JohnAmardeil.com

The Panorama View Window: Let the sunshine in to new homes in Ontario.

People are often surprised by the British fondness for convertible cars. In a country with such cloudy, rainy weather, why on earth would you get a convertible car?

I disagree. If you have few sunny days throughout the year, there is no better way to make the most of them than to drive a convertible, the sun on your face, the wind on your hair.

By the same token, I’ve long thought Ontario homes would benefit from blurring the separation between the outdoors and the indoors, and that the first builder to do so on a mass scale would stand to make a handsome profit.

Luckily, our longstanding client Brookfield Homes agreed. And in their Fieldstone community, which had a very successful preview opening last weekend, Brookfield launched the Panorama View Window.

Running along the rear wall in the kitchen, the Panorama View Window affords an excellent view and lets in plenty of light, effectively bringing the outdoors in.

I haven’t see many homes around with such an expansive window — definitely none in Fieldstone’s price range. I’m positive they played a big part in helping sell as many homes as we did during the opening weekend.

As I said in my previous blog post, BAM and Empire Communities were about to have a baby. The baby is called Victory, and it was born this weekend as we opened by preview appointment only.

Empire’s new Live-in Kitchen looks rather like a kitchen you’d find in a condo, not a low-rise community. And that’s precisely why it aroused so much interest.

We used touchscreen displays throughout the Sales Office.

In my last post I also asked whether Ontario homeowners were ready for homes that are a tad fresher than your average new home. I’m glad to report the numbers back this belief, as we sold quite a few homes this weekend — more than we’d anticipated.

Could this be the beginning of an era where Ontario homebuyers demand modern homes? Is it possible we’re witnessing the birth of a trend where people want to live in designer homes, not in downtown Toronto but in the outskirts as well?

While we’re probably not there yet, one thing is certain — given the somewhat pessimistic forecasts for the national real estate market, builders could use a fresh outlook if they are to continue to sell homes.

As I said last week, we’ve been busily working on an exciting new project. Called Victory, it’s coming to Stoney Creek this fall and it’s by Empire Communities, a longstanding client of ours.

What makes Victory different is its focus on design and value. Featuring towns and detached 2-car garage homes from only $269,990, Victory puts stylish living within everyone’s reach.

Think of it this way: if it were a car, it’d be a Hyundai Sonata.

It gets better — we’re making our online marketing play a bigger role than ever before. For starters, we’re asking Victory’s Facebook fans to vote on a selection of features and finishes — we’ll let their votes guide us in refining Victory’s design and style choices.

Second, we’re holding a Facebook contest called “What’s Your Victory” whereby Facebook fans are encouraged to upload a picture or video depicting a personal victory of theirs. The prize? A weekly $50 Ikea gift card as well as a monthly $100 one.

So far, we’ve heard from a person whose missing iPod was returned by a stranger, another whose victory is to do a great workout, and someone who got to leave work early last Friday just before the long weekend rush.

It boils down to this: we want potential homeowners to see that buying a Victory home is a victory for them, both from a design and a value point of view. And we strongly believe this social media campaign will play a big role in achieving this.

In the near future, online marketing will play an increasingly major role. This is our way of moving towards that future, both for our sake as well as our clients’.