People Moving Into Area
The ObserverAugust 12, 2006
Who is buying all the new homes popping up across the Sarnia area?
That question is being asked more and more theses days as the city, which hasn't seen much in the way of population growth in decades, continues the enjoy a mini housing boom.
According to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, there were 243 new housing start in the urban Sarnia area last year, up from just 194 the year before.
And there's plenty more where that came from. The Hampton Group, a Windsor-based company, plans to build 162 single detached dwellings on a site west of St. Christopher Secondary School.
Experts say grey panthers are at least partly responsible for all the construction.
Matt McEachran, president of the Sarnia-Lambton Home Builders Association, said, :at the last site I was working on we did do surveys and found 25 percent were retired people moving in from out of town.
McEachran said many retirees in big cities like Toronto and Calgary are moving to small or medium-sized communities where housing prices are much lower.
Someone who owns a home in Toronto could sell it and buy a new one in Sarnia for cash, he said.
"Talking to builders, we're hearing more about people moving in from out of town," he said. "The low cost of living in Sarnia is attracting people."
Not all the new home buyers are coming from long distances. In some cases, retiring farmers are selling their land to neighbours, the moving into the city. That doesn't increase the population of Lambton as a whole, but it does stimulate new home construction.
As for the future, McEachran said business should be good for at least another two years, even if rumoured new projects in the Chemical Valley don't materialize.
Michelle Timmers, president of the Sarnia-Lambton Real Estate Board, said not all the newcomers are seniors. "We're getting a lot of people coming in from out of town, but they're a mixture," she said.
People deciding whether to move weigh a number of factors, including "affordability, quality of life and how far they are from their families," she said.
Timmers would like to see more done to promote the fact that Sarnia-Lambton is a more affordable community than many others in Canada.
Wherever they're coming from, the new home buyers are doing a lot to help the economy.
McEachran said the home builders association has put out a new report showing that total housing activity in the area came to $141 million last year. That included $46 million worth of new construction and $95 million in renovations.
On top of that, almost 2,000 jobs were generated by housing activity.
That question is being asked more and more theses days as the city, which hasn't seen much in the way of population growth in decades, continues the enjoy a mini housing boom.
According to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, there were 243 new housing start in the urban Sarnia area last year, up from just 194 the year before.
And there's plenty more where that came from. The Hampton Group, a Windsor-based company, plans to build 162 single detached dwellings on a site west of St. Christopher Secondary School.
Experts say grey panthers are at least partly responsible for all the construction.
Matt McEachran, president of the Sarnia-Lambton Home Builders Association, said, :at the last site I was working on we did do surveys and found 25 percent were retired people moving in from out of town.
McEachran said many retirees in big cities like Toronto and Calgary are moving to small or medium-sized communities where housing prices are much lower.
Someone who owns a home in Toronto could sell it and buy a new one in Sarnia for cash, he said.
"Talking to builders, we're hearing more about people moving in from out of town," he said. "The low cost of living in Sarnia is attracting people."
Not all the new home buyers are coming from long distances. In some cases, retiring farmers are selling their land to neighbours, the moving into the city. That doesn't increase the population of Lambton as a whole, but it does stimulate new home construction.
As for the future, McEachran said business should be good for at least another two years, even if rumoured new projects in the Chemical Valley don't materialize.
Michelle Timmers, president of the Sarnia-Lambton Real Estate Board, said not all the newcomers are seniors. "We're getting a lot of people coming in from out of town, but they're a mixture," she said.
People deciding whether to move weigh a number of factors, including "affordability, quality of life and how far they are from their families," she said.
Timmers would like to see more done to promote the fact that Sarnia-Lambton is a more affordable community than many others in Canada.
Wherever they're coming from, the new home buyers are doing a lot to help the economy.
McEachran said the home builders association has put out a new report showing that total housing activity in the area came to $141 million last year. That included $46 million worth of new construction and $95 million in renovations.
On top of that, almost 2,000 jobs were generated by housing activity.