Ok you ex-pats or home grown, been there forever folks living in Calgary or recommended places in Alberta. I need you to help give it too me straight from the horses mouth. I want to know why I should move provinces to Alberta or specifically Calgary - my questions are specific as a retiree.

I can spend hours & hours looking at environment Canada websites, tourist boards, Real estate agent/MLS websites, Grocery store flyers - but I am an inpatient person & I'd appreciate getting the real picture from folks that live in Alberta

No generalities please just straight talk

Climate: seasonal temperatures in Calgary year round - best & worst weather months.

Real Estate Purchasing: typical price of a 3 bedroom house or condo

Condo Fees: how much are they typically based on price of a condo?

Real Estate Rental: is it good bad indifferent, typical prices for 2--3 bedroom apartment or house based on personal or recommended knowledge in any particular neighbourhood/location. Exclude bad areas.

Property taxes: What are typical for those type of houses or condo's based on price or as a percentage of market price. Do seniors get property tax reductions or credits from the municipality or province?

Groceries: Average prices for everyday items such as - milk, bread, eggs, cheese, pork, chicken... add as you like

Neighbourhoods: Places to stay away from

Anything I missed: please add to the list

Looking forward to your help in answering the above

Word from expat Brits is that the people can be a little cold emotionally. I personally have not seen that but I have found them to be a little outspoken, abrasive even. Best thing is that you will not be marginalized if you do not happen to speak fluent Quebecois. The surrounding scenery is staggering, there is none of the humidity that Eastern Canada suffers in summer but the winters there can be bitterly cold and you may need to budget your heating bills accordingly. Pack the Yak-Trax for your shoes if you intend to go outside in the winter, conditions will be slippery.

HTH

Almost canadian said "$1,500 + for a 3 bed house not massively less for a 2 bed."
We have rented in Royal Oak for over 5 years, in 2 houses. Our first, a 2 bed was $1600 p/m. We were in it from Aug 2008 to Jan 2013. We had real difficulty getting another place, every one we inquired about had 50 to 100 other inquiries. The letting agents said the rental market in Calgary was the busiest that had ever seen it!
We did manage to find a 3 bed house, rented by the owner, for $1800, but most similar houses in NW Calgary ( we were mainly looking in Royal Oak, Tuscany, Citadel, Arbour Lake and Edgemont) were over the $2000 p/m.
This was back in Dec/ Jan 2013, and before the floods. There are now even less rentals available as loads of houses are getting repaired and the owners are in rentals. It didn't affect us, but good friends of ours were flooded out and had to find a rental. So we know exactly how the rental market in Calgary is at present.
As always, there are cheaper rentals, and less popular areas of Calgary, this is from our recent personal experiences, I'm sure someone else has their own info to share.

There must be a good reason so many Albertans have moved to the Comox Valley and other places on Vancouver Island

Lots of people do retire to Alberta, because there are no healthcare specific fees (although you probably will need a drug plan at least). I was pretty shocked during the H1N1 vaccination how many old people there were in Calgary.

In contracts they usually use November 15 - April 30 as the winter months, but it's usually chilly after Thanksgiving. Basically frigid from the first week of December until the end of February and on and off through March. Although there is the "Chinook" effect (Foehn winds) which means you get a day or two of genuinely warm weather every few weeks but it's not as amazing as some people seem to think it is.

But it's extremely dry so you don't have to go outside as much and shovel it - but on the other hand... it's extremely dry, I mean EXTREMELY dry. Which is a problem because if you try and humidify your house and it's -25 outside you're going to be chipping ice off the windows.

330 days of sunshine though! It's not as warm as southern Ontario during the summer but it is warm. Usually. Sometimes we have a crap summer.

3 bedroom? I'd say $250-350,000 if you want something okay in a condo, but you can pay more of course. Condos are becoming more popular. Houses cost more.

Depends on whether it's an apartment or a townhouse. $150-200 I would say for a 3 bedroom.

There aren't really any bad areas in Calgary (mmm, well some limited parts of the NE near downtown are a bit crappy) and it's hard to say because there is a huge demand for housing at the moment, the city is talking about allowing secondary suites. You'd have to check on craig's list or wherever.

It's about 0.6% of the assessed value, which is usually around 85%-ish of the market value. There are tax payment programmes for people: http://www.calgary.ca/CSPS/CNS/Docum...P/ptap_faq.pdf but that only gets you out of the increase and also this: http://www.health.alberta.ca/seniors...-deferral.html

I doubt it's any different than where you live now, except we only have GST so things subject to HST are obviously less here. Less fresh food though, there isn't anything like Longo's. Loblaw's usually has the best prices (aka "The Real Canadian Superstore").

Crappy parts of the NE near downtown, however bear in mind some of the nicest areas are in the NE near downtown e.g. Kensington and there is huge amounts of house construction going on in the NE. People often say the NE is crappy but it's a huge area, only very select areas are a bit crappy, check on Streetview. E.g. East Village is a bit of a s---hole.

Beware of anything listed with a "mountain view". Usually this means if you stand on top of the house with a periscope you might be able to see the mountains. Until someone builds something next door. Anything with a genuinely decent mountain view inside Calgary city limits is mega bucks.

I don't agree on either of those, Calgary is the centre of the oil and gas industry remember, natural gas is pretty inexpensive, I can't remember ever thinking my heating bill was expensive. I always pity these idiots going door-to-door selling gas plans because there isn't any point to them as far as I can see.

And there is a by-law requiring you to clear the sidewalks and if you don't, you will hear about it from by-law services. Plus we get less snow than back east. I can't remember it being a major problem, I very rarely wear my boots.

True... i go walking all year round and just wear my trainers..i have never worn my boots since i have been in Calgary

HTH a bit.

Oh you do exaggerate, it was only -42 with a windchill of -48.

There's nothing quite like being able to feel the inside of your lungs.

There are a lot of First Nations in Calgary.

when i first moved to Calgary, i got the cheapest rental i could find and ended up in the NE near the City Centre (Renfrew)

it looked a bit run down, as all the older neighbourhoods do, but i never experienced any trouble there, although 2 houses up was a drug dealer, but they tend to want to keep any trouble out of the way