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Good luck retiring in most major Canadian cities if you don't already own real estate there.
by jlos 5y ago
Good luck retiring in most major Canadian cities if you don't already own real estate there.
- nostrademons 5y agoArticle said "don't live in a major city". Besides, my understanding is that prices are still reasonable in smaller cities like Quebec City, Kingston, Halifax, Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg, etc.
- LegitShady 5y agoPrices in all of these cities have gone up. Halifax average sale went from $330k to $370k from 2019 to 2020. People see if they don't buy in now, they may never be able to buy in, and are buying in, driving prices up further, causing more people to panic buy, etc. It also leads speculators to buy houses because they see property giving incredible returns. Pay in many of these cities, or employment opportunities that pay well, are limited. If they're relatively reasonable now at this pace they won't be for much longer. Alberta is perhaps a little different because they seem to build new housing much faster than many other provinces.
- moolcool 5y agoHalifax is still livable/affordable as a remote dev-- far more affordable than places like NYC or SF. On remote engineer salary the increases in cost of living aren't so much the killer as the insane income tax is.
- LegitShady 5y agohalifax is still livable if you get money from someplace that isn't halifax, but what does that say to the future of halifax? Who will provide all the services when they can't afford to live there on halifax incomes? What's the healthcare availability in NS compared to other provinces - Halifax healthcare was in crisis even before COVID. Just in October they announced that the child healthcare system was at capacity and they might have to start diverting patients to other provinces. How does that work for people who aren't on remote engineer salary, and how does that bode for the future of halifax?
- nostrademons 5y agoWelcome to the Bay Area, where the only people who can buy houses are those that can funnel the retirement funds of the world into their pockets. The answer for us is that all the local service providers live far outside the core urban areas and have terrible commutes. Or they double or triple-up, multiple families per unit. As the area becomes increasingly unlivable for people that do the local gruntwork, a number of them leave the metro area. Those that stay have less competition, and so they start charging higher wages. Eventually the local economy equalizes at a much higher price point; local service workers find they make a livable wage again; globalized tech workers find that most of their income is eaten up by daycare, housecleaning, gardening, and restaurant meals out (to say nothing of housing); and the whole region settles into an uneasy truce, yet enjoys great geographic arbitrage opportunities over other regions. We can go make Halifax unaffordable and live like a king there, for example.
- LegitShady 5y agoYou wi t have healthcare or city services and you'll create crazy crime waves as I equality grows but hey I guess that is the bag area - with lack of self awareness included.
- raydev 5y agoAs someone who just sold a house in Halifax last year, and with friends who weren't as lucky to have bought a home in the 2000s, I think you can safely remove that city from your list. We moved to a town a couple hours away from Toronto, and the prices were shockingly comparable to Halifax, while Halifax household incomes are lower.
- mastax 5y agoThat's rule 4: > Don’t live in big cities (go for smaller, more liveable towns).