Earlier today, the Conservative Party of Canada made the following housing policy announcement. If elected this fall, they would (copied verbatim from here): Fix the mortgage stress test to ensure that first-time homebuyers aren’t unnecessarily prevented from accessing mortgages and work with OFSI to remove… Read More
Rachelle Younglai and Chen Wang’s recent piece in the Globe and Mail on suburban household debt (in Canada) has a number of interesting stats. Here are some of them: Looking at debt service ratios across the country, the most financially stressed neighborhoods in Canada are… Read More
Shane Dingman’s recent Globe and Mail article about “the investment case for mid-rise condos” is a good summary of why this housing type has become so popular in Toronto. Mid-rise buildings tend to attract more end-users because of their boutique scale. That is, they attract… Read More
Alex Bozikovic (architecture critic for the Globe and Mail) is one of the most vocal proponents of more housing and more density within Toronto’s low-rise neighborhoods. Last year, he organized an international design competition where he asked firms to come up with innovative, yet sensible,… Read More
Jamaican-Canadian billionaire, Michael Lee-Chin, was in ROB Magazine last week talking about how he grew up, how he got into the investment industry, and how he thinks about wealth creation. I met Michael once back in 2009 thanks to an introduction by my father. And… Read More
Things are busy right now as we get ready to unveil Junction House this fall and so I’m a bit behind on my news and reading. I just finished reading Alex Bozikovic’s Globe article on BIG’s new KING Toronto project (official name). It is an… Read More
Yesterday Urbanation released its Q2-2018 rental report for the Greater Toronto Area. It tracks both purpose-built rentals and condominium rentals, the latter being condominium units that are listed for rent on MLS. The average condo rent, for all unit types across the GTA, is up 11.2%… Read More
This evening Slate Asset Management hosted the community meeting that I’ve been writing about on the blog over the last little while. And at this open house Jeanne Gang of Studio Gang introduced a new block plan and mixed-use building at the southwest corner of… Read More
Doug Saunders recently published a great piece in the Globe and Mail about the “the dead spaces between buildings” and the architectural revolution that is taking place from Mexico City to Toronto to solve this underappreciated problem. The example in Mexico City is that of the… Read More
Recently we’ve been talking about California’s Proposition 13 and how it may be creating a disincentive for longtime homeowners to move. They’re enjoying below market property taxes, and so they stay put, even if they may have too much house. But this concept of “overhousing” isn’t… Read More
