On Saturday, February 17, 2018, when Canadian Prime Minister, with his family, arrived in India for a week-long visit to discuss business and trade, it became evident that India’s presence in Canada is much more than mere numbers.

Though Canada is home to immigrant communities from all around the world, Indo-Canadians are one of the fastest growing communities in Canada. According to Statistics Canada, this makes them the second largest non-European ethnic group in the country after Chinese Canadians. Toronto has the largest Indo-Canadian population in Canada. Almost 51 per cent of the entire Indo-Canadian community resides in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), 20 per cent in the Greater Vancouver Area (GVA), followed by growing communities in Alberta and Quebec. Most Indo-Canadians in the Toronto area live in Brampton, Mississauga, Markham, Scarborough, and Etobicoke.

Indo-Canadians have a strong presence in Brampton, where they represent a third of the population. Likewise, around 20 per cent of the entire Indo-Canadian community resides in GVA and nearby areas like Surrey, Burnaby, Richmond, Abbotsford and Delta. Of late there has been a surge in the number of Indians, moving to other areas outside of GVA. The City of Surrey has over 107,000 South Asians which makes up about 30 per cent of the City’s population. South Asian Canadians are those who were either born in or can trace their ancestry to South Asia that includes nations such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal.

Brad J. Henderson, President and CEO at Sotheby’s International Realty Canada (SIR) who founded the Indian Service Group in 2017 gauged the potential of this particular segment and how it will positivity impact the Canadian real estate market.

The Indian Service Group at SIR was formed because of several reasons. Firstly the idea was to capture more incoming and domestic spend associated with Indian buyers and sellers of residential real estate. We also want to partner with commercial real estate brokers to refer commercial investment opportunities and also provide a service that can be leveraged by other SIR Canada team members.

In addition to this, the Indian Service Group concentrated on more efficiently interacting with Sotheby’s International Realty affiliates in India as well as connect with other India Services Groups throughout North America and the world. “This helped us in significantly improving our capability and services to the market and our clients, thus, are recruiting more Indian real estate professionals in Canada,” adds Henderson.

Rizwan Malik, Senior Vice President-Sales at SIR Canada was eight when he moved to Canada from Pakistan.

I moved right to downtown Toronto with my family. People mostly back then would move to the City, however, in the last 20-30 years, the suburbs have developed quite a lot in regards to amenities, services and connectivity. This has become a huge draw for South Asian communities who are immigrating and settling in suburbs by purchasing properties.

Malik credits education as well as the healthcare system, stable economy and public safety as some of many reasons for people to immigrate to Canada. In regards to settling in the suburbs, he feels that it is convenient as the homes are larger, newly built, less expensive and last but not the least there is a sense of community. “This is especially important for newcomers who can otherwise find a big new city like Toronto overwhelming,” he adds.

Malik notes Milton and Oshawa are some new suburbs that are currently attracting a large number of South Asian communities of late.

In my opinion, 20-25 per cent of South Asians are living in the City while the rest are settled in the suburbs. I meet an average of two to three South Asian clients in a month and they mostly want to be in the suburbs unless they are in university or college then they want to be right in downtown.

Scores of foreign students choose to study in Canada especially in Ontario as well as British Columbia because of their internationally renowned education, better job opportunities, and the higher standard of living. In 2016, India topped the list with 33 per cent of students pursuing education in Canada, followed by China with 26 per cent. A report from the University of Toronto states that in 2017, Canadian colleges and universities admitted 100,000 students from India. Indo-Canadian students are well represented in Toronto-area universities; students of Indian origin make up over 35 per cent of Ryerson University, 30 per cent of York University, and 20 per cent of the University of Toronto’s student bodies, respectively.

When it comes to trade and commerce, the relations between both the countries are going uphill. From past two years, bilateral trade between India and Canada has increased by nearly 30 per cent. In 2017, two-way merchandise trade between Canada and India was $8.4 billion. Canada mainly imports pearls, organic chemicals, pharmaceutical products, textiles, bicycles and motorcycles from India. It exports vegetables, paper, fertilizers, wood pulp, iron and steel and precious stones to India. In 2017, about 150 Indian companies visited Toronto, to seek new partners, find opportunities to launch start-ups, explore investment opportunities, and identify new products and technologies.

Canadian Prime minister Justin Trudeau, on his most recent visit to India, met with six of India’s most influential business tycoons, resulting in partnership that will create more than 5,000 new jobs as well as invest more than $250 million in Canada in the coming years in everything from pulp mills to pharmaceuticals and the IT sector.

Great to see Prime Minister @narendramodi again today in Delhi. Thank you for the warm welcome & productive talks on how Canada & India will collaborate more closely, creating more jobs and opportunities for people in both our countries. pic.twitter.com/HqmhMNk4W5

— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) February 23, 2018

India plays a pivotal role in strengthening Canada’s economy through major contributions in all the three important sectors – real estate, education and business. With the change in United States of America’s foreign policy, Canada is seeing a very strong improvement in the above-mentioned sectors and is not stopping anytime soon.

Title photo by betty_xo

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We’ve all heard the old adage about “the American dream”, but modern opportunities, volatile political climates and the friendly reputation of Canada has more and more people revising this statement to encompass “the Canadian dream”, and part of that means international students looking to study in Canada. Just last year, ICEF Monitor reported that Canada saw an eight percent increase in international students, a trend that started a few years ago, and then experienced a spike since the 2016 U.S. presidential election with many schools seeing a 20 percent increase in applications.

University of Toronto is the top draw among prospective international students, who made up 20 percent of the school’s student population of 17,452 students of undergraduate and graduate students last year alone.

Interested in studying abroad in “The True North strong and free”, it’s time to get cramming. Here’s the CliffNotes version for International Students on everything you need to know if you wish to study in Canada.

Why Canada?

More and more Americans are finding studying in Canada to be a relatively low risk way to spread their wings, and explore another country, that in many cases is only a lengthy drive or train ride away from their home down south of the boarder. Ben Elling says he decided to study in Canada because it was close and familiar:

Growing up my family spent much of our vacation time hiking and canoeing in Ontario, and it always felt like a second home to me. When my girlfriend (now wife) decided to go to University of Western Ontario it seemed like a good opportunity to spend some more time in Ontario.

Other people, like Amber Goodness, decide that they are able to get more bang for their educational buck by moving to study in Canada in relation to comparable schools in the U.S.:

I decided to go to Queen’s University because it was much cheaper than going to school in the US (I went as a dual citizen) and it was a high-caliber school compared to many I was applying to in the US. It was technically my ‘reach’ school and therefore when I got in, I knew I needed to go there. I also loved the area and loved how I was going back to Canada for part of my adult life.

Where to study in Canada?

At the moment, the most popular provinces among international students are Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec. A total of 26 Canadian Universities are featured in QS World University Rankings for 2018, and the most popular of them are:

• the University of Toronto
• McGill University
• the University of British Columbia
• the University of Alberta
• Université de Montréal
• McMaster University
• the University of Waterloo
• Western University
• the University of Calgary

Old Montreal

Student Visa & Application Process

Each school has its own standards and timelines for those wishing to study there, so take a good look at those deadlines and what’s required for the specific institutions where you’d like to study, with the general recommendation being that all international students apply to their colleges and universities of choice around a year before they want to begin their study.

Amber Goodness says it’s not that different from application process in the States:

The application process was very similar to applying to schools in the states, just a different application. Although there is no SAT in Canada, as a dual citizen, I needed to provide my SAT score and it needed to meet the minimum requirements to be accepted.

The schools should easily be able to provide information on:

• the cost of the application, tuition fees,
• rent/dormitory fees,
• required health insurance,
• and whether or not language tests will be necessary.

All students will need their high school transcripts, like any post-secondary application, may be required to pass a medical exam to prove they are in good health, and will need a valid passport.

In comparison to the USA application program, Canadian students are asseed primarily based on high-school grades and an application essay. Sometimes SAT scores are required as well. However, Canada doesn’t have a Common application, unlike the U.S., so students have to submit a separate application to each of their desired universities.

University of Toronto – St. George Campus, Toronto, Canada

The Cost Of Study in Canada

Canadian students pay around 5,000 CAD/year of tuition. In comparison, the average tuition for private universities in the United States is $32,100/year. International students in Canada pay a higher rate to study than Canadian students, with some paying nearly 30K per year to study, which is still lower than what an international student would pay in the U.S., which is around $24,930.

Undergraduate fees in Canada

• According to Statistics Canada, the average tuition fees for international students (2017/2018) are around 25,180 CAD per year.
• Medicine and engineering are among the most expensive, with an average of 28,625 CAD
• Business and management course fees are lower than average at 24,683 CAD

Postgraduate fees

• The average tuition fee in 2017/2018 is 16,252 CAD/year

This rate is not much different than American education fees, but many Americans feel it’s worth the investment.

Ben Elling says:

The international tuition rate seemed reasonable to me, especially when compared to some of the private universities in the US, and not far off some of the state universities.

For Amber Goodness, the savings on tuition were very significant:

Financially, going to school in Canada was MUCH cheaper than going to the same level school in the United States. If I compared it to a similar school down here, the difference would be around $20,000 per year.

Scholarships

If you’re looking for ways to finance your studies in Canada, there are scholarship options available to international students. Most Canadian universities have their own scholarship programs you can apply for. Make sure to apply as early as possible even before you apply to a school. If you’re coming from other Commonwealth countries, make sure to check out the Canadian Commonwealth Scholarship Program. The portal TopUniversities.com compiled a guide to scholarships in Canada that’s worthwhile checking out too, you can find it here.

The Cost of Living in Canada as an International Student:

According to University of Toronto, below are estimated costs of living in Toronto, Mississauga and Scarborough in 2018-19.

Estimated living and studying costs for the academic year (8 months):

• Food: 1604 CAD – 3700 CAD
• Clothing: 900 CAD – 1100 CAD
• Local Transportation: 934 CAD (116.75 CAD per month)
• Books, supplies and instruments: 1000 CAD – 2000 CAD+
• Miscellaneous: 1000 CAD – 2000 CAD

[fvplayer src=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqnfjRb9Li8″ splash=”https://torontoism.com//images/2018/03/uoft-st-george-campus.png” width=”783″ height=”522″ caption=”Living at the U of T St. George”]

The Université de Montréal’s research shows students need 15,050 CAD per year including housing, food, accommodation, books and school supplies, phone costs and other expenses. The University of British Columbia in Vancouver estimates the living costs for students to be at 15,500 CAD/year, excluding mandatory health insurance (864 CAD/year).

Comparing with US study programs 

Ben Elling said a major difference he found between his study in Canada vs. U.S was a greater emphasis on streaming towards a particular degree early on:

Generally in the US first year is composed of a range of classes (e.g., I took astronomy and fencing as my electives while tracking towards an English major). I found in Canada there didn’t seem to be that same flexibility in first year.

University of British Columbia classroms, by Jay Banks

After visiting a U.S. university during her studies in Canada, Amber knew she made the right choice:

When I was in my first year, I went to visit my friends at the local state school that I almost went to in Connecticut and I was shocked how it reminded me of a high school classroom versus a college classroom.

Working While In School

There are some loopholes that can be taken advantage of, for American and International students who wish to work in Canada while studying, where they won’t be required to get a work permit.

Anyone with a valid permit of study who is a full-time student can work on campus at the school, however anyone who wants to work off campus will need to obtain a work permit which can be applied for through Citizenship and Immigration Canada.

How Do I Stay If I want to?

Ben Elling decided to stay in Canada because he didn’t like the situation in the U.S. back then:

While the degrees I obtained in university would likely translate to some US jobs, by the time I finished school I was certain I did not want to go back to the US. George W. Bush had been elected not long after I left the US and it sure seemed like things weren’t trending particularly progressively down south.

Amber Goodness on the other hand, returned home:

I found it very expensive to live in Canada compared to the U.S., particularly groceries and all the other living costs, which influenced my decision. I also returned back to the US because my family was in the States and I was in a serious relationship with someone living in the U.S. in my second and third year of study. I think if I was not in a relationship, I would have considered staying in Canada for a couple of years. I ultimately would have wanted to get my Masters of Education where I planned on settling long term, so I think I would have returned to the US at some point anyway.

International students who study in Canada may be eligible for a special work permit that will allow them to stay in the country for employment for up to three years after graduation, provided they are granted a Post-graduate work permit from Citizenship and Immigration Canada.

Downtown Toronto

Those who want to stay permanently in Canada can apply through the Provincial Nominee status to the federal government. To be eligible for this, applicants must be a recent graduate or graduating soon from a publically funded Canadian College or University (in Canada) and have a qualifying permanent full-time job offer from an employer located in their chosen province. People who have their Masters or PhD’s can apply without a job offer in hand.

Former student turned Canadian citizen Ben Elling says,

From my experience, I found that if you didn’t have a partner or sponsor of some sort, staying on when you finish school as an international student took a lot of work. I think it could certainly be made a bit easier to transition from being here as a student to applying as a permanent resident. I think there should also be a greater emphasis on attracting international students to trades schools and technical colleges.

Before Doing Anything, Research Your Future Stomping Grounds

A road trip or visit to Canada before applying to a school could be a smart choice to ensure your selection meets the needs and expectations of your university/college experience. Former Western student Ben says,

Take the time to research the area where you think you’ll want to go to school. While University of Western Ontario was a great choice and I don’t regret it, London turned out to be a fair bit smaller than I expected.

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Tracy was recently interviewed for WSJ’s article about the Chinese New Year and the symbolism of numbers 8 and 18, which spoken in Cantonese sound like  ”prosperity” and “I want to be very wealthy”, in that order. Since we’ve entered a year that ends with number 18, it is expected to be a very lucky and therefore considered to be a good year to invest in real estate by many Chinese buyers.

Here is an excerpt from the article, you can read the whole version here.

Chinese will soon be celebrating the Year of the Dog. It could also be the Year of the Deal.

It has long been known in real-estate circles that an address or price that includes the number eight—which when spoken in Cantonese sounds like the word for “prosperity”—can make a property more popular with Chinese buyers. Now some real-estate agents are reporting a reaction to the auspicious year of 2018: The number 18, when spoken out loud in Cantonese, sounds like the phrase “I want to be very wealthy,” says Kelly Xie, a Toronto-real estate agent for Century 21.

Janet Wang, a real-estate agent with the Corcoran Group in New York City, says five of her clients suddenly went from casual browsers to active property seekers. “These clients have been looking for a while, then—I don’t know if it’s related to 2018—but around December 23 or January 1, suddenly they say, ‘OK, this year we’re really going to look.’”

Carrie Law, chief executive of Juwai.com, a Chinese international real estate website, says she knows of Beijing-based buyers who were ready to purchase a home in the $5 million range in New York City last year, but postponed the purchase so they could buy this year instead. “There may have been other factors at play, but that’s the reason they gave us,” she says.

While real estate veterans aren’t banking on a big 2018 bump, Christopher Wein, president of the Toronto-based development company Great Gulf, says the number 2018 very well could spark “enhanced” market activity.

Besides investing in a Shanghai office and equipping its sales sites with Chinese-speaking staff and Chinese-language marketing material, Great Gulf pays attention to lucky numbers. A pre-sale offering of 65% of the units at its desirably located 8 Cumberland Street development sold out in a month, says Mr. Wein.

Chinese numerology has long been an important factor in certain real-estate markets. While the number eight is always beneficial, the number four—which sounds like the word for death—is to be avoided. In the greater Toronto city of Markham, where nearly half the population self-identifies as Chinese, “sellers have to put an eight in the price, and you try your hardest to avoid four,” explains Anthony Tomasone, a real-estate agent with the online listing and referral service
Zoocasa.com.

From January to May 2017, 66% of all Zoocasa’s Markham listings contained at least one eight in the offer price, up from 25% in the first three months of 1990 and 35% in the first three months of 1995. In non-Asian- majority neighborhoods in the U.S., eight was the last nonzero digit in just 4% of all home listings in 2017, according to data from Trulia, while in Asian-majority neighborhoods the figure was 25%—up 5% from 2012. Among listings for homes over a million dollars, that number in Asian-majority neighborhoods is 38%.

In New York, Chinese buyers flock to the condo development at 80 Park Avenue between 38th (an especially auspicious number that sounds like “create wealth”) and 39th, says Geovanna Lim, president of the real-estate investment and brokerage firm Park Avenue International Partners.
Some would-be buyers will lobby for a change in house or unit numbers. Seattle Berkshire Hathaway real-estate agent Becco Zou recalls the buyer who liked everything about a $3 million home except for its address: 1044. “He went to the city of Bellevue and got it changed within a day,” she recalls. Tracy An, a sales representative for Sotheby’s in Toronto, says one of her clients, with a neighbor’s consent, was able to change his house address from 44 to 42A.

The Chinese preference for certain lucky numbers has become so well known that even non- Chinese buyers are careful to pay them heed, says Peter Ng, Calgary-based president of multicultural real estate specialist KORE Marketing. In Richmond or Burnaby, British Columbia, he says, where 80% to 90% of pre-sale condo units are snapped up by Chinese buyers, non- Chinese are loath to buy a numerally challenged unit; in a few years, they might find it impossible to sell.

Whole article on WJS.com

Jane Darville has said that healthcare is in her DNA. By this, it seems she means that she has always been drawn to it as a career—for certainly, it is the trajectory in which her decades of work have run. Two years after its opening, Darville became the Executive Director of Toronto’s groundbreaking AIDS hospice Casey House which recently became the first and Canada’s only stand-alone HIV/AIDS specialty hospital with outpatient programming, and later served as the Vice President of Clinical Services at York Central Hospital—now the Mackenzie Richmond Hill Hospital—as the Executive Director for Vancouver’s Canuck Place Children’s Hospice, and as the Vice President of the health care consulting firm CSI Consultancy. Now retired, she is still involved in healthcare on a volunteer basis, as well as chairing the Patron’s Committee of the National Ballet of Canada.

Much of your career has taken place in Toronto. What is your connection to this city?

I was born and raised in Brantford, which is about seventy miles southwest of Toronto, and I moved to Toronto after high school when I started my post-secondary education. So from about age 18 on. Many of my strong friendships are here…and my career grew here, my life grew here. So I actually think of Toronto as ‘home’.

What drew you to health administration as a career?

Well, originally I trained as a nurse.. and after I finished training and I got a diploma in public health nursing I started off in community work. Working for VON [Victoria Order of Nurses] actually, back in the 70s in downtown Toronto. I was a visiting nurse and had walking areas. It was great; a young, exciting thing to do when you’re 22—as I was with my first job. And I just sort of naturally fell into doing more administrative things—being a team leader. And then I went to work for the Homecare program—it’s now called the CCAC, but at that point, it was the Homecare program. They had coordinators based in hospitals to arrange for people to go home, who needed care—nursing, physio, all that sort of stuff.

And so I was their coordinator back in Toronto General [Hospital] where I trained. That was really more of a management job because you were coordinating services, you weren’t doing care. I mean, I haven’t done physical nursing care since I was probably 25. And then I went back to school and got other degrees in administration. I just liked that work. But I also liked being in healthcare. So I just gradually got other jobs that were more administrative, and there you go.

How did you become involved with Casey House?

When I was a manager at Metro Homecare—it was in the early to late 80s—when people living with AIDS were really sick, and no one really knew what was going on, and people were frightened. And people in healthcare were a bit frantic. Anyway, we were bringing these men (they were mainly men at the time) onto the program, I was given the project of seeing how to do that, and what to do so that we could bring them home out of the hospital and take care of them.

So I was involved in that project, and June Callwood and her group had just started to meet about the potential of creating a hospice for people with AIDS, and somehow I got invited to—I think probably their second meeting—to talk about whether Homecare could help in this situation.

Casey House

I went to the meeting, and in June’s inimitable way, if you went to a meeting you were IN the meeting. You were at the next meeting and the next meeting. So from about the second or third meeting I was just involved in the whole development of the program, and the whole hiring of staff, and everything. I was one of the original members of the Steering Committee. So that was in the mid-80s.

And then we transitioned from the Steering Committee to the first Board, and I was on there for a few years, and then I actually went to work at the Ministry of Health and came off the Board because—being a Ministry employee—I couldn’t be on the Board.

So I was off for about four years or so, and in the meantime, they had gone through a couple of executive directors. It was a difficult time, you know, still people weren’t funding it properly…anyway, they were looking for an executive director and they called me, and I didn’t know if I could do all the external stuff because I’d never done it. I went down to some event there and thought ‘well, maybe I can do this job’. So I applied and got it.

What are your most enduring memories of your time at Casey House?

You know, I think being on the original Steering Committee. That first year of trying to develop—out of nothing—what you thought a program might look like. There weren’t free-standing hospices in Ontario at the time, there wasn’t real policy around it. And it was a unique circumstance and an emotional circumstance. It wasn’t easy. So that was intellectually interesting to me because I had never been involved in anything like that. None of us had been. We were really on the cutting edge of a lot of things.

And I guess it was interesting to watch the evolution of how AIDS went from something that was frightening and not acceptable to where people were becoming more accepting of it and understanding it more. That was a great time to be involved, actually, and there was a transition from having difficulty getting donors to support the hospice (although we had government funding), to it being a more interesting charity to support.

Did you ever run into prejudice in those early years because of your involvement with Casey House and AIDS?

Yeah. Probably from some people who may have wanted to date me. But not career-wise, because it did start to change and become more acceptable, so career-wise, actually, it was a good move. Personally, my women friends and more enlightened male friends thought it was great that I was doing what I was doing. It was the only hospice in Canada, we were getting more publicity, and people thought that it was doing such a valuable thing, that I sort of rode on the coattails of that, actually, when it started to change.

[clickToTweet tweet=”It was interesting to watch the evolution of how AIDS went from something that was frightening and not acceptable to where people were becoming more accepting of it and understanding it more. That was a great time to be involved.” quote=”It was interesting to watch the evolution of how AIDS went from something that was frightening and not acceptable to where people were becoming more accepting of it and understanding it more. That was a great time to be involved.”]

What does the Executive Director of a hospice do?

Oh God… well, you know, it’s a small healthcare organization, so you have to be a jack-of-all-trades, for lack of a better word. So you’re responsible for the solvency, the quality of the care that is given, the policies, the interaction with the Board, and in places like Casey House, you also have a very external face. You have to be able to represent the organization. Well, all CEOs or Executive Directors do. You have to be able to explain the organization, you have to be able to be the public face and the public spokesperson for it.

You also worked at Canuck Place. A lot of people would find it very depressing working in a palliative care or end-of-life setting with children.

Palliative care covers a broad range of things, end of life being one part of it. So at Canuck Place, the definition of that is; that the children, because of the disease that they have, won’t live into adulthood. So their life expectancy is probably sixteen or seventeen at most and for some not even that. So a big part of the program in the children’s hospice was providing respite care at intervals as their disease progresses. You know, you’d see them over long periods of time, with some of their syndromes, and they would be in for respite for periods of time as you would… you know, watch their disease progress, basically. And of course, there’s the end of life there, as well. It’s sad some days. It’s terribly sad.

Where do you think healthcare is being done the best now?

I don’t know if I can say where it’s done best… there’s just so many different components to healthcare. There are areas where we aren’t doing as well as we should. There are still issues around mental health. Wwhen you look at reports that were written a decade or so ago they would often refer to mental health as the orphan of healthcare. Now, in the last few years, that’s changing a bit, and there’s more and more focus being given to mental health. I think there’s still a lot to be done in terms of preventative care; we talked for years—since I was first a nurse—about the importance of prevention, and how we should be giving it more money, and that story still hasn’t been told. It’s still the case that in Canada, and in a lot of places, the money that we spend on healthcare is the money we spend when we’re already sick. That’s the way it is right now.

[fvplayer src=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD1pNnThkic&feature=youtu.be” splash=”https://torontoism.com//images/2018/02/Screen-Shot-2018-02-16-at-11.59.54.png” width=”780″ height=”461″ caption=”Compassion lives here”]

Are there particular changes you’d like to see made to hospices or palliative care in Canada?

It needs more money. To be blunt. I don’t know what the current stats are, but you know, in my day (which wasn’t all that long ago) if you looked at the percentage of people across Canada who had access to specialized palliative care, the percentage is low. It used to be way less than 50 per cent. More like 30. I don’t know what the current number is, but probably not that much more.

What are some of the biggest improvements you’ve seen in healthcare over the course of your career?

I think there’s certainly been improvements in acute care, surgical techniques, less invasive surgeries, more research being done. So there’s a lot of progress in health, and I think there’s a lot of respect amongst the different components of healthcare. We all know what each other does, and what we can do and what we can’t do, and I think there’s been more of a realization of how we’re interdependent—or I like to think there is.

I guess when you look at community stuff, there’s still work to be done in terms of access across provinces to a certain level of home care. Provision of palliative care. And we all know that healthcare is related to socio-economic status and education and poverty, and that’s still out there. It seems like ever since I’ve been in healthcare we’ve been talking about child poverty, and we’re STILL talking about child poverty, and what can be done.

[clickToTweet tweet=”We all know that healthcare is related to socio-economic status and education and poverty, and that’s still out there. It seems like ever since I’ve been in healthcare we’ve been talking about child poverty, and we’re STILL talking about child poverty, and what can be done.” quote=”We all know that healthcare is related to socio-economic status and education and poverty, and that’s still out there. It seems like ever since I’ve been in healthcare we’ve been talking about child poverty, and we’re STILL talking about child poverty, and what can be done.”]

You were awarded the Queen’s Jubilee Medal in 2003. Looking back, what do you see as some of your most satisfying accomplishments?

It just has to be Casey House. And close behind would be Canuck Place. But I had great jobs. When I was working for Homecare for many many years I had lots of accomplishments there—to know that what you were doing allowed people to be at home and get better or not get better.

But in terms of jobs for me that really made me grow, and were interesting and crazy and wild at the same time, it would have to be the two hospices, and Casey House in particular, because I was so involved in the early stages with Casey House, and through that whole sort of societal thing around AIDS. It wasn’t just about Casey House. It was about the whole AIDS issue.

Donate to Casey House | Donate to Canuck Place

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TREB just released their Market Year in Review and Outlook Report for 2018. In compiling and analyzing the data, TREB worked with Ipsos, Altus Group, C.D. Howe Institue, Toronto Region Board of Trade and Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis.

We had a look at TREB’s stats with Jim Burtnick, Broker, SVP-Sales at Sotheby’s International Realty Canada and Rizwan Malik, Sales Representative at Sotheby’s International Realty Canada. Here is our review of the 2017 Toronto Real Estate Market and predictions and expectations for 2018.

Looking back to 2017

In 2017, the total number of sales reported through TREB’s MLS System was 92,394—which represents an 18.3 per cent drop compared to the record set in 2016. The average selling price of $822,681 in 2017 was a 12.7 per cent increase compared to 2016.

During the last two-thirds of 2017, the prices started to drop as the number of listings increased. The total number of new listings in 2017 was 178,489—up 15.7 per cent compared to 2016.

In the first quarter of 2017, home sales were up by 11.5 per cent compared to the same period in 2016. The inventory was low, especially in the detached segment, which has lead to the accelerating pace of growth in average price, peaking in March 2017 at 30 per cent compared to the same period in 2016. At the time, the average price was $916,567.

In April, after the Ontario government announced the Ontario Fair Housing Plan (OFHP) with its rent controls and Foreign Buyer Tax, the market has slowed down. However, this wasn’t due to high foreign buyers activity. Multiple sources confirmed that the foreign buying activity was low before OFHP and remained low afterwards. An Ipsos survey has shown the foreign buyer share to be 4.9 per cent (plus/minus two percentage points). Studies by Statistics Canada and land registry estimates released by the Ontario government were also in this range. The drop in sales after the announcement of OFHP was indeed affected by the OFHP, but analysts agree the impact was only psychological, with many would-be home buyers deciding to wait and see what happens to the market.

Jim Burtnick, Broker, SVP at Sotheby’s International Realty Canada also agrees that the Foreign Buyer Tax (FBT) effect was entirely psychological:

I felt this way when it was implemented and I feel the same way today. Whenever there is government interference into a free marketplace, buyers and sellers step back to see what effect this government disruption will cause. It is to be expected anytime this type of intervention occurs. Add to that the “perceived boogeyman” of foreign buyers that the press has blamed for increasing prices and well, you get a psychological overreaction to the FBT. The same thing occurred in Vancouver when they implemented their FBT and its effects eventually waned too.

The FHP effect was one of the reasons behind the lower number of sales and the higher number of listings on the market at that point in 2017. But if you expected the prices to drastically go down, you were wrong. Although the buyers had more choice, with more listings on the market from a historical perspective, that didn’t affect the home prices as much. The always more expensive detached home segment experienced a slower price growth, but the prices were still growing towards the end of the year. The condo segment prices, however, continued to experience double-digit growth rates throughout 2017, with more buyers opting for condos.

Rizwan Malik says that it wasn’t OFHP that slowed down the market and agrees that the plan had a psychological effect only:

Once the new rules, aimed at targeting foreign buyers, were announced in April 2017 it was as if the real estate tap turned off. Buyers almost used it as an excuse to halt immediately and to see what would happen to the market. Since foreign buyers accounted for less than 5 per cent of the pie, the market started to pick back up again. I do not believe that the OFHP cooled the market, people’s perception and expectation did. However, once they realized that the market was picking back up again it was business as usual and buyers started offering again, but with a little more caution.

As the Foreign Buyer’s Tax effect started to wane, the market picked up significantly. It was also the announcement of the OSFI mortgage stress test, which means that borrowers will now have to qualify for their mortgage at the greater of their contract rate plus two percentage point, or the posted five-year fixed rate as reported by the Bank of Canada (5.14 per cent at the time when this report was published) that helped the situation. Buyers rushed to close deals before January 1st when the new mortgage rules were to come into effect.

Rizwan says he had clients who wanted to close before December 31st, but it wasn’t a deal-breaker for them:

They all still wanted the “right house for their needs” rather than a last-minute scramble to settle for anything.

Jim says he noticed that it was mostly first time buyers who were in a hurry to close deals before the year’s end:

I would not say I had a “lot” of buyers in the fall trying to take advantage of mortgages before the OFSI stress test kicked in. However, anecdotally I would say that I noticed that there were more first time buyers trying to make a deal before the year ended. And if they did not make a deal by then, they were sure to get their mortgage pre-approval commitment letter extended into the new year to give them some additional time to make a deal before having to qualify under the new OFSI stress test rules.

The Rental Market

While the homeownership market has experienced some relief in terms of supply, the opposite was true for the rental market. Every year CMHC publishes the vacancy rate for purpose-built rental apartments and investor-held condominiums. For both of these markets, the vacancy rates were down in 2017 compared to the same period in 2016. While purpose-built rental apartments dropped from 1.4 per cent year-over-year to 1.1 per cent, the condo apartment vacancy dropped from 1.1 per cent to 0.7 per cent year over year. The low supply combined with strong demand resulted in double-digit annual rates of growth for the average price of rent in 2017.

Rizwan remembered the bidding wars on rental properties that Toronto has experienced last year:

There is a very low vacancy rate in both the condominium market and the purpose-built market. This was especially evident this year when there were bidding wars on rental properties. I think as a bigger picture, Toronto is becoming like other large metropolitan cities. People will gravitate towards renting downtown and buying properties in the country. It will take us a while to get there but I feel we are on our way.

According to TREB’s Rental Market Report, the average rent for a one bedroom apartment in the GTA increased from 7.8 per cent in the first quarter of 2017 to 10.9 per cent in the 4th quarter in a year-over-year comparison, amounting to $1,970 at the end of the year. The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment increased from an annual rate of approximately 7 per cent in the first quarter of 2017 to almost 9 per cent in the fourth quarter, resulting in $2,627 on average in the fourth quarter of 2017.

The Ontario Fair Housing Plan also addressed the problems of the rental market, as one of its points was installing rent controls again, but TREB reminds, as we did in one of our recent articles, that this could have unintended negative consequences. Rent controls could help further constrain the supply of rental units, pushing the vacancy rates to even lower numbers.

Jim agrees with TREB:

I agree wholeheartedly that OFHP rent control rules will indeed have the opposite effect. It will cause vacancy rate to go even lower than its already too low rate, drive up new rents well above inflation, and cause tenants to stay longer in one place. They will also force landlords out of the market—which will result in even less rental inventory—because their controlled rents are in fact causing them to lose more and more money every year as costs (maintenance fees, taxes and mortgage payments) continue to increase well above the amount that the OFHP will allow them to raise rents.

If an investor is faced with a limit on rent increases but with no limits on annual cost growth, they may be less likely to invest in rental properties and could look elsewhere for returns on their money. Furthermore, when it comes to investor-held condo rentals, if the condo owners choose to take advantage of significant double-digit increases in condo prices over the last year and sell their properties rather than rent them out, we could soon be facing even worse inventory levels. Jim Burtnick predicts there is trouble on the horizon:

This was really the worse aspect of the OFHP and in my opinion, it was just added because the current government has an election coming up this spring and there are far more tenant voters than landlord voters. But mark my words, this aspect alone will cause an already serious vacancy issue into a full-blown crisis.

Was Ontario’s Fair Housing Plan a good idea?

Looking back at the announcement of OFHP in April 2017, it doesn’t seem it has made a lot of difference in Toronto’s real estate market. Toronto is still facing low home affordability, low inventory and the government’s plan didn’t bring any relief. If anything, it brought a lot of confusion and yes it has slowed down the market activity, but it was about to slow down anyway, says Jim:

The market was already beginning to cool when the OFHP was announced on April 20, 2017. March numbers were unsustainable and the marketplace was naturally reacting by slowing down. All the OFHP did was quicken that dampening for reasons stated above.

He also expects the said effects of the OFHP to wear down very soon:

The OFHP was an effort by the current government to be seen doing something (especially slaying the foreign buyers’ bogeyman which never existed). It was simply optics and just like the Foreign Buyer’s Tax put in place in Vancouver. The psychological effects will wear off in about a year since the plan was announced in April 2017.

In their report, TREB also says the impact is only temporary and when it fades, we’ll be left to face the real problems of the market—the supply, both in the ownership and the rental market:

Senior government officials have acknowledged publicly that the impact of the OFHP was psychological. When the short-term effects of the OFHP recede, just as the effects of the foreign buyer tax did in BC, we will still be left with a supply problem in the GTA—for both ownership and rental housing.

Predictions for 2018

According to Ipsos Home Buyer Survey conducted in November 2017, 26 per cent of responders indicated that they were very likely or somewhat likely to buy a home in 2018. One-quarter of respondents felt that they would not qualify for a mortgage if their qualifying rate increased by two percentage points, which also explains the fact that the drop in buying intention was most significant among first-time buyers. In the fall of 2016 more than a half of intending home buyers were first-time buyers.

TREB estimates that under new mortgage stress rules, borrowers would have to qualify at $450 over $950 more per month than their actual payment, depending on the home type, “with the upper end of the scale in the detached market segment and the lower end for condominium apartments”. This doesn’t mean that people will stop buying. Some of them will, but others will choose to buy in a less expensive neighbourhood and perhaps buy a condo instead of a house.

First-time buyers have already recognized condos as a better choice—due to lower prices, low-maintenance, proximity to work and entertainment and lower living costs—and that will not change anytime soon, says Jim:

Condos are the most affordable category of housing available. First-time buyers generally do not want to commute long distances from home to work and will seek housing in close proximity to their jobs.

The New Mortgage Stress Test Effects

Other than the increased market activity at the end of 2017, we still haven’t really seen all of the effects the new mortgage stress test will have on Toronto. Jim Burtnick expects a few effects of them to come into force in the second quarter of 2018:

The effects will include about 20 per cent less borrowing power for mortgagees using the five big banks to finance their purchases and it will generally affect first-time buyers the most. Most upsize/downsize buyers have considerable equity in their homes already. We’ll also see more buyers using credit unions and private lenders for mortgages as they are not subject to the OFSI stress test rule.

This will change the nature of the market as well, with fewer people able to buy and looking for different solutions for their housing situation, but Jim sees it as a positive change for the consumers:

We’ll see more people staying in their houses longer and choosing to do renovations and/or additions instead of moving. (This also avoids the two Land Transfer Taxes). Overall, I think the new stress test rules will give more stability to the residential real estate market as we move away from the record low-interest rates than some might argue consumers have gotten too comfortable with.

Rizwan predicts that the new mortgage stress rules will also have only a psychological effect on the market:

The new mortgage stress test will definitely impact the market as the OFHP did, but again it will all be psychological. I predict that by the third quarter it will be business as usual and these new lending policies will be the new norm.

Sales & Average Price 2018 Forecast

The strong Canadian economy, income growth above the rate of inflation combined with an increased immigration target will help the demand in 2018, but TREB says this will still be affected by the impact of government’s policies and higher borrowing costs:

When we consider the combination of solid demographic and economic conditions versus the impact of higher borrowing costs and various government policies, the latter will win out in the short term.

TREB predicts between 85,000 and 95,000 transactions for 2018. The inventory will stay between 2.5 and three months over the course of 2018—up from 2016 and first quarter of 2017, and in line with the second half of 2017.

The balanced market conditions are expected to result in mid-single digit increases in the average price, which TREB expects to accelerate in the second half of 2018. The forecast range for the overall average selling price is between $800,000 and $850,000.

Rizwan predicts:

I think we will be closer to the lower estimate that TREB put out for the number of transactions in 2018. I think this will be a strong year but not a record-breaking year!

Jim adds that we’ll see the most action in the centre of Toronto:

I agree with TREB’s forecast overall. When you drill down into the micro level, I foresee the 416 area outperforming the entire GTA. Proximity to public transit, work, schools and local amenities like shopping, restaurants and community centres will become more and more desirable and therefore sell at a premium above these predictions. Location, Location, Location to the city centre will be the name of the game.

With the market changing and the buyers’ attention shifting from detached homes to more affordable alternatives, it’s time to once again have a look at Toronto’s issue with the lack of middle housing options.

The Missing Middle

According to the Missing Middle research by The Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis (CANCEA) Toronto has a problem with people living in inadequate housing. At the moment there are over 5 million spare bedrooms in Ontario, which represents 25 years worth of construction. Over 400,000 homes in Ontario have three or more empty bedrooms, representing almost 1.3 million empty bedrooms in family-sized homes.

In the whole of GTA, approximately 45 per cent of all housing types are single-detached homes and 35 per cent are apartment buildings. The “missing middle” housing makes 20 per cent of the whole market.

The “missing middle” segment includes semi-detached homes, row homes, townhomes, multiplexes and courtyard apartment. This type of housing presents a more affordable ground-level (or almost ground-level) housing, without having to live in small, family unfriendly condos in a high-storey building.

CANCEA research shows that the housing affordability in Toronto could improve over the next 15 years by steering people to right-size and make developers build adequately-sized units. CANCEA predicts that if this would happen, the sales in the region “would grow by 67,500 to 94,500 over ten years”, representing an annual increase of 7.1 per cent to 10.1 percent in sales.

For this to happen, more “missing middle” housing types need to be built. At the moment a significant portion of the city only allows detached homes. Approximately 40 per cent of the city is zoned this way.

Toronto is a very diverse city, if not the most diverse city in the world. Jim Burtnick adds it’s time for its housing stock to become more diverse as well:

One part of the solution that has been talked about for some time is allowing laneway housing in Toronto. All the infrastructure is already there. Stop talking about it and allow it to happen already! Another quick remedy would be to allow a certain percentage of duplexes, triplexes and multiplexes into detached single-family neighbourhoods. Again, all the infrastructure and services are already in place. These areas just need to become a little more heterogeneous (like our City).

Right-sizing would also help buyers get out of “over-housing”, which happens when people are living in much bigger homes than they actually need, cutting the access to good housing options for bigger families.

CANCEA estimates that at the moment, 30 per cent of all households in the GTA are either under-housed or nearly-underhoused. Of the under-housed, they are “short” by nearly half a million bedrooms; at current construction rates, it would take over two years to construct the housing to accommodate these families. As we already mentioned, nearly two-thirds of Ontario homes are over-housed, holding 5 million spare bedrooms, which represents 10.5 times the number of bedrooms the under-housed are short.

A solution, which would help solve the problem and help improve housing affordability, would be building more appropriately sized housing—the missing middle, and encouraging current households to right-size to more appropriate housing. Toronto is changing and its citizens are leading very different lives today than they’ve lead a few decades ago. The city needs to finally adapt to the people, instead of having people adapt to the city and housing is a big part of that change:

People do not spend as much time at home as they once did and do not require big detached houses like they once did. Let’s adapt our housing inventory to reflect these societal changes too.

What are your expectations for 2018? Are they different from what we’ve written in this article? Let us know in the comments below.

And if you need help navigating the market and you have questions you can’t find answers to, contact us at , we’d be happy to help you!

For many of us in the Northern Hemisphere, the allure of tropical climates can be enticing, especially in these winter months.

Many people long for the option to move to warmer regions like Florida or Mexico, but property prices there are rising and foreigners are prohibited from buying property in tourist regions of Mexico. That’s causing some people to look further afield.

Michelle Lyons of Belize Sotheby’s International Realty is one of those people. She and her husband had always dreamed of moving to Mexico from their home in Idaho but were deterred by the idea of learning Spanish. But seven years ago they discovered Belize, just south of Mexico, where the language barrier wouldn’t be a problem.

It took a while to convince me that English was really the national language, and that made so much more sense than Mexico.

The couple made the move seven years ago, and both stayed in the same line of work they were doing in the United States, him as a general contractor and her in real estate. “We just do it without any snow,” she jokes.

Buying Property

There are a few differences between buying a home in Canada and Belize.

For one, attorneys handle the closing by doing the title search and facilitating the transfer of ownership. But that means the initial purchase documents are simple, says Lyons. All the real estate agent does is connect the buyer with the seller, facilitate a meeting of minds on the property’s price, and set a closing date.

Canadian buyers will likely also be struck by the closing cost. As Lyons points out, property taxes in Belize are one of the biggest differences. Where in Canada, homeowners pay a monthly tax, in Belize they collect what is called a “stamp tax” or “stamp duty.” The stamp tax is about eight per cent of the home and land value and is collected up front. After that is paid, the cost of owning property falls to about US$50 per year, Lyons explains.

So if you look at the upfront cost of buying property, it’s completely offset by 30 years of next-to-nothing in taxes.

Owner Financing

Another big difference in Belize is that you don’t necessarily have to pay all cash up front. Lyons explains that many sellers today originally purchased their homes in the 80s and 90s, so the place has been completely paid off.

Purchasers can offer a 20 or 30 per cent down payment, and pay the rest off monthly directly to the owner. The sale is registered through an attorney and with the government as a legal transaction, so buyers don’t need to be concerned with the property being sold out from under them. However, an important thing to know if you want o buy a property in Belize is that the ownership doesn’t transfer until the home is paid off, so the seller is protected as well. This gives the seller a guaranteed income, while also giving new residents a little more money to get situated with.

Oceanfront Casa Del Mar for sale at $525,000

Is Belize Real Estate A Good Investment?

Many signs point toward Belizian property as a good investment. Some professionals say property prices rose 30-to-40 per cent between 2015 and 2017, but it can be a difficult number to nail down as there are no official house price figures. The region was hit hard by the global economic crisis, with values falling by as much as 30 percent, but 2012 saw a rebound that continues today.

A recent tour boom, coupled with the passage of the Retired Person Incentive Act in 1999 has been drumming up more buyer interest in the country. According to GlobalPropertyGuide.com, prices along coastal and tourist areas rose by as much as 30 per cent annually, while inland prices rose by about 15 per cent annually.

These days, in the more expensive regions like Belize’s famous islands or in the Placencia region, it’s not uncommon to spend a million dollars on a home. But if you’re content with something more off the beaten path, there are great deals to be had says Lyons.

People are usually really pleasantly surprised. Especially on the mainland. You can get 30 acres with three houses and a thousand coconut trees for US$230,000.

The jungle and mountain areas are even more affordable, where fifty acres of farmland with two houses, a stream, and a cenote can be had for $500,000.

So you can get a bit more bang for your buck on the mainland as opposed to venturing out onto an island.

And if you’re looking to make a little extra cash, you can always rent out part of your property on Airbnb. There doesn’t seem to be any restrictions against using the service in Belize.

Casa Royale Belize for sale at $429,900

Cultural Differences

There are some things that folks from Canada might not be used to. For instance, because of the way property taxes are collected, the roads aren’t maintained as well.

It can also be difficult to find some American or Canadian products, but Lyons says that’s one of the main reasons people live in the Caribbean—to escape the consumerism. Part of the draw is to have a simpler life. “If you can’t find it here you probably don’t need it or there’s a substitute for it,” she says.

But in a country where the average coastal temperature ranges between 24°C to 27°C, giving up a few creature comforts can seem worth it.

“Even when it rains it’s not cold, it’s just wet,” says Lyons. “Leaving the snow behind was our big draw.”

General Advice

Lyons suggests that people be open-minded about where they live. Many people are fixated on buying on an island, but there are many other options and climates, including islands, beaches, mountains, and jungle.

Don’t listen to other expats because each person that you talk to will try to convince you that the area that they live in is the very best. So you may come here thinking that you need to live in a beach community because that’s what someone told you, then you realize that you’re much more suited to the climate in the jungle areas.

The Great Blue Hole, Belize

Be Aware…

Of course, there are some things to keep an eye out for.

For one, buyers should be extra careful choosing an agent since there’s no licensing requirement to sell real estate in Belize.

If you’re interested in buying a condo rather than a house, it’s usually better to deal with an owner-owned condo association rather than an outside management company, according to this New York Times piece. Management companies often take a hands-off approach to the property, but when the condo owners handle things themselves they tend to handle them with more care.

Safety concerns are natural when moving to a place like Belize. Certain areas are more dangerous than others. As the United States Overseas Security Advisory Council says, “there is no indication that foreigners are broadly targeted, although tourists can be easy targets when not displaying situational awareness.” It is recommended that people exercise extreme caution when visiting Belize City.

As we’ve seen just in the last year, hurricanes are a major concern in the region around Belize. Since 1930 there have been 16 hurricanes in Belize, eight of them major. The deadliest occurred in 1931, killing 2,500 people. Most storms hit Belize in the months of September and October, but you’re less likely to see the effects of a hurricane in Belize than you are in certain regions of the US. According to the Belize Magazine, the odds of a hurricane landing in Belize in a given year is just 17 per cent, while in Florida the odds are 68 per cent.

Still, storms in that part of the world appear to be getting worse with each year, so buying insurance is highly recommended. Coverage can be bought—known as “all peril” insurance—that ensures against storms, hurricanes, fire, and more.

Getting Started

Lyons says you should contact a local realtor if you’re interested in buying real estate in Belize. The realtor can send links and pictures of properties while the buyer is still in Canada. In fact, there are a number of Belizean properties already listed on the Torontoism website.

Belmopan Estate for sale at $780,000

Realtors can help out with a rental car and lodgings when they come down to look at potential properties. The realtor will set up the initial offer and then introduce them to an attorney. Those attorneys can also help with importing pets or setting up a business in Belize.

The only requirement is that you have a valid passport and a downpayment to buy property in Belize. The closing can be done as quickly as 60 days or set for six months while the buyer gets their affairs in order back home.

Belize is an untapped resource for many people looking to buy a home in warmer climates. It’s a safe and secure option, but also offers a bit of adventure.

“Like my mom told me, if you go down there and decide it isn’t for you it’s not like we’re going to close the door, says Lyons. “You can always come back home but at least you will have tried.”

Available properties in Belize:

[property type=”international” status=”available,sold-conditionally” orderby=”price” area=”Belize”]

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