nizblake

Good Day to all,

Iv been considering living in Ontario, when we get over there as iv been told there is alot of work (electrical) for hubby.

Iv been researching Oakville, Hamilton & Burlington can someone who live's or has good knowledge of these areas give me some advice we have children so i would like somewhere nice for raising children with decent schools etc around and shopping malls not too far away but quiet and not hectic at the same time.

someone told me that Hamilton is not the nicest out the 3 but didnt really give me a explanation why, im greatful for any advice given.

Thank you

Souvy

Hamilton is basically an industrial city (steelworks), although it has a university. It's what you'd expect from an industrial city and I believe that there are some really crappy bits.

Burlington and Oakville are pretty much the same as each other (Burlington is bigger). Wealthy and a bit like Tunbridge Wells. Both are stuffed with Brits, including a few posters on here.

I used to live in Oakville and I liked it a lot. That was ten years ago, though. I don't know what is like now.

Oakvillian

Hamilton sometimes struggles to overcome its reputation as a down-at-heel city recovering from the collapse of heavy industry, steel in particular. While there are still areas of the city that are less, um, salubrious than others, by and large the reputation is no longer deserved. A lot of effort and money has been injected into urban regeneration projects. It has all the good bits of being a city: a decent downtown area, halfway sensible public transit options, a number of neighbourhoods with high walkability scores. However, it also has some of the downsides of being a bigger urban area, with still higher than average unemployment, particularly among young people, and an economy struggling to come to grips with the new reality.

There's not so much to choose between Burlington and Oakville. Both are now pretty much dormitory suburbs of Toronto; both have a historic core that has been overtaken by the outward expansion of subdivision housing. There are huge swathes of new-build housing, both medium-density condos/townhouses and single-family homes, currently being flung up on the northern limits of both towns. Either would give you decent schools, your choice of any of several dozen shopping malls, quiet non-hectic anonymity, and so much choice of excellent extracurricular programming for kids that the challenge is to keep enough unscheduled time for them to enjoy "unsupervised childhood." But there's no illusion that both Burlington and Oakville conform to some people's dystopian stereotype of North American suburbia: it's not quite Suburgatory despite what some on this board would have you believe!

Affordability goes up with commuting distance from Toronto, so you get more for your money in Hamilton than you would in Oakville. But which you choose will really depend on where you'll be working. That's the first consideration I would look to before setting your mind on a particular place to live.

christmasoompa

Is he a qualified electrician now? I seem to recall in a previous post you said he wasn't qualified yet. And does he have a job offer in Ontario for the visa?

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'd look at the visa and provincial certification side of things first before deciding where to live, as that will have a big bearing on things. There's no point in focusing on Hamilton if he can't find a job offer/LMIA there?

Good luck with it.

Souvy

What you say about property prices is something of an understatement. Property in Oakville is very expensive and getting more so.

I just did an MLS search. There are three streets (in your neck of the woods) with townhouses identical to the one we sold in 2004. One of the townhouses is on the market for double what we sold ours for, and we set a record!

SchnookoLoly

What Oakvillian said about Oakville-Burlington is pretty accurate.

WE debated between the two when we moved, but as my husband works downtown Toronto, Burlington was just that bit further away, so we decided Oakville was the better compromise. His door-to-desk time (From walking out of the house to sitting down at his desk downtown Toronto) is an average of about 55 minutes. Trains are super regular and generally reliable. Burlington was going to be an extra 15 minutes each way and the main measure for Husband was to keep the door-to-desk commute to under one hour.

Burlington is a bit bigger and certainly cheaper, but that's not unexpected with moving away from Toronto. Property taxes are also a bit higher in Oakville.

As for house prices, yes, both are pricey. A 4-bedroom house on a decent lot in Oakville will run you $900,000 give or take. Townhouses, usually 3-bedroom, run more like $550,000-600,000 depending on the lot, area, and size. South of the highway in Oakville is almost all north of $1m. Further north (north of Dundas) does get a bit cheaper, but it's that much further removed - large houses on small lots very crammed in. We stuck to the more "original" part of Oakville (not far from Oakvillian, actually) which is still large(r) houses but on big(ger) lots and more spaced out.

Souvy - I generally agree with the sentiment, Oakville is very "hot" right now, but generally the market is WAY hotter now than 2004! So while Oakville probably sold higher, I'm not quite sure saying things are selling for double is entirely accurate once you take into account 11 years and a change in the market.

Shard

Are house prices a bit less in Burlington considering it's an extra 15 minutes on the train?

SchnookoLoly

I believe so, yes.

Oakvillian

It's probably at least as much a "postcode snobbery" issue as a genuine reflection of commuting tedium, though.

I sit on the board of a local youth choir. A number of choristers come in from some distance outside Oakville to rehearse and perform. We looked a while ago at changing the name (which references Oakville) to reflect the broader geographical reach. Quite strong push-back from choristers (and especially their parents) that there was some indefinable "cachet" about the Oakville name that adds some kudos to the organization. I thought that was the sort of thing I'd left behind in south-west London ("oh, you poor thing - two streets down the road and you'd be in SW6, but you've ended up in *gasp* Hammersmith!" - or the equally silly snobbery between residents of Chiswick, Acton and Ealing).

Shard

Any guesstimate of % price difference on like for like housing stock. The two areas seem to have a similar geographic characteristic, ie. expensive near Lakeshore and less so northward?

sharkus

The Oakville to Tunbridge Wells comaprison is somewhat interesting to me, seeing as I currently live in the former, and grew up in the latter.

I can certainly agree about the snobbery aspect. In both places there are people who really need a thump to make them realize that we are all human beings, and having a big house, in a nice part of town, and more money does NOT make you better than anyone.

Having said that. Thankfully the place isn't made up completely of stuck up or pretentious types, there are some very lovely people that live there.

Pretty much echo what others have said, and it has got expensive. The house we purchased, that we had fell in love with, was nothing overly special (3 bedroom mid-row townhouse, finished basement, backing onto woodland) and was a pretty good deal. Sold it last year for what I still think is a daft price, considering what we paid for it.

If you are considering commuting into Toronto, then Burlington is about as far east as I'd recommend going. I have friends who commute in from Hamilton and it is do-able, but throw in some dodgy weather, or an accident on the road and it's a long commute.

Certainly look at prices and availability in both Oakville and Burlington.

SchnookoLoly

Okay, I *THINK* I found two comparable houses. I know Oakville better than Burlington, but this probably gives a reasonable idea.

First, Oakville. 1299 Blackburn Drive , Oakville, Ontario L6M2N5 - 2081609 | Realtor.ca Listed at $870,000

Next, Burlington: 5178 FERNBROOK CRT, Burlington, Ontario L7L6J5 - W3110053 | Realtor.ca Listed at $800,000 (Apologies That The Description Has The First Letter Capitalized!)

"Better" features of the Oakville house:
--Bigger lot size
--Backing onto ravine/forest area
--Bigger master bedroom (other bedrooms roughly the same size)
--Bigger family room (by about 1m on each side - decent margin)
--Roof replaced 6 years ago
--Furnace replaced 3 years ago

"Better" features of the Burlington house:
--Additional bedroom in the basement
--More interior upgrades (quartz in kitchen and bathroom, new backsplash, etc)
--Interior generally less "dated"
--Bigger formal dining room
--Main floor den

Common features:
--Both have large backyard decks with minimal landscaping
--Bedrooms 2, 3 and 4 are roughly the same size
--Kitchen and living rooms are about the same size
--Both have lots of original fixtures and fittings (carpets, faucets, counters, etc)
--Both on streets with local traffic only (crescent, court, etc)

Can't say for sure that the Burlington one doesn't have updated stuff (roof, furnace, etc) but that stuff is usually listed if it HAS been upgraded.

So on the balance, I"d say that the Oakville house probably would be listed slightly higher anyway maybe $30-40k, but probably not by $70k - I don't think (personally) that the differences between the two houses are worth $70k in a like-for-like comparison. However, as we have said, the Oakville house is slightly more simply because it's in Oakville.

JMO and all that.

Shard

You are an absolute star Schnooks. Thanks for taking the time! Both nice houses. So about 5-10% between the two areas based on that particular example. Anyway, don't want to take over the OP's thread so will leave it at that for now.

SchnookoLoly

Happy to help!

HGerchikov

The statistics published by the Real Estate Boards for Oakville and Burlington show that there are definitely more affordable choices in Burlington. Its not easy to do a comparison based on the list price of two houses, as its not the list price that matters but the selling price.

For 2014 the average price of all homes sold in Oakville was $807k and the median was $685k For Burlington average is $512k and median $473k.

There is a huge amount of variation depending on the area within each town too. One area of Burlington, for example, had an average sale price of $958k which is way above the average for the town as a whole.

At the moment the cheapest 4 bed detached house in Oakville is $639k and it is advertised as a 'renovate or build new' project. There are two 4 bed ones in Burlington for $499k, albeit not great location, and another one in a decent location for $559k with some updates.

I think Burlington is still considerably cheaper than Oakville.