Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 1366

In 2007, I spent the summer working in Dublin, Ireland for a boutique real estate consulting firm called Urban Capital. (For those of you who are from Toronto and know the industry, there’s no connection between the Urban Capital in Dublin and the Urban Capital in Toronto.)

At the time, they were working with a number of government agencies on the development of masterplanned communities, as well as on specific development projects. Real estate was booming and everyone wanted to be a part of it – including the band U2 .

But as you all know, the following year (2008) wasn’t kind to the real estate industry and, in particular, to Ireland. That year the country fell into recession for the first time since the 1980s  and became labeled as one of the “ PIGS .”

I really wish I had started this blog by that point because it would be interesting to look back today on my posts from that summer and see how I was thinking about the Dublin real estate market. I remember having many Guinness-fueled discussions about whether the bull market could continue.

In any event, the Irish economy is coming back.

This year GDP is expected to grow by 5.4% , which would make it the fastest growing economy in Europe. National debt is also falling . At the end of 2013 it stood at €215 billion or about 123% of GDP. And at the end of 2014 it had fallen to €203 billion or about 109% of GDP. The national debt is expected to fall below 100% of GDP by 2018.

At the same time, Ireland also got permission to pay off its bailout loans early . That’s a good sign.

I’m thinking and reading about all of this today because I was looking through my photo collection this morning and I stumbled upon a folder titled “Dublin 2007.” The photo at the top of this post was the terrace that I had outside of my apartment in the Docklands area. I don’t think I used it once that summer. 

And here’s a photo of my bedroom. It must have been the curtains that sold me on the apartment.

I had a great time in Dublin that summer. It’s a fun and young city and I remember being incredibly impressed by the quality of city building that was going on. I’m sure that wasn’t lost in the Great Recession.

This morning I was interviewed for a Montreal-produced TV show called Ports D’Attache . The English version of the show is called “Waterfront Cities of the World” and it airs on Discovery. 

Here’s a list of all the cities they’ve visited in the first 4 seasons and here are all the shows from the first 2 seasons in English (which you can watch online for free).

Rather than a travel show, it’s a look at the “spirit and soul” of each waterfront city through the lens of “local personalities.” There’s definitely a lot of fodder for city geeks and so I thought you all might find the series interesting.

Toronto was the last stop of season 5. The other cities from this season include Philadelphia, Budapest, Rome, Taipei and Kuala Lumpur, to name only a few of them. 

I’m glad that they decided to come to Toronto and I’m delighted that they invited me to be on the show. The team was great and, if you haven’t already noticed, I love supporting this city.

The show will first be released in French (with my comments dubbed over), but an English version will follow. Once that version is released, I’ll circulate a link.

Kembangan by Jason Waltman on 500px

Earlier this week I attended RealNet’s Q1 2015 market update webinar for the Greater Toronto Area. If you don’t already subscribe to RealNet , you should consider it. They’re one of the best sources for Canadian real estate market information.

During their webinars, they occasionally run interactive surveys where they ask the audience a question and participants respond using their web browser. On this particular webinar, they asked the following question, which I thought was interesting:

What is the likely housing moving by Millennials in raising their families?

A) Move Up - Embrace urban high-rise housing forms

B) Move Out - Accept extended commutes (including the Greater Golden Horseshoe and Hamilton Area) to find affordable ground oriented housing

C) Move In - Cohabitate parental homes

It’s an interesting question because it’s one that I’ve asked myself a number of times. Sure, Millennials are rushing back to cities and living in high density and walkable communities, today, but what are they going to do and where are they going to move when they start having children?

As a Millennial myself, I know that I’ve always told myself that I want to stay urban for as long as I can (i.e. Move Up). But I’m only one data point. And given the seemingly endless demand for low-rise housing in Toronto, I always felt like I was in the minority. I figured that the majority of people, at least here in this city, still want a ground-related home when it comes time to raise a family.

Putting aside economics, I still think that may be the case for a lot of home buyers. But the majority of people on this week’s RealNet webinar (which would be almost exclusively folks from the real estate industry) either think that preference is going to change (or already has) or that consumers won’t have a choice due to affordability.

50% of the people on the call answered A – move up and embrace urban high-rise housing forms. The balance was about 44% for B and 6% for C.

That’s not the outcome I expected to see. So today I’d like to re-ask this question to the Architect This City Community. Where do you think Millennials are going to move once they start having children? Please let us know in the comment section below.