As Brossard's home prices keep rising, challenges mount for first-time buyers
CBC
Sasha Konjkave and his girlfriend started house-hunting about two months ago, wanting an upgrade from their condo in Brossard, Que.
The couple wanted to stay in the city on Montreal's South Shore, but given the hot housing market, they also set their sights on neighbouring areas.
They ended up buying a house in nearby Saint-Hubert for $540,000.
"Brossard was way too expensive," Konjkave said. "For the same property in Brossard, we may have had to pay maybe $600,000 or $700,000."
Aside from high price tags, the couple encountered another increasingly common residential real estate reality: bidding wars.
"[A listing] comes out, and you have to call them as quickly as possible, because they're booking, maybe, the Friday, Saturday and Sunday to do the visits," Konjkave said. "It's all 15 minute blocks, and it's full from Friday afternoon until Sunday evening."
Brossard's real estate market is seeing a drop in listings, coupled with a price increase that's among the highest in the province.
The Quebec Professional Association of Real Estate Brokers (QPAREB) groups Brossard and Saint-Lambert together in its quarterly reports.
The most recent figures show the area's median single-family home price over the last 12 months ($658,500) was still lower than on the island of Montreal ($685,000).
But in the last five years, the median price here jumped by 80 per cent — compared to a 67 per cent rise in Montreal.
"The market is really, really tight — and is overheating, actually — and we can see that there's a shortage of inventory," said Charles Brant, the QPAREB's market analysis director. "It creates some bidding wars, and it drives rapid acceleration of the prices."
Brant points to an exodus from the island of Montreal in recent years, along with infrastructure investments and the arrival of the Réseau express métropolitain light-rail network in Brossard.
Real estate broker Jessica Tam says she still has buyers from Montreal who can get a larger property in Brossard with the same budget.
But she points out that the city's hot housing market makes it harder for some first-time home buyers to find something here.
The new owner of Ontario steelmaker Stelco says his company "will not disappoint the people of Hamilton and Nanticoke," where the business's major facilities are based.
A Winnipegger is warning others about an intricate scam she says she almost fell for.
Fort William First Nation is opposing a planned redevelopment of the Ontario Power Generation's (OPG) 117 year old Kakabeka Falls Generating Station, which is located in their traditional territory.
A building that sits at the corner of Sussex Street and Brunswick Avenue has had many lives over the last century — being a church, a school and offices. Now it's set to become housing, at a time when the city sorely needs it.
A Waterloo, Ont., elementary school principal will be sentenced in the new year after pleading guilty to child sexual exploitation charges following a joint investigation that involved the London, Toronto and Waterloo police services.
Students at UPEI have let their student union know what they want from the province this fiscal year, and those priorities are reflected in a 2024-2025 advocacy document brought to the legislature on Wednesday.
Larger communities in the N.W.T. will soon see a boost in their territorial funding to maintain infrastructure and deliver services — like water and waste management — but the increase still falls short of what communities need.
The toxic drug crisis has taken more than 47,000 lives in Canada since 2016 and the synthetic opioid fentanyl has become a household name. But now, what's believed to be an even more potent class of synthetic drugs is showing up in drug busts across the country: nitazenes.
The Liberal government and the NDP have agreed to introduce a two-month GST vacation on certain items before the holiday season, Radio-Canada has learned.
Veterinarians are warning Londoners to make sure their dogs are vaccinated and keeping clean after a deadly virus outbreak was declared in London this week.
Registered nurses rallied in St. John's Wednesday as part of a week-long convention, again calling on the Newfoundland and Labrador government to create permanent solutions to staff shortages and workplace violence.