February 19, 2025 • 35 mins
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In this episode, Bekim is joined by Benjy Katchen. Benjy is the Co-Founder & CEO of Wahi Real Estate from Toronto, Ontario. Previously revolutionizing the banking sector at President's Choice Financial and Founding Oaken Financial at HomeTrust, Benjy brings 20 years of experience in creating customer-centric digital solutions to Wahi, a digital real estate platform & brokerage that helps consumers have a better experience when searching and buying a property. Wahi is the winner of multiple awards including Canadian Business Innovator in 2023 and 2024 and Inman Top AI Real Estate Startups in 2024.
Benjy is here to discuss: → His history of innovation for consumers, what surprised him about the real estate industry, and building a talented team. → What Wahi means, what you need to think about when building tech, and what consumers want. → Market predictions, the market's driving factors, and advice for consumers in this market.
Wahi Real Estate Website: www.wahi.com
Wahi Real Estate Instagram: @wahi.realestate
Wahi Real Estate LinkedIn: @WahiRealEstate
Benjy Katchan's LinkedIn: @BenjyKatchen
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of Lending Thoughts,
(00:02):
sponsored by Rocket Pro.
Today, I'll be joined by Benji
Katchen.
Benji is the CEO and founder of
Wahi, a digital real estateplatform and real estate
brokerage, which helps consumershave a better experience when
searching and ultimately buying aproperty.
Benji does an awesome job tellingus about the market and how he
(00:25):
sees it with his marketpredictions.
We talk about what the name Wahieven means, and we get into
technology and why you shouldn'tjust build technology for
technology's sake, but ratherfocus on the consumer experience.
So have a listen in, and thank youagain.
Benji, thanks for being on with metoday.
I appreciate you.
(00:49):
Great.
Thanks for having me.
So I've had the privilege of
having many conversations withyou.
Would love for people to get toknow you a little bit more.
Can you tell us your life story in60 seconds or less, please?
60 seconds is short, seconds isshort, but keen, but I'm going to
try.
I was born and raised in Calgary,
so I'm a native Albertan.
However, I spent the last 30 years
in Ontario.
Career -wise, I've really spent
the last 20 years innovating.
(01:10):
For consumers, first in banking
and now in real estate.
I have two daughters and an
amazing wife.
And my three big passions outside
of work are travel.
I love taking our family on very
cool trips to places like Japan orIsrael or France.
I love playing tennis and I'm anavid skier.
Very interesting.
Where do I start?
(01:31):
So what's a favorite place thatyou've ever traveled?
There are so many.
are so many.
That's a tough one.
I love Japan and Asia.
I love anywhere on theMediterranean for the food.
And I spent some time when I wasmuch younger living in Mexico, and
I definitely love Mexico for theculture.
Very interesting.
And I love how simply you boil
down 20 -ish or so years, if I'mnot mistaken, of banking,
(01:52):
entrepreneurship, et cetera, intothe way that you did it.
But I'm going to force you to go alittle bit deeper.
So what was banking life like?I mean, if I'm not mistaken,
worked at multiple banks, haveinnovated in... side of them
before you went and startedinnovating externally.
What does innovating at a bank inCanada even mean?
One of the early careeropportunities I had was I worked
(02:13):
at Amicus Bank, which went tomarket as President's Choice
Financial.
Folks would now know it as simply
financial.
And at the time, in the early
2000s, that was a fintech beforeanybody knew the term.
FinTech.
It was a banking business that was
going up against the big guys.
It had a million customers.
It had a category killer valueproposition.
(02:33):
And everything we did, we livedand breathed, was about innovating
for the customer.
It was creating a in the palm of
your hand digital first experiencejust while the banks were getting
their feet wet with.
digital and internet.
It was creating an omni -channelexperience.
So helping customers bank whenthey want, where they want, how
they want.
(02:53):
And it was cutting out all the
unnecessary bureaucracy that oftengoverns banking relationships.
So it was a very cool experiencein that we got to really go and
innovate against the status quo,innovate.
for the consumers and createseveral new and distinct products
and services through this.
So that was very cool.
I took that experience and I won'tget into every detail along the
(03:15):
way, but one of the things that Ihad the opportunity to do a little
over 10 years ago was I joinedHomeTrust.
And obviously HomeTrust is prettybig in the broker community and
the mortgage community.
They at the time wanted to start a
consumer banking business, adirect -to -consumer banking.
Prior to that, the whole ethos wasabout brokered deposits through
(03:35):
financial planners.
through wealth advisors, et
cetera, to fund mortgages that aresold through mortgage brokers.
They had never done anything wherethey had gone direct -to
-consumer.
And I had spent my whole career
building and growing direct -to-consumer businesses.
And they offered me a platform tobuild that.
We called it Oaken Financial.
(03:55):
And Oaken Financial, over the
ensuing 10 years, became a bigpart of home trust funding.
It became a $5 billion depositbusiness in its own right by the
time I left to start Wahee threeyears ago.
Gotcha.
So your job is essentially
responsible for bringing in thosedirect -to -consumer deposits,
which then can be lent out throughthe... the mortgage business.
Is that correct?Sure.
But it's even more than that.
To bring in a deposit, people
don't just back a truck up to thebank and bring in their deposits.
(04:18):
It's actually a business in itsown right.
So you actually have to create acategory killer value proposition
for those customers.
There's different customers than
the mortgage customers.
Somebody who needs a loan is
probably a bit younger in age orthey're running a business.
People who tend to have depositsthey bring to the bank tend to be
a little older and wanting to takeless risk or have a balanced
portfolio.
versus the stock market.
But you have to build a businessfor them.
(04:40):
And that's really what Ispecialize doing is finding that
value proposition and then weavingtogether an amazing digital plus
in -person experience involving acustomer and the bank in order to
create that as a, you could argue,almost a standalone business in
its own right.
Yeah, that's interesting because
it's both product and experience.
It's effectively the entire go -to
-market.
A hundred percent.
Who are we going after and what dothey want?
Right.
And it's also the service delivery
(05:02):
model because you have to be ableto do it in an efficient digital
first way.
The consumer today.
So even though, for instance,Okun's customers, they tended to
be above 60.
There were customers.
that were 80, 90.
We even had a couple of customers
that were 100.
And the conventional wisdom at the
time is, oh, anybody over 60, youknow, they want a branch or they
want their wealth advisor to guidethem every step of the way, or
(05:24):
they're not going to be using amobile app.
not And what we found is if you'vebuilt technology, not for
technology's sake, but you buildit in the pursuit of servicing the
clients and what their needs are,we're past the tipping point.
Canadians of All generations andall ages expect to be served how
they want to be served.
And that includes great digital
and mobile experiences.
And in banking, which involves
(05:44):
trust and very much like realestate, which is the business that
I lead today, is really abouttrust.
It's equally about that humanconnection as well.
So it's that great service modelthat involves amazing tech and
amazing humans in the pursuit ofservice excellence.
You know, it brought me back justnow to something that I think the
year was roughly 2012, 13.
(06:04):
And I remember, you know, working
on some go -to -market stuff foranother product.
And we were doing some research onFacebook and, you know, users
there.
And I think that at the time, the
average user was something like 58years old.
And there was this idea that like,you know, hey, you know,
technology and, you know, who arewe going after a bunch of like,
(06:25):
you know, teenagers?And it's like, nope.
The average user was actually 58.
It was actually, you know, your
mom, my mom, whatever, right?Who were the people who were using
this and actually interacting withit, which is interesting.
You know, COVID was an interestingexperiment for all the negatives.
Sure, 100%.
Told us who was like, you know.
being digital at first, or atleast being digitally comfortable
to build around.
So that's a really interesting
experience.
And then you said you basically
(06:46):
take those learnings and then youtake them to a separate business
in Wahee.
So what's sort of the founding
story of Wahee?And then maybe what is Wahee
exactly?100%.
Told Well, why don't we start withthe name Wahee?
What is Wahee?Where is Wahee?
I think it's a very, very coolname.
But what we ultimately set out todo was to build the...
Next generation of real estatebusiness for how today's
homebuyers want to transact.
And if we take a step back, almost
(07:08):
every other industry has beenaffected by digitization.
You know, whether it's how youbook your trips, how you apply for
your mortgage, how you even lookup the balance of the mortgage,
how we order our food.
Yeah, how you order your food, how
you order your Airbnb, your Uber.
You know, we sort of lose track
that everything we do now is inthe palm of your hand.
how you order your food, how youorder But yet we rely on this
(07:29):
individual, all -knowing expertthat has all the information when
we make the biggest purchase orsale of our lives, which is our
house.
And we set out to say, well, how
can we give two things, controlback to consumers for this biggest
purchase, but also amp up thelevel of expertise of the people
giving advice with betterinformation and tools at their
(07:50):
fingertips to help thoseconsumers.
So we set out to create Canada'snext.
great property tech platform,which is Wahee.
And we come back to why Wahee?What is Wahee?
And what we wanted was a name thatreally was a unique digital name,
but was based on something aboutthe house.
The house is the place where, youknow, people grow their families.
It's a place where Canadiansreally value more than anything.
And Wahee means... place inhawaiian and we had a moment when
(08:13):
we heard this name for the firsttime and we said yeah we're going
to call it wahi so it's a bitunique and different but also it's
all about the house it's all aboutthe sense of place all about the
house it's all about the sense ofplace Yeah, I'm a curious
individual.
So I Googled it right when I heard
(08:33):
about you guys.
I'm like, what the heck is a Y?
Initially, I thought it was maybean acronym for something, right?
And I'm like, sitting there, youknow, mapping it back to my brain,
trying to figure out what the Wcould be and the A. And I couldn't
(08:54):
get there.
I have to Google this.
And then I realized what it was.
And I go, that makes total sense.
Yeah, 100%.
And then we learned later after we
named it.
people started coming up to us and
said, oh, it means revelation inArabic.
I'm like, okay, well, it could berevelation.
Or there's all these othermeanings ascribed to it.
But really, it's about the senseof place, which is what we're
creating.
Yeah, I love that.
So what are you creating?What are you learning now?
(09:14):
I mean, obviously, you go tomarket, you have an initial
hypothesis for how you could serveconsumers and what consumers are
looking for.
Are there... any of your original
assumptions that did not prove tobe true and you know to the flip
side of that are there some thingsthat you did not give much thought
through that are now likeridiculously clear after three
years four years of you knowconsumer data because i guess one
of the advantages of being adigital platform is as opposed to
the individual realtor who's outon the street that may not have
(09:36):
all the data to back them up likeyou guys can create data and
create fresh data really throughconsumer behavior through the app.
So what's that telling you?Sure.
One of our original hypothesis wasthat we had to build the best app
to be in the palm of the hands ofthe consumer.
had to build the best app to be inthe palm of the hands of the
consumer.
And we started building the
(09:57):
company saying, we're going tobuild that best app.
And we had some ideas of what thebest app was, where we were a
little fuzzier in our thinking wasexactly what is the value
proposition that is going to makeconsumers say, hey, rather than
transacting with my best friend'ssister's cousin, who's a realtor,
which is typically the wayCanadians find their realtor
today.
What's going to make them say,
maybe like that realtor, she'sokay, but maybe I would be better
served if I used a realtorassociated with Wahey in some way,
(10:20):
because they could do somethingfor me.
And at the beginning, we thoughtthat that something might be
better insight, better controlover the experience, better
digital tools.
But what really got the business
to take off is when we launchedCashback.
It was putting a bit more money inpeople's pockets for buyers.
And what we quickly figured outwas that the technology that we
built wasn't just better for theconsumer being more informed, more
in control, being able to bookthings online so they could keep
track, doing multi -directionalchats.
(10:41):
So they had all their chats andtheir listings and other journeys
and everything organized.
but that actually it was making
the realtors better realtors.
And we had a number of realtors
that are part of Wahee, part ofthe brokerage.
They're Wahee realtors.
And we have a national marketplace
of realtors as well.
(11:01):
We've got 250 or so realtors
across the country, and many ofthem are using the tool.
And we're finding that it'sactually making them better
realtors.
They're able to find customers of
the house faster.
They're able to move their leads
through the funnel at a rate thatthey've never seen before.
And they're able to close agreater percentage of those leads.
(11:22):
And what we learned through thisprocess was that by making these
realtors better realtors, they'renot just two or three times more
efficient than a traditionalrealtor, but they're 10x more
efficient.
And in being 10x more efficient,
we could afford to give customerssome cash back and we would all
win.
The customer would win, the
realtor would win, and we wouldwin in the process.
(11:43):
And I really believe in win -winsituations where you're not doing
something at the expense of theconsumer or the realtor, but
you're doing something where yougrow the pie for everybody.
And that's really what we learnedthrough this process.
It's interesting because, yeah, Ithink most would tell you like,
hey, I want better service, butI'm not willing to give up a whole
bunch of value and money as partof the transaction to get it.
(12:04):
consumers are thinking, okay, notonly do I want cash back, that's
fantastic.
I still want the same great
service, if not better service indoing that.
And so you got to like go out andactually deliver a superior
experience than they would havegotten for, I think it was, you
said like, you know, sisters,cousins, cousin, or something like
that, like that third connection.
So a hundred percent.
(12:24):
like that third connection.
So a hundred percent.
And that's one of the things Ilearned at digital banking was,
you know, there was thisconventional wisdom at the time,
20 years ago, that customersneeded the branch and that maybe
if they used the internet channelor an app it would be at the
expense of the branch or somethinglike that actually customers want
is they want everything to workand they don't want to really
think about how it works they justwant it to be better and by
(12:47):
creating better digital toolsWe're able to have customers say,
OK, that builds trust because itjust works.
It builds trust with the customer,which then allows you to innovate
value propositions on top of thatthat create the value, which
convinces them to actually giveyou a try in the first place.
And we found that that samethinking is true here in real
estate, that you have to actuallyhave not just the better tools.
That's great, but that's tablestakes.
One of the things about realestate, though, is unlike many
(13:07):
industries, and you'll obviouslyfind this as well in the mortgage
space, is.
It's a very infrequent
transaction.
Your mortgage might be every three
to five years as you renew it.
But actually buying or selling a
home is something people only dofour or five, six times in their
life.
It's an average of every seven
years in Canada.
And oftentimes, as we've been
targeting first -time homebuyersfor the first couple of years, you
(13:28):
don't know what you don't know.
So you're going into this
thinking, OK, well, this is howeverybody does it.
So you actually have to dosomething radically better to have
consumers question conventionalwisdom and say, OK, I'm actually
going to try this.
And for us, it's great that they
try the app and they use it, butit costs a lot of money to put all
of the technological capabilitiesand all the data acquisition into
(13:48):
this app.
So we also need to be able to
monetize that in a way.
And that's where the value
proposition comes in and isequally important to this.
important to this.
Yeah, it's interesting what you
said in that the transaction is soinfrequent that people might not
even remember how much the lastone sucked.
They might have done their lasthousing transaction 10 years ago
when they bought their... previoushome.
It might've been terrible.
(14:10):
I've experienced that too.
You know, even on the mortgageside, we're like, we're over here,
like we know what a great mortgageexperience looks like.
And we'll look back and we'llremember a client or something
like that.
Like, Ooh, that last one was
really rough.
We ended up closing on the
mortgage, but it was like uglyright up until the last second.
And we're like, that client'snever going to work with us again.
(14:30):
They'll come back to us three tofive years later.
They'd be like, hey, so excited towork with you guys again.
You know, it's time to take a lookat that renewal.
We're like, whoa, didn't youremember how bad it was?
They don't sometimes.
And they have no baseline to
compare it to.
And they have no baseline to
compare it to.
So they don't know if it would
have even been worse somewhereelse.
And consequently, when it's great.
it They're like, that was good.
(14:51):
Yeah.
They just take it for granted.
Okay.
I got my mortgage.
I now owe you money for the next25 years.
That's great.
Yeah, exactly.
Thanks for the bill.
So, you know, trying to create
that consistency across theexperience, it sounds like what
you guys are doing is trying tomarry that, you know, what we
would call like an old fashionedhandheld approach through a real
estate agent, which clients stilllove, but enhancing that human
(15:12):
being experience with.
technology rather than a full
technology replacement for thehuman experience.
Am I understanding that correctly?That's exactly right.
I don't believe that customers areever, don't believe that customers
are ever, or maybe it's just avery rare customer that would do
this, but the general mainstreamcustomer is ever going to want or
expect.
a one -click Amazon experience,
like buy my house now and justsend me the bill a million dollars
and the mortgage is going to besigned up.
I think customers want to takecontrol of the situation, but
buying a house is a very, veryinvolved experience.
It involves often a lot of humanemotion.
(15:34):
We believe that we should add somedata and consistency to add a
little bit of rationality.
to that as well so that we can
balance both that emotional aspectof buying where you're really
going to live, where you're goingto raise your family, where you're
going to sleep, where you're goingto, you know, maybe work with
ensuring that it's done in a sane,rational way that it's purchased
at a price that's fair for boththe buyer and the seller.
It's done.
for buyers with eyes wide open so
(15:55):
they're not risking their family'sfuture by not putting the
appropriate conditions on an offerand making sure that they do an
inspection so they go in eyes wideopen knowing what they're getting
into, et cetera.
There's a lot of things here that
are a little bit complex andintricate.
And it's one thing to go buy thatbook or cord to charge your laptop
(16:17):
with one click on Amazon.
But I think the house, just like
the mortgage, is a much moreintricate experience that...
should be put onto steroids, forlack of a better word, with better
user experience, better appdesign, better data, better
information, and ultimately betteradvice using all of that.
using all of that.
I think you said it.
It's just such a big transaction.
(16:37):
It evokes so much fear from
people.
In the data that we've gathered
and the surveys that we've run,clients actually aren't as
concerned with the how.
They care more about the what.
And what I mean by that is whenthey're thinking about the
mortgage transaction, the realestate transaction, as a whole and
we start selling all of our valuepropositions that we're like
(16:58):
deeply proud of over here like webuilt this we built that we built
it clients are like yeah i don'treally care i just want the most
certainty that i can get throughthis very stressful period of my
life.
So I need to know that this
mortgage is clear to close andthat the real estate transaction
is going to go through as plannedwithout an entire mess.
So like whatever you need to do,Benji and became in the team to
(17:22):
like figure that out is whateveryou need to make happen.
I don't want a whole bunch ofbumps in the road.
I don't want to be within 24 hoursof my signing date wondering, is
this going to happen?Is this not going to happen?
I just want to know, like, as soonas I give you what you tell me you
need.
You check the boxes.
I get a whole bunch of green boxessaying that we're good to go and
(17:45):
that it actually gets deliveredon, period.
And we always come back to thisword, which is certainty.
Clients want certainty.
100%.
I'm sure they would notice if forwhatever reason there wasn't
certainty.
You know, it's the same thing with
technology.
In my career, I found many firms
pursue technology for technology'ssake.
But technology exists as a meansto an end.
So in your case, it could be aboutcertainty.
And in some cases, technology isthe best way to get there.
(18:06):
In other cases, it's human processis the best way to get there.
And I think it's important to notlose sight on what is the end
goal, which in your case iscertainty.
Yeah, that's awesome.
So what's interesting is, you
know, you've talked about yourselfbeing a platform, but you've also
talked about yourself being a realestate brokerage network in a way.
Who are the types of real estateagents that Awahi would work with
as a part of its network to makesure that it's delivering that
(18:28):
type of client experience that youguys are after?
That's actually a reallyinteresting question, actually a
really interesting question,Bakim.
We've done a lot of work todetermine what makes a great And
certainly there's certain aspectsjust about the charisma, being a
good listener and empathetic andreally understanding customers'
needs and putting those intoaction.
But there's also some foundationalskills that we've correlated.
And we've done a lot of datascience and analysis around this,
analyzing many, many listings, forexample.
And there's some skills aboutputting together, you know, it may
(18:49):
sound like it's bread and butter,but it's putting together a great
listing.
Ensuring that there's great photos
that market the property and thatthey're done with a proper
resolution so that they show thebest.
Having a sense to ensure that theplace shows well through whether
it's a bit of repair or staging,etc. It's not necessarily do
complex analytics themselves, butto understand the analytics as
presented.
One of the products that we've
built, I believe, is Canada'sbest.
digital current market assessmentit's not publicly available on the
(19:12):
site but it's a tool that weenable all our realtors to use
where we can essentially structureall the information to help have a
very very data -driven pricingconversation with customers it's
the ability to take that and lookat what we come up with and really
add their own two cents to it arewe looking at the right comparable
properties to the subject propertyAre the puts and takes on
valuation accurate?We have a view using our machine
(19:33):
learning that that plus den on thetwo -bedroom condo adds an extra
$30 ,000 of value to the unitversus the other subject property
that doesn't have it or theparking spot's worth X dollars.
We have a point of view on that,but they have to be able to take
that and understand the dataenough and understand the market
enough to be able to turn thatinto empathetic advice for the
customers.
And it's a lot of things that we
ask to be a... great realtor, butthat's really what the full
(19:56):
package entails.
And we've been pretty successful
at recruiting a number of thoserealtors inside our brokerage.
We have a number of them that arealso independent contractors that
do some of the tours and thingsfor us, plus have their own
listings with Wahee.
And then there's this network of
marketplace realtors.
There's about 250 of them we co
-advise with, and we're reallylooking.
(20:17):
for those characteristics.
And that's what they all bring
together is that combination ofcharacteristics of a great empathy
as demonstrated through variousreviews, as well as the ability to
structure the advice, prepare goodlistings through analyzing the
listings, et cetera.
Yeah.
So you guys are putting a lot ofenergy then into making sure that
(20:41):
you have the right real estateagents inside of that network.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
This isn't just, just, you know,John said this person is good.
We're actually going and reallydoing our own due diligence and
using our own tools to evaluate.
Yeah.
I mean, it also means it's notgrowth at any cost.
It's client experience at anycost.
(21:02):
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
We're very client experiencedriven is what I would say.
Yeah.
With that said, I mean, you know,
kind of going back to something wewere talking about earlier, but is
there anything that has surprisedyou over the last couple of years
that maybe, you know, today, andI'm sure there's a lot that you
know today that you didn't know,you know, before you started
(21:24):
Wahee, but is there anything thatlike truly was surprising that
maybe you were just fully off onbefore you got going that now you.
look back and like, wow, I wish Iknew that?
You know, I think the biggestsurprise to me, which with 2020
hindsight should have beenobvious, but it's just how long it
often takes for a customer or acouple to find their dream home.
You know, I come from industrieswhere when Somebody calls you or
sends an email saying, hey, I wantto maybe come in to talk to you
(21:48):
about this, take the bankingindustry.
I want to maybe open up a GIC orsomething.
From first click to transactioncould be a matter of minutes in
the shortest case, or at the most,it's a week.
It's like maybe they want to comein and chat, but it's a week.
What has been one of the sort ofstrangest things for me to adapt
to as I come into this real estateindustry is it could be a two or
(22:13):
three year experience for somebodybuying a house.
quarter of 2024, for example, wewere finding houses from customers
that we had found at the beginningof 2023.
And we've been working with them,talking to them, waiting for the
right house to become availablefor sale, ensuring they go on a
tour, maybe losing an offer or twobecause some of the conditions
weren't met in terms ofinspection, or they weren't able
to get it quite at the price thatthey could afford.
(22:34):
And it's a very long journey.
to get to that.
So I think that would be thebiggest thing.
The other thing that's surprisingfor me coming from banking is the
transactional nature of thisbusiness.
In your business, in mortgages,it's transactional in that you get
the mortgage, but the mortgage iswith you for the duration.
And then presumably everybody atRocket wants to get the renewal or
refinance.
And when you get a customer, it
could potentially be a 25, 30-year relationship.
(22:55):
In our business, it could be twoyears to get to a transaction.
And then even after thetransaction, we're not old enough
that we figured this out yet.
I don't know how it's going to
play out.
I want to make sure that we set
the stage to play out.
But we want to engage those
customers for many more years.
So seven years later, when they're
willing to upsize or downsize orlife events happen to them, that
(23:19):
we're one of the first people theyconsider, if not the place they
consider to be their real estateagent.
So that, I think, are the twothings that were maybe obvious
with 2020 hindsight, but took alittle bit of getting used to as I
migrated to this industry.
Yeah, I love the concept of the
three R's, which is something wetalk a lot about in our team,
(23:40):
which the three R's stand forreview, refer, return.
So if you're looking for guidingmetrics, you know, you probably
could or should start there.
Again, we're a little further
along in the journey, but.
Sure.
five years right now.
And then that's some of the things
that we're looking at is likethose three R's is like, can we
make those three things happen?Those are high indicators in our
experience of a really qualityexperience and delivery on the
(24:01):
first transaction.
Because like you said, I mean, if
you are going out and you areacquiring clients net new with
every single transaction over thenext 15, 20, 25 years, you can
have a tough time making it.
You really want to create repeats,
referrals, all those things,right?
A hundred percent.
So we're thinking about that the
same way.
I'm going to ask you a market
question.
I don't want you to like go, you
(24:23):
know, feel like you need to beNostradamus because who the heck
knows what's going to happen in2025.
There's so many macro factors thatdrive real estate and the hardest
one to measure is usually justsentiment.
So what are you seeing right nowin terms of user behavior on the
application as well as with yourreal estate agents in the buying
market right now?Are we in a good real estate year
(24:43):
in 2025?Or do we still need to contend
with some headwinds here?So if you were to ask me prior to
Trump's tariff announcement, Iwould say we're looking for a much
stronger 2025 than 2024 or even2023.
I think 2024 is a very difficultyear and it followed another
difficult year in 2023 as themarket normalized post -COVID.
I would say the activity levelswe've seen over the last six to
eight weeks have been verypositive for the year.
Typically, the winter monthsaren't big transaction months in
(25:05):
real estate, but they're monthswhere serious buyers and sellers
get prepared.
They get prepared to list in March
or April or May.
They get their ducks in a row, so
to speak, to ensure they havefinancing lined up.
They start getting educated on themarket in the wintertime so that
they can jump when housinginventory grows.
And we're absolutely seeing thosetrends.
Right now, so far, they haven'tslowed down.
The big million dollar questionthat we all ask is what happens to
interest rates and what happenswith Trump tariffs?
(25:29):
And I think that those twoquestions are related.
And I guess the only time willtell what actually happens.
I think Yeah.
So when we think about the
interconnectedness of those twothings, is it to say that if the
tariffs happen, is likely topotentially pause rates or force
us to go back up in rates?protect the Canadian dollar
against the U .S.
dollar?
Like, is that the conclusion?Sorry, I'm going to pull you back
(25:51):
to your bank days to like ask youto play economist here.
But, you know, the U .S.
Federal Reserve has two jobs,
which is full employment and pricestability, i .e.
lack of inflation.
Canadian Central Bank, their
mandate is only one job.
And that's price stability, so
lack of inflation.
So if the tariffs prove to be
inflationary on one hand, thenthat would imply higher interest
rates.
The flip side, though, is even if
(26:12):
they're inflationary today, ifthey lead to unemployment, that's
disinflationary.
So I don't know where it will all
play out.
I'm not an economist and I haven't
gamed it all the way through, butwe shall see.
shall see.
I mean, it should be very
interesting just given the factthat there are so many factors
playing against one another.
And interest rates basically, like
(26:32):
you said, from a stabilitystandpoint for at least, you know,
the last couple of decades havebeen proven to be a good driver,
if you will, or a good controlmechanism for keeping things a bit
stable.
But we're... enter a new territory
so i appreciate you uh we haven'tseen this territory with tariffs
since the smooth holly act in 1929or 1930 so what's the expression
(26:54):
that history doesn't repeat itselfbut it often rhymes and i think
we're in for one of thosesituations right now where it
might rhyme a little bit so weshall see so if i'm a consumer how
do i you uh we haven't seen thisterritory with tariffs since the
smooth holly act in 1929 or 1930so what's the expression that
(27:15):
history doesn't repeat itself butit often rhymes and i think we're
in for one of those situationsright now where it might rhyme a
little bit so we shall see the ifi'm a consumer how do i treat that
information to make the best realestate decision as I look forward.
I've been floating around themarket here for a couple of years.
I want to buy a home.
I don't know if it's the right
(27:36):
time, but I've been waiting since2017, 18, 19, 20.
Here we go.
Is this going to be the right
time?It seems like it's never the right
time, but in hindsight, it wasalways the right time.
What do I do with that informationand how do I use it to my
advantage to make a real estatedecision?
Sure.
I don't think that if you have
five economists in the room,you're going to have five opinions
(27:56):
as to what's going to happen inthe next five years and what the
right time is.
So you almost have to discount
that information.
I'm not saying bury your head in
the sand, but I think you have tofocus on a couple of things.
What's your own individualsituation to make sure that you
can afford what you're buying?You're buying something in your
price range and that youpersonally can survive a little
bit of a shock.
(28:16):
It might sound like motherhood and
apple pie, but you should have anemergency fund.
can get you by if you, for somereason, lose your job and you've
got to spend a little bit of timelooking for a job or there's a
personal situation that happens.
But as long as you buy something
that's within your affordability,you know, there's never the
perfect time.
But as you said, in hindsight, if
(28:38):
you're going to own that house for10 years and you're a first -time
buyer, I'm sure you're going tolook back at 10 years and say,
okay.
You know what?
That was the right thing to do.
Whether prices go up, whether they
stay flat, at the very least, it'sa forced saving mechanism.
It's a place that you can callhome, raise your family, do your
work, live life.
(28:58):
I'm not one of those people that
says buy now or you're going toeat cat food when you're old age
or something like that.
I'm not one of those people that
says just buy, buy, buy.
But at the same time, I do believe
that you have to live your life.
And you may want to wait till
there's a little bit moremacroeconomic clarity.
But then even when there'smacroeconomic clarity, you can't
predict that.
Like who would have predicted
COVID?You know, you could be in the most
stable time, but then COVIDhappens.
So life is unpredictable.
You know, get your own house in
order, so to speak.
Make sure you can afford what
you're buying and go live yourlife.
(29:19):
Including if home ownership is inyour dreams.
Get your own house in order may bea brand slogan that I just haven't
given enough thought to.
I'm going to pull that one away.
That's great advice.
I mean, the question that I've
always tried to think through whenI'm talking to friends and family,
it's, you know, hey, I can't tellyou what's going to happen over
the next 12, 24, 36 months, but Ican make an accurate prediction
probably.
Like you said, you know, history
(29:40):
doesn't always repeat itself, butit rhymes.
real estate is likely to raise invalue over the next 30 years.
I think that's a pretty accurateprediction.
think that's a pretty accurateprediction.
And it's the same with the stockmarket, right?
Like people ask you, oh, whatstock should I pick?
Should I buy Tesla?Should I buy this?
I would never give anybody thatadvice.
I'd say, don't put all your eggsin one basket.
And it's time in the market, nottiming the market.
I don't know if you've heard thatone before, but if you've got time
(30:00):
in the market, then that's likelygoing to sort itself over a long
period of time.
Right.
Because if the stock market andthe real estate market go down
over the next 30 years, we're allin serious trouble.
So that long -term advice is theview that I recommend as well.
So I much appreciate that.
I'm curious.
I mean, you've done some amazingthings, Benji, for anyone who has
not used the Wahee app andexperienced with the Wahee app.
(30:22):
brings to the market.
I highly recommend it.
I'm using myself.
I'm always poking around on there.
Very cool.
Thank you.
And we appreciate the partnership.
So as you think forward now, I
mean, you guys are building,growing, developing your consumer
experience, developing a lot ofnew learning.
And you said yourself, you know,in some ways, like you're learning
and developing as an individual aswell and figuring out how to drive
that.
How do you envision the rest of
your career that, you know, theexperience with Wahee and
(30:43):
ultimately the legacy and impactthat you want to create as you
look forward?Well, that's quite the question.
I can't say that this is my lastact, so I'm not quite on the
legacy question yet.
What I would say is one of the
things I'm proud of is growingsome amazing teams.
And I've had the honor to workwith several really, really
talented individuals over time.
And what I'm most proud of.
at Wahee in my current situationis that we've built a stable of
extremely talented leaders.
And that allows several things to
(31:03):
happen.
One, it's a team to create this.
It's not just me.
Number one.
Number two, we get the best ideasfrom having the diverse
perspectives.
And three, I'm not a micromanager.
So, you know, I can go take mydaughter skiing for a few days.
And, you know, there's severalpeople here that can continue
driving the day -to -dayoperations, the customer
experience, the innovation thatallows me not to take a step back
because I really am, and I believethat I'm in founder's mode, for
(31:24):
lack of a better word, butfounder's mode without
micromanaging at the pursuit ofexcellence for the customers and
the realtors and for innovation.
And those are some of the things
that I'm really particularly proudof and I really love spending my
time doing.
I love to hear that.
And I've been through that.
I know what it's like to... you
know, build from zero and be inthe spot where you're doing every
single thing and then developsystems and processes and human
(31:45):
beings around you.
Take a step back and see it.
And it goes.
Oh, it's working.
I know.
It's like giving birth to another
baby.
Really?
Yeah.
Yeah.
They're like standing on their ownand you see them like walking and
like, they're walking on theirown.
No, I don't have to hold themanymore.
And you know, they're off toschool.
It is an amazing experience.
I mean, a company is like a
living, breathing thing andwatching it grow and then seeing
(32:05):
yourself develop through that andhaving the ability to, you know,
step back and be proud of it.
That's impacted itself.
So I appreciate you sharing that.
perspective and the fact that
you've been able to build that andcontinue to build that is an
awesome inspiration for us all.
So Benji, thank you much for being
on here with me.
Also, thank you for the
partnership.
And again, if you have not checked
(32:26):
out Wahee, please go check out theapp.
It is incredible and it is amongthe best in the market that I have
seen.
And this is coming from an
American who's seen the otherside, come to Canada, seen this
side.
You guys are just doing some
awesome stuff.
So keep it up.
Perfect.
Thanks very much, Vakim.
Thanks for having me.
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of Lending Thoughts,
(00:02):
sponsored by Rocket Pro.
Today, I'll be joined by Benji
Katchen.
Benji is the CEO and founder of
Wahi, a digital real estateplatform and real estate
brokerage, which helps consumershave a better experience when
searching and ultimately buying aproperty.
Benji does an awesome job tellingus about the market and how he
(00:25):
sees it with his marketpredictions.
We talk about what the name Wahieven means, and we get into
technology and why you shouldn'tjust build technology for
technology's sake, but ratherfocus on the consumer experience.
So have a listen in, and thank youagain.
Benji, thanks for being on with metoday.
I appreciate you.
(00:49):
Great.
Thanks for having me.
So I've had the privilege of
having many conversations withyou.
Would love for people to get toknow you a little bit more.
Can you tell us your life story in60 seconds or less, please?
60 seconds is short, seconds isshort, but keen, but I'm going to
try.
I was born and raised in Calgary,
so I'm a native Albertan.
However, I spent the last 30 years
in Ontario.
Career -wise, I've really spent
the last 20 years innovating.
(01:10):
For consumers, first in banking
and now in real estate.
I have two daughters and an
amazing wife.
And my three big passions outside
of work are travel.
I love taking our family on very
cool trips to places like Japan orIsrael or France.
I love playing tennis and I'm anavid skier.
Very interesting.
Where do I start?
(01:31):
So what's a favorite place thatyou've ever traveled?
There are so many.
are so many.
That's a tough one.
I love Japan and Asia.
I love anywhere on theMediterranean for the food.
And I spent some time when I wasmuch younger living in Mexico, and
I definitely love Mexico for theculture.
Very interesting.
And I love how simply you boil
down 20 -ish or so years, if I'mnot mistaken, of banking,
(01:52):
entrepreneurship, et cetera, intothe way that you did it.
But I'm going to force you to go alittle bit deeper.
So what was banking life like?I mean, if I'm not mistaken,
worked at multiple banks, haveinnovated in... side of them
before you went and startedinnovating externally.
What does innovating at a bank inCanada even mean?
One of the early careeropportunities I had was I worked
(02:13):
at Amicus Bank, which went tomarket as President's Choice
Financial.
Folks would now know it as simply
financial.
And at the time, in the early
2000s, that was a fintech beforeanybody knew the term.
FinTech.
It was a banking business that was
going up against the big guys.
It had a million customers.
It had a category killer valueproposition.
(02:33):
And everything we did, we livedand breathed, was about innovating
for the customer.
It was creating a in the palm of
your hand digital first experiencejust while the banks were getting
their feet wet with.
digital and internet.
It was creating an omni -channelexperience.
So helping customers bank whenthey want, where they want, how
they want.
(02:53):
And it was cutting out all the
unnecessary bureaucracy that oftengoverns banking relationships.
So it was a very cool experiencein that we got to really go and
innovate against the status quo,innovate.
for the consumers and createseveral new and distinct products
and services through this.
So that was very cool.
I took that experience and I won'tget into every detail along the
(03:15):
way, but one of the things that Ihad the opportunity to do a little
over 10 years ago was I joinedHomeTrust.
And obviously HomeTrust is prettybig in the broker community and
the mortgage community.
They at the time wanted to start a
consumer banking business, adirect -to -consumer banking.
Prior to that, the whole ethos wasabout brokered deposits through
(03:35):
financial planners.
through wealth advisors, et
cetera, to fund mortgages that aresold through mortgage brokers.
They had never done anything wherethey had gone direct -to
-consumer.
And I had spent my whole career
building and growing direct -to-consumer businesses.
And they offered me a platform tobuild that.
We called it Oaken Financial.
(03:55):
And Oaken Financial, over the
ensuing 10 years, became a bigpart of home trust funding.
It became a $5 billion depositbusiness in its own right by the
time I left to start Wahee threeyears ago.
Gotcha.
So your job is essentially
responsible for bringing in thosedirect -to -consumer deposits,
which then can be lent out throughthe... the mortgage business.
Is that correct?Sure.
But it's even more than that.
To bring in a deposit, people
don't just back a truck up to thebank and bring in their deposits.
(04:18):
It's actually a business in itsown right.
So you actually have to create acategory killer value proposition
for those customers.
There's different customers than
the mortgage customers.
Somebody who needs a loan is
probably a bit younger in age orthey're running a business.
People who tend to have depositsthey bring to the bank tend to be
a little older and wanting to takeless risk or have a balanced
portfolio.
versus the stock market.
But you have to build a businessfor them.
(04:40):
And that's really what Ispecialize doing is finding that
value proposition and then weavingtogether an amazing digital plus
in -person experience involving acustomer and the bank in order to
create that as a, you could argue,almost a standalone business in
its own right.
Yeah, that's interesting because
it's both product and experience.
It's effectively the entire go -to
-market.
A hundred percent.
Who are we going after and what dothey want?
Right.
And it's also the service delivery
(05:02):
model because you have to be ableto do it in an efficient digital
first way.
The consumer today.
So even though, for instance,Okun's customers, they tended to
be above 60.
There were customers.
that were 80, 90.
We even had a couple of customers
that were 100.
And the conventional wisdom at the
time is, oh, anybody over 60, youknow, they want a branch or they
want their wealth advisor to guidethem every step of the way, or
(05:24):
they're not going to be using amobile app.
not And what we found is if you'vebuilt technology, not for
technology's sake, but you buildit in the pursuit of servicing the
clients and what their needs are,we're past the tipping point.
Canadians of All generations andall ages expect to be served how
they want to be served.
And that includes great digital
and mobile experiences.
And in banking, which involves
(05:44):
trust and very much like realestate, which is the business that
I lead today, is really abouttrust.
It's equally about that humanconnection as well.
So it's that great service modelthat involves amazing tech and
amazing humans in the pursuit ofservice excellence.
You know, it brought me back justnow to something that I think the
year was roughly 2012, 13.
(06:04):
And I remember, you know, working
on some go -to -market stuff foranother product.
And we were doing some research onFacebook and, you know, users
there.
And I think that at the time, the
average user was something like 58years old.
And there was this idea that like,you know, hey, you know,
technology and, you know, who arewe going after a bunch of like,
(06:25):
you know, teenagers?And it's like, nope.
The average user was actually 58.
It was actually, you know, your
mom, my mom, whatever, right?Who were the people who were using
this and actually interacting withit, which is interesting.
You know, COVID was an interestingexperiment for all the negatives.
Sure, 100%.
Told us who was like, you know.
being digital at first, or atleast being digitally comfortable
to build around.
So that's a really interesting
experience.
And then you said you basically
(06:46):
take those learnings and then youtake them to a separate business
in Wahee.
So what's sort of the founding
story of Wahee?And then maybe what is Wahee
exactly?100%.
Told Well, why don't we start withthe name Wahee?
What is Wahee?Where is Wahee?
I think it's a very, very coolname.
But what we ultimately set out todo was to build the...
Next generation of real estatebusiness for how today's
homebuyers want to transact.
And if we take a step back, almost
(07:08):
every other industry has beenaffected by digitization.
You know, whether it's how youbook your trips, how you apply for
your mortgage, how you even lookup the balance of the mortgage,
how we order our food.
Yeah, how you order your food, how
you order your Airbnb, your Uber.
You know, we sort of lose track
that everything we do now is inthe palm of your hand.
how you order your food, how youorder But yet we rely on this
(07:29):
individual, all -knowing expertthat has all the information when
we make the biggest purchase orsale of our lives, which is our
house.
And we set out to say, well, how
can we give two things, controlback to consumers for this biggest
purchase, but also amp up thelevel of expertise of the people
giving advice with betterinformation and tools at their
(07:50):
fingertips to help thoseconsumers.
So we set out to create Canada'snext.
great property tech platform,which is Wahee.
And we come back to why Wahee?What is Wahee?
And what we wanted was a name thatreally was a unique digital name,
but was based on something aboutthe house.
The house is the place where, youknow, people grow their families.
It's a place where Canadiansreally value more than anything.
And Wahee means... place inhawaiian and we had a moment when
(08:13):
we heard this name for the firsttime and we said yeah we're going
to call it wahi so it's a bitunique and different but also it's
all about the house it's all aboutthe sense of place all about the
house it's all about the sense ofplace Yeah, I'm a curious
individual.
So I Googled it right when I heard
(08:33):
about you guys.
I'm like, what the heck is a Y?
Initially, I thought it was maybean acronym for something, right?
And I'm like, sitting there, youknow, mapping it back to my brain,
trying to figure out what the Wcould be and the A. And I couldn't
(08:54):
get there.
I have to Google this.
And then I realized what it was.
And I go, that makes total sense.
Yeah, 100%.
And then we learned later after we
named it.
people started coming up to us and
said, oh, it means revelation inArabic.
I'm like, okay, well, it could berevelation.
Or there's all these othermeanings ascribed to it.
But really, it's about the senseof place, which is what we're
creating.
Yeah, I love that.
So what are you creating?What are you learning now?
(09:14):
I mean, obviously, you go tomarket, you have an initial
hypothesis for how you could serveconsumers and what consumers are
looking for.
Are there... any of your original
assumptions that did not prove tobe true and you know to the flip
side of that are there some thingsthat you did not give much thought
through that are now likeridiculously clear after three
years four years of you knowconsumer data because i guess one
of the advantages of being adigital platform is as opposed to
the individual realtor who's outon the street that may not have
(09:36):
all the data to back them up likeyou guys can create data and
create fresh data really throughconsumer behavior through the app.
So what's that telling you?Sure.
One of our original hypothesis wasthat we had to build the best app
to be in the palm of the hands ofthe consumer.
had to build the best app to be inthe palm of the hands of the
consumer.
And we started building the
(09:57):
company saying, we're going tobuild that best app.
And we had some ideas of what thebest app was, where we were a
little fuzzier in our thinking wasexactly what is the value
proposition that is going to makeconsumers say, hey, rather than
transacting with my best friend'ssister's cousin, who's a realtor,
which is typically the wayCanadians find their realtor
today.
What's going to make them say,
maybe like that realtor, she'sokay, but maybe I would be better
served if I used a realtorassociated with Wahey in some way,
(10:20):
because they could do somethingfor me.
And at the beginning, we thoughtthat that something might be
better insight, better controlover the experience, better
digital tools.
But what really got the business
to take off is when we launchedCashback.
It was putting a bit more money inpeople's pockets for buyers.
And what we quickly figured outwas that the technology that we
built wasn't just better for theconsumer being more informed, more
in control, being able to bookthings online so they could keep
track, doing multi -directionalchats.
(10:41):
So they had all their chats andtheir listings and other journeys
and everything organized.
but that actually it was making
the realtors better realtors.
And we had a number of realtors
that are part of Wahee, part ofthe brokerage.
They're Wahee realtors.
And we have a national marketplace
of realtors as well.
(11:01):
We've got 250 or so realtors
across the country, and many ofthem are using the tool.
And we're finding that it'sactually making them better
realtors.
They're able to find customers of
the house faster.
They're able to move their leads
through the funnel at a rate thatthey've never seen before.
And they're able to close agreater percentage of those leads.
(11:22):
And what we learned through thisprocess was that by making these
realtors better realtors, they'renot just two or three times more
efficient than a traditionalrealtor, but they're 10x more
efficient.
And in being 10x more efficient,
we could afford to give customerssome cash back and we would all
win.
The customer would win, the
realtor would win, and we wouldwin in the process.
(11:43):
And I really believe in win -winsituations where you're not doing
something at the expense of theconsumer or the realtor, but
you're doing something where yougrow the pie for everybody.
And that's really what we learnedthrough this process.
It's interesting because, yeah, Ithink most would tell you like,
hey, I want better service, butI'm not willing to give up a whole
bunch of value and money as partof the transaction to get it.
(12:04):
consumers are thinking, okay, notonly do I want cash back, that's
fantastic.
I still want the same great
service, if not better service indoing that.
And so you got to like go out andactually deliver a superior
experience than they would havegotten for, I think it was, you
said like, you know, sisters,cousins, cousin, or something like
that, like that third connection.
So a hundred percent.
(12:24):
like that third connection.
So a hundred percent.
And that's one of the things Ilearned at digital banking was,
you know, there was thisconventional wisdom at the time,
20 years ago, that customersneeded the branch and that maybe
if they used the internet channelor an app it would be at the
expense of the branch or somethinglike that actually customers want
is they want everything to workand they don't want to really
think about how it works they justwant it to be better and by
(12:47):
creating better digital toolsWe're able to have customers say,
OK, that builds trust because itjust works.
It builds trust with the customer,which then allows you to innovate
value propositions on top of thatthat create the value, which
convinces them to actually giveyou a try in the first place.
And we found that that samethinking is true here in real
estate, that you have to actuallyhave not just the better tools.
That's great, but that's tablestakes.
One of the things about realestate, though, is unlike many
(13:07):
industries, and you'll obviouslyfind this as well in the mortgage
space, is.
It's a very infrequent
transaction.
Your mortgage might be every three
to five years as you renew it.
But actually buying or selling a
home is something people only dofour or five, six times in their
life.
It's an average of every seven
years in Canada.
And oftentimes, as we've been
targeting first -time homebuyersfor the first couple of years, you
(13:28):
don't know what you don't know.
So you're going into this
thinking, OK, well, this is howeverybody does it.
So you actually have to dosomething radically better to have
consumers question conventionalwisdom and say, OK, I'm actually
going to try this.
And for us, it's great that they
try the app and they use it, butit costs a lot of money to put all
of the technological capabilitiesand all the data acquisition into
(13:48):
this app.
So we also need to be able to
monetize that in a way.
And that's where the value
proposition comes in and isequally important to this.
important to this.
Yeah, it's interesting what you
said in that the transaction is soinfrequent that people might not
even remember how much the lastone sucked.
They might have done their lasthousing transaction 10 years ago
when they bought their... previoushome.
It might've been terrible.
(14:10):
I've experienced that too.
You know, even on the mortgageside, we're like, we're over here,
like we know what a great mortgageexperience looks like.
And we'll look back and we'llremember a client or something
like that.
Like, Ooh, that last one was
really rough.
We ended up closing on the
mortgage, but it was like uglyright up until the last second.
And we're like, that client'snever going to work with us again.
(14:30):
They'll come back to us three tofive years later.
They'd be like, hey, so excited towork with you guys again.
You know, it's time to take a lookat that renewal.
We're like, whoa, didn't youremember how bad it was?
They don't sometimes.
And they have no baseline to
compare it to.
And they have no baseline to
compare it to.
So they don't know if it would
have even been worse somewhereelse.
And consequently, when it's great.
it They're like, that was good.
(14:51):
Yeah.
They just take it for granted.
Okay.
I got my mortgage.
I now owe you money for the next25 years.
That's great.
Yeah, exactly.
Thanks for the bill.
So, you know, trying to create
that consistency across theexperience, it sounds like what
you guys are doing is trying tomarry that, you know, what we
would call like an old fashionedhandheld approach through a real
estate agent, which clients stilllove, but enhancing that human
(15:12):
being experience with.
technology rather than a full
technology replacement for thehuman experience.
Am I understanding that correctly?That's exactly right.
I don't believe that customers areever, don't believe that customers
are ever, or maybe it's just avery rare customer that would do
this, but the general mainstreamcustomer is ever going to want or
expect.
a one -click Amazon experience,
like buy my house now and justsend me the bill a million dollars
and the mortgage is going to besigned up.
I think customers want to takecontrol of the situation, but
buying a house is a very, veryinvolved experience.
It involves often a lot of humanemotion.
(15:34):
We believe that we should add somedata and consistency to add a
little bit of rationality.
to that as well so that we can
balance both that emotional aspectof buying where you're really
going to live, where you're goingto raise your family, where you're
going to sleep, where you're goingto, you know, maybe work with
ensuring that it's done in a sane,rational way that it's purchased
at a price that's fair for boththe buyer and the seller.
It's done.
for buyers with eyes wide open so
(15:55):
they're not risking their family'sfuture by not putting the
appropriate conditions on an offerand making sure that they do an
inspection so they go in eyes wideopen knowing what they're getting
into, et cetera.
There's a lot of things here that
are a little bit complex andintricate.
And it's one thing to go buy thatbook or cord to charge your laptop
(16:17):
with one click on Amazon.
But I think the house, just like
the mortgage, is a much moreintricate experience that...
should be put onto steroids, forlack of a better word, with better
user experience, better appdesign, better data, better
information, and ultimately betteradvice using all of that.
using all of that.
I think you said it.
It's just such a big transaction.
(16:37):
It evokes so much fear from
people.
In the data that we've gathered
and the surveys that we've run,clients actually aren't as
concerned with the how.
They care more about the what.
And what I mean by that is whenthey're thinking about the
mortgage transaction, the realestate transaction, as a whole and
we start selling all of our valuepropositions that we're like
(16:58):
deeply proud of over here like webuilt this we built that we built
it clients are like yeah i don'treally care i just want the most
certainty that i can get throughthis very stressful period of my
life.
So I need to know that this
mortgage is clear to close andthat the real estate transaction
is going to go through as plannedwithout an entire mess.
So like whatever you need to do,Benji and became in the team to
(17:22):
like figure that out is whateveryou need to make happen.
I don't want a whole bunch ofbumps in the road.
I don't want to be within 24 hoursof my signing date wondering, is
this going to happen?Is this not going to happen?
I just want to know, like, as soonas I give you what you tell me you
need.
You check the boxes.
I get a whole bunch of green boxessaying that we're good to go and
(17:45):
that it actually gets deliveredon, period.
And we always come back to thisword, which is certainty.
Clients want certainty.
100%.
I'm sure they would notice if forwhatever reason there wasn't
certainty.
You know, it's the same thing with
technology.
In my career, I found many firms
pursue technology for technology'ssake.
But technology exists as a meansto an end.
So in your case, it could be aboutcertainty.
And in some cases, technology isthe best way to get there.
(18:06):
In other cases, it's human processis the best way to get there.
And I think it's important to notlose sight on what is the end
goal, which in your case iscertainty.
Yeah, that's awesome.
So what's interesting is, you
know, you've talked about yourselfbeing a platform, but you've also
talked about yourself being a realestate brokerage network in a way.
Who are the types of real estateagents that Awahi would work with
as a part of its network to makesure that it's delivering that
(18:28):
type of client experience that youguys are after?
That's actually a reallyinteresting question, actually a
really interesting question,Bakim.
We've done a lot of work todetermine what makes a great And
certainly there's certain aspectsjust about the charisma, being a
good listener and empathetic andreally understanding customers'
needs and putting those intoaction.
But there's also some foundationalskills that we've correlated.
And we've done a lot of datascience and analysis around this,
analyzing many, many listings, forexample.
And there's some skills aboutputting together, you know, it may
(18:49):
sound like it's bread and butter,but it's putting together a great
listing.
Ensuring that there's great photos
that market the property and thatthey're done with a proper
resolution so that they show thebest.
Having a sense to ensure that theplace shows well through whether
it's a bit of repair or staging,etc. It's not necessarily do
complex analytics themselves, butto understand the analytics as
presented.
One of the products that we've
built, I believe, is Canada'sbest.
digital current market assessmentit's not publicly available on the
(19:12):
site but it's a tool that weenable all our realtors to use
where we can essentially structureall the information to help have a
very very data -driven pricingconversation with customers it's
the ability to take that and lookat what we come up with and really
add their own two cents to it arewe looking at the right comparable
properties to the subject propertyAre the puts and takes on
valuation accurate?We have a view using our machine
(19:33):
learning that that plus den on thetwo -bedroom condo adds an extra
$30 ,000 of value to the unitversus the other subject property
that doesn't have it or theparking spot's worth X dollars.
We have a point of view on that,but they have to be able to take
that and understand the dataenough and understand the market
enough to be able to turn thatinto empathetic advice for the
customers.
And it's a lot of things that we
ask to be a... great realtor, butthat's really what the full
(19:56):
package entails.
And we've been pretty successful
at recruiting a number of thoserealtors inside our brokerage.
We have a number of them that arealso independent contractors that
do some of the tours and thingsfor us, plus have their own
listings with Wahee.
And then there's this network of
marketplace realtors.
There's about 250 of them we co
-advise with, and we're reallylooking.
(20:17):
for those characteristics.
And that's what they all bring
together is that combination ofcharacteristics of a great empathy
as demonstrated through variousreviews, as well as the ability to
structure the advice, prepare goodlistings through analyzing the
listings, et cetera.
Yeah.
So you guys are putting a lot ofenergy then into making sure that
(20:41):
you have the right real estateagents inside of that network.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
This isn't just, just, you know,John said this person is good.
We're actually going and reallydoing our own due diligence and
using our own tools to evaluate.
Yeah.
I mean, it also means it's notgrowth at any cost.
It's client experience at anycost.
(21:02):
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
We're very client experiencedriven is what I would say.
Yeah.
With that said, I mean, you know,
kind of going back to something wewere talking about earlier, but is
there anything that has surprisedyou over the last couple of years
that maybe, you know, today, andI'm sure there's a lot that you
know today that you didn't know,you know, before you started
(21:24):
Wahee, but is there anything thatlike truly was surprising that
maybe you were just fully off onbefore you got going that now you.
look back and like, wow, I wish Iknew that?
You know, I think the biggestsurprise to me, which with 2020
hindsight should have beenobvious, but it's just how long it
often takes for a customer or acouple to find their dream home.
You know, I come from industrieswhere when Somebody calls you or
sends an email saying, hey, I wantto maybe come in to talk to you
(21:48):
about this, take the bankingindustry.
I want to maybe open up a GIC orsomething.
From first click to transactioncould be a matter of minutes in
the shortest case, or at the most,it's a week.
It's like maybe they want to comein and chat, but it's a week.
What has been one of the sort ofstrangest things for me to adapt
to as I come into this real estateindustry is it could be a two or
(22:13):
three year experience for somebodybuying a house.
quarter of 2024, for example, wewere finding houses from customers
that we had found at the beginningof 2023.
And we've been working with them,talking to them, waiting for the
right house to become availablefor sale, ensuring they go on a
tour, maybe losing an offer or twobecause some of the conditions
weren't met in terms ofinspection, or they weren't able
to get it quite at the price thatthey could afford.
(22:34):
And it's a very long journey.
to get to that.
So I think that would be thebiggest thing.
The other thing that's surprisingfor me coming from banking is the
transactional nature of thisbusiness.
In your business, in mortgages,it's transactional in that you get
the mortgage, but the mortgage iswith you for the duration.
And then presumably everybody atRocket wants to get the renewal or
refinance.
And when you get a customer, it
could potentially be a 25, 30-year relationship.
(22:55):
In our business, it could be twoyears to get to a transaction.
And then even after thetransaction, we're not old enough
that we figured this out yet.
I don't know how it's going to
play out.
I want to make sure that we set
the stage to play out.
But we want to engage those
customers for many more years.
So seven years later, when they're
willing to upsize or downsize orlife events happen to them, that
(23:19):
we're one of the first people theyconsider, if not the place they
consider to be their real estateagent.
So that, I think, are the twothings that were maybe obvious
with 2020 hindsight, but took alittle bit of getting used to as I
migrated to this industry.
Yeah, I love the concept of the
three R's, which is something wetalk a lot about in our team,
(23:40):
which the three R's stand forreview, refer, return.
So if you're looking for guidingmetrics, you know, you probably
could or should start there.
Again, we're a little further
along in the journey, but.
Sure.
five years right now.
And then that's some of the things
that we're looking at is likethose three R's is like, can we
make those three things happen?Those are high indicators in our
experience of a really qualityexperience and delivery on the
(24:01):
first transaction.
Because like you said, I mean, if
you are going out and you areacquiring clients net new with
every single transaction over thenext 15, 20, 25 years, you can
have a tough time making it.
You really want to create repeats,
referrals, all those things,right?
A hundred percent.
So we're thinking about that the
same way.
I'm going to ask you a market
question.
I don't want you to like go, you
(24:23):
know, feel like you need to beNostradamus because who the heck
knows what's going to happen in2025.
There's so many macro factors thatdrive real estate and the hardest
one to measure is usually justsentiment.
So what are you seeing right nowin terms of user behavior on the
application as well as with yourreal estate agents in the buying
market right now?Are we in a good real estate year
(24:43):
in 2025?Or do we still need to contend
with some headwinds here?So if you were to ask me prior to
Trump's tariff announcement, Iwould say we're looking for a much
stronger 2025 than 2024 or even2023.
I think 2024 is a very difficultyear and it followed another
difficult year in 2023 as themarket normalized post -COVID.
I would say the activity levelswe've seen over the last six to
eight weeks have been verypositive for the year.
Typically, the winter monthsaren't big transaction months in
(25:05):
real estate, but they're monthswhere serious buyers and sellers
get prepared.
They get prepared to list in March
or April or May.
They get their ducks in a row, so
to speak, to ensure they havefinancing lined up.
They start getting educated on themarket in the wintertime so that
they can jump when housinginventory grows.
And we're absolutely seeing thosetrends.
Right now, so far, they haven'tslowed down.
The big million dollar questionthat we all ask is what happens to
interest rates and what happenswith Trump tariffs?
(25:29):
And I think that those twoquestions are related.
And I guess the only time willtell what actually happens.
I think Yeah.
So when we think about the
interconnectedness of those twothings, is it to say that if the
tariffs happen, is likely topotentially pause rates or force
us to go back up in rates?protect the Canadian dollar
against the U .S.
dollar?
Like, is that the conclusion?Sorry, I'm going to pull you back
(25:51):
to your bank days to like ask youto play economist here.
But, you know, the U .S.
Federal Reserve has two jobs,
which is full employment and pricestability, i .e.
lack of inflation.
Canadian Central Bank, their
mandate is only one job.
And that's price stability, so
lack of inflation.
So if the tariffs prove to be
inflationary on one hand, thenthat would imply higher interest
rates.
The flip side, though, is even if
(26:12):
they're inflationary today, ifthey lead to unemployment, that's
disinflationary.
So I don't know where it will all
play out.
I'm not an economist and I haven't
gamed it all the way through, butwe shall see.
shall see.
I mean, it should be very
interesting just given the factthat there are so many factors
playing against one another.
And interest rates basically, like
(26:32):
you said, from a stabilitystandpoint for at least, you know,
the last couple of decades havebeen proven to be a good driver,
if you will, or a good controlmechanism for keeping things a bit
stable.
But we're... enter a new territory
so i appreciate you uh we haven'tseen this territory with tariffs
since the smooth holly act in 1929or 1930 so what's the expression
(26:54):
that history doesn't repeat itselfbut it often rhymes and i think
we're in for one of thosesituations right now where it
might rhyme a little bit so weshall see so if i'm a consumer how
do i you uh we haven't seen thisterritory with tariffs since the
smooth holly act in 1929 or 1930so what's the expression that
(27:15):
history doesn't repeat itself butit often rhymes and i think we're
in for one of those situationsright now where it might rhyme a
little bit so we shall see the ifi'm a consumer how do i treat that
information to make the best realestate decision as I look forward.
I've been floating around themarket here for a couple of years.
I want to buy a home.
I don't know if it's the right
(27:36):
time, but I've been waiting since2017, 18, 19, 20.
Here we go.
Is this going to be the right
time?It seems like it's never the right
time, but in hindsight, it wasalways the right time.
What do I do with that informationand how do I use it to my
advantage to make a real estatedecision?
Sure.
I don't think that if you have
five economists in the room,you're going to have five opinions
(27:56):
as to what's going to happen inthe next five years and what the
right time is.
So you almost have to discount
that information.
I'm not saying bury your head in
the sand, but I think you have tofocus on a couple of things.
What's your own individualsituation to make sure that you
can afford what you're buying?You're buying something in your
price range and that youpersonally can survive a little
bit of a shock.
(28:16):
It might sound like motherhood and
apple pie, but you should have anemergency fund.
can get you by if you, for somereason, lose your job and you've
got to spend a little bit of timelooking for a job or there's a
personal situation that happens.
But as long as you buy something
that's within your affordability,you know, there's never the
perfect time.
But as you said, in hindsight, if
(28:38):
you're going to own that house for10 years and you're a first -time
buyer, I'm sure you're going tolook back at 10 years and say,
okay.
You know what?
That was the right thing to do.
Whether prices go up, whether they
stay flat, at the very least, it'sa forced saving mechanism.
It's a place that you can callhome, raise your family, do your
work, live life.
(28:58):
I'm not one of those people that
says buy now or you're going toeat cat food when you're old age
or something like that.
I'm not one of those people that
says just buy, buy, buy.
But at the same time, I do believe
that you have to live your life.
And you may want to wait till
there's a little bit moremacroeconomic clarity.
But then even when there'smacroeconomic clarity, you can't
predict that.
Like who would have predicted
COVID?You know, you could be in the most
stable time, but then COVIDhappens.
So life is unpredictable.
You know, get your own house in
order, so to speak.
Make sure you can afford what
you're buying and go live yourlife.
(29:19):
Including if home ownership is inyour dreams.
Get your own house in order may bea brand slogan that I just haven't
given enough thought to.
I'm going to pull that one away.
That's great advice.
I mean, the question that I've
always tried to think through whenI'm talking to friends and family,
it's, you know, hey, I can't tellyou what's going to happen over
the next 12, 24, 36 months, but Ican make an accurate prediction
probably.
Like you said, you know, history
(29:40):
doesn't always repeat itself, butit rhymes.
real estate is likely to raise invalue over the next 30 years.
I think that's a pretty accurateprediction.
think that's a pretty accurateprediction.
And it's the same with the stockmarket, right?
Like people ask you, oh, whatstock should I pick?
Should I buy Tesla?Should I buy this?
I would never give anybody thatadvice.
I'd say, don't put all your eggsin one basket.
And it's time in the market, nottiming the market.
I don't know if you've heard thatone before, but if you've got time
(30:00):
in the market, then that's likelygoing to sort itself over a long
period of time.
Right.
Because if the stock market andthe real estate market go down
over the next 30 years, we're allin serious trouble.
So that long -term advice is theview that I recommend as well.
So I much appreciate that.
I'm curious.
I mean, you've done some amazingthings, Benji, for anyone who has
not used the Wahee app andexperienced with the Wahee app.
(30:22):
brings to the market.
I highly recommend it.
I'm using myself.
I'm always poking around on there.
Very cool.
Thank you.
And we appreciate the partnership.
So as you think forward now, I
mean, you guys are building,growing, developing your consumer
experience, developing a lot ofnew learning.
And you said yourself, you know,in some ways, like you're learning
and developing as an individual aswell and figuring out how to drive
that.
How do you envision the rest of
your career that, you know, theexperience with Wahee and
(30:43):
ultimately the legacy and impactthat you want to create as you
look forward?Well, that's quite the question.
I can't say that this is my lastact, so I'm not quite on the
legacy question yet.
What I would say is one of the
things I'm proud of is growingsome amazing teams.
And I've had the honor to workwith several really, really
talented individuals over time.
And what I'm most proud of.
at Wahee in my current situationis that we've built a stable of
extremely talented leaders.
And that allows several things to
(31:03):
happen.
One, it's a team to create this.
It's not just me.
Number one.
Number two, we get the best ideasfrom having the diverse
perspectives.
And three, I'm not a micromanager.
So, you know, I can go take mydaughter skiing for a few days.
And, you know, there's severalpeople here that can continue
driving the day -to -dayoperations, the customer
experience, the innovation thatallows me not to take a step back
because I really am, and I believethat I'm in founder's mode, for
(31:24):
lack of a better word, butfounder's mode without
micromanaging at the pursuit ofexcellence for the customers and
the realtors and for innovation.
And those are some of the things
that I'm really particularly proudof and I really love spending my
time doing.
I love to hear that.
And I've been through that.
I know what it's like to... you
know, build from zero and be inthe spot where you're doing every
single thing and then developsystems and processes and human
(31:45):
beings around you.
Take a step back and see it.
And it goes.
Oh, it's working.
I know.
It's like giving birth to another
baby.
Really?
Yeah.
Yeah.
They're like standing on their ownand you see them like walking and
like, they're walking on theirown.
No, I don't have to hold themanymore.
And you know, they're off toschool.
It is an amazing experience.
I mean, a company is like a
living, breathing thing andwatching it grow and then seeing
(32:05):
yourself develop through that andhaving the ability to, you know,
step back and be proud of it.
That's impacted itself.
So I appreciate you sharing that.
perspective and the fact that
you've been able to build that andcontinue to build that is an
awesome inspiration for us all.
So Benji, thank you much for being
on here with me.
Also, thank you for the
partnership.
And again, if you have not checked
(32:26):
out Wahee, please go check out theapp.
It is incredible and it is amongthe best in the market that I have
seen.
And this is coming from an
American who's seen the otherside, come to Canada, seen this
side.
You guys are just doing some
awesome stuff.
So keep it up.
Perfect.
Thanks very much, Vakim.
Thanks for having me.
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