Natalie Fitzgerald and her husband Devin Schaffner bought their first home, a postwar brick bungalow at the corner of Broadview and O’Connor in Toronto, in 2016.But they sold this spring after a financial adviser confirmed the couple was drowning in debt, compounded by a yearlong maternity leave and the expense of the house. Fitzgerald, 37, and Schaffner, 36, were using loans to stay afloat.Fitzgerald had joked that it was her love of new pyjamas causing the financial strain, but the adviser said it was much more serious than that.“‘It’s not the pyjamas that are killing you,’” Fitzgerald recounted. “‘It’s everything. It’s your fixed expenses. It’s paying your minimum monthly payments.’ Which I guess was very validating that we had to move.”The house, however, turned out to be a great investment. They bought it for $830,000; after three years, the couple sold it for over a million — $200,000 above their asking price.“We have paid off all of our credit card debt, and all of our lines of credit, and that felt really good,” said Fitzgerald. They moved to Chatham, halfway between London and Windsor, and now live in a historic home they purchased for $260,000, with their daughter Fitz, who will be four in October.Life without debt has been “unbelievably freeing,” said Fitzgerald. “Like I can breathe.”One of the reasons the bungalow sold so well, earning the couple a more than 20 per cent return on their investment, is that buyers are willing to pay a premium to live in a desirable neighbourhood.Read more:Here’s what you’d need to earn to buy a mid-priced home in your Toronto neighbourhood — and what a typical family there earns (Hint: Not nearly enough)MLS sales data for 2018 analyzed by the Star shows that the couple’s neighbourhood of Broadview North was one of 50 areas in the city where buyers paid significantly above askin ...
|
