the blairs

Hi

I just booked our flights for a trip in Oct for 8 days and am now trying to piece together a plan of action.

My husband is going to arrange meetings with recruitment agencies and mortgage brokers whilst I am in charge of arranging school visits and house hunting.

I am going to contact a realtor (any reccomendations welcome) and arrange a couple of days to look at houses but obviously having never been before I am a bit stuck as to which areas to look at.

We will definatly look at Oakville as this seems to be a lovely area (don't mind cookie cutter so much whilst the kids are young and need friendsto play with) But I don't know about other areas.

We are looking for...
good high schools,
safe neighbourhoods with lots of kids,
close parks or good walks (for our daft springer spaniel),
Close to smaller grocery stores (don't mind driving to bigger ones but its always handy to have a corner shop),
Commutable distance to Toronto,
Close enough to a GO train station (walking or driving)
Detatched 4 bed with a decent sized garden.

If there is anything else I should be thinking about please do tell !!!

Thanks
the blairs

beckybev

Hi, I can't really answer your question as we are in the same boat but wanted to say 'hi' for the same reason. We are looking at North of Toronto, such as Pickering, Ajax and Whitby. We are doing our reccie next summer, although we hope to have our visas by then. When are you hoping to move there? How far through the process are you?

TheGrizzlyHattons

Will send you a pm about realtor.

the blairs

We havn't even sent our docs in yet !! We just want to get a feel for the areas before we finally put our application in. They will definatly be in before christmas though.

I think this trip we will look south of the city and next trip look north of the city.

Its really hard to choose areas before you've even been !!

the blairs

dbd33

Bring snorkels.

the blairs

why snorkels ????

I take it that means I will be in the lake !!!

Sorry I should have said west ;O)

the blairs

beckybev

we haven't sent in our docs either but plan to do so before the end of August. We know more or less where we want to go as we're hoping that the OH gets a job at one of the power stations in Ontario so we are looking specifically at those areas. I have visited Ontario many times over the past 24 years and know that it is definitely the place for us. Have you looked at the mls realtor website? It's fab and gives you a very good idea of how built up each area is. If you haven't, I will pm you the website. How old are your kids and are they excited about the move?

the blairs

I've had a look at the mls site and now I am desperate to go !!

The kids are 11 (son) and soon to be 8 (daughter) and yeh they are getting excited by the minute. At first they were unsure but I am managing to sway them with thoughts of sledging all winter and swimming pools in the back yard

the blairs

beckybev

We love looking at the mls website, especially the aerial views. The kids have already chosen a house they love!! We went over at Christmas and my son (11) spent most of the time outside sledging. We are going over again next summer to show them how great it is in the summer. My daughter (13) wants to go now but we've explained that we have a few loose ends to tie up here (qualify for a visa, sell house, find job etc.). Are you using a consultant to help with the paperwork? We've decided to use Phil Mooney as we figure that it costs so much, it would be better to get it right the first time. Take the kids to 'Tim Horton's' and they'll be sold immediately!!!