115
Summer 2013
Escarpment Magazine
Still, in every cloud, there is a silver lining. Surveyors call the receding
water’s edge accretion. It is the opposite of the erosion that the rising
water’s edge created in the 1980s. It creates a problem not only for
the people who own the waterfront land, but also for Municipalities,
conservation authorities and other agencies that have jurisdiction in this
area, and for those who survey the land. Some industrious souls have
made the best of a bad situation and engaged professionals to assist
them in the process of dealing with this accretion. Put another way,
since there is now more “land” in front of some waterfront properties,
some property owners are taking the opportunity of adding the ac-
creted additional land to their holding. It isn’t easy, and it isn’t cheap,
but it is happening.
The question is: Is the land out in front of some of these waterfront homes
exposed lake bed, or part of one’s property holding? To even start to
answer that, you need a good land surveyor.
It is also worth noting that not all properties are equally affected. Some
properties where the land shoals more gradually to the shore have seen
the point at which that water meets the shore go out significantly. In
some places where it shoals more steeply, there is an effect, but it isn’t
as pronounced. At Mariner’s Haven, a lovely Collingwood waterfront
community, people are still parking their cars, walking out to the dock,
and jumping right on their boat for a day on the lake. Perhaps they are
a bit more cautious as they leave the harbour, but out they go.
Year-to-date single family home sales continue to lag be-
hind 2012. To the end of May, 545 single family MLS
®
home sales have been made which is a drop of 3% from
the 561 single family homes sold in the first 5 months of
2012. Conversely, MLS
®
condominium sales total 137
units which represents an increase of almost 4% over last
year while vacant land sales which have been lackluster
for the past couple of years are up 27%.
Notwithstanding the fact that year-to-dateMLS
®
unit sales
are up 3%and total dollar sales reflect a 5% increase from
last year, most area municipalities are seeing individual
residential sales in 2013 that are below those for the first
five months of 2012. MLS
®
residential sales in the Blue
Mountains are up 25% to the end of May whileWasaga
Beach is showing just over a 2% increase. Other year-to-
date sales results by municipality are as follows: Colling-
wood -2% Township of Clearview -5%, Municipality of
Meaford -6% and Grey Highlands -30%.
While there is still an abundance of properties listed for
sale. The number of new MLS
®
listings that have come
to market this year totals 2,961 individual properties, a
drop of 5% over the same period last year. At the same
time, the number of expired listings has increased by 4%
with many sellers electing to take their properties off the
market for the present time. This has led to more bal-
anced market conditions overall which should continue
for the balance of the year.
*
The Numbers
