Spring is in the air :)
By Warren McNeil
Hello everybody, it has been a long time since I have made a blog post. I was away to beautiful Hawaii where the temperature was a constant 84 degrees. The trip was amazing. We flew out of Detroit. Good thing we did because the Toronto airport was apparently closed down. In Detroit, we were delayed 1 hour because they had to de-ice the plane. Pretty scary stuff for a person who doesn't fly very often. We visited two islands, Oahu and Big Hawaii. When we landed on Big Hawaii I thought I had landed on the moon with all the lava rock everywhere. We visited Pearl Harbour, Honoloulou Zoo, a Luau, Volcanoe National Park and many other places. It was a really good time.
While I was there I couldn't resist looking at real estate. The median house price on Oahu according to the local paper was $675,000. That sure is alot more then I would be willing to spend on a vacation home right now. On Kona, we visited a condominium situated right on the Ocean and it was priced at $505,000. Apparently it was priced at $100,000 below assessed value. This sounds like it would be a good investment considering a couple years ago the market value for these units was apparently over $700,000. All I can say was there were lots of houses for sale. I even had the chance to see the Trump tower on the Waikiki Beach Walk. Pretty impressive building. It apparently sold out in less the 8 hours.
Back to Kitchener and Waterloo. Spring is in the air and the housing market seems to be really picking up. The Spring market is usually very strong in our area and it is starting to show evidence of that. I am happy to say, it looks like this is going to be a good year for the real estate market here. Interest rates are stable, supply seems to be a little low but if you wait long enough you can usually find a pretty good home. I seem to be spending alot of time with student investers and parents of students who want to invest in real estate here. The UofW, Wilfred Laurier and Conestoga College are the three big schools in the Waterloo Region and we are seeing people buying investments properties instead of paying rent. This makes a lot of sense if you are able to do it.
One last thing I wanted to mention before I finish up here is if you are ever looking for a place to board your dogs, I highly recommend Contry Paws Kennels in St Agatha. Their website is http://www.countrypawskennel.com/. Glenda, the business owner, was absolutely amazing. She took really good care of our dogs. We have an older Cocker Spaniel (15yrs) and she had some diarea and wasn't eating properly so they made special arrangements to take her to the vet and get her some special dog food that would be more gentle on her stomach. I was totally impressed by their level of service. The care was top notch! Please use their kennel, I know you won't be disappointed.
Thanks for reading!