Alex and I have seen between 10 and 15 houses now. Some great, some not so great. But all consistently overpriced and out of our reach. In Toronto, this is what $800,000 (or more) gets you.
I’ll start with the worst and most shocking.
This house in Roncesvalles (a cute west end neighbourhood) was a disaster. It was also posted at a time when we had seen house after house sell for ridiculous amounts of money (usually around $150k over asking). We were in a desperate state (ok, I was in a desperate state) and suggested to our realtor that we visit this place. It was such a disaster that the selling agent even included a warning in the listing to “leave your children at home.” Our realtor decided to leave us at home too and told us to avoid this house like the plague. We did.
Earlier in the year (back when we were still hopeful) we fell in love with a beautiful house in Roncesvalles. But so did 100 other people. It was exactly what we were looking for but also out of our reach. It became the standard to which all other houses would be compared.
It sold for $801,000. Sigh.
I’ll throw in this ridiculous one for you as well. We went to see this cute little house in Trinity Bellwoods (our current hood). It was a clear flip (last year the same house sold for $600K, pictured left) and was extremely staged. We even recognized much of the furniture and accents from other open houses in the area.
The house sold for $942,000. I don’t even know how to process this… It’s not that big, the location is great but not $900k great, and the reno work was pretty shotty.
All of these things have led us (ok, me) feeling fairly defeated and we haven’t even begun! At least we don’t live in Vancouver…