Editor’s Note NOVEMBER 2017 VOLUME 4, No. 9 Unreal Estate W


HEN PEOPLE TALK about the real estate market in Canada, they oſten


focus on the mega-markets of To- ronto and Vancouver. These two cities dominate the landscape and have seen a huge surge in house prices and, especially in Toronto, a frenzy of condo construction over the past half-decade. As is to be expected, there’s been


lots of talk about overheating and about the market revealing itself to be a bubble that would inevitably burst everyone’s dreams. In the summer of this year, the market dipped and the naysayers and doom-and-gloom crowd almost joyfully predicted the collapse of what they felt was an unsustainable market — in August, one Toronto practitioner of the dismal science, economics, foretold a 40% drop in housing prices. But over the past decade, economists have proved no better than street-corner fortune-tellers at predicting the economic future; the market has defied all expectations for years, and in September, as if to mock the prognosticators, the Toronto market resumed its upward climb, led by detached-home sales. The market may yet crash late this year or early next year — or it may not — but by early/mid-October, the business press was reporting that the Canadian real estate market is “puzzling.” This was because a Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. study suggested that the market in Toronto was not behaving like a typical market. Why? Normal factors such as population, incomes and borrowing costs weren’t entirely responsible for the surge between 2010 and 2016, according to a Bloomberg article. When we decided to produce a special issue on the real estate market in Canada,


the confusion about what is going to happen to the market made CPA Magazine reject the media group march toward economic bubbles. We’ve focused instead on what people are doing to beat the heat of the market and how to go about doing it. In “Home Free” (p. 34), contributing editor Lisa van de Geyn looks at a few very real


options open to people who don’t want to sink their life savings into a million-dollar matchbox in Vancouver or Toronto. One of the thinking-out-of-the-box solutions she found is a family that used seven shipping containers to build a 1,350-sq.-ſt. off-grid vacation home in cottage country — yep, that’s why there’s a shipping container on the cover. Van de Geyn tells us that “the octopod has garnered a following of fans. Last year, the [owners] hosted an open house as part of the Green Energy Doors Open initiative … and ended up with 250 people — including a couple who flew in from California.” And in “The Real Estate Investor’s Toolkit” (p. 28), Rosalind Stefanac talks to experts


who tell you how to manage your own property, invest in REITs, invest in the market, and other valuable tips. You definitely want to read this special issue.


Okey Chigbo editor-in-chief


2 | CPA MAGAZINE | NOVEMBER 2017


EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Okey Chigbo DEPUTY EDITOR Bernadette Kuncevicius ASSOCIATE EDITOR Yvette Trancoso ASSOCIATE FRENCH EDITOR Mathieu de Lajartre EDITOR, DIGITAL EDITIONS Margaret Craig-Bourdin MAGAZINE WEB PRODUCER Alan Vintar


ART DIRECTOR Bernadette Gillen ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR Kevin Pudsey


EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Harriet Bruser DIRECTOR, LANGUAGE SERVICES Jane Finlayson EDITOR, PROFESSIONAL MATTERS Anya Levykh CONTRIBUTORS Taryn Abate, Yan Barcelo, Mary Teresa Bitti, Dwayne Bragonier, Steve Brearton, Peter Carter, David Descôteaux, John Lorinc, Cathy Hutchinson, David Malamed, David Trahair, Lisa van de Geyn, Karen Wensley, Trevor Wilson


PUBLISHER Heather Whyte, MBA, APR


MANAGER OF ADVERTISING SALES Alexandra Garant (416) 204-3397 agarant@cpacanada.ca


QUEBEC ADVERTISING REPRESENTATIVE Serge Gamache (450) 651-4257 sergegamache@videotron.ca


MAGAZINE PRODUCTION AND ADVERTISING COORDINATOR Michael Marks (416) 204-3255


CIRCULATION MANAGER Jennifer Griffiths (416) 204-3366


CPA MAGAZINE EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD: Chair: Vinetta Peek, FCPA, FCMA; Fred Clifford, CPA, CA, CPA (Ill.); Debra J. Feltham, FCPA, FCGA; John Redding, CPA, CMA; Andrée Lavigne, CPA, CA; Ashley Kennedy, CPA, CA


CPA MAGAZINE is published 10 times a year (with combined issues in January/February and July/August) by the Chartered Professional Accountants of Canada. Opinions expressed are not necessarily endorsed by CPA Canada. Copyright 2017. TORONTO: 277 Wellington St. West, Ontario M5V 3H2, Tel. (416) 977-3222, Fax (416) 204-3409 MONTREAL: 680 Sherbrooke St. West, 17th floor, Quebec H3A 2S3, Tel. (514) 285-5002, Fax (514) 285-5695 SUBSCRIPTION INQUIRIES: Tel. (416) 977-0748 or 1-800-268-3793, Fax (416) 204-3416 ON THE INTERNET: cpacanada.ca/cpamagazine EMAIL: cpamagazine@cpacanada.ca letters.editor@cpacanada.ca advertising.cpamagazine@cpacanada.ca


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Photo: Paul Orenstein


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