There was a couple in Greater Toronto, Canada, who wanted to change houses 3 years ago, and as a result, they sold their house in Uxbridge for $330,000, but they did not expect to receive CREB subsidies due to the epidemic, and they looked at the house mortgage but did not approve it.
sUperLIFE.ca According to Tornto Life, A.J. Brandon and his wife Melody bought a town house in Uxbridge back in 2016. Toronto is a 90-minute drive away. After 3 years, they are ready to upgrade the big house. Just when they thought they had found the home of their dreams, their mortgage was a problem.
They had to go back to his parents' basement, and the explosion of property prices had made them feel far away from the chance of re-entering the market.
Brandon said, "I will always remember our first home. It was a brick town house nestled in Uxbridge. Not far from where my wife and I went to high school. We bought the house in 2016 for about $200,000. ”
Melody got some of the money for the estate, while Brandon, who has lived in his parents' spacious basement since college, has been frugal and saving money for years. Although the two prepared a down payment, they could not get enough mortgages because they were both working low-income jobs.
At this time, Brandon's father took the shot. He was willing to lend them money to buy a house. Brandon agreed to repay at the same interest as the bank.
The house is small and has to pay an administrative fee, but this is the home. The couple felt lucky to have bought a house at Uxbridge for the price. Because it's not too far from Toronto, house prices are also heating up.
By 2019, they had all decided to work harder in their careers. After years of low-paying work, they finally adjusted to their careers, doubling their annual income. Brandon manages a board game retailer in Scarborough, while Melody works as a department clerk at a hospital.
That fall, they were ready to change houses. At the time we looked at dozens of houses and apartments, most of them in Ajex and Whitby, both of which were close to work for both.
However, every time they make an offer, they always grab someone else. They were struck by bids that far exceeded the asking price.
As they move into 2020, they don't think that's going to work. Either stay where you are, sell your house, make money, and then come back to market with a huge down payment and fewer bid terms.
So they prepared to move in with Brandon's parents. In the spring of 2020, during the chaos of the first lockdown, they moved into the basement of their family.
They quickly sold the house to a young couple for $330,000. Then I started looking at the house.
The real estate agent showed them a house in Ajex. They fell in love at first sight.
It was a quaint, separate bungalow with a renovated kitchen. It wasn't huge, only two bedrooms and two bathrooms, but it met everything they needed.
Since at this time, the popular real estate market has begun to take off, so they do not hesitate to be ready to buy.
They and another buyer grabbed the offer. Brandon and Melody bid $530,000, while another buyer was several thousand dollars taller than them.
However, they were lucky. The owner of the house, an acquaintance of Brandon's job, told Brandon that he would rather sell the house to someone he knew, so he accepted their lower offer.
The couple is happy and broken! Thought the house was bought.
Unexpectedly, the next day, everything was in vain.
Because Brandon was fired earlier in the pandemic, like millions of other Canadians, he was left to rely on the CERB emergency grant. While they had made pre-approvals before buying a home, the real estate agent told him that the latest policy on CERBs prevented him from applying for a mortgage with any of his pre-pandemic income.
Worse still, melody's clerical job was judged to be a permanent part-time position due to union rules and was not factored into the mortgage consideration.
"The mortgage failed and our dream of buying a house broke," Brandon said.
At the time, the couple thought that maybe the property market would cool down soon, and once they were eligible to apply for a mortgage again, then they could buy another house.
However, they were wrong. In 2021, the Tulane region became one of GTA's hottest markets. At Ajex, which interested them, the average house price increased by 30% in 2021 to more than $1 million.
Brandon said, "I can only think that in many other ways I am lucky. I have great parents, a wife who loves me, and a career I love... Although we didn't buy a house at Ajex, we were lucky enough to save about $130,000 in 4 years. But now to buy a small house in the SUBURBS of GTA, that profit is no longer enough. It's been more than two years since the pandemic, and my wife and I are still stuck in my parents' basement. ”
Now, Brandon is back at work, this time for another small board game publisher, and Melody has switched to full-time. They feel that there may be a chance to get a mortgage approval, but the budget house may have limited options.
"We may only be able to afford a house like the first town house, which will allow us to take on a mortgage that is larger than the total value of the house in 2016," he said. This made us unbearable, so we decided to wait. We want to know if the market is really a bubble. At the same time, I try not to look at Uxbridge's soaring home prices. Otherwise it will be very uncomfortable. ”
Brandon said, "It's easy for me to blame people who left Toronto during the pandemic and bought in gta suburbs and southern Ontario that they pushed up property prices." But I can't blame you for choosing to live somewhere else. What frustrates me is the people who invest in flipping houses. They buy the property and rent it to someone else. If someone grabs an offer with me, it's okay, but I can't stand them robbing the house and renting it to me again. ”