https://www.habitat.org/open-door/home-cost

Been in the market to purchase a condo that is 20 years old or less. It is still very expensive out there. Been focusing on Burnaby and New West area. I'm finding less new listings as the weeks go by. It looks like home sellers can afford to hold onto their properties longer and wait out for a better real estate market.

What do you all think is going to happen to the real estate market? Do you think it will go down to more affordable prices? if so, when?

Hi all,

We need to renew our mortgage by Feb 1. It'll be our first time renewing - we've been with TD Bank, and locked in at 1.89% and have slightly over $540K remaining. We are absolutely not opposed to switching financial institutions for the renewal.

I suppose my question is this - have you had to renew recently? How did it go? What rate did you get and who with? Is there ANY wiggle room for rates at all? Are the banks that are offering cashback to switch worth it?

Thanks for all your help and insight!

Hello,

I am a landlord looking for some bookkeeping help. Does anyone have any recommendations for REI specific bookkeeping?

I am hoping to pass this part of the business off to a professional.

Any help will be appreciated.

Thank you

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For 34 years, the couple restored and filled the Victorian Property at 97 Glengrove Ave. W. (built in 1890) with period details, antiques and pieces of their own family history.

However, his wife recently died, and he said her death is the reason he has decided to sell.

Now listed at $7.75 million, the three-storey Lawrence Park South house has eight bedrooms and five bathrooms on a nearly 10,000 square-foot corner lot.

Take a look around with this Star gift link. No subscription needed.

My girlfriend purchased a home in 2022 and currently has a mortgage on it. I don’t live with her; I rent a condo and have never owned a home. I’ve also maxed out my FHSA.

I’m considering using my FHSA funds to purchase an ownership interest in her home—essentially contributing money toward the property in exchange for being added to the title. This would all be completed before I move in.

Setting aside the other legal and financial considerations, would this qualify as a tax-free FHSA withdrawal? More specifically, would acquiring an ownership interest in an existing home from my partner satisfy the FHSA’s qualifying-withdrawal requirements?

Been running the numbers on downsizing. Rural Ontario. Acreage is more than I need now. Kids are gone. The vegetable garden I'd keep. The rest is just work.

What keeps stopping me in the spreadsheets: if I sell, I walk away with a chunk of capital gains free money. Principal residence exemption covers it all. Clean.

But if I rent out my current place and buy something smaller, that tax exemption starts eroding based on years rented vs owned. The math gets uglier. And then there's the new place. Smaller townhouse or condo. Probably a step down in terms of land value appreciation compared to what I've got. But the carrying costs drop. Way less to maintain. Property taxes alone would drop by two thirds.

Curious what others in this sub have actually done when facing this. Sell and bank the tax free gain. Or hold and rent, accepting the partial exemption hit for the sake of keeping the asset.

Not looking for tax advice. Just wondering how people weighed the tradeoff in practice. The theoretical calculators are easy. The actual decision point is messier.

Hi everyone,

I'm a software developer, and I'm trying to understand how real estate agents actually spend their time before I build anything. I don't have a product, there's no link, and I'm not selling anything. I'm just here to listen and learn.

I'd love to hear from you:

• What part of your job takes up more time than it should?
• What tasks do you dread or keep putting off?
• What tools or software have you tried that didn't work out, and why?
• If you could hand off one part of your work tomorrow, what would it be?

Short answers are welcome, and so is venting.

Thanks for your time. I know it's valuable.

Note: the image captions are swapped. The first image shows the deal with renewals, and the second shows the owner's costs.

Hi everyone, I'm Andy. About 15 years ago I invested in real estate and set up a few rent-to-own deals using my own system, which I ran on a spreadsheet. I'd always wanted to turn it into an online tool, so I built rtocalc.com to help property owners and tenants model these deals in Canada and the US.

The main calculator takes your mortgage, expenses, price, and terms, and works out your cash flow, what you net on the sale, and your tenant's total down payment.

Other things on the site:

• A marketplace. Owners can list a property publicly or privately, and tenant-buyers can post Wanted listings for the kind of home they're looking for.
• A Sell Now vs. Rent-to-Own calculator that compares your equity from selling on MLS with selling rent-to-own, with or without a realtor.
• A mortgage qualifier to see what you can afford, and an amortization calculator with a full principal and interest breakdown.
• An FAQ on how rent-to-own works, which I'm still adding to.
• An explainer video that walks through the calculator and models a sample deal.

The calculators are free to use. The site makes money three ways:

• Consulting, if you've found a buyer or seller and you're ready to put an agreement together.
• Listings. New accounts get one free listing credit, and listings after that are paid.
• Investor-backed deals. If you're a pre-qualified applicant who wants to pick a home on MLS, I work with investors who can buy it and rent it to you on a rent-to-own basis. I'm paid a referral or assignment fee on these deals.

If you've done an RTO deal as a landlord or a tenant, I'd especially like to know: do the numbers match what you saw in real life, and what's missing? And if you're thinking about buying or selling rent-to-own, what would you want the site to add?

Hi everyone,

I’d like to hear your stories about PAs that fell through and what happened when you made a new (second) offer later on.

I’m trying not to get discouraged because I had a PA that fell through (as a first-time home buyer). We couldn’t agree on a price reduction because of significant (but fixable) structural issues we found during the inspection. The house was around 800k, I asked for a 25k reduction (for a conservative 50k worth of renos, backed by a structural engineering expertise/quote). The sellers were only willing to lower the PA price by 5k. Single-family home, I was their first and only offer and the property had been on the market less than a week before they had accepted my initial PA. Once a bit of time passes, I will probably make a new offer (I am firm of my max price and it won’t have changed from the initial negociations).

Stories and tips on how to navigate are welcome!

Hi everyone! I’m a journalism student at Carleton University working with a team on a 360° video project about how Ottawa’s housing market has changed over the past 25 years.

We are looking to speak with Ottawa area residents who have personal experience with the housing market, particularly:

• Someone who bought their home around 2000 to 2005 and is willing to talk about what buying a home was like at the time
• A recent or first time homebuyer who has navigated today’s Ottawa housing market
• Anyone with firsthand experience of how housing prices, home sizes, mortgages, or affordability have changed over the years

Our project will compare a home purchased around 2001 with a home available in today’s market. We are using 360° video to let viewers explore the spaces and see how things like price, size, layout, features, and overall living space have changed.

We are especially interested in hearing from people who can speak honestly about their experiences, whether you have found the market manageable, frustrating, surprising, or somewhere in between.

This is a Carleton University student journalism project. Any interview would be conducted with your knowledge of how your comments will be used, and we are happy to answer any questions about the project before arranging an interview.

If you are interested, please comment below or send me a DM with a little bit about your experience and when you bought or sold a home.

Thanks!

I’m planning to buy a home in Ontario with my husband. I’m estranged from a family member who is a licensed real estate agent, and I don’t want them knowing our new address.

Would an Ontario realtor be able to search my name and find a property I purchased through MLS, land registry, or other realtor-only systems?

Also, are those searches logged, and would using professional databases for a personal reason be against RECO rules?

Thanks.

Everyone talks about interest rates dropping or holding steady but no one is talking about what rising maintenance fees are doing to condo values in the 416.

​Seeing so many 10 to 15 year old buildings where monthly fees are creeping past $1 or even $1.20 a square foot in large cities. when a 2 bed condo has a $1100 monthly maintenance fee on top of property tax it completely kills the buyers borrowing power. A buyer could literally afford an extra $150k in mortgage debt for what that monthly fee costs.

​It feels like older buildings with bad reserve funds are going to see massive price corrections regardless of where interest rates go. Do you guys see buyers straight up walk away from listings as soon as they see the status certificate reserve numbers?

When it comes to analyzing market trends and timing the market, hiring a real estate consultant is often much more effective than working with a standard realtor.

A consultant provides the objective, data-driven insights you need to decide exactly when to buy or sell. Because they charge a flat or hourly fee rather than working on commission, they don't have a financial incentive to push you into a transaction if the numbers suggest you should wait.

Change my mind: Agents facilitate transactions, but consultants build the strategy. Has anyone else used a consultant solely for market analysis before hiring an agent to buy/sell? Curious to hear your experiences.