Investment Opportunities - A coming Boom Town???

[Jeffinhamilton]

Dave2, thanks for your posts here. I never even heard of Cochrane but am now interested in finding out more. I'm tired of Hamilton. Tenant pool leaves a lot to be desired.

[LandlordD]

Some good ideas here!


Anticipating a flood of new workers at the Detour Lake mine, Lynne Cheff-Lawson and her husband have recently opened a laundromat and hair salon in downtown Cochrane. The salon has long been a dream of hers; the laundromat a direct response to Detour's arrival.


Former police officer Jaime Mageau recently opened the Ice Hut Bar and Grill, with a dance floor, big-screen TVs and sleek black stools, in downtown Cochrane. He expects the Detour Lake gold mine workers to have a big impact on his business.

[pmrockstar]

Hey Dave,

This is really interesting...

I'm new to the forum but own a couple properties myself.

How much did the land cost if you don't mind me asking?

Thanks

Natural resource industry based towns go through a boom and bust cycle. The key is to get in early. Some of the best fortunes from the Dawson Gold rush were made not by the miners but the merchants.

Like a surfer the key is to keep ahead of the wave not be buried or behind the wave.

My personal forecast of a coming boom town in Ontario in 2012 is Cochrane, Ontario (not alberta).

Why: The town currently has a population of 5,400 people but a local big mining investment will add 1,000 new jobs in early 2013.
(Canada's largest gold mine)

http://www.detourgold.com/PROJECTS/Deto ... fault.aspx

total mining investment is $992,000,000 dollars. (yes that's eight million dollars short of a billion.) The mine was justified on a gold price of $US 850 an ounce. Guess where it is now???

Why I am being so nice about telling you this. I made my move two years ago in another investment which is land which I have 250 acres locally.

Not certain if I will up my bet or stick with what I have. Lets say we could always talk.

I wonder what the Landlord and tenant bureau would say if I wanted to charge rent in ounces of gold???

[Dave2]

Hey Dave,

This is really interesting...

I'm new to the forum but own a couple properties myself.

How much did the land cost if you don't mind me asking?

Thanks

[/quote]

Land is a raw state product and relative purchase price is all over the map. Hopefully a lot less then I can sell it for. As I say you don't need to go to Florida to find swampland we have lots of it here in southern or northern Ontario.

One of my pet peeves with the real estate industry in the sale of land is the standard seller phrase, "Buyer to do his own due diligence". Also if you think our esteemed Liberal government is tough to deal with for residential tenancies; you ain't seem nothing when it comes to land regulation and control. Ask any rural property owner about wind farms.

You have to remember particularly with land is that people confuse purchase price with total cost. Purchase price is only the start. Locally I am known as a buyer of last resort; that is if a seller cannot sell a piece of property normally; they can approach me; like what happened with a piece of vacation property I was offered late last week with access to a nice well known vacation lake less then two hours drive from Toronto. I was offered the property by a local real estate company and preliminary checks were okay so myself and my boss (after 35 plus years of marriage I know my place) decided to take a look.

The owner had got it 30 years ago for $2 in what I believe was an inheritance and it was the almost the last vacant property in an area with a lot of cottages. After looking at it I offered the real estate agent yesterday half of the thirty year old price, $1. The problem was it was swampy bottomland and IF I was allowed to do anything with it (thats a very big if) I would need over 200 loads of fill, at local prices make it uneconomic for me to make a profit on resale.