Lot Size Deconstructed
There are so many reasons to love living in the Beach. The mature canopy and varying size and style of homes make each street unique. And, while each one of us may have different visions of our dream home, for many, the fifty-foot lot is the holy grail of Beach real estate.
For those seeking to purchase their forever home, a fifty-foot lot offers many advantages. Quite often, setbacks from the street are further on streets lined with fifty-foot lots allowing for additional landscaping on the property and a buffer from the nearby hustle and bustle. The more expansive lots also allow for privacy and breathing room between neighbours. The wider frontage means an overall larger lot area, enabling homeowners to build extensions on their home with greater ease than with a smaller lot.
As we navigated COVID over the past two years, the importance of our outdoor living space has become paramount. With parents working from home, children were encouraged to play in the backyard, and our outdoor spaces were used to entertain more than ever before. With the expansion to outdoor living, the demand for in-ground pools skyrocketed. The ability to create a truly customized backyard oasis is amplified with a fifty-foot lot – outdoor kitchens, fire pits, and pools with cabanas are some of the most popular improvements to these roomy backyards throughout the city.
In the Beach, you will find a large array of homes on fifty-foot lots ranging from homes in great disrepair needing to be torn down or completely rejuvenated, to wonderful family homes that have been kept up over the years, to newly built homes with modern bells and whistles. Because of this, the value of a home on a fifty-foot lot can vary widely and may appeal to a number of potential buyers.
Buyers looking for fifty-foot lots have varied intentions, the common thread being they are looking for a modest home on a large lot. The first group of buyers are happy with the home the way it is and continue to lovingly maintain it over the years. The second group of buyers have larger plans and commission substantial renovations or additions to the existing home. The third group of buyers search for an existing newly built luxury home or are willing to purchase a lot with a small or tired home to build their dream property. The final group of buyers are investors. They are looking for fifty-foot lots with the potential to tear down a home and replace it with a state-of-the-art new construction home which they can then sell to the earlier group of buyers seeking a turn-key dream home. But, increasingly, investors are looking for fifty-foot lots that can be severed down to two twenty-five-foot lots. With custom homes on twenty-five-foot lots now creeping towards $3.5m, the economics behind splitting a lot and building two new homes is very compelling.
When I write about fifty-foot lots, thoughts of strolling down Balsam, Kingswood or Munro Park come to mind. On these streets and those similar, nearly all, if not all, lots are fifty feet wide. The uniformity of a street lined with large lots is what draws many buyers to these locations. The city recognizes this and has measures to protect the uniformity of lot sizes on the street. Severing a fifty-foot lot down to two twenty-five-foot lots is next to impossible on these streets.
But, some fifty-foot lots exist in other areas of the Beach, around Kew Gardens or on the Tree Streets, that are anomalies. They are the remaining large lots on streets filled with detached homes on twenty to twenty-five-foot lots and semi-detached homes on even narrower lots. These are the remaining fifty-foot lots that are of most interest to developers looking to sever and build two new homes because the city sees the reduction of the larger frontage as creating a more uniform street.
The Beach real estate market remains red hot and demand for properties on fifty-foot lots has never been higher. An important strategy when selling your home is to consider who your buyer will be, then market to that demographic while leaving the door open to unexpected buyers. Determining your target buyer helps us tailor an individualized marketing plan for you and your home – from the best market timing, the right pricing strategy, whether there are strategic improvements that will help you maximize your sale price, to the level of staging required. For some sellers, a quick off-market sale at a price they are happy with is the best approach. For others, a full-fledged staging and marketing plan with MLS exposure is the right way to go.
And, if you are looking to purchase a home on a fifty-foot lot, it would be our team’s pleasure to hit the streets and find you the home you are looking for, even if it’s not publicly available on MLS!