More space, please
Ongoing pandemic demand for roomier quarters is fuelling the market for condos with two bedrooms or more
Made la ine D r e w ’ s two- bedroom condo isn’t all that different from the 11 other split- level penthouse units atop 383 Sorauren. All the usual high- end features — an expansive terrace, multiple bathrooms, engineered hardwood flooring — are accounted for. Ten- foot ceilings? Everywhere except the bathrooms.
There’s only one thing Drew pines for: a third bedroom like the one in Penthouse 10. “Now that my partner and I are both working at home, that’s really the only thing I wish we had,” the thirtysomething software engineer explains.
Drew is far from alone in her desire for more private space as pandemic pressures boost demand for roomier condos. Of the 90 pre- construction condos sold by Royal Lepage Signature Realty over the summer, as many as 70 per cent had two bedrooms or more, says salesperson Simeon Papailias. “For decades it was all about two students or a young couple in a one- bedroom- plus- den. Now, in lieu of a house and a white picket fence, people are starting to choose an urban setting to grow their families.”
It’s a shift that was underway before the pandemic hit. In 2017, the City of Toronto released Growing Up, a set of urban design guidelines advising that 25 per cent of the units in a new development should be large ones, with two- and three- bedrooms totalling at least 15 and 10 per cent of the units, respectively. A year later, 63 per cent of new projects had achieved those ratios, up from 31 per cent in 2017. As of mid-2020, the recommendations had informed the review of more than 100 new developments.
“The guidelines are all about creating an attractive, safe and healthy city where children are valued and residents have access to housing, support services and recreational activities,” explains Growing Up project manager Annely Zonena. “Condo unit diversity and livability needs to support a range of household types and sizes. Without unit diversity in new construction, Toronto will not be able to offer housing to support its citizens as they move through the housing life cycle from childhood to old age.”
Demand appears to be lining up with the planning
policy. Recent Multiple Listing Service data reveals that the average August- to- September price of three- bedroom condos in the GTA jumped 27 per cent over the same period in 2019. Studios and one-bedroom units, meanwhile, yielded single-digit price growth.
Condo developers, of course, are already onboard and contributing to the bedroom boom. When Gairloch Developments completed 383 Sorauren in 2017, two- bedroom suites accounted for 35 per cent of the 145- unit total, with just a single three- bedroom unit
on offer. Fast- forward three years, and those ratios have been reversed — and then some — across Gairloch’s next two midrise projects, both of which are in preconstruction. Just south of Davisville Avenue, 80 per cent of the 44 units in 1414 Bayview include two or three bedrooms. The latter are especially abundant in the 111- unit Junction Point building, which includes 11 three-bedrooms near the triangular intersection of Dupont, Dundas and Annette streets.
Beyond bedrooms, both Junction Point and 1414
Bayview have been designed with families in mind. The ground floor of the former, for instance, will be pulled back from the street to create a public promenade that can accommodate strollers and pets, while the latter will equip suites with laundry rooms and bathrooms with double vanities.
“We’ve always gravitated towards end- user products, which are generally larger on an average- square- footage basis than investor-style products and tend to involve more two- and three- bedrooms than you would find in a typical podium tower configuration,” says Gairloch founder and president Bill Gairdner. “That’s why we went beyond the Growing Up guidelines to offer unit mixes and sizes that were attractive to families.”
A third of the floor plans for Concert Properties’
53- storey Burke Condos feature three bedrooms, with the largest spanning 2,091 square feet. Proposed for 900 The East Mall in Etobicoke, four 20- and 21- storey towers helmed by Harhay Developments will exceed the Growing Up bedroom guidelines by 42 per cent, and offer family- oriented amenities such as a daycare and a new public playground and park.
Larger units are appealing to investors too, Royal Lepage’s Papailias says. “Eighty per cent of our clients are investors, and they’re always looking to be on top of the latest condo trend. They see that COVID has caused the cost of living to go down by 15 to 30 per cent, which means renters can afford more — more building amenities, more space, more bedrooms.”
people are starting to choose an urban sett ing to grow their families.