hi guys,

just trying to sort out a realtor to line up some houses for when we visit canada in 3 weeks. we are trying to identify some areas that we want to look at and wondered if anyone could help.

the chances are if i am lucky enough to receive a job offer, it will be the outskirts or heart of downtown Ottawa, or possible even Gatineau! ideally we want to live no more than 30-ish mins drive door to door. price wise, approx $300-350k, house with minimum of 3 bedrooms, reasonable size plot, bi-lingual area not an issue, easy access to downtown with public transport routes, near to sports such as hockey, skiing, skating, football, cricket etc is important, and it would be nice to have good access to national parks and lakes.

from browsing these forums i was thinking orleans, kanata and barrhaven but do any other areas fit the bill?

CentrePointe is pretty much 'central' to all those locations. The closest bus station is Baseline. It shouldn't be too hard getting a 3 bed house in your price range.

Ottawa is pretty small and places, even Gatineau, are easy to get to if you have a car. Football is almost everywhere. Not seen any cricket though.

Check out the following for cricket:
http://www.ottawacricketclub.ca/

i've seen that before actually, looks like they actually play a bit over there. canada's national team is about equivalent to scotland's, so not great

can anybody help with my query about ottawa areas?

MLS is a good place to find properties.
http://orebweb2.oreb.ca/mlssearch/Se...aspx?x_map=a00

Click on Ottawa and on the map any of the places in areas L,K, M,N,O are in commuting distance of downtown. O, Orleans is the cheapest.

Ottawa is small but rush hour traffic is bad enough that I would wait until you know where your job is before making a house purchase. If you end up working in Kanata for example you would probably regret buying a place in Orleans or Gatineau (unless of course there is something about those areas you absolutely love). Why spend 30-40 mins commuting each way when you could do it in 2-15 mins from Kanata, Barrhaven, Bells Corners etc..

If you are working downtown the commute from most of the outlying suburbs will be fairly equal as far as I know. There are various rush hour bottlenecks (417, bridges over Ottawa River, Aviation Parkway) which will become obvious to you fairly quickly. You may decide that one of the inner suburbs is a better bet although it will be harder to find the space you want for your budget.

When you are here for your recce don't forget that traffic will be lighter as some people will be away at the cottage. Also try to imagine how long a commute will take in winter. Even a moderate amount of snow will lengthen your commute times.

I can recommend a realtor, we came here for 6 days and she managed to find exactly what we needed in that time. PM me and I will give you her contact details.

is Orleans the cheapest for any particular reason? would it be a nice place to live for suburban family life?

I Can't comment on why Orleans is cheaper, I never considered it as I was working in the west end and wanted a sub 15min commute. I would do some of your own research on realtor.ca to see the price differences.
When you get here on your reccie I think you will see the difference between the east and west end yourself.