Canada Bob

The housing market varies quite a bit too in and around Halifax, there's certain streets in Halifax where the prices go through the roof faster than than a squirrel ! Mostly around the North West Arm area, some fabulous homes there that's for sure, but there's other areas where you're money will buy you a lot of house on a lot of land yet still not break the bank.

A lot depends on where you expect to be working, and how much of a commute you can tolerate, but just to put "traffic jams" into perspective, compared to Westhoughton {between Wigan & Bolton} where we now live, the traffic you're likely to encounter in Halifax Matro area is a breeze.

You'll hear folks say how bad the traffic is, but for the most part they are comparing it to how things were 10 or even 20 years ago, so they tink things are BAD these days.

Put it this way... at any moment of any day there are more vehicles on the 401 Highway in Ontario than the total number of cars registered in Nova Scotia ! A snarl up on the 401 or the QE in Ontario can stretch from Hamilton to Toron'o !!! and I'm going back 15 years when I'd be driving to work from St Catherines on the Niagara Penisula to Mississauga {near Toron'o airport}.

I doubt that there's ever been a tail back of a mile anywhere in Nova Scotia, but the bridges can seem hellish at times {to those who have forgotten reality} when you may be held up for 10 minutes.

Put it another way, when we lived in Colby Village Dartmouth then Bedford and we were headed to Halifax airport, it would take around 20 minutes on the Highway and I've counted as many as 5 cars a minute as we drove there !

Hang on... I've digressed, back to the houses, I'd short list Colby Village, Dartmouth, Eastern Passage {if you want to live very close to the Ocean at a reasonable price, nice golf course down there too, but there's no shortage of them anywhere}. Also Bedford {always though by the locals as "the place to be"}, you'd like Pete's Fruitique run by a Limey, lots of decent shoppingin Bedford, but you can say that for just about anywhere in the HRM {Halifax Regional Municipality}. Waverley is also very nice, as is the Kingswood area of Halifax, lots of very nice new homes around Kingswood, to behonest you're close to being spoiled for choice, it all boils down to your budget and how far you want to commute.

As to the mix of families, there's no noticable difference to anywhere that I've ever lived, but no doubt a 14 year old would think Nova Scotia is tanked up with owd folks :-) don't give it a second though, be easy enough to look for the demographics via StatsCan.

Not sure where you're located right now, but as far as house prices are concerned, here in the Untidy Kingdom {say in the Greater Manchester area} it's not unknown for a Coronation Street type house to sell for $200,000 !

Right now in Westhoughton ex Council houses are selling for $300,000 and my little place has just been listed for $500,000. In case anyone wants to jump in and buy the place it's a detached 2 storey house with a foundation foot print of around 30ft x 30ft, small garden etc, and the sub division has 20+ houses on 1.5 acres of land. The home we had in Eastern Passage {2245 Shore Road} was Ocean front, stood on 1.5 acres, and cost me less than this place did :scared: add to that the footprint of the garage we had there was bigger than the foundation of this place I'll be glad to see the back of it, we are looking at moving back to Canada, somewhere on the coast of BC probably {due to the no snow zones}, but we are also considering Ireland for the same {coastlines} etc.

Canada Bob.

AnyaT

I suspect he\she meant retired people, not people over 30 (God, that means Im almost over the hill!) There is a trend in NS for younger people to leave to find better work opportunities, but come back when they retire. However it seems more prevalent in rural communities - I wouldnt say Halifax is full of old people. Its 5 universities see to that. And of course, most of the communities growing up around Halifax have lots of families with younger children.

ClareBC

I emailed m'friend, who is also debating whether to go to BC or NS, about whether the area was affected by Hurrican Juan (it was).

As my friend said - "hurricanes vs earthquakes whaddayado?"

Mind you, the hurricane season is annual....

Clare

AnyaT

True, but NS doesn't actually get hit by hurricanes very often. Juan was the first in several decades. Normally NS just gets a day of heavy rain as the hurricane that has devastated various US states blows out to sea.

Canada Bob

Hello Clare,

I wouldn't bother too much about the hurricanes, Juan was a really odd occurance for Nova Scotia, a once in a hundred years thing they said at the time, yet since then they say that due to the Gulf Stream that passes close to Nova Scotia, and the water in there getting warmer it is likely that some place will get hit again in the next 10-20 years. The thing is we all had at least 24 hours warning, enough time to get to Toron'o if need be

Who knows if BC will be hit by an earthquake in the next 100 years, I just hope it won't be when we are there The trouble with earthquakes is there's little if any warning at all, you'd be lucky to get out of bed let alone be on your way to Toron'o but the risk of any real danger to us personally are small... It's a bit like folks who stay away from New England because they have Lyme Disease there, sure it's a risk but it's a remote risk.

From my experience I'd rather look out the window and see Juan than an earthquake :scared:

Canada Bob.

ClareBC

Yep, me too!!

http://earthquakescanada.nrcan.gc.ca/index_e.php

Clare

dingbat

The earthquake in 2000 cracked my basement where I lived in PoCo. Felt like I had had one too many when it hit...very weird...

Corky

Why don't you...the ones coming to NS for a visit, go to www.novascotia.com and ask them to send you the tourist guide for 2006.....it really is well worth reading. You will find all kinds of things to do in NS..but it really depends on the time you come. I am on the south shore if anyone fancies a visit!