we have the extra 5% tax on out of province buyers that are using it for an investment. But that only applies to that if you buy a property in somewhere that has over 100,000

people. Okay. Okay. There's not a lot of places. And only if you rent it out, correct? Like it's not like that if it's a secondary home or what about secondary home? Like yeah. Secondary home, I think there's like a way to get around it.

I think that you need to allow a little bit of housing. But if it's, say if it's a property if you're in Ontario and you bought it like as a full on rental in Halifax, you can use it because you're providing housing to Nova Scotians. if you're buying it as an Airbnb in Halifax, it's not allowed anymore. We have brand new rules starting September that Airbnbs are only allowed. Yep. Airbnbs are only allowed in your own residential home or commercially zoned areas now. So like where hotels are.

Huh. Because the housing shortage is so bad that they're restricting everything. They did that in Hamilton too and Niagara areas. Like everybody is doing it now and it's because of the housing crisis. Like, do you know in Hamilton, we have people living in parks? We have encampments all over the place. It's crazy. It has to be done, right?

At the end of the day, it has to be done. Now, what about if I want the perfect beach house, where do I want to live? You want to live in like on the south shore, anywhere in the south shore. Like you can move to Loonenburg, you can move to Mahombe. I love Digby. You can drive all the way up to Digby, and you can get a absolutely gorgeous house in the ocean there for 300,000. Like further away you go from, it's insane.

The further away you go from Halifax, you're getting, those houses are old, arguable. They're very old. So one in three Canadians are descendants from pure. 21 in Halifax. So we are like the first original stomping ground. So homes are very old, like especially

oceanfront homes. They're built in the 1800s. We got stone foundations. There's going to be water in your basement. You're going to have an old oil furnace. And I think it's kind of a shell shock, especially if you're thinking, oh,

I'm going to move to Nova Scotia and buy a really cheap house, well, you're kind of getting what you pay for as well. It's 150 years old. There's going to be probably rodents because we're in a harbor city, just like Hamilton, right? Yeah. You're in a harbor. So, yeah, you can get something really cheap, honestly, scoop something up. So I had moved last year six families to here that just basically cashed out in Ontario. had cash to buy something out right here. And we had to work through these things. Like, you're going to go an older house.

Yeah. We have, we have floods. We have different climate than you guys. Truly, it's like we're like a cold Florida. Huh. Hurricanes, generators. Last, like, last September, like, I've, since I've lived here for eight years, I've been without power in September.

at least once, once every September for at least like three to four days because of a hurricane. Wow. Huh. Yeah, I don't make attention to what happens out east. I did. Yeah, how would you know? Like, when I lived in Hamilton, I didn't even really even knew like Halifax existed. Right?

Like, I didn't. Okay, so I want you to recommend, okay, so if I have, if, I have, coming there on vacation or there's clients from across Canada coming on vacation, where are they staying, where are they going, and where are they eating? So you're going, you're going to fly into Halifax. Halifax is the airport. You're going to spend, let's say, two days in Halifax. You can do it in two days. It's a lot of bars. It's a lot of pubs, a lot of restaurants. you're going to eat seafood, you're going to walk on the harbor. It's a lot of Celtic music.

We love a band. We love singing, dancing, getting up. Everyone's your best friend, and someone's going to walk past you on the street and say, where are you from, how are you, who are you from, all that. And then you're probably going to drive up and you're probably going to go to Cape Breton. Like Cape Breton, you're going to do the Cape Breton. trail you drive down there i've lived here for eight years and i haven't done it all like i there's every place on the coast it's just spectacular every little town you'll pick your rest if you think of

nova scosia you think of every house being a different color yeah i love that homes are at homes are actually painted different colors because at the time uh sailors would paint their ships corresponding to what their house was painted so that you knew who was out. Oh, my God. Oh, the McDonald's. Yeah, the McDonald's are out on their ship and you correspond the house with the ship. Oh, wow. So arguably, all of Nova Scotia is so worth seeing.

So my Ontario buyer, she just came up here. She was coming up here every month and we would look at Airbnb's. I'd pick her up, put her in my garage. car and we would map out where we would go and we'd stop for lunch and every time we stopped for lunch the shop the business owner would come and sit at our table and talk to her about why nova scotia is it and i think that i really think that it's it's not just like what does it like have to offer you because there is so much you're you're never further away than 50 kilometers from the ocean when you live in Nova Scotia wherever you are.

And I think in Ontario it's like 500 kilometers from the ocean. Yeah. So you could drop anywhere and go absolutely anywhere and have an experience. You could go on a boat. You could go in the ocean, like see whales. Like there's just so much. Oh my God, Taylor. This is, you're making me want to come visit.

and I'm afraid I won't leave. I'm coming to visit you. This is what's going to happen. I'm doing a working trip to Nova Scotia. And we're going to hang out for two days, okay? I want to come. Well, we have. You should be doing.

He is getting bigger here. Yeah, 100%. Like, there's people that I can go see out there as well, right? But like, I love your energy. I feel like. Yeah, I just feel like if you were to add more content about actual Nova Scotia and what it has to offer outside of real estate, you would destroy social media for the entire province. Because your energy, your knowledge is a realtor and then like your passion about this province is like you make me want to come visit there and I've never had a desire to go out east before. I hadn't even been out here until I moved here.

I didn't even go once. And I just packed all of my stuff and moved here. And I was like, okay, hope for the best. And people here, it's like, you know, when you, you walked down the, like, I felt when I first moved here, everyone was talking yet. Like, you walked down the road in Hamilton. Why are you talking to me? You know what I mean? Like, you got to be cautious.

You got to kind of, like, protect your own. And then when I first moved here and there, people would stop you on the sidewalk. I was like, leave me. You know, I'm like, why are you in my business? And then now I'm realizing like, oh, it's like people want to share with you. Although they have their little crusty about the home prices, they truly want everyone to know how awesome Nova Scotia is in general. I love your energy.

You're doing such a good job at, you know, everything on social media. And you just convince me to come visit. So if anybody that is listening is curious about Nova Scotia or Halifax, follow Taylor Shields. She's fantastic. I promise it will not. You will be entertained. And Taylor, thank you so much for coming on today. Thank you, Carrie. It was so much fun.

Thanks for listening to everything they never told you about real estate. Be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. To connect with Carrie or for more information about her coaching program, check out carriesovey.ca or at Carrie Sovey and Associates on Instagram and TikTok. Thanks again for tuning in and we'll see you next time.