5 Toronto Skyscrapers Under Construction

Toronto Leads in North America Constructing Skyscrapers and High-Rise Buildings

First Published Date: Jan 14, 2012

World class city Toronto is the leader in building high-rise buildings and skyscrapers in North America. A recent chart published by the Toronto City Council’s Economic Development Committee shows (source www.emporis.com) that there are currently there are 132 high-rise buildings under construction in Toronto. Mexico City and New York City are in the second and third position with 88 and 86 high-rises under construction.

In terms of completed high-rises and skyscrapers, Toronto stands in the second position in North America with 1,875 after New York with 5,000. According to Emporis, a high-rise building is 35 – 100 meters tall (12 – 39 floors) and buildings above 100 meters are considers skyscrapers.
Now, let’s look at Toronto’s top 5 skyscrapers under construction.

Trump Tower – Located in the heart of downtown Toronto’s financial district at Bay and Adelaide at 25 Adelaide St. West, this 900 feet (276 meters) glass and steel tower will be the second tallest building and the tallest residential building in Canada. The original plan was to make it a 70-floor building, but later the builder settled with 57 floors.

College Park Aura – Located in downtown Toronto’s Yonge district at Yonge St. and Gerrard St. at 444 Yonge St., this 873 feet (266 meters) 75-storey skyscraper will be completed in 2014 and will tie Ten York condo in floors. Aura will be Canada’s tallest residential condo.

Number One Bloor – Located in the heart of downtown Toronto’s Bloor-Yorkville’s upscale neighbourhood, Toronto’s most prestigious address Number One Bloor is located at the southeast corner of Yonge St. and Bloor St. This 777-ft. (237 meters) skyscraper will be completed in 2015 and will have 65 floors.

Ten York – Located in downtown Toronto’s financial and waterfront district at York and Harbour St. at 10 York St., this 787-ft. (240 meters), 75-storey skyscraper is a joint venture between city-owned development agency Build Toronto and Tridel.

120 Harbour – Talks are underway to build a 75-storey skyscraper at 120 Harbour St.

What to Do When Your Income Decreases

Facing A Reduction of Income or Wage Cut

First Published Date: December 19, 2015

When you are made redundant, there is usually some form of remuneration payment and the prospect, no matter how bleak it may appear at the time of further and new employment. For some, the lucky few, there is the encouragement of being told that your employment is secure, and that there is also the possibility of a pay rise or promotion further down the track. However, there are some who have been given an assurance of ongoing employment, only at cost of having to work reduced hours and for a reduced pay check at the end of each week.

Meeting the challenge of a reduction in pay is something that can bring out resourcefulness in many different ways.

The first thing that should be done is to make a complete list of what income is actually spent on each month. Often, by the simple process of listing and setting out in writing what each expenditure is, it will immediately be seen which are essentials and which, consistent with maintaining a reasonable standard living can be cut out, or pruned back.

Compare the total of this list with your total after tax income and you will have a precise amount, the deficit that you will have each month if expenditure remains at the same level.

Part of the expenditure will be fixed, in the form of loan or debt repayment. You can look at taking advantage of new lower interest rates by considering a debt consolidation loan, converting all your monthly debt repayments into one, lower interest rate, debt servicing repayment, against which you may be able to offset the interest charge even more by having the repayments made weekly instead of monthly, which can save years of repayments in terms of a home mortgage debt.

Charges for Utilities, and rates are often able to be paid on a weekly repayment arrangement if you make contact with the relevant authorities and inform them of your situation, rather than having to meet the entire cost of pre-payment in one lump sum.

Expenses associated with motor vehicles can be drastically reduced, and give you the possibility of a much needed capital sum, if you consider selling one of two motor vehicles and making use of public transport and  sharing the use of the remaining vehicle. For some, using public transport might mean that a private car is no longer needed.

Look at your savings – it is a good idea to keep some on call funds for possible emergencies – but there is no point in having funds in a savings account, earning little interest if you have high interest debts that you could use this money to repay, and so reduce your monthly outgoings.

Every voluntary expense can be looked at to see what can be discarded, and which will need to be reduced. Subscriptions can be cancelled. It is often tempting to reduce expenditure on food, but this can often be a mistake, as you will need to keep healthy and fit, and to have a lot of spare energy to survive a financial crisis

Two New Mid-Cap U.S. Equity ETFs

IShares Launches Two New ETFs

First Published Date: September 6, 2015

IShares Canada recently launched two new equity ETFs for Canadian. These ETFs will provide exposure to the mid-cap sector of the U.S. market.

XMC – iShares S&P U.S. Mid-Cap Index ETF MER 0.15% – XMC tracks the S&P MidCap 400® Index, which represents the mid-cap sector of the U.S. equity market made of diversified range of industries. XMC provides exposure to U.S. $, as this is unhedged. The index is made of 400 stocks and has greater exposure in the Financials, Information Technology, Industrial, and Consumer Discretionary sectors.

XMH – iShares S&P U.S. Mid-Cap Index ETF MER 0.15% – Same as XMC, but hedges currency exposure back to Canadian dollars.

More ETFs bring more choices and more exposure to diversified sectors. Always do your research and seek the assistance of qualified financial professionals before investing into ETFs or any investment products.

How Not to Hold: Using Apps That Let Customer Service Reps Call You Back

Make Customer Service Reps Hold for You

First Published Date : September 8, 2015

We all have those frustrating moments of calling customer service; they put us on hold for hours and to make matters worse we don’t know how long we will have to hold. In the past, I always thought there was no solution to this infinite hold, but I guess I was wrong.

What technology makes possible today was unthinkable just years ago and yes, I am talking about the end of the vicious cycle of being forwarded from one number to another at customer service and the endless hold times. There are apps now for your smartphone that can do all that, as they will make customer service call you back. You don’t have to be transferred from one number to another because these apps will tell you what numbers to press at each prompt to get you to the right department.

FastCustomer: When you call your desired company using the FastCustomer app on your phone, FastCustomer calls the number, navigates through the menus, listens to the music, and once it gets a live rep, it will call you back. So you don’t have to hold and wait for someone; the app will call you back and you can spend time doing something else.

GetHuman: GetHuman gives you more options, as it shows how long the wait time is for the number you are trying to reach and what options to press at prompt to get through. Or if you prefer to have a call back, GetHuman will call you back once a live rep is available, just like FastCustomer.

Keep in mind that not all companies are on these apps’ database yet and there might be problems with calls occasionally, as these apps are still developing. I tried both apps from Canada to call WestJet, American Express, and VISA and they worked. I had a call back from these companies and everything went smooth. What I noticed is that if one company is not on one app’s database, probably it will be on the other one’s. So it’s a good idea to use more than one app to get your customer service. And there are other similar apps available like these two, but I find these two work the best and the most user friendly.

Real Estate in Turkey

Buying Property In Turkey

First Published Date: Feb 16, 2010

Ownership of the real estate in Turkey, comes under the reciprocity principle for a foreign individual. Those countries which allow the Turkish citizens or legal entities to own property in their country, only their citizens are allowed to purchase real estate in Turkey. Those countries are the United States, Canada, Latin America, Africa and most of countries in Europe.

The price for the real estate has increased after the relaxation in the ownership restrictions for the foreigners under the Law No. 5444. a foreigner can purchase a maximum of 30 hectares (74 acres) of real estate in Turkey. More than 73,000 foreigners have bought real estate in Turkey. Buyers who are mostly from England, Germany and Greece have poured US$10.4 billion into the real estate market over five years (2002-2007). The foreign buyer has no restrictions to buy 10% of property and land in officially zoned areas like cities, resorts and towns etc. Ownership of real estate in Turkey, is prohibited for foreigner in the rural areas and also the immediate vicinity of a military zone.

There are many rules and regulations to be followed by the foreigner investor and the process become little tricky to handle. A lot of real estate agents, brokers and also property advisors are available to guide their customers. A real estate agent normally charges 3% from the buyer and 3% from the seller so the total of that becomes 6% of the whole amount. The registration process takes around nine days to finish. The “title deed of transfer” is released in about three to nine months, after the application is processed to the court. The registration and notary fees, title deed charges, and including the agent’s commission is paid by the buyer and the seller is suppose to pay the stamp duty fee along with the commission of the agent. The roundtrip transaction cost around 9.85% = 10.75 % and it also include the fees of the lawyer, notary public, registration, taxes and agents’ fees. The real estate in Turkey is subject to a change of price after one year, five years and ten years according to the latest available data or house price index, inflation is not adjusted here. As for the annual percentage, change in the house price or index from (2005-2006) or the latest data available on the price index upon yearly basis. After five years the annual percentage change in house price index and house prize is from 2001-2006 and then the price change after every ten year is from the index 1996. A landlord can expect gross annual rental income which is expressed as a percentage of price of purchase of the property.

It is highly recommended to have a solicitor to do the conveyancing, though legally there is no such requirement. For buyers of the real estate in Turkey, the government authorises an interpreter for the notarization of the property. The buyer and the seller’s presence is mandatory at the entry of the title. The economic recession has hit hard the Turkey’s exports manufacturing sectors and the logistic market is badly affected. This has resulted into the real estate in Turkey slowed down in the line with the rest of world. The consumer confidence is again picking up and retail turn over is growing although the growth rate is slower than the last year. Most of the buyers or occupiers of Turkish real estate are re-locating themselves mostly on the less expensive locations like Asian side of Istanbul.

To streamline and minimize blog maintenance, I will be discontinuing maintaining the realestateexpedition.com website (however, I will still hold the domain). I will gradually move all articles from this site to A Dawn Journal. This article originally published on the above website on Feb 13, 2010.