A recent Wall Street Journal article estimated that a pool costs between $3000 and $5000 in maintenance per year. And that doesn’t cover major repairs that may be necessary from time to time.

Pool advocates like the Association of Pool and Spa Professionals claim this misses the point. Pools “may or may not be a financial investment, but they are most assuredly a quality-of-life investment.”

Further reading:
Are Pools Worth the Expense?
Taking a Bath On Your Pool
Is It a Pool or a Money Pit?

According to the survey of 765 Royal Lepage agents “more than 86 per cent of respondents said the HST is affecting their business somewhat.”

The biggest misconception is that the HST applies to resale properties. It does not. It applies to fees and commissions for all home sales, but only to the sale price of new homes.

If you have any questions at all about the impact of the HST on your 0 home sale or purchase please contact me and I’ll give you the full story.

Related articles: Remember Y2K? The unfounded fear lives on with HST

Good news for home owners who have seen a steady increase in their home’s equity. Bad news for some prospective new homeowners wanting to buy their first home.

Good news for an economy bouyed by home construction and low interest rates. Possible bad news if interest rates go high enough to make mortgage payments unmanageable.

David Macdonald, author of the report, suggests that homes are affordable because of record low interest rates. But if rates go even marginally higher, mortgages will quickly become unaffordable.

The report recommends that mortgage lenders “stick to slow, gentle increases”. It also suggests that a return to more conservative lending rules (10% down, 25 year amortization) would be beneficial in the long term.

The mediocre numbers were due mainly to a serious slowdown in consumer spending and in housing investment. Housing investment had its slowest quarterly gain in five quarters.

It is expected these numbers will ease the pressure on the Bank of Canada to raise interest rates. Rates had been raised twice since June 1.

Related stores: Economy sputters in second quarter

In this video, kitchen remodel expert Bob Schmidt discusses options for remodeling your kitchen. There are two basic types of kitchen redesign, and he briefly talks about both.

The first is a situation that involves changing your floorplan – knocking down walls, rearranging the configuration of your appliances, adding new windows, etc. For this type of remodel project you should spend the money and consult with a legitimate designer or architect.

The second type of kitchen remodel project just involves working within the space already being used for your kitchen – upgrading or installing new cabinets, flooring, appliances, etc. For this type of project you will probably not need a designer. You can get a lot of helpful information – including suggestions on competent tradespeople – from a major building center like Home Depot, Lowes, Rona or Home Building Centre.

For example, Home Depot will come to your home, measure up your space and then create a computerized kitchen design. They will do this for a small fee ($100 is mentioned in the video). Lowes has a very similar service at a similar price.

The major decision is whether you hire a contractor or do the sub-contracting yourself. For suggestions on finding kitchen remodeling help in the My Town area, give me a call.

Yes it’s true that the Blackberry from RIM still holds a commanding lead in the business sector. After all, this is where RIM made its mark. But how quickly this lead will shrink depends on how quickly RIM adjusts to the new death-defying competition facing them.

What business people need is a secure, dependable and easy-to-use messaging device and the Blackberry is all that and more. In fact Apple’s unwillingness to include a physical keyboard with the iPhone will continue to make it difficult to win over hard core business users. Sending emails and text messages is still significantly faster using a physical keyboard than the touch screen keyboard of the iPhone.

But RIM has not been overly concerned with the very things that the mass market wants – video, apps, and web browsing. On all three of these fronts the Blackberry suffers by comparison. The new Blackberry Torch released in the summer takes RIM part way there. But that only buys them some time. Their next effort will have to be better if they hope stop the flow to Apple and start winning customers back.

See this post for more on the SmartPhone Wars.

Why bother insulating your attic? The reasons are pretty straightforward. Since your attic is much more exposed to the outdoor weather the temperature in your attic will be much more extreme – hot in the summer and cold in the winter. So without a sufficient insulation barrier between the attic and the interior of your house there will be a lot of heat transfer. That means you will have a less comfortable house, and higher heating and cooling bills.

Here is a video, produced by the Owens Corning company, where they demonstrate how to properly insulate an attic. They show how to place insulation between your attic joists, where to use a vapor barrier, and just how much insulation to use.

Remodeling or improving your kitchen is an important way to increase the resale value as well as your own enjoyment of your your town home.

This is the first in a series of videos about kitchen upgrading and design. In this video kitchen remodeling expert Bob Schmidt discusses the preliminary steps you should go through when deciding on remodeling your kitchen.

Communication between you and your spouse or partner is very important, along with getting the advice of an experienced professional. Every facet of your remodel project has an impact on the end result and on the cost.

From the ebook “Retire to an RV”

- from the ebook “Retire to an RV”

More and more people are selling their large family home, getting a smaller house and buying an RV and hitting the road for a few months every year. Some just ditch the home altogether and live in their RV.

The RV lifestyle is not for everyone. If the idea of pulling up stakes every few days and traveling from place to place interests you, then it may be for you. But many find the smaller quarters, the sense of homelessness, and the lack of regular visits from friends and neighbors less than attractive.

Buying a decent RV is the most costly part of the project. A self-propelled vehicle like a Winebago will probably cost at least $50,000 – although no doubt you can get a used one for less. Buying for less will probably increase your maintenance costs significantly. A more elaborate and larger RV will run in the $100,000 range.

Living costs while on the road will vary with the type of traveling you do, and the frugality of your lifestyle. Some experienced RVers say they can live on less than $1500 per month. Others say the difference between RVing and living in a condo are not all that significant.

For more information on the RV lifestyle visit RV Lifestyle Experts.

For an idea of RV costs – both new and used – check out the RV section of Kijiji.com for your city.

When making a house market-ready it is important to emphasis the home’s best features. A good place to start is the main room, or living room because that’s what potential buyers see first when they walk through the front door.

If you’re greeted with room crammed with furniture, shelves overflowing with books and magazines, and artwork hung haphazardly on the walls, you’ll immediately wonder what the rest of the house will look like. That’s why it’s really important to make a good impression by ruthlessly reducing clutter.

Create open space by keeping the walls neutral and artfully placing furniture in groupings. A beautiful fireplace can serve as the focal point of the room so make the most of it by backing it up with a warm dark color. Placing a stylish mirror above it will add to the feeling of spaciousness and light.

If you have one of those new clothes dryers that has a blocked vent indicator, you will at least be aware that having an unblocked vent is important. Many people don’t know that a build-up of fluff can cause a fire.

A few tests have shown that even when a vent completely blocked, these new indicators may or may not light up to warn you. Therefore the prudent thing to do is check your dryer vent regularly and remove as much lint as possible. Also remember to clear the lint trap after every dryer load.

In this video from Lowe’s Mike Kraft their home improvement expert, offers helpful tips for maintaining your string trimmer. Learn how to replace string, change the oil, clean the trimmer filter and more that will help keep your trimmer working like new.