The Montreal Real Estate Blog

La « taxe de Bienvenue » est en fait le nom commun donné aux droits sur les mutations immobilières. Toutes les municipalités ont le devoir de percevoir un droit pour le transfert de titre de tout immeuble qu’il soit neuf ou usagé situé sur leur territoire. C’est à l’acheteur que revient de payer ce droit.

La « taxe de Bienvenue » est calculée à partir du plus élevé des montants suivants:

Le prix payé pour l’acquisition de l’immeuble
Le montant de la contrepartie inscrite à l’acte de transfert
La valeur inscrite au rôle d’évaluation municipale uniformisée

Elle est calculée comme suit :

• 0.5% pour les premiers 50 000$
• 1.0% entre 50 000$ et 250 000$
• 1.5% pour les montants excédant 250 000$

Exemple 1 :

Pour une propriété d’une valeur de 275 000$ :

50 000 X 0.5% = 250$
(250 000 - 50 000) = 200 000 X 1.0% = 2000$
(275 000 - 250 000) = 25 000 X 1.5% = 375$
TOTAL :
250$ + 2000$ + 375$ = 2625$

Exemple 2 :

Pour une propriété d’une valeur de 180 000$ :

50 000 X 0.5% = 250$
(180 000 - 50 000) = 130 000 X 1.0% = 1300$
(Excédant de 250 000$ taxé à 1.5% non applicable)
TOTAL :
250$ + 1300$ = 1550$

Pour obtenir plus d’informations sur les droits de mutations, contactez la municipalité concernée.

Written by Sheila Iacono. Affiliated Real Estate Agent.
Royal Le Page Habitaction. Chartered Real Estate Broker

The Montreal Real Estate Blog gives a warm welcome to our new contributor: Sheila Iacono. She will be sharing her Real Estate knowledge with informative articles en français.

A long time friend and collegue, Sheila Iacono is also an Affiliated Real Estate Agent for Royal Le Page Habitaction. She has been involved in the industry for the last five years, working with home sellers and buyers in tMontreal and surrounding areas.
Some of you, who contacted us through our buyers form, had probably met her by now. And if you haven’t, then tune in for upcoming posts, a direct link to her contact info will be available.

Sheila, welcome aboard and looking forward to reading your post.

“Condo conversions aren’t allowed in many Montreal boroughs, so apartment owners are using another tack to sell their properties - and renters want the city to make sure they’re protected against sudden eviction.

Condo conversion is out and co-op conversion is in as the new battleground for tenants and landlords in Montreal, tenant advocates say.

Several tenants of a 300-unit apartment building on Mountain St. that was transformed from a rental building into a co-operative last fall attended a Ville Marie borough council meeting last night to demand a moratorium on that type of building conversion.

The tenants of Club Sommet at 3475 Mountain want municipal and provincial authorities to block such conversions until they can legislate the same kind of protection that exists for tenants whose buildings undergo condo conversion.

Some of Club Sommet’s tenants are facing eviction as the building manager proceeds with major construction work to combine some units to make larger dwellings and breaks up other units to sell.

The first evictions will be heard at the Quebec rental board in June.”

Source: Montreal Gazette. Read the complete article

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Slightly more than one-third of Torontonians (34%) would consider owning a condo solely for investment purposes rather than as their primary residence. 8% have already made this kind of investment.

By comparison, more than half (52%) of Vancouverites say they would buy a condo strictly as an investment, yet only 5% have actually done so. Among Montrealers, only 3% say they already own an investment condo.

Across Canada, condo popularity is steadily increasing. Almost half of urban Canadians (48%) indicate they would consider buying a condo as their primary residence, up from 39% in 2007.

These findings are part of the 2008 TD Canada Trust Condo Poll. Conducted by Angus Reid Strategies between March 20 and 25, the poll looks at the attitudes of urban Canadians towards condo ownership. A total of 1200 online interviews were conducted with Angus Reid Forum panelists who indicated they
are likely to consider purchasing a condominium as a primary residence. The sample consisted of 200 interviews in each of Greater Vancouver, Calgary, the Greater Toronto Area, the Montreal Metropolitan Community, Halifax and Ottawa.

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Canadian Home Sales to Dip in 2008 and 2009, Real Estate Agency Says - Canadian Economic Press
“Canada’s resale housing market will cool in 2008 and 2009, with the number of homes sold expected to drop and the pace of price increases to slow, according to a forecast issued Tuesday by the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA).”
Read the complete article

More evidence housing market cooling - 660 News
“Two new reports are affirming the big chill is hitting our real estate market. R.B.C. Capital Markets is reporting a sharp decline in building permits is being led by this province, and the Canadian Real Estate Association says home sales will drop 19% in Aberta this year.”
Read the complete article

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You have decided to sell your property. You love the home decorating shows on TV. You have good taste and you house is well decorated. You are ready to put the property on the market. But, are you really?

I often hear this kind of thinking from certain home sellers, especially women. It’s perfectly normal, as home decorating is becoming an established hobby and is well represented all over the media (on TV, magazines, books, Internet, etc). That’s great!

But, please remember that Home Staging is a set of specific and very efficient techniques. The goal of Staging a home is not at all the same either; we decorate our house for ourselves, in accordance with our personal taste whether the Home Staging is decorating for others, namely the potential buyers! The point of view is completely the opposite – instead of personalizing, we actually depersonalize the property for sale!

And, another important point: it’s very difficult to be objective about your own home. As long as you look at it as a “home” and not as a real estate investment, you won’t be able to present it at its best FOR SALE.

A professional and impartial Home Stager will execute an assessment of your property and will provide you with recommendations to make the property irresistible to buyers. The assessment may show more or less changes to be made to the property but, believe me, in three years, I have still to see a “PERFECT” house!

Written by Sveta Melchuk from www.Home-Staging-Montreal.com.
A Montreal firm specializing in Home Staging and Interior Re-design services.

Photo: Nisroch

View from Rue de la Gauchetière facing Peel. The older building is Windsor Station. - Bernie.

The Montreal Real Estate Blog showcases outstanding images from talented local photographers. Images are licensed with Creative Commons 3.0 . If you’d like to submit your photography, please join our flickr pool.

Net Cash Flow
Incremental after-tax income plus depreciation expense resulting from investment.

Net Income
The difference between effective gross income and a person’s expenses. The term is qualified as net income before depreciation and debt.

Net proceeds from the sale
Residual amount deriving from the sale of an immovable once all selling expenses have been deducted, i.e. mortgage loan balance, broker compensation, legal fees, tax adjustments, etc. Read more »»

There’s absolutely no doubt that Karl Fischer’s work is smoking hot. His creations have been growing by the day in Montreal and New York City, with many other projects to come.
He’s been published in the New York Times and the Montreal Gazette. You can see some of his buildings in our city. Luxury condos in Old Montreal: The Gillette Lofts and Le Themis. Also, the upcoming Le quartier parisien. Not to mention countless of projects completed in New York City.

Now, you may wonder: Who is this Karl Fischer guy? And why should I care?
The reason we are mentioning him here, apart from the fact that he is a great architect, is because he is also a Montrealer; graduated from McGill University. The same McGill in downtown Montreal. In fact, he runs his business in Canada out of a location in Old Montreal.

So we’ve seen some of his projects here, read about his accomplishments, but we’ve never gotten a look of what the person really is, what is behind his success. Up until a well-established real estate online publication posted an article about him.

In the article called: Inside the home of Karl Fischer, The Real Deal described Fischer as;

“Fischer has designed about two dozen buildings, including luxury condos, but there is nothing about the décor of his seventh-floor penthouse residence that would earn it a photo spread in Architectural Digest. Despite his success, Fischer said he feels uncomfortable with luxury, and the décor of his apartment echoes this sentiment. The 900-square-foot pied-à-terre (Fischer has a home in his native Montreal, as well as one in Vermont) is functional with no wasted space.”

“I don’t feel comfortable with luxurious things; it is just my nature,” said Fischer, a compact man of 59 with a salt-and-pepper beard and moustache. “I just like basic stuff.

“I have a standard Volkswagen; I don’t have to get a BMW,” he said.

There are countless of articles on Karl’s projects at Curbed.com, a New York based real estate blog. They have been following closely the progress of his developments for the last year and a half.
But, when Robert at curbed.com mentions: “That’s our Karl”. We would have to correct him. “No, no. That’s our Karl”

More on Karl Fischer at Curbed:

• Karl Fischer Stands Erect on Union Ave.
• Checking In on the Burg’s Luminous Condo Corner
• Greenpoint to Get Another Big Karl Fischer

More on Karl’s Montreal developments, coming soon - right here.
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photography: Ian Rogers

According to BonJour Quebec Magazine, the Godin Building:

“Classified an historic monument in 1990 by the Ministère de la Culture du Québec, the Godin Building was largely ignored in the 20th century. Built in 1915 by avant-garde architect Joseph Arthur Godin, this prestigious “income property” was one of the first Art Nouveau structures to be built in Montréal and was constructed entirely of reinforced concrete. .

Today, the building has experienced a renaissance. Architect Dan Hanganu (Musée d’archéologie, École des hautes études commerciales) began working on the site in 2003. In addition to restoring the façade, he added a new section to the existing building, thus giving birth to the Hôtel Godin, a true boutique hotel.”

As you probably know by now, the Hôtel Godin was sold last year. It is true that it was a remarkable boutique hotel. Unfortunately it never really achieved its full potential as a business; since their opening date on 2004 the hotel had a major setback: they were unable to get a liquor license (it’s a long story), but they did try their best.

“Without a liquor license at the Hotel, the prior owner made the decision to leave the restaurant space unfinished and vacant. This was a major setback because of the Hotel’s strategic location within the entertainment district of Montreal.” - HVS Capital Corp.

On July 9, 2007, Opus Hotel (Trilogy Properties Corporation), a Vancouver based hotel owner/operator, obtained the leasehold interest of Hôtel Godin for $24,350,000, according to HVS Capital Corp.

Even though it is owned and operated by a different group, and it’s now called The Opus Hotel, most of us still remembers it as the Hôtel Godin.

Related Blog post on Opus:

• Opus Brand Alive in Montreal - Vacant Ready
• The Opus Blog

Photo by kinalaya

“Even as Tremblay administration officials announced they were going to accept Devimco’s massive $1.3 billion Griffintown development plan, urban planners and assorted city activists are still trying to rally the forces required to knock the project off the tracks.

At a Thursday meeting held at the downtown St. James United Church, almost 100 people, including city executive council member Alan DeSousa, heard McGill urban planning Professor Raphael Fischler and other experts denounce the project as dull, uninspired, and completely out of date with modern urban priorities. While few had anything good to say about the company’s plans for the site, more than a few questions were raised about the Tremblay administration’s apparently cozy, complicit and complacent arrangements with Devimco. Even as Université de Montréal urban design professor Michel Gariepy believes the city’s present leadership lacks the background and the aesthetic sense required to make such long-lasting decisions, he was especially dismayed by the failure of Montreal’s own urban planning department to stand up to their political masters at city hall. Among several observations, he could not understand why city planners were ready to ignore the city’s own building code along with its six-storey height restrictions in favour of Devimco’s 20-storey plus high-rise condo buildings scheduled to go up alongside its commercial strip development.”

Read the complete article: The Suburban

Selected Griffintown News reading:

• Save Griffintown! - Save Griffintown Blog
• Council gives green light to Griffintown project - Spacing Montreal
• More details on the Griffintown redevelopment - Spacing Montreal
• Last Irishman Standing - Montreal Mirror

Photo source:Imtl

TD Canada Trust announced it is increasing the cash rebate on its Green Mortgage and Green Home Equity Line of Credit for qualified purchasers who apply between April 25th to July 31st, 2008.

Customers will continue to receive 1% off the posted interest rate on a five-year fixed rate mortgage or on a five-year fixed rate portion of a Home Equity Line of Credit AND will now receive a cash rebate up to 1.5% (up from the regular rebate of up to 1%) of the amount of the mortgage/HELOC when customers make ENERGY STAR qualified purchases.

In addition, TD Canada Trust will donate $100 to the TD Friends of the Environment Foundation each time a customer receives a rebate. “Both our Green Mortgage and Green HELOC products meet a growing desire among customers to make environmentally friendly choices like energy efficient upgrades or purchases,” said Joan Dal Bianco, Vice President, Real Estate Secured Lending, TD Canada Trust. “At TD we are very committed to the environment, so it’s great to be able to offer even more of an incentive for homebuyers to go green.”

A wide range of ENERGY STAR qualified products are eligible for rebate in the following categories:

• Major appliances
• Heating, cooling and ventilation equipment and controls
• Windows, doors and skylights

The cost of a residential energy efficiency assessment is also eligible for the rebate.

Source: Canadian News Wire

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Maintenance Fee
A periodic assessment or charge that residents pay to their homeowner’s or condo association to pay for the maintenance and repairs of common areas.

Market Conditions
Factors that can affect the sale of homes in a certain area. Such factors include interest rates, the unemployment rate, home appreciation, weather, time of year, etc.

Market Value
The highest price in terms of money, which the property will bring to a willing seller if exposed for sale on the open market allowing a reasonable time to find a willing purchaser, buying with the knowledge of all the uses to which it is adapted and for which it is legally capable of being used, and with neither party acting under necessity, compulsion or peculiar and special circumstances. Read more »»

You can buy a new condo from the developer before or during its construction and also before the condo corporation is formed. A developer may have some unsold units available after the condominium has been completed and registered.

In some markets, the developer may wait to sell a large percentage of the units before registering the condo corporation or even starting construction.

Usually, a deposit is required to secure or reserve, a condo unit in a new development.

Buying a new condo. The Good Side:

• New home warranty protection. (Up to five years)
• You have more choice of locations within the building; floor level, different views, etc.
• Customized design (in some cases); more options and upgrades to choose from.
• Newer buildings have less risk of having to undergo costly repairs and renovations.
• The purchase price could be lower than resale market condos. Especially in pre-sale phase of the construction.

Buying a new condo. The Bad Side:

• If the constructions have not started, you cannot physically see what you are buying and have to rely on floor plans and sketches that are subject to change.
• Your initial deposit will be locked up for the duration of construction.
• Some banks may refuse to give you a mortgage if the condo corporation has not been registered.
• The construction of the units may not be completed by the expected date. And the delivery date can be a lot later than originally agreed.
• It’s possible that you may move into your unit while construction continues in others.
• Last but not least; More taxes. New constructions have to pay GST and QST. (Not the same as the Land Transfer Tax) But, the good news is: you might be eligible for a housing rebate.

So there you have it. The choice is yours.

Still want to buy a new condo? Send us an email. Perhaps we can help you.

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Photo: Johpor

The Montreal Real Estate Blog showcases outstanding images from talented local photographers. Images are licensed with Creative Commons 3.0 . If you’d like to submit your photography, please join our flickr pool.