Comox Valley 2026 Municipal Election series, Post 2 of 10 Not long ago I was walking a client through an ordinary Courtenay lot, one older house, a deep backyard, a couple of fruit trees, when they asked what they could actually do with it. A few years ago the answer was simple: not much. It … Read more
As a managing broker, I see every deal that moves through our brokerage, not just my own, and two things stood out this July. Homes were getting showings, plenty of them, and the showings weren’t necessarily turning into offers. Then the deals that did come together were coming apart a bit more than usual, over … Read more
2026 Comox Valley Municipal Election Series Almost every week, I talk to clients who say a version of the same thing. A young couple pre-approved for a number that doesn’t quite reach the price of the listings they actually like. Retired grandparents who want to downsize but can’t find anything smaller that pencils out. A tradesman driving in … Read more
. For seventy-six summers, the Courtenay and District Memorial Outdoor Pool is one of the places the Comox Valley learned to swim. It is also sinking into a floodplain. By late August, the lineup at the deep end is three deep with teenagers. The Comox Valley Blue Devils, one of the oldest swim clubs in … Read more
I have clients who’ve been looking for the right piece of land near the Tsolum River for the better part of seven years. Not anywhere near the Tsolum; in deep Merville, where the farms are quiet and there’s no highway noise, just the kind of stillness that’s hard to find this close to town. Ten … Read more
Stand in the front window of a Valley View home and you can read most of Courtenay from one spot. The main city spreads out below: downtown’s five blocks of coffee shops, bookstores, and buildings that remember the last century, the Puntledge River threading through on its way to the estuary, and beyond it the … Read more
The new bridge on 6th Street opened a couple of weeks ago. I walked across it and stopped partway to look. East, down the Courtenay River toward the estuary and the harbour, the water wide and quiet. West, toward Lewis Park. Four metres of space for people walking, rolling, and cycling, with nobody revving behind … Read more
In June, more townhouses sold in the Comox Valley than came on the market. Twenty-two were listed. Twenty-eight sold, meaning buyers absorbed inventory faster than new listings arrived. Last month I wrote that the townhouse and condo surge was the quiet story of this spring. A month on, it’s not so quiet, and it’s helping … Read more
Pull up a title search on almost any property in the Comox Valley and you’ll find it, buried in the Charges, Liens and Interests section: EXCEPTIONS AND RESERVATIONS / REGISTERED OWNER: ESQUIMALT AND NANAIMO RAILWAY COMPANY. Most buyers see it and move on. Some stop and ask what a 19th-century railway company is doing on … Read more
There’s a sound I’ve never been able to ignore in my neighbourhood: the wood chipper. It starts up somewhere down the street and my first thought is always the same. One of the good ones is coming down. In a place like the Comox Valley, where older streets run under a canopy of Douglas-fir and … Read more
A client I sold a waterfront lot to last year sent me a message recently. They’re deep into the design phase of a project, close to sending drawings to engineering, and generally optimistic. Then came this: “Was just curious if our long term outlook with real estate needs to adjust based on these land claim … Read more
In 2024, BC’s Bill 44 legislation required municipalities across the province to open single-family land to more density. The Comox Valley moved quickly: Courtenay rezoned 5,649 residential properties to a new designation called R-SSMUH, or Residential Small-Scale Multi-Unit Housing, and Comox followed with over 4,000 lots under similar permissions. Together, these changes affected the majority … Read more
The federal ban is real. In the Comox Valley, where it applies can come down to a km or two. I’m one of those people who visits a new place and immediately starts doing the math on how to move there. I’m fairly certain a solid chunk of the international visitors wandering Fifth Street, relaxing … Read more
There’s a street in Courtenay, and you’ve probably driven down one like it, where two for-sale signs went up this spring within a few weeks of each other. One of them has a “sold” rider on it now. The other one is still standing there, and the grass around the post is getting long. Same … Read more
Downsizing is an emotional decision long before it’s a financial one. The trouble is, the emotion and the math are tangled together and you can’t untangle them until you can actually see the numbers. There’s a moment I’ve watched play out in a lot of living rooms. Someone stands in the doorway of a room … Read more