An Out-Of-Country Buyer Invests In A Toronto Condo

Hi Thomas,

My wife and I live in England but we wanted to buy an investment property in Canada. We started by looking at real estate listings on the internet and found that our very modest budget would buy a surprising amount in the Maritime Provinces and virtually nothing in British Columbia, with a bewildering range of possibilities in between. We settled on Toronto because it seemed to have a wide variety of suitable properties and also offered the prospects of sustained economic growth over the longer term.

Although there are some agents in England who specialise in finding properties for buyers, they generally operate only at the upper end of the market and charge a high fee for their services. Normally, a buyer is on his own and, like a lamb among wolves, has to deal with agents whose responsibility to the sellers is tempered only by their wish to achieve a sale and thereby claim their commission.

The idea of the buyer representative as a normal feature of the market was new to us and very appealing. Having found the Thomas & Sally Cook www.TorontoRealEstate.ca Team website, we liked what we saw and made contact in February 2008.

Downtown Toronto Bachelor Suite

Natalie Lynch, one of the Team Buyer Specialists, responded with some very helpful information and that began an exchange of e-mails that lasted on and off for nearly a year. We started by asking to be sent, through the HomeWatch program, details of condominiums in our price-range in Toronto as a whole.

That proved confusing because of the large number of results it generated so, after further e-mailed consultations with Natalie, we narrowed down the areas of Toronto that seemed to offer what we were looking for (namely a readily lettable condominium in a good and central area) to just two areas of downtown Toronto.

That produced a more manageable flow of particulars and we were able to start our serious education as buyers by making a detailed comparison of the properties on offer.

We took our time over this stage of the process and I also signed up for the e-book ‘Buying Your Toronto Home for the Best Price,’ which was very helpful. It gave me a very clear understanding of the way the Canadian house-buying process works and answered all the questions I had at that stage, as well as many that hadn’t occurred to me until then.

After seven months we felt that we had made as much progress as we could working at a distance. We had by then been offered a mortgage in principle so I arranged to make a short visit to Toronto to meet Natalie and view some apartments. I had three working days at my disposal and with Natalie’s help I was able to make good use of my time.

Although we had, in effect, conducted a detailed buyer consultation over the internet, we started the first day by clarifying and confirming our wishes. Natalie then showed me several apartments of differing ages and styles that were then on the market in our selected areas.

On the second day I called on a prospective solicitor, and also on a prospective letting agent, whose name had been given to me by Natalie, to discuss what we proposed to do and to obtain advice on the practicalities of letting a condominium.

Home buyer classes are held several times each month

I then attended the Home Buyer Academy Workshop, which was fast-paced, intensive and extremely valuable. While inevitably it covered the same general topics as the e-book, it provided many additional angles and also served to clarify a number of important areas. I picked up some tips on minimising expenditure on mortgage interest that would never have occurred to me otherwise, and which seem likely to save us far more than the entire cost of my trip.

I spent my last day familiarising myself with downtown Toronto, getting a feel for the different areas.

Back in England I recounted to my wife what I had seen and we went over our calculations of prospective income and expenditure yet again. Despite the uncertainties in the property market we decided that we would proceed by making an offer on one of the apartments I had seen.

I conferred with Natalie over what to offer for it and we then embarked on the exciting process of offer and counter-offer, which lasted three days, by the end of which we and the sellers had reached a mutually agreeable price. We then had six weeks to work towards the closing date, but that time seemed short enough when working from a distance of several thousand miles and with the Christmas and New Year breaks intervening.

As I write this, closing is less than a week away, and I have been surprised at how much can be done by fax and e-mail when all the parties are committed to getting the job done.

Lovely Kitchen Cabinets

Although our purchase is very much at the lower end of the market, and involved a lot of e-mail communication over many months, we never received a less than excellent standard of service from Natalie and from every other member of the Thomas and Sally Cook Team with whom we dealt.

Without the help of an agent committed to putting our interests first we would have had to spend very much more time on getting to understand the local market and how the buying process worked, and even then we would have found it very difficult to know whether we were getting a good deal or not.

Our happiness with the arrangements was, naturally, increased by the fact that Natalie’s services did not cost us anything; where else could you find a professional to look after your interests in such an important matter at no charge?

We are very grateful to Natalie and the other members of the Team for all the help they have given us so far, and are looking forward to completing our purchase.

Peter and Elza Burdge

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