Are You Moving To Toronto? Check Out Lauren’s Top 10 List Of Useful Things To Know!

May 15th, 2008 Categories: Lifestyle News, On The Fridge Door

So you’re thinking about moving to Toronto. It can be tough just moving to another neighbourhood, let alone another city. Knowing a little something about your destination can be extremely helpful in either making the decision, or smoothing the transition. And we all know that good information leads to good decisions.

But what you really need is … insider information. As a native Torontonian, I’m happy to oblige. Jelly Bean Tips

Before we begin, a nod to Dustin Luther of Rain City Guide, who inspired this post during his informative blogging seminars at this week’s Realtor Quest 2008, Canada’s largest real estate tradeshow. I go for the information, of course, but you’ve gotta love the trade booth jelly beans and bubble gum.

Useful Things To Know
About Moving To Toronto

And now I offer you my Top 10 Toronto jelly beans in no particular order of delicious:

Pronunciation is everything. How you pronounce the city’s name will identify you as a local, or not. A pronunciation of “toe-RON-toe” or “tuh-RON-toe” pegs you as a visitor. Locals have several slurry options such as “tuh-RON-oe” or “TRON-oe”. Mine’s in bold. But no matter how we say it, we all call it Home.
It takes 12 coats to live in Toronto. No kidding, I can’t stress this enough. On any given day, your coats and jackets will be either too warm or not warm enough. And you can’t prepare in advance, you’ll simply have to live in Toronto for a year and collect the outer wear that works for you as you go along. You can resist, but you WILL be a member of the “Coat of the Month” club.
The Leafs fall in the spring. No, not those leaves, the ones that lace up in the fall and break our hearts EVERY spring. It’s been 41 years since Lord Stanley’s Cup came home to Toronto; you wanna be a Maple Leafs fan, you’ve gotta want it bad. But, on the bright side, you will never be alone in Leafs Nation. Oh, what the heck: Go Leafs Go!!
Toronto is magnetic and attractive, and there’s a study that proves it. The Conference Board of Canada study looked at the features that magnetize or make cities attractive to workers. Because if you can’t attract, you struggle. Toronto scored an overall “A”, second only to some other city in the overall ranking of attractiveness. So if you’re not magnetic, you better be good looking; no bringing down our stats, eh!
Torontonians love their bikes. We must; there are over one million cyclists in the city. All wearing Spandex. If you’re into bikes, a great way to familiarize yourself with the City is to ride with the Toronto Bicycling Network (TBN). With over 900 members it’s Canada’s largest recreational cycling club. This club is serious about the cycling and serious about the fun. I’m a native Torontonian, and I’m amazed at some of the streets and trails I’ve discovered while on some of the rides.
Torontonians can’t stop talking about the weather. See Item #2. Master the following two mandatory phrases and you’ll be able to carry on a casual conversation anytime, anywhere: “It’s Not the Heat, It’s The Humidity” and “It’s Not The Cold, It’s The Damp”. My out-and-about observations indicate we can take the cold better than the heat, but that could just be my personal bias. Which reminds me of my Grade One teacher who said that Canadian children should be used to the cold and able to walk to school (as she pulled into the teacher’s parking lot in her Buick).
It always rains on Victoria Day.
Torontonians also talk about taxes. A lot. And with good reason. On a positive note, Toronto home owners pay the lowest residential property taxes in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and we get quite a bang for our buck. However, our lower tax rate causes upset in other areas, and plays into that whole Toronto as Centre of the Universe thing. On the downside, there is a newly-introduced Toronto municipal land transfer tax that has caused controversy. Toronto real estate agents lobbied aggressively against this tax, and we were able to get a break for first-time home buyers. If you are thinking of buying a house in Toronto and would like more information on these taxing matters, click here, here and here.
We’re no longer blase about the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF). In the early days of the TIFF, we were pretty laid back about the actors and celebrities who’d show up to promote their work. The focus and interest related to the WORK. No big (or excessively big) fuss was made over the Hollywood stars; Torontonians took it all in stride and I kinda think the artists liked it that way. But today’s warped culture of celebrity has changed everything. So if you plan on taking in some of the festival events, be prepared to get caught up in some crazy.
Toronto is close to other interesting places. Drive about an hour-and-a-half in any direction (except due south, think about it!) and you will be in some of the most beautiful areas in the world: Niagara Falls, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Hockley Valley, Village of Elora, Kleinburg, Prince Edward County, and on and on. People come from around the world to enjoy the autumn colours and it’s right in our backyard.