As the Star’s housing editor, I began our search for a home last spring with what I thought were realistic expectations.
We did have some lingering student debt and a car lease.
We crunched the numbers and determined we had a budget of $800,000 — roughly $200,000 less than the average home in Toronto at the time — so long as the house had a basement apartment we could rent out.
Of the houses we saw, one had a musty basement and an inspection report revealed issues with the foundation.
We were set to see it when our realtor messaged us: the owners had accepted a bully offer that would see the house go for well over $1 million — a number that’s since become the norm.
did last summer, instead of last month, or if we had at least known for sure one was coming, we might have been able to jump when prices were lower.
We hoped the market’s typical slowdown in the new year would give us a chance to sneak into the market amid less competition.
I’ve been fortunate to work from home during the pandemic, but once back to the office, that time spent commuting isn’t going to come out of my workday, it’s going to come from what little time I have with him.
But bigger means more money, which means less savings, and the average cost of a home in Toronto already went up about 20 per cent in the year that we’ve been looking.
The median family income in Toronto is $89,150, less than half the $200,000 income needed to buy a home.
After leaving that tiny northwest bungalow, walking past the bulging wall and up the cracked stairs, and getting into our car, feeling dejected — the house would indeed go for well over our budget — my partner tapped my knee.
Real estate is emotional.