The Chase: a couple lucks out in the Junction Triangle—thanks to some quick bidding
The buyers: Derek McCallum, a 29-year-old interning architect at JCI Architects, and his partner, Sam Yuen, a 32-year-old communications associate.
The story: Yuen and McCallum are diehard west-enders who lived in a 630-square-foot Sudbury Street condo. But they’d grown weary of Queen West’s spring break vibe. “We were tired of people puking on our doorstep,” McCallum says. They wanted to stay in the west but to get away from the bar scene, and a second bedroom to accommodate guests was a must. They set a budget of around $500,000 and viewed a dozen houses within a three-week span. At the end of their search, they were pleasantly surprised by the way the fickle market worked in their favour.
OPTION 1
Gordon Street (near Dufferin and Dundas). Listed at $499,900, sold for $610,000.
This three-bedroom had been renovated by the previous owners, both architects, and McCallum and Yuen wanted it. They stretched their budget to put in a bully bid of $560,000 that sparked a six-hour bidding war. They went up to $585,000, but were eventually outbid by $25,000.
OPTION 2
Rebecca Street (near Queen and Ossington). Listed at $559,000, sold for $530,000.
This miniscule row house was close to the late-night Ossington overflow, but McCallum and Yuen were smitten with the house’s light wood floors and professional-calibre kitchen appliances—until they learned about the termites in the crawl space.
THE BUY
Campbell Avenue (near Dupont and Lansdowne). Listed at $499,000, sold for $510,000.
Yuen and McCallum were unfamiliar with the Junction Triangle but drawn by its relative tranquility, convenient transit access and early-stage gentrification (McCallum knew a bunch of architects who’d recently bought there). They looked at two houses on the same street. The first house, for which offers were accepted on a Tuesday, went for $60,000 over asking. On Wednesday, they were fully prepared to bid on a 130-year-old Victorian semi. They got in first and made an offer of $11,000 over asking. It was accepted within 20 minutes.
NEVER MISS A TORONTO LIFE STORY
Sign up for This City, our free newsletter about everything that matters right now in Toronto politics, sports, business, culture, society and more.
