scrubbedexpat091

You know I don't think the whole, just move somewhere cheaper method really works, all it does it drive up prices in more locations, domino effect but like dominos eventually you kind of run out of options eventually.

I remember when Halifax was one of the affordable options, seems these days they also have a housing problem.

"the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Halifax went up by 20 per cent between January 2020 and January 2021, and the average price to purchase a home went up by more than $100,000 between June 2020 and June 2021."


Wasn't even that long ago that Halifx area was one of the places to move to because it was affordable, now getting there where unless you sold a house somewhere, its losing its affordability too.


Now wait for the complaints about homeless people increasing and tent city's popping up, and local governments thinking the solution is to just kick homeless out of parks, well that isn't a solution once people are in tents in parks, they probably have no options for housing at that point.

abner

So the QEW and 403 will become even more screwed than the Don Valley Parking Lot?

Ouch, but maybe not forever. Work-from-home arrangements, whether for gold-collar, white-collar, or pink-collar, are becoming more prevalent, and entrenched, in the post-CoVid environment.

And Hamilton, whether central core, "mountain", or even (to some extent) "outskirts", is recently a more interesting place to be. I have no skin in that game, but do have several close friends who are quite happy there, and more and more so recently.

Shard

That's an impressive selection of towers. Will the people work in Hamilton or is it for Toronto commuting ?

Siouxie

Hamilton has become a commuters paradise due to previously reasonable housing costs. Hamilton is a blue collar worker city in the main.. I doubt very much if people who buy those will work here. The influx of commuters / people who have moved from the GTA are pretty much pushing housing costs so high the 'the local workforce' are out priced.

From the previous census - 6 years ago; wages haven't increased by a lot over the years - but housing has. https://wowa.ca/hamilton-housing-market

Median total income in 2015 among recipients ($) 32,917
Median total income of households in 2015 ($) 69,024

Median monthly shelter costs for owned dwellings ($)1,227
Median monthly shelter costs for rented dwellings ($) 892

https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/ho...190115267.html

abner

It would be interesting to see some data about that, if you can provide it.

My anecdotal experience suggests otherwise, e.g. a small cluster of friends and acquaintances who have cashed out of Toronto real-estate (on average not rich, but now mostly mortgage-free in Hamilton), retired from their previous GTA-style careers, and established (with frankly varying degrees of success) craft-related, internet-based businesses which sell back into their GTA-based social networks of like-minded craft enthusiasts. And their young-adult children have mostly relocated with them, and have pursued mostly service-related careers in the wider SEO region (not necessarily Hamilton, but never Toronto--too brutal a commute).

An unrepresentative sample to be sure. But your own post, as quoted above, has the opposite problem. "Blue collar" seems an overbroad generalization about today's Hamilton. And I'd even suggest your "I doubt very much if people who buy those will work here" deserves more data backing it up, as well.

(Relative income data isn't sufficient. What is the evidence of actual commuting distances undertaken by Hamilton-area residents?)

Siouxie

Your anecdotal information is an example of how GTA people are moving to Hamilton but are not likely to be working here (your examples work from home online business- or if they are, then working in 'service industry' at minimum wage jobs - i.e. the same as the standard 'blue collar workers' (there are a lot of factories/manufacturing/steel jobs here too).

My point was, the people who live and work in Hamilton (as opposed to commuters) are likely to have low to mid range income (particularly those that originate from here)... and not able to afford the new increased prices of housing... unlike those who have sold up in the GTA and bought out the cheaper housing here! Your friends were very fortunate.

The information is readily available online on stats Canada.. if you are that interested, to look.

Hoisted by your own petard, lol..

caretaker

What happened to the steel mills and the tire plant? Is all that gone now? I only knew a couple of people from Hamilton and that was long ago but they made it sound like the place was all smokestacks and whistles.

Siouxie

There are still steel mills.. Hamilton has been a steel city for a long time (hence the nickname) - they have recently started hiring new workers..
.https://www.stelco.com/about-us/our-facilities
https://dofasco.arcelormittal.com/

Firestone closed in 2012

abner

Oh, bullshit.

Moving to Hamilton, and starting up businesses out of Hamilton-based homes is still very much "working in Hamilton".

And the three adult children of the family I know best in this little arts'n'crafts cluster work as:
- a veterinarian
- a cop
- a civil engineer

...i.e. all service-industry workers, none on minimum wage, and only the cop arguably "blue-collar".

Your assumptions about "service-industry", "blue-collar", and whether either or both are necessarily "minimum-wage" are out-of-date, and frankly insulting.

Hoist on your own petard, indeed.

Siouxie

Excuse me?

Working for a company in Hamilton, as opposed to being self employed and working from home are 2 very different scenarios. You stated in your previous post that the adult children of your aquaintances worked in the service industry = service industry is generally understood to be trade / retail / hospitality etc.
are professions - not generally considered 'service industry'.

I suggest you might have a better idea of the reality if you actually lived here and had expienced living and working here personally.

I find your response dismissive and insulting.... but you are entitled to your opinion, as am I... but if you care to look at stats canada for the income levels for the majority of workers in this city, you will see that the majority earn far below what a professional will earn..

dbd33

Isn't that the whole issue? Many people in Canada would not be able to afford the house they now live in, if they hadn't bought it years ago. In the case of Vancouver, "years ago" is 2015. People who owned houses at that time suddenly had lots of equity and were able to buy more houses to rent to the new "working poor", people like newly qualified CPAs, associates in law firms, doctors and dentists, the kind of people who nominally have "good jobs' but who will never be able to catch up with those who had the same jobs in 2015.

It's this sort of price escalation that leads people like, say Adele, to have to move to cities that are their second choice, LA in her case, because Lahdons too pricey, innit?

Aren't you a home owner in Hamilton? Soon to be a member of the bourgeois.

scrubbedexpat091

Maybe we need to build like this in Canada. The NIMBY's of Vancouver would lose their collective minds, but that is also an example of why nothing gets solved in Canada, the policy makers cave into homeowners demands rather than doing what is best for society as a whole, and SFH in a land limited place like Vancouver is poor use of land.

Moses2013

I'd say it's the same eveywhere and while doctors and dentists seem to be the kind of people who nominally have "good jobs' for the older generation, it's very different today. People working in the so called service industry can make a fortune and the whole job landscape has changed. Even plumbers and electricians can make more money than the average lawyer today. There are enough people (home owners) who move from one property to another and the price is just a number for them.

scrubbedexpat091

service-industry I would not consider a doctor, lawyer, vet, or cop to be in, it generally refers to lower level front facing positions, at least in this part of the world, nobody uses service-industry for high paid professional jobs even if they are providing a service.

dbd33

Some, perhaps, but in the Thatcher era the tabloids celebrated a bricklayers assistant, a man with a giant hod, who was making a fortune. I suspect this is the same, the high earning trades are wild exceptions.

<goes off in search of giant hod man>

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-ma...-84181197.html