Profile · Corcoran Horizon Realty, Rego Team
The market moved.
He was already watching.
William Forbes spent a decade on the finance side of the table before he ever held a real estate licence. That background shapes everything about how he works now.
Before the open houses and the offer nights, there were bond desks and balance sheets. William Forbes spent the first decade of his career in capital markets — learning, as he puts it, “how to underwrite without falling in love with the deal.” It is a discipline that does not come naturally to everyone who enters real estate, and one that shapes every conversation he has with a client.
That background means he arrives at a property with a different set of questions. Not just “do you love it?” but “what does it cost to carry, what is the realistic exit, and what could go wrong?” In a market where many buyers are making the largest financial decision of their lives, he considers that kind of rigour a minimum standard.
Eight years, the hard way.
The classroom for the second chapter of his education was Waterloo Region itself. Eight years of owning and operating income properties across Cambridge and Kitchener taught him things no licensing course covers: what a foundation crack actually costs, how a bad tenant clause plays out in the Landlord and Tenant Board, and why the neighbourhood three streets over from the “good” one sometimes outperforms it over a five-year hold.
“The theory is easy,” he says. “Buying a $750,000 property and having something unexpected happen in month six is when you find out what you actually know. I went through that. I want my clients to have the benefit of those lessons without having to pay for them personally.”
“I’d rather a client come in already knowing the market than spend our first meeting on orientation. The more informed they are, the better the decisions we make together.”
Who he works with.
His client base skews toward people in transition: first-time buyers navigating a market that feels deliberately complicated, downsizers trying to figure out what their next chapter actually looks like, and people relocating to the region who need someone to translate the difference between Uptown Waterloo and Doon South in a way that actually helps them decide.
He also works extensively in new builds. William holds active relationships with builders and developers across Waterloo Region, Cambridge, Guelph, and beyond, and serves as an independent buyer’s representative at the builder’s table. The builder’s sales rep works for the builder. He works for the buyer. In most cases, that representation costs the buyer nothing out of pocket.
The Rego Team and Corcoran Horizon.
William works under the Rego Team banner at Corcoran Horizon Realty, one of Waterloo Region’s more active brokerages. The team structure gives his clients access to a broader network of buyer leads and listing exposure while his own practice remains focused and deliberately small. He is not trying to be the agent who closes the most transactions in the region. He is trying to be the one whose clients feel they got an honest deal.