Golden Jackass Tobacco Shop

[KastelCo]

Michael,

One of my clients is a homebuilder. They see no let up yet. Their estimator has a similar story to yours. A home recently sold for an astronomical price. There is another home on his street going for a silly price. If it sells his house will go for sale also.

Then again my next door neighbour is a real estate appraiser and so is also close to the industry. He is doing a lot of appraisals for re finance. He finds appraisal values (dependent on market price) have topped here or are at least resting. A big difference this go around from the last big boom in the 80's is that then there was a huge amount of speculation ( a la Nasdaq etc) which is not apparent this go. It seems to be more cocooning.

Even in my case the profits in my non registered account got blown on home upgrades before I could lose them back to the market, phew ! My home value is up at the prices of the last bubble 320K, I bought in the last bust for 219K :o) One down the street went for 550K and one around the corner is valued 1 million plus. Older neighbourhood (40-50 years) with big lots by today's standards and the pricier ones are newer builds on old lots.

I guess in all this it depends on your neighbourhood and city. I'm not seeing the same mania as when I bought my first home (beginning of the last bubble here, I've been lucky) but prices are definitely high. Toronto's near future appears economically sound. It's the re financing that concerns me.

regards,
Kastel
A cute and cuddly Canadian