| Home Page | Our Hopes & Plans | Our History | Our Journal | Our Resumes |
| Costs | After Applying | Research Trips | Guest Book | Time Lines | Contact Us |
Research Trip September / October 2006 - Houses
Like most things on this trip we were not in a position to really commit to a house - we didn't have funds in Canada for a deposit and we didn't know when we would be over permanently. We did, however, have an opportunity to look around several areas and from that make a decision about which communities we would like to live in. We also had a chance to go around a few house with our realtor Ian from Canilink. There is also a twist in the tail but more of that later.The first place we looked at was Okotoks. This is about 15 or 20 minutes south of the 22x and may people had said it was a great place to be and also that the prices had not gone quite so high as in Calgary so you would get more for you money. Certainly it ticked all our boxes. The drive in was through some lovely scenery and we started by looking at the shops that were there. There was certainly a good selection and we felt that we wouldn't be needing to go into Calgary every time we needed something.
We stopped at a realtors shop and got a list of properties in our price range so that we had something to work from as we drove around rather than just driving aimlessly about. We could have got this from MLS but most of the 'public' postings don't have addresses on.
There are still some new properties being built in Okotoks but a couple of people said that they have already agreed a limit to ensure the town remains small. As such it is expected that once that limit has been reached the prices will start to increase as demand will outstrip supply.
What we liked about the houses on Okotoks was that many of them backed onto green space or were on the edge of town so there was not that cramped feeling you sometimes get. Having said that we decided that Okotoks was too far out for us - assuming I get a job in down-town Calgary it would mean 20 minutes or so in the car followed by another 30 minutes on the C-train. It's not bad I know as I commute 45 minutes one way now (on a good day) but for now we have ruled it out.
So that brought us back to Calgary. Our first port of call was Sundance as we know it well now and it's close to shops, the C-train etc. but the back-yards are small and we felt that to be a disadvantage. Having said that there were a couple of houses that we liked the look of so we arranged to view them with Ian. The first was a nice size with an out-of-date kitchen (not that that's an issue) but it was on the main drag through Sundance and with the boys growing up we felt that a cul-de-sac was a must. The second was also not on a cul-de-sac but was on a quieter road. It had evidence of recent work on the roof so that was a bonus. Having said that it was too small and it was right in the corner of Sundance overlooking where the 22x meets MacLeod so we felt that was not appropriate either.
But we didn't feel that this time was wasted - it had helped us to get a feel on the size of house we wanted and also the other factors like yard-size (which seems to be governed by the age of the property), location, proximity to green space etc. and with this in mind we started looking around other communities to see if there was anywhere else we liked the look of. So we made a plan to drive around after lunch for a few days while the boys were asleep in the back looking at the various communities to try to get a feel for where we would be comfortable.