351 Wallace Ave Unit 160

If you’re a first-time homebuyer in Toronto, one thing that you will need is perseverance - especially if what you are looking for is full of tight competition. In the fall of 2023, I was connected to a lovely young family who was looking to buy their first home. However, similarly to many first-time homebuyers, they were looking for a house or condo townhouse around $1,000,000. They also had very tight location restraints and that made things a bit more difficult, as the area they had to stay in was not friendly to entry-level buyers.

Around the $1,000,000 price point, we see many first-time buyers and those wanting to purchase with less than 20% down, which significantly drives up competition. Most of the properties we see around that price point are very small or require a lot of work, however there are very limited options that come to the market. We had looked at dozens of properties over the course of six-months and found some promising options, but even more doozies. Some of our most memorable visits included a house with a basement that has a completely bricked-in room that we could not figure out how to access, a house that was COMPLETELY crooked (not a single floor or wall was straight), a house that was infested with a strange looking bug, and last but certainly not least, a duplex that had what we could only assume were brains in a jar, hopefully not human… My clients remained optimistic that the right property was out there and that it was just a matter of time before it came along.

After several unsuccessful bidding wars and just as they began to lose hope, we found it - a stunning 3-bedroom townhouse in the Junction Triangle, and better yet, it was far below the top end of their budget. Unlike what they had become accustomed to, we were actually able to negotiate the price and submit an offer with conditions. A few days later, the sale went firm and my clients were through the moon. They had finally found a home that they loved and were able to avoid putting themselves in a position of financial strain. Oh, and I may or may not have pruned the shrub outside that was growing into the air conditioning unit (with house scissors).