Pine Cone

Do many people in Canada own weekend cottages by lakes? Is this something normal regular folk have a chance of ever affording, or a luxury for the wealthy or those who bought a few decades ago when prices were way, way cheaper? Just wondering how this whole Canadian cottage business compares to the obligatory NZ batch, that lots of over 50's seems to own (now sitting on a gold-mine by the beach despite being a fridid glorified shed half the year) and everyone under 40 has pretty much zero chance of ever affording.

Also exactly many hours away would a person be willing to drive for a weekend away in a cottage? Do people really just in the car and drive for 4-5 hours after work on a Friday evening, or have my conversations with Canuks been greatly exaggerated?

Tirytory

So I live in cottage country, approximately two hours north of Toronto. Certainly the highway is known for it's Friday traffic up north by Torontonians (and Sunday too). Cottages seem to pass along from generation to generation and waterfront property is very desirable on the big lakes. One of our friends has a prime lake spot (actually a lot of our friends do) because her great, great, great grandfather once got paid for some work he did with a parcel of water front land which was so big it got split up and cottages built and her parents and siblings now only four or five properties along there.

There are smaller lakes too and we've considered buying a cottage on one to rent out. We'd probably be looking at $300/400,000 for two/three bedrooms in a reasonable condition (no major work) on one of the smaller lakes. The further north you go the cheaper the property will get, but the longer the travelling time. How affordable it is depends on how much you have... It wouldn't be just the mortgage though, property tax for water front property would be around the 3/4000 a year mark for the above value and then there is upkeep, closing it down for winter etc. A lot of cheaper properties are three season only as useable in -30 or even +5! Residential taxes on waterfront into area will range from $6500 upwards. For the purpose of perspective, we have two friends that have four bedroom cottages on the lake, they would be sold at around the $1.5/2 million point maybe even more...

The lifestyle is lovely though! If you're on one of the big three (Lake Muskoka) you can boat to various places for dinner, public beaches off islands, go tubing, water skiing etc.

Aviator

Pretty much everyone here owns at least one.

cxx

Here in NB it seems like most people have a trailer on one of many caravan parks near the beach, which they refer to as "the cottage". Many of them just move there for the Summer as the commute is around 30 minutes. There are also some areas of cottages. We looked at renting one a few years ago and it was horrible - dark, damp and stank of mold.

dbd33

That's about right.

This understates the commute. A colleague leaves work at lunchtime on Friday in order to get to Lake Joseph (near Tirytory) by midnight. He leaves the cottage at midnight on Sunday in order to be at work in the morning.

Pine Cone

With the taxes, is that paying $3-4k property taxes AND residential taxes of $6.5+ per year? In that case you are looking at $10k+ per year in taxes in order to own a cottage?

dbd33

Rather more than that, all in, but it's something one needs for career progression as a well placed cottage is much more of a snob thing than a well placed house. Managers have cottages in the Kawarthas, Directors have cottages in Muskoka.

Pine Cone

What about people who don't give a c**p about social status, but who have been frugal enough with money and well enough paid that they can afford a small weekend getaway in a reaonsably nice area. Where might one go outside GTA where they can have fun kayaking with the kids, keep an inexpensive little boat, enjoying a glass of wine outdoors in relative peace in the evening and not worry unduly about being eaten by large wildlife.

Suggestions please, so I can amuse myself for an afternoon looking at real estate listings! One of my friends mentioned Otter Lake. Is this a nice place? Is it a long from from Toronto? I know absolutely nothing about it at all.

dbd33

I don't imagine anywhere with cottages has large wildlife. Cottages are packed in tighter than tract houses. Somewhere like Sauble Beach is all houses but they're closer together than the caravans at Canvey Island.


It's a classic cottage location. 5 hours or so from Toronto on a Friday, maybe two and a half on a Wednesday.

I have to say I'm baffled by this desire to buy a hut on a bug ridden pond and then spend hours in traffic getting to and from it only to have to mow the lawn and paint walls upon arrival.

dave_j

I'm obviously missing a great deal here.
I live in a house and all of my pastimes are here with me.
If I bought a cottage by a lake, what would I be doing there that I wouldn't be doing here?
Sure, if I had a boat I could drift out to somewhere else where I could eat, swim and generally be happy in the knowledge that there wouldn't be anyone else around, but I still can't get my head around the cost-benefit analysis.
I agree that if I lived in the center of a large city and lived in, what has sadly become known as a town house.. or apartment block as it used to be known, then I could understand the need to escape the claustrophobia. But is this the reason or is it really part of the canadian culture or does it just provide a hideaway where canadians can indulge in some of those strange and outrageous acts that might get you locked up for a long time were you to attempt them in the center of Toronto?

Pizzawheel

It always brightens my friday when my colleagues tell me they are going cottaging for the weekend.

Pine Cone

This is rather what I'm trying to figure out from a cost-benefit point of view. Imagine the scenario of being in a job you love and which is reasonably well paid, but where you are 100% definitely tied to living in a big city or spending lots of time in horrendous traffic or crowded public transport by taking the alternative approach of living on the city periphery in order to have some peace and quiet and a bit more room for the family. Living in a city would be fine, but then you've got the issue of paying for holiday accomodation for you larger than averge family in order to indulge in some of your favourite weekend past-times occasionally (kayaking, canoeing, hiking etc) as opposed to owning a second property where you can do this whenever you fancy. Maybe it's not worth the financial investment or ongoing costs, but perhaps it is?

bats

I love in a less swanky cottage area east of Toronto. It's possible to buy a place for 100k but you'd get banjo music with that. Trailers are increasingly popular too as evidenced by the two down the road. An ordinary house in a village would cost $150k up. Cottages of the older log or wooden lakefront kind do tend to be family owned but there are several newer houses in our street that are used as cottages.

Some people even have a cottage a few miles from their main home. Daft buggers

I don't see the point really. Two houses to maintain, clean, garden. Obligatory trips to open up for the summer, close down for the winter. The worry of weather damage. Ugh. Even sharing it all with family would be horrid. The idea of a family cottage is too claustrophobic for me.

dbd33

A colleague once told me that over the weekend at the cottage she'd been spitroasted. "They were so confident" she gushed "they'd obviously done it before". That'd get you noticed, and possibly arrested, in Scotland Yard.

dbd33

When I lived in east end Toronto (the Beach), I had a boat at the nearby yacht club (not a snob yacht club, oh no) and would bicycle there. We also had/have some kayaks and would paddle them out from there.

The neighbours had a cottage and went there all the time and, granted, they weren't sailing in sewage as we were, but they were doing pretty much the same things and spending hours to get there. They had all kinds of money tied up in the cottage. I couldn't see it, the cost of a cottage buys an awful lot of hotel rooms and they're not all in the same place.