richy2016

Hi,

I have an offer of work in Canada through the company I currently work for. I've been many times before but my wife hasn't. We'll have a toddler and a baby by the time we move, so I'm after some advice on areas to live! Ideally somewhere with young families, away from city life.

The work will be based in downtown Toronto, but I'll mainly be working from home.

Where are the decent schools and kindergartens?

Can you give us any tips on places with that family community type of feeling?

In the UK we have one or two websites that cover places to rent/buy in the whole country... Is there a major website I can use that has lots of property's on? Or am I best finding a local company that deals with property?

TIA

humanist

Look at www.realtor.ca to buy, www.viewit.ca to rent.

If you're mostly working from home you might want to live a bit further from downtown, to get more bang for your buck (as they say).

magnumpi

See ""

HGerchikov

It depends on how often you think you will need to go downtown, if its once a month then maybe you could live further out and just have one horrible day a month. If its once a week or so then perhaps near a GO train is a good idea, if its more than that then definitely near the GO train on the Lakeshore line, as this has the best service in terms of frequency of trains.

Property prices in Toronto and the GTA as a whole are high (and getting higher at an alarming rate). The realtor.ca website will tell you the list price of the property but it won't tell you the selling price which in hot areas can be at least $50000 - $100000 over the list price (I did see one earlier this year that was $400k over list on a property listed at $900k). Generally the East side of Toronto, Ajax, Pickering etc, is cheaper than the West side, Oakville, Burlington etc.

pennyhp

My son and his wife live in Oakville.
Its 30 minutes west of Downtown Toronto on the Go train.

They have a two year old and a newborn.

Its a really nice town with nice walks down on the lake.
Welcome to the Town of Oakville, Ontario, Canada

Another avenue to see property is also kijiji.ca

Pizzawheel

What HGerchikov said.

Depending on frequency of downtown work I wonder whether a little further afield on the VIA rail network (outside of the GO trains) would work. As I said in the other thread, Cobourg is nice.

richy2016

Thanks for all the replies guys.

How many of you have entered the country on a working visa and successfully applied for citizenship whilst working there?

christmasoompa

Do you mean Permanent Residency? If you move on a Temp Work Permit, you're around 6 years away from being able to apply for citizenship - PR comes first.

Lots on the forum have gone over on TWP's and then applied for PR though, if being able to stay permanently is important to you, then do look at your possible PR routes before you move, to make sure that you can do so.

Good luck.

richy2016

Sorry, got my terms crossed there. Yes PR I mean

HGerchikov

We did. Three year work permit, then PR, now citizens.

christmasoompa

No worries. I'd say that's how the majority of people on the forum move - there are a lot sponsored by a husband/wife, adult child etc, but most move for work and get visas that way. So there's certainly plenty of people with that experience and threads to read with info on.

As I said, do just check that you would qualify for PR before you move though, if you do think you'll want to stay. I'm assuming that you're fairly senior in your company if you're moving on an intra-company TWP, so hopefully you should be fine, but best just to check.