Oftentimes, it feels like there is a perception that developers price new housing with the fattest of margins. Meaning, if only developers were less greedy, housing could be more affordable. But as we have spoken about many times before, real estate development is a competitive… Read More
By some measures, housing affordability is, in aggregate, the worst it has been in Canada going back to the 1980s. Below is a chart from RBC showing homeownership costs as a percentage of median household income. The previous spike came around the early 90s, but… Read More
Today, Rad Marketing and Blackline hosted their second annual “Ballin’ Out For Charity” basketball tournament. And it was a fantastic event. My sore lower back proves it. It’s always fun getting so many Toronto real estate people into one room (or onto a giant court… Read More
Over the years, we have spoken a lot about the role that investors play in Toronto’s pre-construction condominium market. In the media, they are often spoken about pejoratively. They are seen as being a well-capitalized group that outbids end-users for a limited supply of new… Read More
This week, Urbanation released its condominium market update for Q1-2024. And I’d like to point out two data points. Firstly, across the Greater Toronto & Hamilton Area (GTHA), there were 1,461 new condominium sales for the quarter. This is the lowest quarterly total since Q1-2009… Read More
Back in 2018, Amazon opened its first cashier-less grocery store. The technology — which it later branded as “Just Walk Out” — was intended to allow customers to do exactly that. All you had to do was put items into your cart and walk out… Read More
This evening in French class we discussed a Parisian apartment type called the chambre de bonne. The direct translation is “maid’s room”, and it’s exactly what it sounds like. A small one-room apartment that is found on the top floor of bourgeoisie apartment buildings. Indeed,… Read More
One of my arguments around return to office is that we have not yet reached a post-pandemic equilibrium. Meaning, we’re still in the process of coming back and it’s probably too early to say where exactly we will end up. The latest data (above) from… Read More
I came across this chart in Charlie Bilello’s weekly newsletter: What it shows is the average size of new single-family houses in the US. And what it tells us is that median and average floor areas are falling. They are now roughly back to where… Read More
The $418 million commissions lawsuit that was settled last week with the National Association of Realtors (NAR) is certainly a big deal. The NAR is trying to sound positive, but all signs point to this outcome being meaningful for the industry. TD Cowen Insights is… Read More
BRANDON DONNELLY 