Wednesday 8am Guest - Ron Butler

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1:02centrist in Brad Bradford. This is why Brad's got Ontario liberals endorsing him. He's got a lot of federal current carny former Trudeau liberals endorsing him. Naturally, Olivier Chow is trying to paint him as some, you know, mega light. This is what you do. This is what you do. You paint somebody even remotely centrist as towards the right would bow down to Donald Trump. This seems to connect and it's terribly frustrating, but the municipal land transfer tax kind of stacks directly on top of the provincial land transfer tax and no other city does it. It's probably one of the most heavily debated policies in all of real estate, but maybe in the entire city's book of policies, Ron Butler from Butler Mortgage. I'm really eager to get his opinion on this. I love here and from Ron. You hear him on our station as well. We're a grateful recipient of his advertising and he joins us now in Toronto today. Thank you very much for the time. Thanks for having me. What do you think here? It's a controversial policy. Always has been Toronto does it.

2:04No other Ontario city does it is Brad on the right track to connecting with voters here by saying I'm going to get rid of it for people who are buying a new home. I think fundamentally we have to believe that every tax reduction is good. I mean, it just that has to be our base case. Now what's this about? This is about giving people who are wanting to buy their first home. One less expense that they have to cough up when they hit the lawyer's office to finish the signing for their new property. And look, it's hard. It's hard in Toronto for young people, for a young couple to get going and buying their first home. It's a big down payment. There's a lot of cost. So sure. Why not target those people and give them a break? Do you see it as, I mean, a lot of Olivia Chow's policy seemed aimed at renters. She even talked about having a bad landlord, you know, Gestapo for lack of a better term to chase down the bad landlords, but she ain't saying that about tenants. Do you see is this sort of a counter act to that run where Brad targets homeowners and

3:09goes on the candidate for you? Because he thinks maybe Olivia Chow's got the renters locked up. Well, I think that it's reasonable to say that Brad Bradford is somebody who would be thinking about people who are not boomers. We saw the policies coming out of Olivia Chow just this week about more support for seniors. The sad truth about the municipal elections is that people over 60 outvote people under 35 by like three to one. So, a pander to old folks like me and you're probably going to get some more votes. But this is the problem we have today. We have way too many policies that don't support young people buying homes. I mean, it is probably the hidden worst aspect of what's going on in Canada today is the inability of young couples to form a family by starting to buy their first home. And Toronto that Toronto hits you so much harder. You know this Ron, because you deal all over the province.

4:09It hits you so much harder for practically everything than the suburbs do. It, first of all, you get less, less bang for the buck for space. You're going to pay more for daycare. You're going to pay more for getting around and transit. Yes, you're closer to a lot more cool things and necessary things. But young families almost universally head to the suburbs, raise a family and then they're like, okay, what's the next step? But the suburbs offer more in terms of cost, uh, cost maintenance basically. Well, you're so right. I mean, Mike Moff at my friend, Mike Moff at a numerous studies that show that children are draining out of Toronto that we're headed in the direction of a childless city in Toronto, because it's just so expensive and things are stacked against young people having kids. Yeah, you've nailed it. Yeah, if I see an eight year old in Toronto, Ron, I assume they're lost. I call the police right away. I'm like, clearly they're not with their pair. They're pair, they're visiting their tourists. That's what that's what they are. That that they're tourists kids. Yeah. Yeah. Um, the numbers I, I look at it, if you and I are buying a new home in Toronto at $1.1 million,

5:13if they eliminate the MLTT, the municipal land transfer tax, the number Brad mentioned is correct. According to everything I can get online, $18,475 in cash out of pocket on closing day, which again, tells you just how strapped people are when they make that transaction. Um, over the last 20 years since we've had this tax. So that person who's buying for 1.1 million has potentially had to come up with over $200,000 worth of down payment. So now we start to layer on the provincial tax, then we layer on the city tax. And yeah, people wonder why there's a difficulty in young people buying a home in Toronto. This shouldn't be a puzzle to anyone. Uh, this is a very, very difficult situation. And, and the trouble is it's all hidden, right? I guarantee you the majority of young people when they hear from their lawyer, but what they've got to bring in are questioning what this extra money is because it's not like any but works. Any of us are exposed to it.

6:14It's like a secret tax on that one transaction. Yeah. No, you're so right, Ron. And I think obviously all costs from an owner get paid, get, get, um, trickle back. They don't just trickle back. They flow back to the renter. So when someone is buying a home and all of a sudden it's open for rent, you do have to wonder why am I paying more in Toronto than it's not you're paying more anyway than you are an Ottawa kitchen or London, but you're also paying because the owner got hammered on the transaction itself when he decided to, to, to, uh, buy the place in these tax twice for it. So 100% correct. And possibly the most amazing thing about this is, uh, Olivia Charles reaction to it, that it's impossible to live without the $300 million worth of taxes that this would reduce. We'd be go down $300 million. It's just crazy to me that everyone in the mayor's camp believes that you can't give up one penny of tax. There's no ability to save any money in the city, in the multi billion dollar budget of

7:18the city of Toronto. It's impossible to reduce taxes because we need to keep taxing the heck out of people. So the bureaucracy can keep growing. I mean, to me, that's almost as remarkable as anything. What do people in the real estate business in Toronto who have a vote? What do they say about the choice between the candidates? Well, they want, uh, we're, we're in the housing business. We're in the business of finding people homes, getting people into homes. Yes, this is 100% positive. I mean, your point is true. The support for tenants does not create a better environment for young people to buy a home and start a family. That's absolutely the case. Yeah, that's, that's what I see. Also, you can go to a butlermorgens.ca, find out more about what Ron can do for you if you're, if you're looking for a new place and looking for a new rate as well. Thank you very much for your insight on this, Ron. Always appreciate it. Thank you. Ron Butler, joining us. Thanks for listening to the Toronto Today podcast. We dropped the highlights of the Daily Show every weekday morning.

8:20Well, forget you can hear the entire show on the radio at home on your smart speaker ask Alexa or say, hey, Google, play 640 Toronto or Toronto today. You can hear us on between 530 and 9 weekdays on 640 Toronto. Have a great day.