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Toronto house prices surge

salvius

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Toronto house prices surge
House prices in Canada continued to rise, despite a slowdown in the U.S.
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/261171

Sep 27, 2007 09:22 AM
THE CANADIAN PRESS

Toronto's housing market continued to set records throughout the summer, with the price of a typical two-storey home rising nine per cent to $523,320.

Royal LePage Real Estate Services' (TSX: RSF.UN) third-quarter survey of the national resale housing market found home prices in major Canadian cities continued rising strongly.

The company found that on a national basis the average condominium price increased 15.7 per cent from a year earlier to $241,818, while standard two-storey properties gained 13.4 per cent to $407,613 and bungalow prices were up 14.3 per cent to $340,941.

"Much like the Canadian dollar, the Canadian housing market is charting its own course, quite independent from the United States and its currency and housing climate," said Phil Soper, chief executive of the national realty operator.

"The strength of the Canadian dollar, and the fact that the country is adjusting well to its value, will continue to keep interest rates at their existing low-to-moderate levels, boding well for buyers looking to enter the market."

Saskatoon had the most dramatic year-over-year price appreciation – over 60 per cent – while a typical two-storey house appreciated 55 per cent in Saint John, N.B., 27 per cent in Fredericton, 26 per cent in Edmonton, 17.5 per cent in Calgary, 17 per cent in Regina, 15 per cent in Winnipeg and 11 per cent in Vancouver.

The Royal LePage survey of 250 neighbourhoods in 16 cities found that the Alberta market is easing from its recent intense activity, while "Central and Eastern Canada are now rising alongside their western counterparts as their local commodity industries receive increased attention."

It also noted increasing home ownership in Montreal, traditionally a city of renters.

Toronto's housing market has a bright outlook. The report said Canada's biggest market "is poised for continued activity and rising average house prices as the city continues to attract both buyers relocating to the city centre from the suburbs, and newcomers to the country."

In Atlantic Canada, "the past few months have seen both Saint John (N.B.) and St. John's (N.L.) become the 'Calgarys' of the East, as several energy-related projects in New Brunswick and Newfoundland gain attention," Royal LePage reported.

"While Halifax is not directly related to the oil industry, the city is experiencing a spill-over effect."

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Basically, if you've got a family and aren't rich, please get out of the city.
 
From the perspective of that article, I don't have an average condo anymore.
 
Here's a link to a report CityTV did last night, basically on the same data:

They mentioned Riverdale as the biggest increase in home prices..

http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_15214.aspx

Snippet of the data, which breaks down the neighbourhoods:

Downsview
Standard two-storey home increased slightly by 1 per cent to $315,000
Detached bungalow fell slightly to $369,000
Standard two-storey increased by 6.7 per cent to $176,000

North Toronto
Detached bungalow rose by 15.4 per cent to $553,800
Standard two-storey home increased by 22 per cent to $707,550
Standard condominium increased by 7.1 per cent $364,300

Mid-town Toronto
Standard two-storey home increased by 5.1 per cent to $1,400,000
Condominium increased by 4.7 per cent to $450,000

Moore Park
Standard two-storey home increased by 22.7 per cent to $990,000

Waterfront
Standard condominium located on the increased by 33.3 per cent to $400,000

Leaside
Detached bungalow appreciated by 12.6 per cent to $608,000
Standard two-storey rose by 5.1 per cent to $725,000
Standard condominium rose by 18.2 per cent to $325,000, over the same period in 2006.

Cabbagetown
Standard two-storey property decreased by less than one per cent to $570,000
Standard condominium increased by 29.7 per cent to $380,000

Bloor West Village
Detached bungalow increased by 27.8 per cent to $556,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 10.1 per cent to $578,000
Standard condominium increased by 14.7 per cent to $304,000

Riverdale
Standard-two storey home increased by 47.1 per cent to $500,000
Standard condominium increased by 33.6 per cent to $350,000

The Annex
Standard two-storey home in rose by 13 per cent at $780,000
Standard condominium increased by 27.2 per cent to $500,000

The Beach
Two-storey property in increased by 6.9 per cent to $544,000

Central Mississauga
Detached bungalow increased by 5.2 per cent to $343,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 4.8 per cent to $324,500
Standard condominium appreciated by 6.7 per cent to $214,500

Meadowvale and Streetsville Village
Detached bungalow in rose by 9.8 per cent to $380,000
Standard two-storey home rose by 6.5 per cent to $329,000
Standard condominium appreciated by 5.7 per cent to $221,000

Oakville
Detached remained the same at 300,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 7.7 per cent to $350,000
Standard condominium remained the same at $220,000

North Etobicoke
Detached bungalow increased by 3.5 per cent to $412,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 2.9 per cent to $393,000
Standard condominium increased by 3.9 per cent to $186,000

South Etobicoke
Detached bungalow increased by 4 per cent to $340,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 3 per cent to $340,000
Standard condominium increased by 13 per cent to $305,000

Islington/Kingsway
Detached bungalow increased by 4.4 per cent to $424,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 2.2 per cent to $460,000
Standard condominium increased by 17.5 per cent to $275,000

Central Scarborough
Detached bungalow increased by 10.7 per cent to $320,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 9.1 per cent to $359,000
Standard condominium appreciated by 4.3 per cent to $195,000

Agincourt
Detached remained almost steady at $324,500 (-0.5%)
Standard two-storey home increased by 5.8 per cent to $344,000
Average price of a standard condominium increased by 8.3 per cent to $195,000

West Hill
Detached bungalow decreased by 0.9 per cent to $327,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 7.9 per cent to $340,000
Standard condominium increased by 15.5 per cent to $175,000, over the same period in 2006

Richmond Hill
Detached bungalow increased by 3 per cent to $345,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 2.9 per cent to $350,000
Standard condominium remained steady at $235,000

Markham
Detached bungalow in increased by 7 per cent $460,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 7.7 per cent to $463,000
Standard condominium remained near steady at $285,000 (+1.1%)

Woodbridge
Detached bungalow increased by 1.1 per cent to $427,000
Standard two-storey property increased by 0.9 per cent to $351,000
Standard condominium remained steady at $272,000

Source: Royal LePage
 
Riverdale prices have become totally insane over the past couple of years. It used to be a nice neighbourhood for writers, artists, designers, musicians, filmmakers and miscellaneous chatterers with something interesting to say. Now a dull, monied bourgeoisie is moving in, big time. There goes the neighbourhood.
 
The artistic types and chatterers always blaze the way for the moneyed types, Shocker. Toronto provides several examples over the years. Time to move on, perhaps. How about the Junction neighbourhood?
 
Yeap, classic gentrification..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gentrification

The role of certain social groups

The urban middle-class typically does not begin to occupy new neighborhoods all at once. In many cases, more economically marginal subgroups of "trend-setters"—often referred to in popular literature as "urban pioneers" (Smith 1996, 26) although that term carries with it racist aspersions (Smith 1996, 13)—are the first to arrive in gentrifying areas. Although these groups may not have high incomes, their high educational or occupational status (i.e., high cultural capital) qualify them as marginally bourgeois. In many cases, these individuals are young and live in non-family households, and thus have a higher tolerance for perceived urban ills (such as crime, poor-quality schools, lack of amenities like shops and parks, and the presence of disadvantaged racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic groups) that may dissuade middle-class families.

As the number of "trend-setters" grows, they create amenities valued by the bourgeoisie, particularly service establishments such as new bars, restaurants, and art galleries that serve the gentrifying group's demographic, residents with a similar outlook and greater amounts of capital may follow. This group, in turn, further adds amenities and investment to the area, increases local property values, and paves the way for more risk-averse investors and residents. The first newcomers, priced out of their newly fashionable neighborhood, move on to adjacent areas, where the process often begins anew. In this theory, the classic sector model of urban residential succession—essentially that neighborhoods "trickle down" from one socioeconomic group to another, with the wealthiest residents moving linearly outward from the Central Business District—works in reverse, but the "invasion-succession" process proceeds in a remarkably similar fashion.

Gentrification does not require these intermediary steps, but such a succession greatly facilitates the process. In other instances, as with the London Docklands and other CBD-adjacent urban renewal projects, or in instances of comprehensive public housing redevelopment (as at Cabrini-Green in Chicago), government and large developers can invade the area with sufficient capital to skip the steps entirely. In still other recent instances, a Community Development Corporation has been so successful at stabilizing an urban neighborhood that it becomes desirable for the middle class; examples include Roxbury, Massachusetts, Near South Side, Chicago and Harlem, New York City.


Artists, bohemians, hipsters

Traditionally the largest African-American community in the U.S., Bedford-Stuyvesant in New York City is now undergoing the rapid gentrification of (mostly white) artists and bohemians.The method by which an urban "artist colony" is transformed into an affluent neighborhood has been well documented for many years. Artists and subcultural students (more recently nicknamed "hipsters," but also including the hippies of earlier years) often seek out devaluated urban neighborhoods for their low prices and for their sense of authenticity or "grit" (Lloyd, 89). As the bohemian character of the area grows, it appeals "not only to committed participants but also to sporadic consumers" (Lloyd, 104); eventually, those "sporadic" consumers edge out the earlier arrivals. Christopher Mele described the process with hippies in New York City's East Village in the 1960s:

By the early 1960s, the Beats' enclave of Greenwich Village had been... commercialized by middle-class onlookers... Between 1964 and 1968, dozens of specialty shops that catered to the hippies had opened along St. Mark's Place... In addition to students and hippies, the neighborhood's countercultural atmosphere attracted copywriters, editorial workers, fashion designers, and commercial artists... Although the youthful movement criticized middle-class values and lifestyles, its members, nonetheless, were of largely middle-class origin living in one of the poorest working-class districts in the city. (Mele, 159-169)
Through the 1960s and 1970s, lofts in SoHo were converted en masse to house artists, hippies, and others (Zukin 121-3). As those neighborhoods continued to escalate in price and social status, the artists moved on to Park Slope, Brooklyn and Hoboken, New Jersey, and today (and their followers, the hipsters) to Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Emerging areas where hipsters are being displaced to run along the BMT Canarsie Line (L) and IND Crosstown Line (G) of the New York City Subway system due in large part due to their proximity to Williamsburg.

Similar examples can be found in many cities around the world with large numbers of jobs in media, fashion, and other creative trades.


Gay men

Manuel Castells's seminal work on gay men as "gentrifiers" in San Francisco has revealed a pattern replicated, to some degree, in other North American cities, as "many [gays] were single men, did not have to raise a family (in urban schools of questionable quality), were young, and connected to a relatively prosperous service economy" (Castells, 1983, p. 160). Many gay and lesbian people leave their towns and neighborhoods of origin to start a new life and form a new community after coming out.[citation needed] Gay men tend to choose inner-city neighborhoods as places to live because of the lower cost of housing in these areas and social acceptance (which are generally found in inner-city cores) that may not be found in more conservative suburbs or small towns.[citation needed]

The PBS documentary Flag Wars [1] outlined the tension between an urban African-American community in the old silk stocking district of Columbus, Ohio and the mainly white gays and lesbians moving in, who were accused of gentrification and racism.

Real estate trends can push out poorer gay people, as in San Francisco's Polk District; radical queer activists saw the value of an impoverished neighborhood as a refuge for the economically, sexually and socially marginalized, while others saw renovations and increased real estate values as signs of improvement in the neighborhood.[2] A gay neighborhood might be termed a gay ghetto.[citation needed]
 
Soaring prices dampen August home resales

LORI MCLEOD

From Saturday's Globe and Mail

September 28, 2007 at 8:43 PM EDT

TORONTO — The number of resale homes sold in Canada dropped 4.1 per cent in August from July — the largest month-over-month decline in nearly four years — as soaring prices kept more potential buyers on the sidelines.

Sales dropped to 43,257 units in August from 45,102 in July, the largest decline in activity between consecutive months since November, 2003, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association. This was largely due to fewer sales in Ontario and Quebec, although sales also eased in most other provinces.

"One car doesn't make a parade, but this may well be the start of an orderly decline to more normal sales levels," said Gregory Klump, CREA's chief economist. "It reflects that a runup in prices is leading to a gradual erosion of sales."

August's decline came on the heels of a strong July, in which sales hit their highest level on record.
Home resales declined in August
The Globe and Mail

While high prices have squeezed some first-time buyers out of the market, home sales are probably being propped up by new mortgage products, said Derek Holt, assistant chief economist at Royal Bank of Canada.

"You could argue that even if a cooling of sales extends into next year, it will be offset by the strong take-up rates of longer amortization mortgages," Mr. Holt said.

Last year, the federal government allowed mortgages with terms longer than the traditional 25-year amortization. They raise the cost of owning a home, but increase affordability by lowering monthly payments.

Forty-year amortizations have already become the most popular term with mortgage applicants as home prices continue to rise, according to Mr. Holt.

The average price for a resale residence rose 11.2 per cent in August from the year before to $305,823, according to CREA.

Prices were at their highest level for the month of August in every province, and broke all previous monthly records in Saskatchewan, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador.

"We are still in a sellers' market, and while sales will slow gradually, we still expect the market to be very tight. We expect year-over-year prices to rise 9 to 10 per cent every month for the rest of the year," Mr. Klump said.

Saskatchewan swept the top three in terms of areas with the largest year-over-year price increases in August, according to data compiled by CREA.

In the Battlefords, Sask., comprised of North Battleford and the town of Battleford, the cost of a resale home rose 74 per cent in August from the year before. Next came Saskatoon and Estevan, where prices rose 56 and 52 per cent respectively.

House prices declined in just three of the markets included in CREA's data. The largest drop in price in August from the previous year was 16 per cent in Northern Lights, B.C., followed by an 8-per-cent decrease in Cape Breton, N.S., and a 3-per-cent fall in Parry Sound, Ont.
 
Is that a bad thing? Less property tax for the homeowners, and cheaper house prices for prospective homeowners! Everyone wins! Besides, it is only 1%. Could just be that only a few smaller houses were sold in this period.
 
Perhaps the new wanna-live-downtown-with-my-SUV-and-kids bourgeoisie are bypassing your gated community, for the cleaner air and greener avenues found in the balmy uplands across the valley in Riverdale?
 
Perhaps the new wanna-live-downtown-with-my-SUV-and-kids bourgeoisie are bypassing your gated community, for the cleaner air and greener avenues found in the balmy uplands across the valley in Riverdale?
If you've got a big car and need big spaces, then you're probably right. Cabbagetown is not the place for an oversized SUV. I have trouble getting my Triumph motorcycle down our little driveway, and can't imagine how they got the big 1960s car down from the old garage.

BTW, I hardly consider anyone who worked hard and successfully to buy a house in Cabbagetown as bourgeoisie. What do you call those in Rosedale?
 

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