A Cautionary Tale. My final post this week is going to be a bit of a departure from my usual analysis.  Instead, I’d like to bring a real-life event to your attention – something which occurred just this past week at my own brokerage, and it’s a situation that highlights just how valuable proper representation in the real estate world can be. I know many folks will already be familiar...

As the cost of entry for home ownership continues to defy gravity in the Waterloo-Wellington area, it was always inevitable that we’d eventually see a consequent bump up in average monthly rents here, too.  People need somewhere to call home – and when they’re being priced out of home ownership in ever-greater numbers, they turn to the rental market. There’s a yin and a yang to this...

I don’t often break my professional focus on these pages, but if you already know me well, then you’ll know that not much gets me more fired up than a Leafs winning streak!  While the residential resale market has been absolutely on fire over the past several weeks too (I’ll get into a little stats recap later on), I couldn’t help but be tempted to lead off by making mention of my favourite...

Real estate news in Kitchener-Waterloo was absolutely dominated in 2020 by massive increases in sales prices year over year in every part of the housing market.  And when the average sale price of a single detached home surged above $850,000 for the first time ever just this past month, eclipsing even the 16.9% average increase we saw between December of 2019 and December of 2020, why wouldn’t this...

Here in Ontario, ‘Cottage Country’ is often synonymous with Muskoka. It’s easy to see why this is the case – Southern Ontario, after all, is powered largely by the economics and demographics of the GTA. For city dwellers in search of an accessible playground for their summer holidays, the resort towns of Gravenhurst and Bracebridge with their historic downtowns, quaint restaurants and boutiques,...

Several years back, I published an article on my blog titled “The Expanding Small(er) Markets of Southwestern Ontario”, in which I did my best to counter a prevailing narrative at the time that small towns in Ontario were slowly dying out.  While it’s true that population growth in ‘census metropolitan areas’ (as Statistics Canada refers to larger urban areas) has generally outpaced growth...

It need hardly be said again that 2020 was a year unlike all others.  Expectations being defied and norms being cast aside were common threads which seemed to run through each aspect of the year, since our lives changed dramatically last spring with the onset of an ongoing emergency in our province, country, and the entire world.  Every industry was forced to scramble to adjust, with certain...

Over the past few years, particularly in unusually hot markets such as our own here in Southwestern Ontario, buyers and sellers alike have become accustomed to multiple offer scenarios. While the concept of multiple offers is simple enough on its face, there are myriad of underlying factors and dynamics that can make it a potential minefield for both buyers looking for the best possible deal, and for...

Between the day-to-day running of a newer real estate office, and with the Kitchener-Waterloo market now in full-on ‘spring mode’, it’s been quite some time since I’ve had a chance to update my blog. I’d like to share a few quick thoughts on the current state of affairs in Waterloo Region, and on where I see things going from here for the remainder of 2019. In line with much of what the...

It’s a common assumption when a market starts to cool that the worst-case scenario is imminent. But instead, let’s take a moment to revisit what the previous market was like from a buyer’s point of view. The action was fast and furious with homes being listed and then sold, often in a matter of hours. Buyers struggled to understand prices as houses sold for far over asking in multiple offers....