A Montreal firm is scooping up $500 million worth of unwanted Toronto condos
Jesta Group has already purchased a bunch of units steps from TMU
It looks like deep-pocketed investors are taking advantage of Toronto’s battered condo market. On Tuesday, Montreal-based Jesta Group announced that it will buy 1,000 units over the next year in what will be a $500-million venture, not to mention one of the biggest condo-buying sprees the city has ever seen. The multinational company has already spent $30 million on a bulk condo portfolio beside TMU.
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In a press release, Jesta said it’s in talks with other developers looking to offload blocks of inventory. Buying properties in bulk allows the company to gain a foothold in Toronto quickly and is cheaper than building projects from scratch.
And the market is ripe for the picking. According to Urbanation, 4,295 newly built condos in the GTHA sat unsold in March—a record high. Another 8,629 units are unsold on the pre-construction market, and new condo sales have plunged to a 35-year low.
This marks Jesta’s entry into Toronto’s housing market and suggests that global players still have their eyes on the city as a centre for business.
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“Toronto’s fundamentals remain strong, and the current market environment has created a unique window to deploy capital at scale,” said Anthony O’Brien, Jesta Group’s senior managing director. “We are aggressively pursuing opportunities that fit this investment ethos and encourage developers with qualifying inventory to reach out directly.”
Zakiya Kassam is a writer and fact checker whose work has appeared in Post City Magazines, This Magazine and Now Toronto. She was previously the associate editor at Storeys.
