The Ben Mulroney Show - Ben talks with the Author of the New book about Chrystia Freeland

Episode Date: December 19, 2024

Guests and Topics on Today's Show -New Book about Chrystia Freeland with Guest: Catherine Tsalikis, author of Chrystia -TikTok account pumps out fake war footage with AI with Guest: Francis Syms, Associate Dean in the Faculty of Applied Sciences & Technology at Humber Polytechnic -What happens to a Surety when someone breaches bail… It’s not enough with Guest: Joseph Neuberger, Neuberger And Partners Criminal Lawyers, host of the podcast “Not On Record” -The Toronto Condo Crash Quietly Keeps Growing: It's A Stealth Disaster with Guest: Ron Butler, Mortgage Broker with Butler Mortgage  -Travel is a luxury these days. Is it still financially feasible for me to travel with my children? with Guest: Erin Bury, Globe and Mail Parenting Columnist If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy

Hey everybody, it's Ben Mulrooney. We had a jam-packed show today, including talking with the author of the new book about Chrystia Freeland. What are her thoughts on everything that's gone on this week? Also, what did she learn about Chrystia while writing the book? That and a whole lot more. Enjoy. We had planned on talking to our next guest in a little while, because her book was slated to come out in a couple of months. And the book is entitled Christia, and it's written by Catherine Salikis. And it is an incredible read about one of the most influential women in politics over the past week in Ottawa that saw Chrystia resign prior to the fall economic statement that she was supposed to read and the chaos that ensued. Well, there is so much attention on this story and on this woman that they have bumped up the release of this book to tomorrow. And so I was reading frantically to bone up on this fascinating story, a tremendous read. And I'm very happy to welcome Catherine Salikis, the author of

Chrystia to the Ben Mulroney show. Catherine, welcome. Ben, thank you so much for having me. Thank you for speed reading. But you know what? You're a tremendous writer. It really, it's a great, great read. I commend you. And, and I really, I urge anybody who's been following the story of the past week to, to, to learn a little bit more about Christia Freeland through this book. It's, it's,

it's, it's a really wide ranging, wide ranging book before we get into it. Given the fact that you're probably at this point, the foremost expert on Christia Freeland, what's your read on what happened between Friday and Monday? So my sense was on Friday, Chrystia was put in this untenable position. She was told that the prime minister no longer had confidence in her as his finance minister,

that he was going to move her out of that ministry um offer and and offer her what was essentially a demotion uh cabinet or cabinet post dealing with u.s canada relations that had no money or department yeah um and so she said oh and and uh replace her with with former bank of canada governor mark carney who also happens to be the godfather of her child um yeah it's just but but not but not before she went out and read the fall economic statement. Exactly, of course. Of course. First, you have to be a good soldier.

Yes. And so, faced with that, from what I understand, she told him she would take the weekend to think about it. But there was no question. The position was untenable. Without his confidence, without his support, there was nothing else she could do. I don't think there was an alternative.

And so she dropped the bombshell letter. Do you think she wrote that the way she did and designed this gambit with the intention for all of this chaos to ensue? For inflicting maximum damage? Yeah. You know what? I don't think it was a gambit because that was the timing that Trudeau presented her with. Right.

When else was she supposed to announce this? On the morning of the statement? But knowing what I do of her, she is not a shrinking violet. She is, you know, colleagues who knew her when she was a reporter in the wild east of Moscow in the 90s,

describe her as not a little ruthless. She knew how to get to a story. She knew how to best these powerful oligarch men that she was writing about. It's not the first time she's been faced with a situation like this. Those were definitely her words. I'm not going to be on the bush about, especially when kind of faced with this betrayal.

But no, I don't think it was, I think she has shown a lot of loyalty to Trudeau and also this would have been very emotional for her. So I don't think it's vindictive. I think it just kind of was the way the cookie crumbles. Yeah, and the turning of the tables is what's really interesting to me. You know, reading this book in light

of what we just experienced is probably the most fascinating thing. I mean, I found a quote from my father, no less, during the NAFTA renegotiations where Mulroney continued. He said, when I was prime minister, I wouldn't ever consider entering this kind of negotiation without having complete confidence in my negotiator. And I could tell that that was the way Trudeau viewed

Chrystia's leadership, with complete confidence and trust. So it's just, it's so odd to me to have seen the tables turn the way they have. Yeah. Um, I didn't think it would end this way. No, like I, I was,

I was, I guess it is the next person. Um, that's actually, I, I've been citing that quote to in other interviews when people ask, you know, uh,

what was the relationship like from the beginning? She was his right hand woman. There's a photo of them on the, uh, the swearing in like? From the beginning, she was his right-hand woman. There's a photo of them on the swearing-in of the new Trudeau government in November of 2015. She's sitting right next to the prime minister. And that was a deliberate positioning of her. That was meant to set a signal. She's going to play a big role in this government.

And it's one that she continued to play throughout. The CEDA negotiations, the NAFTA negotiations, COVID, Ukraine. Yeah, and the way you meticulously lay out how difficult these negotiations were, the NAFTA negotiations, and how she was front and center. And yes, Trudeau ultimately was the decision maker, but not before he got, he got all the information, uh, from Christia. I mean, she worked tirelessly to ensure success. Uh, and, uh, and it feels to me on, on reading this, that it was successful at the expense of her relationship with the American administration. You know, they, she was not afraid to put her own reputation on the line. Now, granted, there were some self-inflicted wounds when she gave a speech that did not go over well. But by and large, she was willing to put herself out there in service of the country, even if it meant her reputation being tarnished with the Americans.

That's it. She was willing to play the bad cop. And, you know, what I was told was that there was a difference of opinion between her and Bill Morneau, who was at finance at the time, who wanted a quick deal. He wanted to rip the band-aid off, maybe capitulate a bit more just to kind of get this all over with, whereas Christie wanted to hold out for a

good deal. And you see, you know, like, Morneau was invited to Steve Mnuchin, his wedding, and, like, Morneau was invited to Steve Mnuchin, the U.S. Treasury, like, his wedding. And, like, you see, they're all buddy-buddy. But Christie did it her way. And in the end, what's funny is they did get to a deal that I think was widely considered the best case scenario for Canada. And she came out of it as friends with her counterparts.

Anyway, she had the former USTR Robert Lighthizer over at her house, famously. She coached him a meal himself. I spoke with people around Lighthizer who have glowing things to say about her somehow. I spoke with her Mexican counterparts. So that strategy did play off for her, and she managed to come out of it with relations intact. The president himself is a different story. I feel like that's a whole different ballgame. I don't know how things would have gone if she was still in place for a second.

But that's why I don't understand this weird demotion to a position that she was ill-suited for, U.S.-Canada relations. I don't get that. That makes no sense to me. You know, Ben, I have no insight for you because I am as puzzled as you are. So much of this, I think they, I think her, the Christian camp is also as puzzled as we are. It makes very little sense. But a lot of, I feel like the Prime Minister's decision making has appeared from the outside as questionable. I don't know. And it doesn't seem like there's that much longer to go for this government. So is this like a belated sacrificial lamb, like after the Toronto St. Paul by-election,

in which Christian's former chief of staff lost? There was rumors that the PMO was displeased with Christian's performance. Like maybe then I would have understood a bit better. But this is months later. I don't know. I wish I knew. performance, maybe then I would have understood a bit better. But this is months later. I don't know. I wish I knew. She's a woman who's worn many hats and she's taken on some pretty big foes.

Do you think this is the end of her political career or do you think she has ambitions beyond what she's accomplished thus far? So what I know is that she intends she intends, she intends to run again is what I've been told. She intends to run again in the next election. She follows her paperwork. Anything beyond that is speculation. But knowing what I do and, you know, speaking with people who've known her throughout her entire life, she has ambition and she has drive. And it's not ambition to be someone, it's to do things. And I think the best vehicle for her to do that is via the Canadian government. I wouldn't be surprised if she has designs on the top job. She has never alluded to that. As far as I know, even to her sister, she keeps that very under wraps.

I don't have special insight there. But I also know that when the Liberals were in opposition, she didn't thrive. She likes to be at the center of things. So I don't know that she would want to rebuild the party. Yeah, exactly. Once it's taken down to the studs, we're going to have to leave it there. But Catherine Salikas, thank you so much. It's a tremendous read. It's out tomorrow.

The book is called Christia. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Ben. I enjoyed it. I'm going to say something that shouldn't surprise anybody. TikTok has a lot of misinformation on it it's uh I don't use it and that's one of the reasons

I don't use it but I heard an expression in researching this next conversation that I think is going to become something that we use more and more often it's called AI slop it's a particular type of content it's a worrying type of content and to talk a worrying type of content. And to talk more about it, we're joined

now by Francis Sims, Associate Dean in the Faculty of Applied Sciences and Technology at Humber Polytechnic. Francis, thank you for being here. Hey, I'm happy to be here with you, Ben. What is AI slop? In the last few years, we've seen a rise of AI-generated content online. And AI flop basically refers to this massive amount of content that's poorly generated, ultimately. But it's designed for platforms like TikTok or for people that are scrolling quickly on their phone. And so what they might see is they might see a video, and this is some of the stuff that's been reported, of an explosion in Ukraine or Ukraine attacking some town in Russia in a situation that seems like an atrocity. And the idea there is that it's overpowering your social

feed with all this information, and it becomes very difficult to tell what's real and not real. And we call it slop because if you look closely at a lot of these videos and some of the ones that have been recorded online recently, you'll see things like, you know, something in the distance and then a giant car on top of the building, right? Things that just look weird or everything's burning, but there's like about a hundred homes in the foreground that look like they're perfectly fine and people People walking around. But if you're on your phone and you're in bed at the end of the night, well, you might just be scrolling and you're not going to, you know, zoom in that close. You're not going to you're not going to pour over it.

It's designed it's designed for you to actually gloss over. But but if you see enough of it, I guess the suggestion is that it'll it'll start coloring your view of things. Yeah, it's almost like in the early days of the newspapers, when there were the newspapers wars with Pulitzer in the United States, they would focus on big headlines, right? Because they wanted you to buy that paper. The same kind of idea here, that the headline is actually the video, and then you're going to click on it, and then you're going to get more content from that location.

Maybe you're going to go to their website, and ultimately it's going to turn into either they're being paid by a nation state to do this, or you're going to somehow get money into their pockets. And that's probably the bottom line here. And so there's a story on the CBC website about a particular TikTok account that was pumping out this fake war footage. And CBC investigated, and then it went dark. But I wonder, if it's designed for TikTok, is it designed for TikTok because TikTok, I mean, on top of what you've already said, is it designed for TikTok because TikTok is more permissive of this sort of misinformation? I think so. And I think it's an issue in general with a lot of social media giants. So they all

have rules around misinformation and fake content, and they're supposed to flag it if it looks like it's an AI-generated video. But the problem is they're actually using AI to detect if this is fake videos, and there's so much of it coming. You can imagine there's a gajillion fake TikTok accounts, and they have AI tools that are looking to see if it's fake or not, and then when those tools detect it, then it goes to somebody else. Right.

And so that person, then they need to have a physical person looking at every single video. And they just don't have the time. No. So, you know, Elon Musk pulled back on X. He actually removed a lot of content moderators because he said it was a waste of time and freedom of expression and all that stuff. But the reality is that these companies don't want to pay money to have people sit there and look at the videos because the only other option for them is to curb the number of videos that they allow to be posted to the site.

And they don't want to do that. That goes against their business model altogether. Yeah, I mean, this is a problem with their own making. They created the circumstances that allowed for this to grow. So how do we right this ship? Is it going to require government intervention? At this point, I don't see any other way around this other than government intervention. I think doing things like

I think we're in this period where it's a bit of a honeymoon phase for this fake AI content. People are looking at it. People think it's real. I suspect in a year from now the problem will be that most of us won't believe anything we see on TV anymore or on TikTok. We'll assume it's like a movie or a TV show. It could be real, but it could be fake, which is sad. But we're going to have to sort of validate that. We're going to have to figure out what's authentic a different way, hopefully through, you know, like 64040 a.m. or CBC News or real journalism again, because I think what we're seeing is people turn to social media to get their news, and now we're starting to realize that we can't trust what we see on the computer anymore. Well, meanwhile, this entire conversation might be moot.

If TikTok doesn't find a U.S. buyer, then it's just going to go the way of the dodo bird. Yeah, and it doesn't look good for them right now. No. Although, although Kevin O'Leary, he says that he's part of a group that's looking to buy it. Oh, is that right?

Well, they need to find out, they need to find a local home in order for them to continue business. I mean, the big problem with, with, with TikTok is the Chinese government has a law that basically said anytime, any,

anytime, any company that operates in China, they can look in at the data of the users for national security reasons. Yeah, no, no. And so. So, yeah, we understand why it's going down this path. So that would be interesting if Kevin O'Leary did. Well, let's let's listen to Kevin O'Leary. He made his pitch on Fox News. Yeah, I don't think Trump's going to ignore the fact that Congress on a bipartisan basis has claimed that this is Chinese spyware. And it is. And they're going to shut it down Jan 19th. And I'm one of five groups that are interested in buying it. And so this idea that it's about freedom of speech has nothing to do with it. Congress order simply says sell it to an American controlled entity and you can maintain it.

So it's not about freedom of speech. It's about Chinese spyware. I set up wonder TikTok dot com. Anybody can go there and I have to disclose that it's a giant crowdfunding effort because I want the seven million business owners that know me. And this is a real shark tank platform. We all use it. I want them to be shareholders beside me. And so they can, if they wish, indicate their interest at wonderfultiktok.com. But this is Chinese spyware. And in India, a few years ago, they shut this down. There was a kerfuffle for five days and everybody forgot about it. Yeah, Francis, what do you think about that? This is a spyware issue, not a free speech thing.

I think it's 100% accurate, right? I mean, the reality is that we know that China is one of the big players, right, world now uh from a nation-state perspective the u.s is concerned about uh chinese automobiles right because you can think about that the same way they're connected fields vehicles connected to the internet they have cameras and they're big big machines that could cause damage so i think he's i think he's right on the money that the u.s is concerned about that now you would imagine like like china has also started an antitrust suit against NVIDIA, right? Or they're investigating NVIDIA

because they're stating the same concerns. Why would we trust a manufacturer or an organization that's from outside of China? Just like people in the U.S. are saying, why should we trust anybody outside of the U.S. or Canada? Oh my gosh, it feels like another tit-for-tat trade war. Yeah, and I think that's the way itS. or Canada. Oh my gosh. It feels like another tit-for-tat trade war. Yeah. And I think that's the way it's going to be.

It's all about this, who controls the information and the data that they get from people. Yeah. Listen, I think if the solution that would make the most people happy would be an American company buying TikTok, because otherwise,

I do believe Donald Trump will shut it down. And then you're going to have all these content creators and all these businesses that depend on TikTok, they're going to find themselves having to pivot to some new platform, which, by the way, I'm not really concerned with. There will be an entrepreneur who builds a better mousetrap. It is what it is. No one has been guaranteed a life on TikTok. No, and we don't even know what that mousetrap looks like yet. It could be something altogether

different. Well, yeah, it could be different. It could be better. And if TikTok goes away, somebody will fill that void with something because America, that's what they do. Francis, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it.

My pleasure. Doug Ford gets it done for developers. We interrupt this ad to ask, does get it done mean strip $3 billion out of school funding? Because yep, Doug Ford sure got that done. Now, can we have an undo button, please?

Help us get back to investing in schools. Visit nomore.ca. That's K-N-O-W-M-O-R-E dot C-A. This message has been approved by Kidsplain. A message from the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association. Well, here at the Ben Mulroney Show, we do our best to hunt and peck and find interesting stories and conversations

that will be of note to me and hopefully to you. Information you can use, you can share, you can build on. But sometimes the stories, they materialize out of good conversation. Here's what one of our listeners actually had to tell me once.

My comment is that I really don't understand that if I commit a crime and I'm before the judge and I get released on bail, does not my family or my own personal asset have to be guaranteed to the court for me to follow the bail rules? Like, no one ever talks about these people getting caught again when they were released on bail. Who or is there a way of collecting that money or their family is going in debt or having like no one talks about that. That's an interesting. You know what? You've given us a topic for another segment.

And welcome to that segment. It's true. Sometimes we get focused on repeating the talking points that make sense in our conversation that we don't actually get to the detail of the talking point. We talk about let out on bail, let out on bail, let out on bail. But we don't ask ourselves what goes into somebody being let out on bail. So let's dig into that and find out what are the ramifications?

What is the process? What are the benchmarks? How does it happen? How long does it take? And in order to do that, we're going to go to the guy with the answers, Joseph Neuberger from Neuberger and Partners Criminal Lawyers. He's also the host of the podcast, Not On Record. Joseph, thank you for being here.

My pleasure, Ben. Thank you. Okay. So I'm a criminal. I do one of these smash and grabs. Yeah. And I, unlike most of them. I do one of these smash and grabs. Yeah. And I, unlike most of them, I get caught. What happens to me? Okay, so if an individual is caught and accused of a crime, so let's not presume anybody's guilty yet,

even though when those who are caught on video are obviously guilty, they attend in bail court and they have a bail hearing. As much as people think it's that easy to get on bail, it's not. So you have to have a bail hearing. And if you have a criminal record, it will be that more difficult to get out. If you are able to get out, it's because you will have a strong release plan. In other words, somebody will have to come forward and act as a surety, like a guarantor who will say they will supervise you on release,

and you'll have to abide by conditions. Those conditions can include living at home, abiding by curfew, staying out of a geographic area, wearing an ankle monitor, any number of things. And then there's an amount of money which is pledged. So the surety will say, I can risk up to $100,000 for this person's release, for example, but often bails are, are far less. Okay. And if the surety is approved, then they're released. Okay. So where is the disconnect then Joseph? Because it seems to me that, you know, if I'm a, if I'm a criminal, like all things being equal, I'm assuming a criminal comes from a modest background. So if their family puts up any amount of money, it's a,

it's significant to them. Correct. So how am I reading about and hearing about people who are committing crimes on bail time and time again? What, what am I missing in this equation? Why is this not enough to ensure that if you're out on bail, you're not doing one or two or three or four more crimes?

Unfortunately, you know, this phenomenon is the same in the United States where they even have, you know, more lax bail conditions in certain states. So it's a general, you know, there's a certain segment of individuals who will be charged where there's a general state of lawlessness, and they're not going to abide by conditions. What can happen is the Crown attorney can seek a treatment of the bail that's pledged. So it's called an estreatment hearing. It's in the Superior Court. The surety will be summonsed to appear. Let's say they pledge $10,000. That amount, after a hearing, could be forfeit to the government.

Normally, they only go after a third or 50% of it because, as you noted, for some people it's a lot of money. And then sometimes the government doesn't even follow up and seek in a street because they're just too busy and the courts are overwhelmed as it is now. But I don't understand it. You've made a deal. We've said we're coming for your money if you don't abide by essentially the contract that we've all agreed to. And if you break that contract, shouldn't it just be automatically? I mean, you said they don't

have the time or the money to go get the money, but why isn't it just taken automatically? Like, isn't that you've broken the rules, the money, were keeping the money we're keeping the surety. That's an excellent question. So the money is not deposited with the court. So it's pledged. So in other words, you say I pledged $10,000, but the money is not provided to the government and sort of a cash or other deposit. There's no lien taken on a house. In much more serious cases, there can be instances where money is deposited. In that case, that can be forfeited and much easier. Or there is sometimes a lien, let's say on a property, but that's very, very rare. So the government has to bring a hearing, bring the surety before the court, then get a ruling,

and then seize the assets of what's available. Much more cumbersome process. Yeah, it seems like we're setting ourselves up to never collect. We've set up a situation where, okay, you're promising the money. I mean, do they have to show that they have the money before saying, yes, I'll promise the money? Absolutely. They have to come with up-to-date bank records.

For example, if you're pledging $100,000 and it's because of your assets like your home, you have to bring the deed as well as a mortgage statement, a valuation. So you have to provide proper documentation to establish that you're good for the money. That is a very strict regime in place. I mean, Joseph, you know better than me, but my sense is if that system was just tweaked a little bit and instead of pledging the money, they actually had to put up the money, which could then be withheld in the case of somebody breaching the conditions of their bail or their release. I think that would change a lot of things for the better pretty quickly. Look, it makes a lot of sense. In the United States, you have bail bondsmen, which

hopefully we don't develop here, but there you can go to a bail bondsman, pledge a certain amount of money of, let's say, $10,000 on a $100,000 release. The bondsman then puts the bond in place, and then they go after the surety for the full amount of money if there is a breach. So, you know, something similar to that can be imposed here. So if it's $10,000, the requirement may be deposit 25% of that. Because to ask the full amount may be extremely difficult. But some sort of deposit is possible. And that is an amendment that the government could look at. It's a very good idea, Ben. I'm full of good ideas, my friend, as I'm sure you are too.

So why don't you give me a list of things that you think we could that wouldn't require a heavy lift, but could have a really big impact on deterring people from going back on the streets and committing crimes or never committing them in the first place. I think there's a number of things that need to be looked at. One is follow up on release orders and the police need proper funding for bail checks. They need robust resources so they have specialized teams that will go out and identify those who are at high risk for recidivism. And they're out on a release on a serious offense and they're able to then do checks on a regular basis. It would not be one where the individual is notified. It has to be a random basis. But we need proper funding for police to be able to do that. That's one important thing. Two, I think something can be looked at with respect to bail, like you say. So there has to be a deposit in certain cases where you are dealing with somebody who is a repeat offender. And again, it's a serious offense like a robbery or something involving a firearm. The court should be requiring some sort of deposit

rather than just simply a pledge. Generally, the principle because of the Constitution and case law has been that, you know, everybody's entitled to a reasonable bail, but that can be worked on, in other words, so that there would be a deposit. I think the other thing that we have to look at is how we deal with certain crimes. So, and I'm not really saying this as a criminal defense lawyer, but I'm just saying this from a pure procedure standpoint. If it is a very serious gun-related offense where the evidence is extremely overwhelming, so an individual is arrested through a valid search of a house. The gun is found in a night table next to the loaded. You've got fairly strong evidence. On a bail hearing, the procedure is simple. Is the person going to show up for court? Are they going to commit other

offenses? And how strong is the Crown's case? It's called the tertiary ground. Well, emphasis can be placed on that and they can be detained. So in that respect, I think they need to be detained. Okay. Well, thank you very much. I'm glad to have had this conversation. I learned something new and I hope our listeners did as well. You take care and happy holidays. You too, Ben. All the best. It's been an odd time. Not a great time. If you're in the market, if you're looking to sell, if you're looking to buy, it's been tricky. It's been really hard to navigate these waters. And Ron Butler, the mortgage broker with Butler Mortgage, he's got insights that most people don't.

He hears things, he reads the tea leaves, and he can see what's around the corner. And he recently tweeted, I keep saying tweet, but it's X. I guess I got to make peace with that. That the Toronto condo crash quietly keeps growing, calling it a stealth disaster. He says that every other day a call comes in with a new construction condo story that is either quiet desperation or borderline panic. So let's bring Ron into the conversation and drill down. Welcome to the show, Ron. Thank you. Thanks for joining us on the Ben Mulroney Show. Thanks for having me, Ben. Okay, so what are we talking about here? We're talking about a phenomenal mispricing problem,

a pricing problem that developed way back in 2020, and even worse in 2021 and 22, when the price of pre-construction condos escalated dramatically. Condos were typically sold for around $700, $800. Sometimes we go back to the old days in 2013 through 2018, down around the $400 a square foot rate. So they climbed radically. We have people who bought in 2021 for $1,400 a foot, for $1,500 a foot, for 1,250 a foot. And today, a resale condo sells for just about, in an average condo, a small condo below 500 square feet, sells for 900 a

square foot. So these people who have paid 1,250 are now confronted with an almost unmanageable problem. Now, so put me in the shoes of one of these people. What am I looking at? What am I carrying? And why is it untenable? Perfect question. So this is a person who has owned condos before. They bought, they sometimes sold by assignment, they rented successfully.

They might have a couple of rental condos. And when they bought for $1,150, $1,200 a square foot, they knew they were paying more than they paid in the past, but they just assumed everything would go up. They didn't understand that interest rates would go up. They didn't understand that rentals would actually start to gradually fall in Toronto in the last little while. They also didn't understand the incredible numbers that are coming on stream a twenty five thousand of these units come on stream this year pre constructions turning into new condos we have another thirty thousand next year but mostly they didn't understand

that those prices wouldn't work pete you can't rent and pay the uh... condo fees and pay the mortgage cost and pay the property tax and make any profit at all, you will lose money every single month because you paid $1,100 or $1,200 a square foot. You just can't find any renters that will make that work. As they see the train coming at them that they have to close, they know that something, the something they paid 900 for is now worth seven 50 and they know they're

going to lose a thousand dollars a month if they close. So it's a serious problem. So, so if, if this were happening to one person, it would be, it would be just too bad buyer beware. But how many people is this happening to?

I mean, cause you're referring to it as a crash and a disaster. So that tells me that it's enough people that it could impact the entire sector. Sure. All 30,000 condos are going to be completed. Pre-construction condos are going to complete next year in 2025. All of them are priced incorrectly. Their rents are falling today in the city of Toronto for these condos. And that's a big

number. 30,000 is a real number. I mean, every one of those developers and builders expects as a contract where they expect these people to close and make good on their promise to pay. And there's no economic sense to doing it. So how many of them are just going to say no and be faced with a lawsuit? 30,000 is a very real number. And I mean, is this something like what's the fastest way? What's the fastest way to make the most improvement to this situation? If you could wave a magic wand right now, what do you do? What's the one thing you do that makes this just a little bit better?

You could have interest rates fall by another 2%, which is not going to happen. I guess you would need a magic wand for that. That's pure magic. That is like Harry Potter level magic. So the truth is, Ben, there's no actual solution to this thing. It's just going to be lawsuits, pain and suffering for the people who are stuck in it, difficulties for builders and developers. And by the way, there's no new condos being sold in Toronto today. They opened 80 sales offices and closed 77. Wow. Ron, is there, like, for every problem,

a problem for one person is an opportunity for another. Is there a, is there, are there any people who are going to benefit from this? In theory, there could be. In theory, if you have radical price reduction, you can, you can be one of the people who take advantage of that when you buy that radically reduced price.

But so far, the prices haven't come down enough to make a condo work today for an investor. And 80% of the condo buyers are investors. You need a square foot price that's probably closer to $750 because the interest rates are higher and the property and the condo fees are higher. So yeah, it's a radical wrenching change that some people might take advantage of. Okay, so play this out for me. You've been in the industry long enough that you can probably make some safe predictions. What happens in January, February, March? How do we work our way through this crisis? Well, by the end of the spring, or even by March or April, we're going to start to see a situation happen where you're actually going to read about a whole condo tower, 250 units, 300 units, that building is one limited company by itself,

even though it might be a big builder, that building now has a phenomenal financial problem because their bank expects to be paid off and they can't form the condo corporation to pay the bank off. So it's going to be a real mess. We're going to see big headlines on this thing at some point in the spring. Yeah. So 2025 is not going to be off to a glowing start for a certain type of person. Yeah. If you own one of these condos, I was going to say when these people call,

they are juggling a decision between getting sued or having to go under greater financial stress, refinance other things, sell other things in order to close on something, they're going to lose $1,000 a month. And what are the knock-on effects going to be for the city? I have to think that the city had projections for tax revenue based on occupancy. Tax revenue is crashing. There's no development fees, other taxes. The province is going to see a radical reduction in land transfer taxes here. But most important, and this is the real crisis, every time you see a crane come down on a finished condo building,

there's no more new starts to replace it. So all those construction workers don't have anywhere to go unless they go to Alberta. Right. I didn't even think about that. My goodness. Yeah, I forgot. I mean, I remember a time where we had more cranes in the air in Toronto than anywhere else in the world. And that was a sign of high employment for construction workers.

That is changing right now. They stopped building low-rise homes like single-family and townhouses about a year ago. They just finished what they had in the system, and they quit selling them. Now it's spreading to high-rise, which is actually a bigger component of construction. I guarantee you by the end of next year, we're going to be hearing a lot about unemployment in the construction world. Ron, thank you so much. Bad news, but a great conversation. Thank you so much, Ben. Welcome back to the ben

mulrooney show and a little bit earlier i was referencing sort of the money in my pocket is i i need to use it for only the things i need i can't i don't have a lot of discretionary um ability with my budget these days and look that's it is it's absolutely true uh to a large extent uh i have been able to afford a family trip to visit my mom for Christmas. We planned this a long time ago, bought our tickets a long, long time ago. But the amount of travel that I had anticipated doing with my family, with my kids, it's been severely circumscribed. I had dreams and ambitions of showing my kids the world. And we just keep punting the ball on that because it's harder and harder to budget for those things. Life finds a way of messing with your best laid plans and budgets are what they are and the economy is what it is.

And it is what it is. But it's nice to know that I'm not alone in this. Uh, we, there's a great article in this, in the Globe and Mail called travel is a luxury these days. Is it still financially feasible for me to travel with my children? It was written by Aaron Burry, um,

Globe and Mail parenting columnist. I'm very pleased to have Aaron on the show. Thanks so much for being here. Thanks for having me, Ben. So yeah, it, it,

it, it, we're, we're all more or less feeling the same pinch and, and it doesn't feel good that you can't necessarily do the things that you thought you'd be able to do with your kids, but that doesn't mean travel is off the table. It's not off the table.

And it's funny because it's not just about the money for me. You know, of course I'm considering now that my daughter's three, I have to pay for her plane seat. It's not as easy as when she flew the money for me. You know, of course, I'm considering now that my daughter's three, I have to pay for her plane seat. It's not as easy as when she flew with me for free. I have to consider, you know, now with two kids, do I need more hotel space? There's all of those things. But there's also this niggling idea in my head, which is, is it even worth it to spend all this money to take them somewhere that they're not going to remember, right? Versus prioritizing that, you know, I went to Disney World with my mom when I was 12 and that was amazing. I remember it. She got her value out of it because it formed a core

childhood memory. And so I'm kind of in this limbo where my kids, you know, my kids are out of the age where they travel with me for free and I can just stick a baby in a stroller and go anywhere. But they're not yet at the point where they're going to form those core memories. And so I'm balancing the cost but also this idea of the phase that we're in as a family. And is it worth spending the money knowing those core memories are not being made? No, you're right. There's a pragmatic approach at a certain time in their lives where you want memories with them, and there is value in that.

But if you wait a little while, you will still have the memories with them, but they will also remember it. Absolutely. And I mean, I also just think what I enjoyed as a kid, right? A friend of mine who, you know, her and her husband is divorced, right? So they're stepkids. They took them to Europe and, you know, on this beautiful European vacation. And when they came home, you know, they asked them about the sites. And again, the thing they cited was not the Acropolis. It was the hotel pool. So how much more expensive is it to go to Universal Studios or to Europe versus going to a friend's house with a pool in the summer and actually just spending that money on you and your partner, maybe going away for a few days without the kids or going to

a nice spa. Well, and you've got some really great tips in your article. To your point, you referenced the second city trend. Why don't you tell everybody about that? Yeah, I saw this recently and I thought it was so interesting because when we make our travel wishlist, we often have the most popular city in a country. If you're going to Japan, you're going to go to Tokyo. If you're going to France, you're going to go to Paris. And the second city trend is, hey, instead of going to the most popular city, go to the second most popular. Instead of going to San Francisco, which is notoriously expensive in California, go to San Diego. Instead of going to Venice, go to Verona in Italy. Go to these off-the-beaten-path locations.

And what I love about that with kids is, as I just mentioned, I don't think your kid will really know the difference between Venice and Verona. No, you're absolutely right. And you also say that one of the biggest costs in a trip is obviously the accommodations. And yes, you said kids love the pool and they love a comfy bed. But they also just love the newness, being somewhere different. And so why not look at trading homes with somebody or something like that? Yeah, which is, I mean, listen, we're in the holiday season.

The Holiday is one of my favorite movies. And the whole premise of that movie is that Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz switch homes. And so they really just have to pay for the flight. Otherwise, they just live in the other person's home. My husband and I met a couple on our honeymoon. We stayed at their B&B, and they told us that they do this all the time. They use this platform called Home Exchange, and they have traveled all over the world by just trading out their house, which admittedly is in a place people want to go, New Zealand. But, you know, I live in Prince Edward County, and a lot of people want to visit Prince Edward County.

So it's definitely on my radar. And the other side of traveling with kids, as you know, is the gear, right? You know, I have to check if the hotel or the Airbnb has a high chair, if it has all of the things that I need. I love the idea of actually trading homes with someone who has a family in the same stage as mine so that there's toys and there's, you know, all of these things that I don't have to then go buy, rent, borrow locally on the ground or bring with me and bring seven suitcases. Oh yeah, we rented, this first time we're using one of the, it's like an Airbnb-like platform.

Never used it before. And we're renting a house in Florida for a week and it's got a beautiful pool. It's in the pictures, but I only found out last week that if I want the pool heated, it's 125 bucks a day. Wow.

Yeah, I know. You gotta read the fine print. you gotta read the fine print but uh yeah it's uh yeah so yeah if you can just trade houses with somebody i mean i don't know if i'd be able to do that aaron to be honest it's the the idea of having someone rifling through my stuff i just i don't know if i could do it well and this is the thing i mean i i don't know if i would tomorrow either but i love the idea that it's not about, you know, choosing between traveling and not traveling. It's saying, you know, my budget allows for this type of travel in 2025, right? Maybe 2025 is not the year. an international vacation with my family because, A, I do not think my children will appreciate it,

and B, it's much more expensive to travel to Europe in the summer versus maybe doing something like renting a cottage with friends locally. So I think it's about weighing the things that you're like, do I want to trade homes? You don't have to, but you also have to, something's got to give, right? So for us, that's, I'm not getting on a plane with my kids next year because it's expensive. And because of the logistics, I'd much rather do a road trip, you know, a couple hours away, share some costs with some friends, keep it simpler and invest in those core memory trips when my kids are old enough to appreciate what I've had time to save. I think you're right, but I think it's also important for parents to remember to not be so hard on themselves

if they're not living up to the expectations that they put on themselves. Like I was telling off the top of the segment, I really did imagine taking my kids all over the world, gallivanting around and having these world tours. They have not yet materialized. And I've been a little disappointed in myself that I haven't been able to provide those things for my kids. But I think they'll come in the future

and we'll find different ways to do that. And your column really puts, it makes me feel better that if I just think a little more creatively and if I'm a little more patient, then we'll get real value out of every trip that we take in the future. Well, and Ben, I saw a meme before I had kids, which now hits home, which is traveling with kids is a trip. It's not a vacation, which I'm sure you can identify with. So it's also this idea that, you know, my husband and I went to a friend's wedding in Morocco in September, and we left our kids at home. And we're lucky that we had family that could watch them. But we invested in taking ourselves

on an international vacation. It was cheaper because we didn't have to bring the kids with us. And so maybe that's not feasible. But my point is, if what you really want is a vacation, I don't know that traveling with your kids is going to do it for you. You're absolutely right. Hey, thank you so much for being here, Erin Burry from the Global Male

Parenting Columnist. The article is, travel is a luxury these days. Is it still financially feasible for me to travel with my children? It's a really great read. Thank you so much, and I hope you have a happy holiday season. You too. Thanks, Ben. Thanks for listening to the podcast. We hope you enjoyed it, and I hope you have a Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and we'll see you soon.