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Hi,

I would like to start by saying, WOW what a great forum, this site has helped us immensely in preparing the big move.
I would just like to know if any of you have the time to give me your opinions on the following:-

What areas should I Consider moving to in and around Toronto?

I will be moving out with my partner and 2 bambinos (aged 5 and 8), I am more than happy to commute (by any available transport methods) for up to 1hr 30ish to get into the city center from any direction (where I hope to work)
Schools are obviously going to be important and we would like somewhere safe and quite and ideally in an area popular with families.
Local amenities are not to much of an issue, I am happy to have to take a short drive (15-25 min’s to find a store)

Any suggestions would be gratefully received we have been searching high and low and end going round in circles…

Also again a suspect a very random question, but I am applying under the FSW scheme (IS/IT Manager) and wondered if any one had an opinion on whether Toronto is the best place to try and obtain work in IT? Am I over looking any other areas?

Any input would be fantastic!!!

Thanks for taking the time to read this! :)

Simon

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The location issue has been done to death on past threads, it depends on:

- your tolerance for indentikit suburbia
- the degree of independence you want your children to have
- the amount of space you want to have

with a willingness to commute 90 minutes each way and a house budget of, say, $400,000, you could, just about, live in the city next to a subway station, in the country with room for a horse, in the bland belt in some ghastly new subdivision, or in an older suburb with a lot proportionate to the house. If you have more money you could live in Oakville like every other new immigrant from the UK. What would you prefer?

The GTA and the area west of it, down to Kitchener-Waterloo is the place with most computing jobs in Canada. Next best bet is probably Ottawa.

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Thanks for the quick response.

Sorry I had scanned older responses, I just wanted a fresh opinion on it.

Living in the country with room for a house sounds great!!
as does the old suburb!!

I guess we are fairly relaxed, and intend to try out a few areas before purchasing.

Again, thanks for your response

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Hi and welcome to the forum.

If you do a search (top right) you'll find lots of info and opinions on areas around Toronto. Some people love the GTA, some loathe it, but it may give you some idea if you have a read of previous threads.

It would also be helpful if you can give people a rough idea of your budget if asking them to suggest an area, as much will depend on that.

Hope that helps, good luck. :)

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Then around Orangeville is 90 minutes to downtown (realistically, it's less than an hour on Sunday) by car. Any sort of rural living of course commits you to using cars for every trip everywhere.

Lots of choice there, depending on budget. Oakville and Missisauga (south of the QEW) to the west, places farther out than Scarborough to the east (I don't know the east as well as the west). Note that the only practical public transit in the suburbs runs along the lakeshore so, if you want your teenaged kids to ever be out of your hair, you either have to live in the city or as near to the lake as funds permit.

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Sorry,

Cant bieleve I missed that off, I guess the budget will be approx 525,000.

Thanks for your help

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The fact that you are willing to drive up to 1h30 to the city centre and up to 25 minutes to a store, doesn't rule out much in the GTA. That would cover basically from St. Catherines to Hamilton to Kitchener Waterloo to north of Orangeville to almost Barrie to almost Peterborough to Cobourg and everything within that area if downtown Toronto is the city centre. You'll spend a fortune of non-recoverable money on transit or car costs if you travel from the extremities.

Good luck on your search

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I kinda feel that the 1.5 hrs commute is what I do now from my town into Central London, which is also faily expensive..

so would be happy to carry on this trend, especailly if I could have a wonderful house in a nice area and really enjoy the bennifits of a chilled out life but with the City lights on the door step (well over an hour away)

Thanks so much for all your replies, its just such a mindfield!

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That's a good point. I live well north of Orangeville and drive to either Guelph or downtown most days (sometimes both). My commuter car was new in 2007 and now has 88,000 miles on it. At 37cents a kilometer, not an especially generous allowance, that's over fifty grand in two years and a bit years. It's a cost at great risk of increasing due to fluctuations in the price of oil. There's also the consideration that some of the roads are subject to weather, if you're going to commute reliably you need a suitable vehicle and then you need another one for the wife and probably more for the kids. Not cheap.

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For me personally, i'm looking forward to not having a commute anything like as my old London one. A chilled out life to me doesn't include 3 hours travel each day :)

I'm not sure if you've ever been to Toronto or even Canada but you may want to visit a couple of times first just to make yourself aware of the areas, cities, outskirts of citys, countryside, etc etc etc.

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These are all really great points. again thanks for taking the time to help me out.

Maybe your right, maybe I should try to rein it back to about an hours cummute.

We are coming out for a scout In Jan, and then again in March/April, we have only ever been as tourists up un till now, I intend to do alot of driving around checking out the areas etc.

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A fine time to test your willingness to commute by car.

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You coukd do Oakville on that - lots of trails, close enough to Toronto without being in it, close to the lake and Bronte provoncial park....my kids 81/2 & 7 love it here as do I!

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The problem though is that they'll grow up and, as teenagers, may find their dependence on "Mom's Taxi" awkward. The taxi driver may also find it a bother to have to drive them everywhere.

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As long as my girls are safe and happy, I don't mind................

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Suburbia made mine unhappy. In Toronto they were able to propel themselves to school, to their jobs, to their sports clubs, to dates and to bars without having to take their mother. That allowed them to grow up.

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My kids won't be tied to my apron strings - not how they'll be raised, not how I was raised. Anyway, may not be here forever..........variety is the spice of life......;)

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I guess my point is that suburbs work for small children but work less well for older ones, it's something to consider if setting up a long term home.

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Where in TO were your kids raised?

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They flitted between their mother's house in the suburbs (between Port Credit and Clarkson) and mine, first by the St Lawrence Market, then in Leslieville, then in the Beach. They went to school at Jarvis and Carlton, by the Maple Leaf Gardens, so were always with me if there was swimming (6:00am downtown) or ice hockey (11:00pm or 5:00am at Moss Park). One became a lifeguard working all over the city, one a serious sailor spending as many nights on the boat, moored just by the Skydome, as at either house. As they aged they spent more time at my house, once they took up driving and stoning having the 24hr TTC service was a blessing.

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I am really glad I have had so many responses,

It has really helped me evaluate our plans,

Your right, I knidda want to change our standard of living, enjoy my surroundings, I guess I have had it drilled into me for to long that a 1.5 hour commute into town is the norm...

I think I am going to try and re-evaluate, and maybe try for a 45 min-1hr max commute.

I take on board the kchild comments and I think they are all very valid, we come froma non big city background, and I guess will cross the tennage years bridge when we get to it!!

Thanks though all your comments are really really helpful....:thumbsup:

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Depending on the day of the week, the phase of the moon, and the color of your socks, 1 1/2 hours could get you from St Catharine's to the downtown core of TO, or it could get you from Port Credit to the downtown core :D

We lived in a very nice rented condo apartment on Marine Parade Drive, which is the west end of Toronto, technically classified as Etobicoke. My fiance works downtown so I'd drive her up to the Old Mill subway station, took about 15 - 20 mins depending on traffic, and she'd then travel down to St George and then get the subway down to Queens Park. I think total door to door was probably about an hour.

We moved to Oakville in December last year and she now takes the Go train from Bronte Go station. It takes about 10 mins to get to the station and, depending on the train she catches it's usually 40 - 60 mins, and then another 10 on the subway or 30 if she walks up to College street from Union station.

We did wonder at first how the commute was going to be but it's fine. I have to say I much prefer the GO setup to South Eastern's service from High Brooms to Charring Cross. They seem to have got the commuter train thing right here. Free parking (try that in the UK!), decent fair prices, big double-decker trains and a fast and efficient service. I've taken the go both in and out of Toronto, in rush hour and after a hockey/baseball game and I've never once had to stand, I always get a seat. I used to frequently travel to/from London on the Hastings line and the majority of the time I had to stand for the entire journey, even one trip when leaving london on a tuesday evening at 8:30 I had to stand.

Anyway, the point being here, if you're happy to commute then you can look outside the city, as we did and get a potential better quality of life, moreso if you're near a GO route.

I pass over the QEW every morning on the way to the station and it's always terribly busy. I also drive downtown from Oakville a fair bit. Once a week at around 5pm on a Thursday evening and it can take anywhere from 35 to 65 mins. That's without any accidents involved. Seems to bunch up between third line and ford drive, opens up a bit, gets slow around mississauga rd to huruntario, then it's usually ok until you hit the Gardiner, at which point it's slow all the way in (I get off at lakeshore and take that up to the Jameson area).
I also travel in once a while at around 11:30 am and it still fairly busy, but at least when you get to the Gardiner there aren't massive tailbacks, so it's usually a 35 min trip.

Coming back, I usually get off at Ford drive, as the QEW from Ford Drive to, well usually past Burloak is jammed.

We chose Oakville as we wanted out of the city, and we also wanted a decent sized house that was in our price range. We were looking to a budget of about $350,000. There were houses in that price range in the area we lived in, but they were not all that big, as they tended to be older houses. When you've got a king size bed you need a lot of room.
We looked outside the downtown area and found places that were more what we were looking for. Decent sized bedrooms, garage, parking on the driveway, a back yard, all the things you'd want.

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What you really need to know is where you'll be working, tricky that.

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Cool, I would have liked to have lived in the Beaches, but too far for OH job and way too expensive.......have friends ho live there, just had their house valued at $1.8 million....:eek:

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Wow, house in Oakville for $350k??? where????

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If its Toronto and 'the greater Toronto area' (GTA) in the beginning depending on where you're going to work, I would suggest looking at renting for 12-months as a first step before buying

Second option is seeing that Toronto is about 50km wide & 30km deep at the longest point that you'd want for you & your family's sake to in the beginning have easy access to public transit (suggestion)

Many folks may live at one end of the metroplois and work at the other end. Some live beyond the east/west boundaries in Oshawa & Oakville to the North in Aurora or Newmarket & commute in to work.

These folks can drive in 30 - 60 minutes or commute on the 'GO-Train' shuttle (like intercity)

In Toronto proper the bus & subway (underground) is fairly good and unique. Its east/west run time all 35-40km is about one hour, connecting to buses. Rush hour connections are fairly good also

Its a big city that runs on forever & ever - personal choice is linked to where you will work to start

Hope this help & good luck

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I liked living in the Beach but it was just a step in my progression through women each of whom needed more outdoor space; from downtown to Leslieville so as to have a barbecue, from there to the Beach so as to have room for a trampoline, from there to nowhere-really so as to have room for horses. I suppose if there's another domestic upheaval I'll be looking to buy the Lion Safari.

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says 0 properties?? seems about right:rofl:

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Just off Heritage Way. So it's within a "box" of Bronte Rd to the west, Upper Middle to the North, QEW to the South and Third Line to the east.

I think it's referred to as Glen Abbey, or Glen Abbey West.

It's 3 bedroom, 1 full bathroom, 3 powder rooms, large deck, small garden, driveway for 2 cars, single car garage, fully finished basement. It's what I'd call in the UK a terraced/row house (not sure if townhouse would be a more accurate description, a block of five, we're in the middle. Backs onto woodland.

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:rofl::rofl::rofl:

Had many women DBD33?;)

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mmm need a ton of upgrading per chance??

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ahhh should have read your post thoroughly - a Townhome. That explains it. I thought you meant a single family home!

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agree, no detached houses in Oakville for $350k ...

Townhouses & condo's maybe

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Yes, but only five "permanent" ones.

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You're a wee dark horse me thinks!;)

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I've just done this search on MLS and it came up with a couple of properties.

One thing I should mention is that the house was originally listed at $379, but it dropped to $350.

Yes, not a semi or a detached. You're quite right, if it were fully detached or even a semi it would be a tiny bit more expensive. I think our next place will be a semi or more hopefully a fully detached place. We're very happy where we are though at the moment :)

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Thats a great shout, we will deffo be renting for the 1st 12months.

The only other issue we have of course is putting the kids in school, dont really want to get them in school, get them settled, then move to the other side of GTA to decrease my commute,

I guess I will just need lady luck on my side..

I can deffo cope with an hour, would rather it be by train of some sort, so at least I can read a book (or the Beano):)

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everyone on the commute reads the popular free daily rag called '24 hours' much like the 'Metro' free daily in the UK

No luck, just simple common sense - it'll all work out

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Oakville is nice.....only been here a month, but we love it!

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Oakville is very appealing, Being a very keen golfer, and having Glen Abbey near by to!!!!!!

goodtimes!!!