More Torontonians are fleeing the hustle and bustle of the city for the quieter, sports-filled lifestyle of The Blue Mountains and Collingwood, area realtors say.

“A lot of families are moving here just for a better quality of life for their kids because there’s more space, it’s a lot safer, they can walk home from school and there are lots of programs,” explains Eva Landreth of Century 21 Millennium. Landreth says 90 per cent of her clients are from the GTA and are either active retirees, families or people seeking a secondary home.

Many can work remotely or go into Toronto one or two days a week “and just suck up the drive so that they can be home.”

Recent population boom makes it a ‘very welcoming place’

According to 2021 Census data from Statistics Canada, The Blue Mountains had the second-highest population growth in Canada between 2016 and 2021, growing more than 33 per cent from 7,025 in 2016 to 9,390 in 2021. 

For its part, Collingwood saw an impressive 13.8 per cent population increase from 21,793 to 24,811 during that period.

Many of the people in the region are newcomers, says Landreth, who moved to the area nine years ago after several years in the Cayman Islands. “Everyone you bump into has just recently moved here within the last five years, so it’s a very welcoming place.” 

Sarah Swackhammer, another realtor with Century 21 Millennium, moved to The Blue Mountains town of Thornbury from Burlington, Ont. in the GTA eight years ago.

“We were coming up on the weekends and decided we didn’t want to leave,” says Swackhammer, who has worked in real estate in the area for three years after a 20-year career in mental health. “We wanted to stay here. We’re both really active and we had younger children.”

When Swackhammer first moved to the area, few people were coming from the GTA but now many are moving from the metropolis 175 kilometres away, seeking quieter lifestyles.

Landreth says many GTA residents lived in their secondary ski chalets during the pandemic but are now selling and moving into bigger, permanent residences. She also has a company called Seasonal Properties that helps homeowners rent out their homes during ski season or other popular periods.

Increased pandemic prices now stabilized to GTA ranges

Housing prices, Landreth says, increased 20 to 30 per cent during COVID but have now stabilized. Still, prices are now like those in the GTA. “To get a beautiful house with a pool in The Blue Mountains is close to $1.9, $2 million,” she notes.

The median list price for homes in The Blue Mountains was $1.128 million in May, up about two per cent over the median price of $1.103 million in April, according to Houseful.ca. 

Swackhammer says houses in the area saw a correction of as much as 30 per cent from the beginning of 2023 to 2024, but she believes it’s levelled out now. “We’re seeing more of a balanced market. Things are still selling but there’s just more inventory.” 

She recently sold a two-storey home in Collingwood that sold in two days for more than its $1.1 million list price, after it received multiple offers. “That typically doesn’t happen, but when you price something well, it’s desirable — the lot was 66 (feet) by 180 or so; it was a good-sized lot.” 

‘Having what I would want in the GTA wouldn’t be possible’

Jess Annand is one of the newcomers to the area. She built her three-storey home in The Blue Mountains four years ago, a year after selling her 900-square-foot condominium on Avenue and St. Clair in Toronto. Annand’s 2,500-square-foot new build cost less than $600,000 — about $300,000 less than her condominium’s selling price. 

“I wanted more space and financially I wasn’t able to have a single-storey home in the GTA,” says Annand, who launched the public relations firm Maeve + Co. last fall.

About 15 of her friends have moved to the area from Toronto, Oakville or Burlington, so Annand decided to take the plunge. “I truly don’t know if I would ever go back. Having what I would want in the GTA wouldn’t be possible,” she says of her new home, a 10-minute walk from Blue Mountains Resort and a 10-minute drive from Georgian Bay.

She notes the area has recently transformed into not just a ski mecca but a four-season community. “We don’t have the accessibility of museums and tons of restaurants and high-end shopping. But it doesn’t really seem to bother anybody.”

An easier way to live without commutes and traffic

Julia Riley and her husband bought their Collingwood house six years ago, “before the market exploded up here. We got in at a great time,” she says.

The former downtown Toronto resident says she loves the lifestyle, from skiing to cycling, and has no interest in returning to the city. She also feels she’s not missing out on anything — it’s not too long a drive to Toronto to take in a Blue Jays game or to visit friends. 

“It’s a tight community and we’ve met a ton of great people up here who have kids around the same age as ours,” says Riley, who has a two-year-old and a four-year-old. “Commuting to work, running all your errands and doing school pickup and dropoff is just so easy up here. You’re not dealing with big commutes and traffic.”