Laura Fortey

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TRANSCRIPTION WITH SPEAKERS
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[00:00] SPEAKER_01: It's Toronto's podcast on the Canada's podcast network.
[00:04] SPEAKER_01: Hi, this is Angela Faye Barnard coming to you from Canada's podcast where you can listen,
[00:09] SPEAKER_01: discover and engage.
[00:11] SPEAKER_01: We're talking to Canadian entrepreneurs making it happen across the country.
[00:15] SPEAKER_01: We are here on location at the Collision Conference in Toronto and I am super excited to actually
[00:20] SPEAKER_01: have BC Entrepreneur Laura with us from Ritium.
[00:24] SPEAKER_01: Yes, thank you.
[00:25] SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
[00:26] SPEAKER_01: I'm going to give you a little bit of a bio on Laura.
[00:28] SPEAKER_01: She's co-founded her third company now with expertise in marketing, journalism and her own
[00:34] SPEAKER_01: real estate investing, sorry, led on her path to co-creating Ritium.
[00:38] SPEAKER_01: And my pronouncing that right, yes.
[00:40] SPEAKER_01: Good, thank you.
[00:40] SPEAKER_01: An asset backed, permissioned, private blockchain marketplace, exchange and protocol.
[00:47] SPEAKER_01: She's going to give us some insight on what that all means.
[00:50] SPEAKER_01: It allows anyone across the globe to invest in income generating real estate using a fractional
[00:56] SPEAKER_01: ownership model.
[00:57] SPEAKER_01: I'm super excited about listening to this.
[00:59] SPEAKER_01: So really the tagline is enabling real estate for everyone.
[01:02] SPEAKER_01: So welcome Laura.
[01:03] SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
[01:04] SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me here.
[01:05] SPEAKER_01: This is great.
[01:06] SPEAKER_00: To find yourself as an entrepreneur, how did you get here?
[01:09] SPEAKER_00: For me, that goes a long time ago.
[01:11] SPEAKER_00: My parents were entrepreneurs.
[01:12] SPEAKER_00: Okay.
[01:12] SPEAKER_00: I come from a long line of entrepreneurs.
[01:14] SPEAKER_00: Grandparents moved over here from Holland and they were entrepreneurs right away as well.
[01:19] SPEAKER_00: So this is my third startup, as you mentioned.
[01:22] SPEAKER_00: About 2007, I started my first company.
[01:25] SPEAKER_00: And my ex-partner and I sold golf information products like golf the sport.
[01:30] SPEAKER_00: And so we sold all information products online.
[01:33] SPEAKER_00: And I learned all the background, all the digital marketing, learning how to sell it on Facebook,
[01:38] SPEAKER_00: Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, all these different places when all of that was brand new.
[01:42] SPEAKER_00: Lived in different places around the world selling our product and had the laptop lifestyle.
[01:47] SPEAKER_01: Okay.
[01:47] SPEAKER_01: So you've been a digital nomad for you before it became kind of the trendy thing to do.
[01:51] SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
[01:52] SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
[01:52] SPEAKER_01: But you were in Toronto living for a while.
[01:55] SPEAKER_01: Yep.
[01:55] SPEAKER_01: And now living in.
[01:56] SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
[01:57] SPEAKER_00: So living in Vancouver, I am from the Toronto area.
[01:59] SPEAKER_00: I'm from Burlington.
[02:00] SPEAKER_00: Born and raised, went to Waterloo University.
[02:02] SPEAKER_00: And then I left Toronto about 12 years ago.
[02:06] SPEAKER_00: Moved abroad, lived in Australia for three years.
[02:08] SPEAKER_00: Then I lived in the UK for about six years.
[02:11] SPEAKER_00: And interestingly, I worked for the Olympics 2010 in Vancouver in 2012 in London as a journalist.
[02:16] SPEAKER_00: Okay.
[02:17] SPEAKER_00: I loved Vancouver when I was there in 2010 and I decided to move back three years ago.
[02:21] SPEAKER_00: So tell me a little bit, a little more insight on Ritium itself.
[02:24] SPEAKER_00: What do you do?
[02:25] SPEAKER_00: Who do you serve?
[02:26] SPEAKER_00: Real estate is incredibly expensive in Toronto and Vancouver in the world.
[02:30] SPEAKER_00: And millennials, Gen Z and the developing nations, they just can't get in.
[02:34] SPEAKER_00: So they're being priced out consistently.
[02:36] SPEAKER_00: So about 90% of the market is what we call a non-accredited investor, which means they
[02:40] SPEAKER_00: earn less than $200,000 a year in income and have less than a million dollars in liquid
[02:45] SPEAKER_00: assets, cash, stocks, bonds, that kind of thing.
[02:48] SPEAKER_00: So these are the people that can't buy into the traditional real estate funds that are
[02:52] SPEAKER_00: for accredited people only.
[02:54] SPEAKER_00: So we wanted to open it up to allow them to buy into a platform that offers real estate
[02:59] SPEAKER_00: investing.
[03:00] SPEAKER_00: So what they do is they invest with us into real estate properties and they earn rental
[03:05] SPEAKER_00: income every month.
[03:06] SPEAKER_00: And then when they decide to sell their shares, kind of like a stock, then they earn the
[03:11] SPEAKER_00: market appreciation of the property at the time of their sale.
[03:14] SPEAKER_00: And what kind of properties do you invest in?
[03:17] SPEAKER_00: We're about to launch, so we're launching in Canada in the States.
[03:20] SPEAKER_00: And the first property coming on our platform is a Canadian single family condo in Vancouver.
[03:25] SPEAKER_00: And people can invest in that once we launch.
[03:27] SPEAKER_00: Will it be mostly residential to start for sure?
[03:30] SPEAKER_00: One of our clients is actually the four seasons, so it's actually a hotel group in Oahu,
[03:35] SPEAKER_00: Hawaii.
[03:36] SPEAKER_00: And they're looking to potentially tokenize two floors of their building.
[03:42] SPEAKER_00: And what they want to do is they want to sell half of their building off to luxury condos
[03:46] SPEAKER_00: to compete with the Airbnb market.
[03:49] SPEAKER_00: And so what we're doing is we're bringing on some properties onto our platform.
[03:52] Speaker UNKNOWN: 
[03:52] SPEAKER_01: Are you actually yourselves buying the buildings or you're the broker in the middle?
[03:57] SPEAKER_00: So in that specific instance, the company is putting the properties onto our platform
[04:02] SPEAKER_00: to sell.
[04:03] SPEAKER_00: So the crowd will own the property.
[04:06] SPEAKER_00: Now the title deed, which is a question we get a lot of the time, is actually held in
[04:09] SPEAKER_00: trust by a trust company, but the crowd owns the property.
[04:12] SPEAKER_00: There's no mortgage, so it's fully funded by the crowd.
[04:15] SPEAKER_00: Kind of like a kickstarter when it gets funded.
[04:17] SPEAKER_00: And that's fully funded and owned by the crowd.
[04:19] SPEAKER_00: Do you think that will be scaled?
[04:22] SPEAKER_00: Like do you think that will be the model going forward?
[04:24] SPEAKER_00: If you look at what people are doing, the millennials, Gen Z, the younger population,
[04:28] SPEAKER_00: they're no longer wanting to live in the verbs, cut grass, do this kind of thing.
[04:31] SPEAKER_00: They have laptop lifestyle.
[04:33] SPEAKER_00: They want to eat their avocado toast and buy their lattes.
[04:35] SPEAKER_00: And they're not wrong because they've retired the idea that they can ever afford it.
[04:40] Speaker UNKNOWN: 
[04:41] SPEAKER_00: So what we're offering them is the ability to get in and have that lifestyle.
[04:45] SPEAKER_00: And their hands off landlord.
[04:47] SPEAKER_00: They don't need to be there.
[04:48] SPEAKER_00: They don't need to property manage.
[04:49] SPEAKER_00: That's a hard time or full time job in itself.
[04:51] SPEAKER_00: I was reading an article and the article sort of predicted that the next generation of
[04:57] SPEAKER_00: people won't own homes.
[04:58] SPEAKER_00: I agree.
[04:59] SPEAKER_00: I mean, they can't own already.
[05:01] SPEAKER_00: So either people are unfortunately waiting for family members to pass away.
[05:04] SPEAKER_00: Even when they get the property, do they want to manage it?
[05:08] SPEAKER_00: Do they want to live there?
[05:09] SPEAKER_00: The answer is not really because a lot of people want to live in the urban environment.
[05:13] SPEAKER_00: They want to have the walkable lifestyle.
[05:15] SPEAKER_00: You know, there's a statistic that by 2050, I believe it is, 70% of the population is going
[05:20] SPEAKER_00: to live in urbanized environments.
[05:21] SPEAKER_00: Right.
[05:22] SPEAKER_00: No longer the countryside of the suburbs.
[05:24] SPEAKER_00: And that's the type of mentality that we want.
[05:26] SPEAKER_00: Can you describe your day-to-day work routine?
[05:29] SPEAKER_00: So we do work in our own office.
[05:31] SPEAKER_00: We have about eight people working in the office.
[05:33] SPEAKER_00: OK.
[05:33] SPEAKER_00: But we are looking to expand our team and we are looking to get space at a co-working,
[05:38] SPEAKER_00: like, oh, we work or that kind of thing.
[05:40] SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
[05:40] SPEAKER_00: I love that mentality because then it allows you to meet other people and it just gives
[05:45] SPEAKER_00: you the accessibility to that ecosystem.
[05:48] SPEAKER_00: Whereas right now, we're working out of our CEO's real estate office.
[05:51] SPEAKER_00: OK.
[05:52] SPEAKER_00: Because we're a startup.
[05:52] SPEAKER_00: You know, we're doing everything in bootstrapped as much as possible.
[05:55] SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
[05:55] SPEAKER_00: And it's been fantastic.
[05:56] SPEAKER_00: But, you know, we're out growing the space.
[05:58] SPEAKER_00: Right.
[05:59] SPEAKER_00: For us, a lot of times things come and we bounce off each other.
[06:03] SPEAKER_00: Because we're still iterating all the time and we're still doing whiteboard sessions.
[06:05] SPEAKER_00: So we do work from the office a lot of the time.
[06:09] SPEAKER_00: Can you describe the vision for the company?
[06:11] SPEAKER_00: We see a world where everyone can get into the market and start generating wealth.
[06:16] SPEAKER_00: Like, why should it only be open to the rich?
[06:20] SPEAKER_00: And we have a lot of people very, very interested in this topic.
[06:23] SPEAKER_00: And people don't know where to put their money.
[06:26] SPEAKER_00: So they're buying it and they're spending it on other ways that are not going to give
[06:29] SPEAKER_00: them that longevity.
[06:31] SPEAKER_01: Do you see the company having staff or contractors or partners in other locations?
[06:37] SPEAKER_00: We currently have a small team in India as well on the development side.
[06:41] SPEAKER_00: And we have one of our developers in the states.
[06:43] SPEAKER_00: We are looking to bring a few of them over to have them in-house, which would be great.
[06:48] SPEAKER_00: We're looking to open an office in Toronto.
[06:50] SPEAKER_00: We're opening an office in Seattle.
[06:51] SPEAKER_00: We're looking to open an office in Hong Kong.
[06:53] SPEAKER_00: So as we want to go global and cross borders, we are launching in Canada and the states
[06:57] SPEAKER_00: to start with.
[06:58] SPEAKER_00: But we see us being in every single country and allowing people to invest cross borders.
[07:04] SPEAKER_00: So that's another thing that differentiates us is our competitors.
[07:08] SPEAKER_00: Let's say they're an American company selling American real estate to Americans.
[07:13] SPEAKER_01: So you, I could be a Canadian and decide, hey, I'd like to travel to India at some point.
[07:18] SPEAKER_01: And you know, I might look at investment opportunities there.
[07:20] SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
[07:21] SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
[07:22] SPEAKER_00: What do you actually do day to day to try and stay on course?
[07:25] SPEAKER_00: So I live two blocks from the beach.
[07:27] SPEAKER_00: So I walk on the beach almost every day.
[07:29] SPEAKER_00: I meditate.
[07:31] SPEAKER_00: I love music, but I do.
[07:34] SPEAKER_00: I bike to work, I bike to the office.
[07:37] SPEAKER_00: And I listen to audiobooks.
[07:38] SPEAKER_00: So that's my thing.
[07:40] SPEAKER_00: I work out to audiobooks, listen to audiobooks, get inspired, listen to the Tony Robbins
[07:44] SPEAKER_00: and motivational speakers of the world.
[07:46] SPEAKER_00: So that's something that we do as a team.
[07:49] SPEAKER_00: It's kind of like a book club sort of idea.
[07:52] SPEAKER_00: We just finished reading a book club.
[07:53] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we just finished crossing the casem.
[07:55] SPEAKER_00: So we were all reading that.
[07:56] SPEAKER_00: Wow.
[07:56] SPEAKER_00: We'll listening to it anyway.
[07:57] SPEAKER_00: And then we talk about it and then we iterate that and we use it in our business.
[08:00] SPEAKER_00: And we, it's interesting and it's really important for terminology in the tech space.
[08:05] SPEAKER_00: Especially when we go to places like the Valley, learning the terminology to be able to speak
[08:11] SPEAKER_00: the language of other startups is very important.
[08:13] SPEAKER_01: How would you describe Vancouver as, you know, a place to do business?
[08:18] SPEAKER_00: Vancouver has a really incredible startup scene.
[08:21] SPEAKER_00: We have startup Vancouver, startup Canada.
[08:23] SPEAKER_00: We have different chapters that are, that cross country as well.
[08:28] SPEAKER_00: Toronto, I hear though, is the number one fastest growing startup and tech ecosystem with
[08:33] SPEAKER_00: all the North American cities combined.
[08:35] SPEAKER_00: That's why for us having a Toronto office and being Canadian, it's incredibly important.
[08:39] SPEAKER_00: But I love Vancouver and anytime I go to an event, I know at least one person.
[08:43] SPEAKER_00: But it's great because then they introduce me and then they, you know, it's more of a
[08:46] SPEAKER_00: warm intro than in a larger city.
[08:48] SPEAKER_01: If you could offer some tips or advice on anybody looking to do business there, what
[08:53] SPEAKER_01: would be three essential events or networking groups or resources that you would encourage
[08:59] SPEAKER_01: somebody to connect with?
[09:01] SPEAKER_01: If they're a tech startup, tech Vancouver is incredible.
[09:05] SPEAKER_00: They have a ton of members all over the city and they host monthly meetups.
[09:10] SPEAKER_00: Usually around two to three hundred people come per meetup every month and then you
[09:13] SPEAKER_00: can pitch at the meetup.
[09:14] SPEAKER_00: You can ask for advice from the community, that kind of thing.
[09:17] SPEAKER_00: Startup Canada is also great if you're not tech, but you are a startup, startup Canada's
[09:21] SPEAKER_00: great.
[09:22] SPEAKER_00: And we actually have a lot of really good events.
[09:24] SPEAKER_00: So BC Tech Summit just happened.
[09:26] SPEAKER_00: We have one called traction that happens in October.
[09:29] SPEAKER_00: We have Vancouver Startup Week.
[09:31] SPEAKER_00: We have an angel forum that comes in the fall.
[09:33] SPEAKER_00: And we have Ted.
[09:34] SPEAKER_00: Ted talks, comes to Vancouver every year.
[09:37] SPEAKER_00: So we have Ted X as well.
[09:38] SPEAKER_00: So it's just being there and being in that environment, just knowing where to find it,
[09:45] SPEAKER_00: looking on meetup, if you're blockchain specific, there's tons of blockchain meetups as well.
[09:50] SPEAKER_01: How are you incorporating blockchain into your particular technology?
[09:55] SPEAKER_00: We use IBM Hyperledger.
[09:57] SPEAKER_00: So it's just a different type of blockchain that we're building on top of.
[10:00] SPEAKER_00: We are building our own blockchain, so it's a private permissioned blockchain.
[10:03] SPEAKER_00: We use the blockchain to facilitate the smart contracts and the trades.
[10:08] SPEAKER_00: So the compliance engine, the protocol on the background layer, holding your data, your
[10:13] SPEAKER_00: information, your ID card, your banking information.
[10:16] SPEAKER_00: So all of that is held within the blockchain and on the third party trust verification
[10:19] SPEAKER_00: system.
[10:20] SPEAKER_00: And we use the blockchain for smart contracts.
[10:23] SPEAKER_00: So what that means is we write the contract for the property and then you can easily buy
[10:26] SPEAKER_00: and sell and facilitate trades at a fraction of the cost that it would if you're papering
[10:30] SPEAKER_00: it in a traditional sense.
[10:32] SPEAKER_00: So we allow for the liquidity factor and the small number.
[10:36] SPEAKER_00: Our minimum buy-in is $100.
[10:38] SPEAKER_00: And if we had to pay legal accounting, all these different things, it would be so expensive.
[10:43] SPEAKER_00: So the blockchain allows us to get in for a lot smaller of a number.
[10:46] SPEAKER_01: You know, some of our best ideas come when we're not in the office.
[10:50] SPEAKER_01: Can you describe a favorite location in Vancouver where you recharge or reconnect or get inspired?
[10:57] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so well, I go to a meditation center which I absolutely love.
[11:00] SPEAKER_00: It's in Gastown.
[11:02] SPEAKER_00: So they do like one hour sound meditations.
[11:05] SPEAKER_00: So I do really love going there.
[11:07] SPEAKER_00: Anytime I can be outside, hiking, I love camping, I bike everywhere.
[11:11] SPEAKER_00: So for me, it's just getting into nature.
[11:13] SPEAKER_00: Is there somebody who's been an influential mentor for you?
[11:17] SPEAKER_00: From a one-on-one basis, I would say not at this time, but I am actively looking for a mentor.
[11:22] SPEAKER_00: Hopefully a female mentor in the technology space is a few specific ones that I've been
[11:26] SPEAKER_00: speaking with.
[11:26] SPEAKER_00: But I am part of different women's networks, the female funders and women's executive
[11:30] SPEAKER_00: networks.
[11:32] SPEAKER_00: We've actually just won an award last week as well, so that's really exciting.
[11:36] SPEAKER_00: And that's through Startup Canada.
[11:37] SPEAKER_00: And there's been a lot of incredible mentorship at ArmsLanc through them.
[11:41] SPEAKER_00: Okay.
[11:41] SPEAKER_00: Personally, I know a lot of the people there and go to their events.
[11:46] SPEAKER_00: Some of them are pitch nights and they teach you how to pitch.
[11:48] SPEAKER_00: And just even being in the audience, you learn a lot from that.
[11:51] SPEAKER_00: So nobody's specific, but at ArmsLanc for sure, there's a lot in the community.
[11:55] SPEAKER_00: Any particular book that you feel has been impactful for you.
[11:58] SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a bit of a cliche, but anything from Brenne Brown.
[12:02] SPEAKER_00: Because it's quite personal.
[12:04] SPEAKER_00: And I believe that when you're on the entrepreneurship journey, even if you're part of a team like
[12:07] SPEAKER_00: me, I'm one of the co-founders on our team.
[12:10] SPEAKER_00: At the end of the day, it's a personal journey that if I don't show up in a certain way,
[12:14] SPEAKER_00: then it's going to affect my whole team and it's going to affect everything that happens
[12:17] SPEAKER_00: within my business too.
[12:18] SPEAKER_00: So it's more about the internal journey for me and then I can show up and then I can lead.
[12:25] SPEAKER_00: So, um, uh, Derek's lead.
[12:27] SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
[12:27] SPEAKER_00: He was one of the latest.
[12:29] SPEAKER_00: And then, uh, Derek, was it Daring Greatly?
[12:32] SPEAKER_00: I believe it was Daring Greatly.
[12:33] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that was another one that I really liked.
[12:35] SPEAKER_01: Now, you're a traveler, right?
[12:36] SPEAKER_01: So, can you pick one place that is a favorite and why?
[12:40] SPEAKER_00: I lived in Australia and I have to say, like that to me, the way that they operate, how
[12:45] SPEAKER_00: they think their mentality, their soul relax and laid back.
[12:49] SPEAKER_00: And I didn't have a bit of an issue with how much they don't really push in terms of
[12:53] SPEAKER_00: entrepreneurship, but the lifestyle and the beauty.
[12:57] SPEAKER_00: Like as a nature person, like I absolutely love that.
[12:59] SPEAKER_00: I love diving.
[13:00] SPEAKER_00: So I've dove the Great Barrier Reef.
[13:02] SPEAKER_00: I've dove in Belize, the Blue Hole, like anything that I could wear anywhere I can dive.
[13:06] SPEAKER_00: Fun question, then.
[13:07] SPEAKER_01: A bit of kind of travel related.
[13:08] SPEAKER_01: If you were on a deserted island, how long would you last on the island?
[13:13] SPEAKER_00: Uh, I think at the beginning I would have trouble.
[13:17] SPEAKER_00: You know, I actually just switched phone plans, but I had a phone plan on purpose that
[13:21] SPEAKER_00: only gave me citywide coverage.
[13:23] SPEAKER_00: Uh-huh.
[13:23] SPEAKER_00: So it was one of the smaller companies.
[13:24] SPEAKER_00: And then when I would go to Whistler, I would go camping.
[13:27] SPEAKER_00: I literally couldn't make any calls, couldn't do any internet.
[13:30] SPEAKER_00: I could only take photos.
[13:32] SPEAKER_00: And for me, that was actually very liberating because people couldn't get a hold of me.
[13:35] SPEAKER_00: I think I could last as long as there's food and some interesting things to do.
[13:39] SPEAKER_00: I could last, yeah.
[13:40] SPEAKER_00: So is there anything you'd like to add for listeners?
[13:42] SPEAKER_00: Canada is an incredible place to be a founder, to be an entrepreneur.
[13:46] SPEAKER_00: And if you have an idea, find out if it makes sense.
[13:50] SPEAKER_00: Tell everybody.
[13:51] SPEAKER_00: A lot of people say, I don't tell my idea because they're going to steal it.
[13:54] SPEAKER_00: Right.
[13:55] SPEAKER_00: It's so hard to steal it.
[13:56] SPEAKER_00: It's so hard to actually run with a business idea.
[13:58] SPEAKER_00: So I would say, tell everybody.
[14:01] SPEAKER_00: Sure.
[14:01] SPEAKER_00: Find out if there's validity, if there's a market.
[14:03] SPEAKER_00: And I would say, just go for it.
[14:05] SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
[14:06] SPEAKER_00: Laura, how can people get a hold of you?
[14:07] SPEAKER_00: Twitter, Instagram as well.
[14:09] SPEAKER_00: All the places.
[14:10] SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
[14:11] SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
[14:11] SPEAKER_01: This has been Angela Barnard from Canada's podcast where you can listen, discover and engage.
[14:18] SPEAKER_01: You've been excited to talk to Laura.
[14:20] SPEAKER_01: Today from Ritium.
[14:21] SPEAKER_01: And we look forward to seeing you at Collision in Toronto again in the future.