Yes, the fees are a problem but I wonder how much of that is attributed to amenities. Used to think fees were directly tied to amenities but they don't seem to be. I've lived in buildings with no amenities yet the fees were sky high. You would think the newer builds need the high fees mainly due to the lack of quality construction. My building is 7 years old and already suing the developer over shoddy construction. You'll see the same situation with other condos too. But fees are a big barrier for those who refuse to down-size. Picture being 70 with a house fully paid off. Why would you down-size to a 900 soft condo? Pay land tax, pay the same amount in property tax and then tack on a $800 maintenance fee that will go up with no cap?
Condos aren't desirable enough so boomers stay in their 4 bedroom houses until they kick the bucket or have to go into a nursing home.
Factor in the fees I should easily be in a vey nice house. But I'm in a box
I wish I could pay condo fees to get condo type upkeep for my detached home. It was so good being able to leave at 7 am and already having the driveway plowed, and also it was great never having to do the gardening, when I lived in my condo townhouse. My neighbour hired a company to do winter driveway shoveling for his detached home, and they'd show up later in the day after everyone had already left for work, and occasionally would miss the job completely, yet my neighbour was still paying many hundreds of $$$ per winter.
Instead, it's a mishmash of myself, my wife, and some third party help to get all this done, and that ain't cheap either. Gardening help for example costs between $15-$35 per hour per person, for example, and I pay retail pricing for gardening supplies. I've gotten people to help cut my grass, but outside a company, often the only grown adults willing to do this are ex-druggies who will then show up at your door 1 month later asking for money for their sick aunt or whatever. If you don't have an industrious young kid in the neighbourhood then the other main option is paying either a crappy landscaping company for moderate prices or a higher end landscaping company for high prices. And most won't weed the lawn.
As they say, the grass is always greener... And I know this as I've lived in owned both condos and freehold.
Also, I recently had to get my roof redone. I contacted 4 companies. One just flat out refused because he was honest and said the roof wasn't simple enough. He had been in the business long enough that now gets a ton of referrals, so he just does the easiest jobs (like square bungalows) for easy money. Anything more complicated gets declined. So I hired one of the three remaining companies, and then the crew showed up and mutinied and refused the job because it was not as easy as they had hoped. What a frickin' waste of time for me. The next company came in and did the job professionally, but by this time it was already several months later.
Actually, my intention is that when I hit 70ish, I will move into a condo. My kids will have moved out, and I will have no desire to maintain the property. I'll capture the equity in the home before I die, and someone else can move into the home. My sister agrees with this. She's in her 50s now and loves her 2 bedroom condo on the waterfront. Pays her condo fees and her housekeeper, and doesn't have to worry about anything regarding her home besides her utility bills. My wife may not agree though. She is a Gen Xer that fits into your caricature of boomers. She wants to stay in the home until she kicks the bucket. So, every person is different.
But the good news is that I am nearing the end of my mortgage era. I have just signed probably last mortgage agreement for my primary home, at a nice low 2.29% for a 2-year fixed. After that 2-year term is up, I will only have a few months of payments left.
Is it because of my awesome financial management skills? I wish I could say that, but nope, it's because I'm one of those Gen Xers that bought in right at the right time. As mentioned previously in this thread, I bought pre-construction in the late 90s, moved into my condo townhouse in the early 2000s, and then upgraded to a detached home a decade ago... and managed to luck into one of the greatest rises in real estate prices of all time in Canada. I feel sorry for my Millenial relatives though, because it is going to be hard enough for them to afford a condo in Toronto, much less a detached single family home.
