July 26 2017
Kitchener Waterloo Real Estate News Update
July 26 2017. In today’s news: John Hancock, declining home sales, shoplift, fire hydrants, snout houses, tiny bubbles and new jobs in Waterloo region.
Putting your John Hancock on that
Manulife exploring IPO or spin off for John Hancock unit
The Wall Street Journal reported that Canada’s biggest life insurer Manulife Financial Corp is looking to list or spin off its U.S. unit John Hancock Financial Services.
Road trip
Take a look at this kitschy photo gallery of 21 bizarre attractions in Ontario.
Six to nine months
Expect the sharp drop in home resales that occurred since the Plan’s announcement in April to be largely sustained, even though the effect of the plan itself will be temporary (perhaps up to six or nine months). Rising interest rates and stretched affordability will become increasingly restraining forces once the market has adjusted to the policy changes. Moderate—but healthy—declines in Ontario home resales are expected in both 2017 and 2018.
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Former Shopify Employees have got you covered
Cover, which was co-founded by Canadian entrepreneurs and former Shopify employees has raised an $8 million Series A funding round.
You put the water in my loo
There are approximately 2500 fire hydrants within the City of Waterloo. All fire hydrants are inspected annually. (My dog knew that.)
Shopify has you covered on Ebay
Shopify announced that it is partnering with eBay to allow its merchants to list and sell their products on eBay directly from their Shopify account. Excellent. Now I never have to leave home.
Tiny bubbles
DBRS, an independent credit ratings agency has compared several housing bubbles dating back to the late ‘80s with Canada’s rapid growth in home prices and credit in recent years and found that even if Canada’s housing market is in a bubble, far bigger ones have existed before in terms of those two metrics.
Windsor discussed banning snout houses
The popular-in-Windsor “snout house,” with its wide, protruding garage dominating the street frontage, should be discouraged or even prohibited, says a new report that cites concerns over safety and its deadening effect on neighbourhoods.
Kitchener, Cambridge and Waterloo: 7,700 net new jobs
Ontario’s roaring performance fizzled a little bit in June, with somewhat soft job numbers amid a slowing housing market.
