It's about developing the habit of investing in your future

Our younger clients have told us they’d like more material focused on tech, lifestyle and how financial investing can be more sustainable.

The Separate + Joint Method: How My Spouse and I Manage Our Money
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The Definitive Story of The Tesla Takedown
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How To Pay Attention Again: attention has become a currency and every algorithm is designed to compete for it. And they're really good at it. The loss of control over our own attention is not about willpower. It's about neuroscience.
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Depreciating Financial Assets: vehicle ownership costs are staggering.
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When Housing Was Affordable: why don’t we build started homes anymore? Is HGTV to blame? We don't build enough small houses anymore and we don't build enough affordable houses. Great article why we don't.
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Lots of People Apply Sunscreen Wrong. Here’s How to Do It Right. Get ready for the sun with this NY Times consumer report.
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Bonus Video:

Everything About America’s Success Was Unlikely: the world's leading economy, the most powerful military force, a superpower. But this country nearly fell apart… more than once.
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Mark has taken our disparate investments and created a focused portfolio that has seen steady growth. Mark is very proactive, keeping us up to date on all of our financial matters, from investments to estate planning. His explanations are always concise, easy to understand, and engaging. Mark is now helping our 2 sons start investing and teaching them the basics of investing...which we think is so important for our family. I highly recommend Mark Hougen and his team to anyone needing an investment advisor.”

-Brad Macson, VP Operations Total Energy, Calgary, AB

There is never a better time to start investing.
Discover how easy it is to build a portfolio with us.
Call Mark today at (403) 221-0364

Archives

- 7 Attributes of The Millionaire Next Door: The 7 common denominators among people who successfully build wealth.
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- First Trip to Europe? What to Expect
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- Packing Smart and Traveling Light
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- The trouble with finfluencers
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- Why does risk matter in investing? Great perspective for all levels of investor knowledge.
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- Ranked: World Carbon Emissions by Country
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Bonus podcasts:
- They Bought Dream Homes in Tulum. Then Came the Nightmare: the dark side of a pandemic-era development spree in Tulum that has left a trail of ripped off investors, millions of dollars in missing cash and even two bodies in its wake.
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- The Most Powerful People You’ve Never Heard Of: Just beneath the surface of the global economy, there is a hidden layer of dealmakers for whom war, chaos, and sanctions can be a great business opportunity. The World for Sale helps shine a light on physical commodity traders. Great podcast...so interesting.
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- Top Scams of 2025: What to Watch For
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- The Things That Make You Money: "It's not the things you buy and sell that make you money; it's the things you hold." And many other important lessons.
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- The Simon Abundance Index 2025: Earth was 518.4 percent more abundant in 2024 than it was in 1980. Good news happens slowly!
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- Misbehaving in a Volatile Market: we all have Behavioural Biases, and we should be aware of them. Really valuable article.
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- Investors duped in $300 million Ponzi scheme sue Royal Bank, B.C. financial regulator: yet another real estate/mortgage Ponzi scheme and obvious fraud.
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- Best Cars of the Year: 10 Top Picks of 2025 by Consumer Reports, the gold standard for research and recommendations.
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Bonus podcast:
- The Memecoin Casino: Crypto is a joke. A website making Dogecoin and other memecoins becomes even more unhinged, all while generating small fortunes for foul-mouthed children. Classic Pump & Dump. "Thanks for 20 Bandos."
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- Visualized: Where Automakers Build Cars Sold in America: Surprise, surprise...look who benefits the most from tariffs.
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- Keep calm and heed Warren Buffett — history shows market meltdowns are short-lived.
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- As ‘Buy Canadian’ grows, more US companies say retailers turning away their products.
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- Alberta at odds with its biggest craft brewery after substantial beer tax hike: Dear Government, please get out of the way. Thank you from all Albertans.
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- The Diabolical World of Phone Scams.
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Bonus articles:
- Tired of scrolling? This Calgary club is helping people reconnect in real life.
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- Why I Joined an Intergenerational Housing Experiment in Calgary: a student moved into a retirement home in Calgary to get affordable housing and the seniors get companionship (and tech support).
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- Finding a Good Hotel in Europe: Rick Steves guidebooks are my go to resource for hotels in Europe.
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- The Best Fire Extinguisher: both are available in Canada on Amazon. Hope you never need to use it.
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- Protesters target Tesla showrooms in US over Elon Musk’s government cost-cutting.
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- The 30 best Netflix original movies: Always a good debate.
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- The real reason it costs so much to go to a concert: we can’t just blame Ticketmaster and scalpers.
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Bonus videos:
- Congratulations Mike Hasinoff (and team) on your truly impressive and award-winning work. It has been 5 years since the Covid 19 pandemic first hit us and the message of your video remains: We are never lost if we can find each other. Take care of yourself. Take care of each other.
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- We are Canadian.
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- The New Housing Market Premium: yesterday's luxuries have become today's necessities. A new home in 1950 was 983 square feet. In 2023 it was 2230 square feet. And fewer people are living in these homes since families are smaller than they were in the past.
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- Addiction Economy: Restaurants are smoke-free, but phones are ubiquitous at every meal. Today we spend 70% less time with our friends than we did a decade ago. We're addicted to our phones, and they keep notifying us on average 46 times per day for adults and 237 times per day for teens.
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- CFA vs. CFP: Very interesting for anyone joining us in the Wealth Management profession.
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- Michael Lewis: Tobacco, Opioids, Sports Betting: the list of the worst things to negatively effect our society. And again, the regulators are years (maybe decades) behind the evil industries.
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- There Goes My Hero: a very thoughtful article by the great writer, Ben Carlson.
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- NFL Game Cost Inflation Over the Last 10 Years
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- How to Rehearse for an Important Presentation
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- Founder of failed global crypto lending platform pleads guilty to fraud charges
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- Good News Stories You Didn’t Click On in 2024: maintaining an accurate perspective on the world takes work—reading this will help.
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- Planning Your Trip: tourists with too little (or outdated) information run out of money, fly home early, and hate the French. Don't let this be you. Plan your trip for success.
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- The Cost of 1 GB of Mobile Data Worldwide: Surprising to see where the USA and Canada place on this list
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- How to Answer “Why Should We Hire You?” in an Interview
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- The Surprising Power of Questions: the Surprising Power of Questions...and most importantly, how to ask great questions
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- Aaron Wagner And Wags Capital: From Pro Football To Utah’s Latest Disgraced Financial Influencer: Yet another "Finfluencer" revealed to be a Ponzi scheming huckster and get rich quick carnival barker.
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- What Are ETA and ETIAS, Europe’s New Visa-Waiver Programs? Canadians will need to have an ETA to enter the UK as of January 8, 2025. Most of the EU will require ETIAS mid-2025.
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- A Little Perspective: The world has never been better but it feels like things are getting worse. Let’s look at the data.
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- AI Detectors Falsely Accuse Students of Cheating—With Big Consequences.
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- What’s the Right Way to Find a Mentor?
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- Is working from home a dying trend? A growing list of companies ordering employees back to the office.
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- B.C. man seeks court help after buying house with friend who now won't sell it.
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- OPP warns about new extortion message sent via email.
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- How to Get Your Resume Noticed (And Out of the Trash Bin)
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- The 30 best documentaries on Netflix. Since this list was published, also added to Netflix is the documentary Daughters: four girls prepare to reunite with their fathers through a special dance at a DC jail in a moving documentary about the healing power of love. At the 2024 Sundance Film Festival, Daughters won two awards: Festival Favorite and Audience Choice: U.S. Documentary Competition.
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- 15 Ways to Lose Money in the Markets
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- The Most Reliable Car Brands, According to Consumer Reports: a lot of surprises
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- Driverless cars may already be safer than human drivers
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- Canada’s Best Affordable Places to Live: Ten cities on the rise where you can still buy a house for less than $700,000
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- The Happiness Paradox: people who are more connected to family, to friends, and to community, are happier and physically healthier than people who are less well connected.
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- The Most Reliable Car Brands: No surprise to see Lexus, Toyota, Porsche, Mazda and BMW. But how about Buick, Chevrolet, MINI, Kia, Jeep and Dodge also making the top 10. The bottom 10 includes Acura, Mercedes-Benz, Infiniti, Volvo, VW, Land Rover and Audi. Ouch!
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- How to Make a “Good” Presentation “Great”
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- How Gen Z, the so-called ‘loneliest generation,’ got its groove back
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- Ranked: The Most Trustworthy News Organizations in 2024
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Bonus video:
- What makes a good life? Lessons from the longest study on happiness. Really worth watching, 12 minutes
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- Ticketmaster says customers' credit card information affected by data breach
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- 300 highest-rated best movies of all time, according to Rotten Tomatoes
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- My 7 Rules for Happiness: especially #5... Stop listening to people who are paid to make you angry.
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- Countries Offering Digital Nomad Visas: allows you to live and work remotely in a foreign country for an extended period, usually six months to a year. It's often accessible to self-employed or remote workers employed by entities outside the host country.
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- Not Getting Rich Fast Enough: Everyone wants to find the shortcut to wealth and some people will take dangerous risks to find it. Successful investing is generally a boring process. The best way to get rich...is slowly.
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- Visualizing the Growth of $100, by Asset Class (1970-2023): Might just be the most important chart to understand the basics for long-term investment success
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- Their money disappeared when they sent e-transfers in Canada. Here's what happened
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- How to Build a Great Relationship with a Mentor
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- 6 phishing scams targeting young Canadians (and how not to fall for them)
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- Side hustles for busy people that you'll actually enjoy
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