Toronto-York Spadina Subway Extension

A lot of transit projects in Toronto are being discussed. This one is nearing completion:

Reportedly end of 2017 the University line – currently terminating at Downsview Station – will  serve further 6 stops, two of them located in the York Region. It will be the first TTC transit line to cross city borders and will run through York University into the York Region.

  • Length of Subway Extension: 8.6 km
  • Toronto Part: 6.2 km from Sheppard West Station (currently known as Downsview Station) to Pioneer Village Station
  • York Region part: 2.4 km from Pioneer Village Station to Vaughan Metropolitan Centre Station
  • Planned Service Levels Trains every 4 minutes

Six stations have been built along the extension:

  • Downsview Park – south of Sheppard Avenue West, adjacent to the Barrie GO Transit Line

  • Finch West (At the intersection of Keele Street and Finch Avenue West)
  • York University (At York Boulevard and Ian Macdonald Boulevard)
  • Pioneer Village (At North West Gate and Steeles Avenue, East of Jane Street)
  • Highway 407 (South of Highway 407 and West of Jane Street)
  • Vaughan Metropolitan Centre (At Highway 7 and Millway Avenue)

(Source ttc.ca)

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NEW MORTGAGE REGULATIONS

A lot happened during the month of October: Let’s shed some light…these are the changes in a nutshell:

  • Under current regulations, any financial gain from selling your primary residence is tax-free and does not have to be reported as income. As of this tax year, the capital gains tax is still waived, but the sale of the primary residence must be reported at tax time to the CRA.
  • As of October 17, 2016, a stress test used for approving high-ratio mortgages has been applied to all new insured mortgages. The stress test aims to assure the lender that a home buyer could still afford the mortgage if interest rates were to rise.
  • As of November 30, 2016, the new rules restrict insurance for low-ratio mortgages based on new criteria, including that the amortization period must be 25 years or less, the purchase price is less than $1-million, the buyer has a credit score of 600 and the property will be owner-occupied.
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Toronto’s Oldest Building – The Scadding Cabin

This one-room cabin is located on the CNE grounds. It was built by the Queen’s York Rangers in 1794 on behalf of John Scadding who served as clerk to the first Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada John Simcoe. The original cabin was disassembled from its original site and rebuilt on the current site. It is a squat, two-storey log cabin with low ceilings, designed to retain the heat from the fire in winter close to its occupants.
(source: wikipedia.com)

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AirBnBs in Toronto

Over the last years Torontonians have increasingly rented out their residences on AirBnB, an online marketplace that enables people to list, find, then rent vacation homes.

For the condo and home owners it can be financially more attractive to rent out short term rather than taking in a long-term tenant. For the paying guests, private residences are usually much more affordable than hotel rooms. On the downside: Complaints through neighbors, trashed places, fines. The hotel industry is losing a lot of money and asks to have more regulations applied .

If you are an owner and rent out your condo/house you can search websites as AirBnB, Couchsurfing, Craigslist, Kijiji to see if your tenant offers your home for short-term rentals.

If you are a potential condo buyer you may want to check the condo declaration and see what it says about restrictions regarding short term rentals.

If you want to purchase a home make sure to check the zoning by-law of your future neighborhood. Most condo units will not allow short term stays and condo boards have started monitoring closer what is happening in their building.

If you own a house or you are in a building that doesn’t ban short-term rentals, make sure to find out how it will affect your insurance if you want to rent out your place. Find out if the required extra insurance will leave you enough to make it worthwhile.

(Sources: Globe and Mail, Metro News)

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Ontario’s Greenbelt

The Greenbelt protects environmentally sensitive land and farmlands in Ontario’s Golden Horseshoe area from urban development. It contains nearly two million acres (800,000 hectares) of land – an area larger than Prince Edward Island – and is the largest and most strongly protected greenbelt in the world.

It extends 325 km from the eastern end of the Oak Ridges Moraine, near Rice Lake, in the east, to the Niagara River in the west.

The greenbelt has also been criticized: The combination of the consistently growing population in the GTA and at the same time the restriction of land supply. As such the Greenbelt is seen as one of the major factors in the continuing surge of house prices in Toronto. The provincial government projects that the area’s population will tip 8.9-million by 2036.

(Sources: The Globe and Mail and Government of Ontario Website)

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Happy Civic Holiday

Or in other words: What on earth are we celebrating? Did you know that Civic Holidays is observed in most but not all provinces, and that each province has a different reason to celebrate it? Some examples:

Alberta: Heritage Day, in honour of diverse Canadian culture and cultures around the world

Nova Scotia: Natal Day, in honour of Halifax’s birthday

Ontario: Emancipation Day, in honour of the end of slavery in the British Empire.

Only in Toronto: Simcoe Day, in honour of the first Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada

(Source: National Post)

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HAPPY CANADA DAY!

Did you know Canada Day makes a good Moving Day? As the rest of Canada celebrates with face painting and fireworks, Quebec opts for a mass exodus of apartments. In keeping with a decades-old tradition, most leases in Quebec expire July 1. Last year, 80,000 Quebecers took part.

(Source: readersdigest.ca)

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SMARTTRACK

Four new GO Transit stations will be built in the city’s west end. The new stations on the Kitchener line will be located in Liberty Village and at St. Clair Avenue and Keele Street while the new stations on the Barrie line will be located at Bloor Street and Lansdowne Avenue, and Spadina Avenue and Front Street.

An additional four new stations in the city’s east end will at Gerrard Street, the Port Lands (Unilever), Finch Avenue and Lawrence Avenue on the on the Stouffville/Lakeshore East GO Corridor.

(Source: CP24)

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“Toronto The Green” – Toronto’s Tree Canopy

Toronto’s tree canopy cover is estimated to be between 26.6% and 28%! Of the total tree population, 6% (600,000 trees) are City owned street trees, 34% (3.5 million trees) are in City parks and natural areas, and 60% (6.1million trees) are on private lands.

Toronto has a target to increase the city’s overall tree canopy of an estimated 10.2 million trees by approximately 13% over the next 40-50 years.

(Source: City of Toronto)

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LIVING ON THE ISLAND

Interested in buying a property on Toronto Islands? You can only lease the land as it belongs to the City of Toronto

Did you know that when a property on Toronto Islands becomes available, it can’t be put on the free market. It’s offered for a fixed price to the first hundred people on a five-hundred-person waiting list. If there are multiple interested buyers, the property goes to the person closest to the top of the list.

If none of the first hundred people are interested, the property is offered to people further down on the list. For obvious reasons, this is very rare.
(Source: torontoist.com)

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