IRRESISTIBLE CHARM
Mountain town of Canmore entices homeowners
Of all the exotic places they could have purchased a vacation home, Ellen Sitler and Aroon Sequeira chose Canmore, a four-hour doorto-door drive from their home in Edmonton.
They investigated the usual places like Palm Springs, Phoenix, Mexico and balmy Vancouver Island. But the mountain town of Canmore, with an average annual temp of just 2 C, held an irresistible charm for them both.
And they didn’t have to get on a plane to get there.
“We could just decide on a Thursday that we were going,” says Sitler, a retired radiology and diagnostic imaging manager.
Sequeira, chairman of his own corporate finance firm, travels frequently to Calgary, so a getaway in Canmore was perfect.
“I don’t have to decide between taking time off work or going to our vacation home. I can kind of do both,” he says.
They purchased a two-bedroom, two-bathroom ground floor condo unit in Creekstone Mountain Lodge in Spring Creek Mountain Village in the heart of Canmore. It was discovered by accident while attending a birthday celebration several years ago. They had been thinking of purchasing a second home for some time and the alpine-inspired architecture of Spring Creek, with its spacious floor plans and walkable location close to Canmore’s quaint downtown area proved irresistible.
“Our home is 1,550 square feet with a beautiful big kitchen. We wanted a place big enough that if we were having family functions, we weren’t on top of each other,” says Sitler, noting the condo has enough space for table of 12 people.
They get to their condo at least twice a month, spending weekends hiking and biking or walking the dog and exploring the town, strolling downtown for coffee and a browse through the town’s renowned art galleries and shops. Sequeira says there have been weekends where the car didn’t leave the underground parkade.
Spring Creek is a 28-hectare (70-acre) mixed-use development that includes work/live units, small boutique retailers, condo residences, a hotel and a seniors community. Select residences in designated buildings are approved for short-term vacation rentals.
Sales representative Ann Ricord says the Spring Creek neighbourhood is 50 per cent completed with just 12 suites left to sell in the current phase.
Those remaining units in the Tamarack and Jack Pine Lodge buildings are 868 square feet to 2,300 square feet in size, priced from $529,000 to $1.359 million plus GST, with possessions slated for late 2022.
Ricord says sales have been steady, even during the lockdown days of COVID -19, because people eager to escape the city were seeking the security of a town with a smaller population.
“It’s so peaceful here, you don’t want to leave,” Ricord says.
Canmore was a simple mining town, population 1,800, when John Borrowman set up shop as a hippie potter in 1975. Now finishing his fourth and final term as the town’s mayor, he says Canmore has grown exponentially along with Calgary, which is 80 kilometres to the east.
Borrowman says despite Canmore’s
challenges caused by the post-1988 Olympic tourism crush, like congestion, affordable housing for locals and protecting wildlife corridors, he says Canmore hasn’t lost its small-town charm.
“The shops are all locally owned and operated. It’s not a cookie cutter resort municipality in that context. People know each other and are friendly. It’s still a beautiful setting,” he says.
Growth in Canmore has levelled out after a wild ride in the mid2000s when the value of building permits skyrocketed to an unsustainable high of $250 million. After real estate values tanked in 2008, that number was down to $20 million and Borrowman says it took years for development to start picking up.
“We’re at a healthier level of development now. Somewhere around $100 million a year in building permits, which for a community our size is manageable. Our construction sector is healthy right now and doing well,” he says.