JohnAmardeil.com

Single women account for one-third of all new sales at popular condo builder Tridel.

When I began working in the industry, most homebuyers were married and with kids. Over the last few years, however, an increasing amount of singles have been snatching up homes across Canada.

Indeed, only one year ago Stats Canada reported more one-person households than couple households with children for the first time ever, according to a recent Ontario Home Builder magazine article.

The reasons for this are threefold: first, as baby boomers age, many find themselves living alone; second, young people are marrying later; and third, many divorcees are in no hurry to tie the knot again.

Obviously, these new homebuyers are attracted to a different type of home. For one thing, space isn’t as important to them. Instead, they focus on amenities and features and finishes. Practicality matters too — as the OHBA article states, single homebuyers can view a condo, townhouse or small detached home as a stepping stone to something larger, with or without a partner.

This phenomenon, of course, presents a marketing opportunity — one that we’re only too eager to benefit from. Take two communities we’re hard at work on, Ten88 and Villagio.

The former is a condo project in Scarborough featuring a payment program designed to enable renters to purchase their first home. The latter is a smaller, somewhat more traditional community in Maple, Vaughan. In both cases, homebuyers can get one-bedroom units. They also get attractive pricing and finishes that are as sleek as the ones they’d find in a condo. And since our client, Empire Communities, also builds high-rise, it will be that much easier to blur the lines between a typical low-rise community and a high-rise condo one.

Now I turn it over to you: how are you making the most of the rise in single-person households?