Kitchener Waterloo Real Estate News
March 13, 2019
Wednesday March 13, 2019. In this week’s Kitchener Waterloo Real Estate News: prediction, K-town building boom, the A-word, Frazier Institute’s school report, over improvements, Waterloo EDC news, correction, instagram moments, saving daylight…
Perennial content
‘Prediction’ posts are the most popular regular blog posts I do. The post “Prediction for the 2019 Kitchener-Waterloo real estate market” has received 1262 page views so far this year, many more than the next most popular post. Although it was written in the first week of January, it still gets visited almost everyday. Not evergreen but perennial content. Long tail.
Although you cannot time the market, real estate is cyclical. The spring market is when the rubber hits the road. It’s when most of sales happen. I read somewhere that 60% of sales happen before June which means if you knock out January and February as they are typically fairly slow months March through May is when you will find your dream home, or maybe find your best buyer.
Kitchener’s Billion-dollar building boom
The city’s core will be transformed in next few years as 18 projects move ahead. Almost 2,800 new residential units will come downtown, more than doubling the core’s population to 6,000. Three new office buildings, the first the first to be built in the core since 1992, will add 387,000 square feet of office space.
The A-word
The topic of amalgamation will continue to come up, I predict until it eventually happens. The argument now seems to be between, “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”, and “it’s broke”.
The Fraser Institute
The Fraser Institute is a Canadian public policy think tank and registered charity. It has been described as politically conservative and libertarian. Every year, the Institute publishes a series of School Report Cards ranking the academic performance of schools based on the publicly available results of standardized testing mandated and administered by the provinces. Here are this year’s rankings.
Are you over-improving for your neighbourhood?
Depending on the real estate market, your neighborhood and what buyers are looking for, you may need to do less, not more, than you think to attract the right buyer.
Tech News round-up: Seven great stories from Waterloo
Waterloo EDC brings us stories on security, technology, startup, manufacturing, automotive…
Is the correction over?
A number of news items in recent weeks have focused on the state of Canada’s housing market, with some hinting the worst of the correction may be behind us, and others suggesting more weakness to come. The thing about experts is that they always disagree.
Instagram tours
My wife and daughter were in Spain a few weeks ago. One of the tours they were offered was an “Instagram tour of scenic spots”. Great idea, unless you happen to live in one of those spots. This story talks about , residents of super-Instagrammable Paris street that are fed up with the selfies.
Daylight savings all the time
Last weekend was again the beginning of daylight savings time. I like it. As a Realtor the extra hour of sunlight in the evening is useful and the hour missed in the morning is not missed at all. Life would be so much better if it were always daylight savings time.
What to read next
- Looking ahead to changes in the real estate world
- Last week on KW Real estate News: newspaper paywalls, pedestrian promenade, February stats, house or condo, buyer mistakes, Silicon Valley Bank, house prices, ten years of change, the indoor generation
