Home Shopping!

As you settle into the country, one of the most important things that you will buy, is your home. While you may choose to rent as you start off, eventually you will look for the security and want to buy a house. I am no expert at this, however, I would like to share some basics through the research that I have done so far.

In Canada, you can either live in an apartment or in a house. While you can also live in penthouses, mansions, suites and fancy manors, I am talking about middle class housing and therefore all my reference work is related to the common man.

Apartments
Apartments can either be condominium apartments or community apartments. Condo Apartments require you to pay maintenance fees which are used for all the exterior up keep of the building. In community apartments residents volunteer to do the maintenance work in the building and therefore the prices of these apartments are lower.

Townhouses
Townhouses as the name suggests are houses in small townships and these can either be freehold or leasehold. In freehold townhouses you own the land that the house is built on while with the leasehold houses the land is leased to you. It is all simple stuff and what they are called often explains what they mean. There are condo townhouses too and they have condo fees which are used for the exterior maintenance of the house. In townhouses you share walls with your neighbours.

Semi Detached
In Semi Detached houses as the name suggests one wall is detached while the other is attached to another house. So normally there are two houses attached to each other in semi detached homes. Semi detached houses are slightly more expensive than townhouses in a particular location.

Detached
Detached homes again as the name suggests are detached from each other and are independent. These are the most ideal types of homes as you do not share walls with the neighbours and therefore you enjoy the most privacy in these type of homes.

Bungalows
These are the most expensive type of houses as they are all on one level and therefore are on larger pieces of land. Since they have a single level, they are extremely popular with older people as these houses are a lot easier on the knees. Bungalows can fetch you a premium price.