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calimehtar

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I'm having a hard time finding answers to two questions:

- how do I measure my condo? My developer says from the interior walls, my lawyer says it's complicated and I need to hire a professional. I decided to take my lawyer's advice, but I can't find _anyone_ - professional inspectors or structural engineers - who will agree to measure the place.

- How much does size play into price? I see a lot of people using price per square foot as a benchmark, but I've heard advice that in general other factors - layout, location, appears - are more important. For myself I tend to compare square feet first, but not exclusively.
 
For question number one you must follow Tarion standards:
http://www.tarion.com/NR/rdonlyres/3C403E96-AAFE-4970-9D7E-A5BBC6696994/0/Bulletin22.pdf

Regarding question number 2, size will give you 100% of your price. the point is that price per square foot is given by those factors you mention like location, building. It will give you an average price per square foot for your building, let's say the the average price per square foot this year at Spire is $511 sq ft, that's the base, after that, the price can be affected by high or low floor, depends also where your unit is facing to, unit features like floor(wood, carpeted), appliances, layout
 
carturo15 said:
For question number one you must follow Tarion standards:
http://www.tarion.com/NR/rdonlyres/3C403E96-AAFE-4970-9D7E-A5BBC6696994/0/Bulletin22.pdf

Regarding question number 2, size will give you 100% of your price. the point is that price per square foot is given by those factors you mention like location, building. It will give you an average price per square foot for your building, let's say the the average price per square foot this year at Spire is $511 sq ft, that's the base, after that, the price can be affected by high or low floor, depends also where are your unit facing to, unit features like floor(wood, carpeted), appliances, layout
Click to expand...

Great Post! Does that mean that when a developer mentions the square footage on a presale condo, that the balcony should NOT be included in that number?
 
actually the balcony is never included, when the condo prices are setup by sq ft, it does not include balcony areas. Obviously when you have large balconies your unit might have a better appreciation.
 
Thanks, carturo15

The dimensions are not in the Agreement of Purchase and Sale, and in the marketing material they include a disclaimer "all floor plans are approximate dimensions." I'm not sure how to read that Tarion document - does that mean they can sell me anything at all? It's off by about 20% by my calculations. A bit less since I am measuring the inside walls and not to halfway to my neighbors' unit.
 
No they can't sell you "anything at all". Your Agreement of Purchase and Sale should include some kind of reasonable description of what you bought (suite number, model name, etc.) Ideally it also should have included a copy of the floor plan (strongly recommended for anyone buying a new unit).

My advice: Get out any documentation which you may have (marketing materials, plans, etc.) Measure your unit carefully, draw a diagram, label each dimension, and carefully recheck all calculations. If you still think something is wrong, gather all of your documentation and take everything to the lawyer who handled your closing.
 
Remember that "dimensions" and "floor space" are not the same. You could get the same total floor space, but the finished rooms might be slightly different in terms of dimensions.
 
Thanks for all the advice. The condo isn't far off from the sales drawing. It doesn't help that they made some major errors in the drawing (extra window not in the original plan, dimensions for 2nd bedroom that are nonsensical, no measurements at all for bathrooms), but if you factor that in it's okay.

I called planit, and they said they only measure condo interiors. They didn't seem to have any idea how I would get a full measure of a condo including exterior walls. I decided I'd just estimate the exterior walls and see how close I get. I realized in doing this that the exterior walls make a much bigger difference to the total size of the condo than I expected. At this point I still don't really know how big it is, but it's close enough that I'm not going to pursue this any further.

My main concern was that I can truthfully advertise the condo for resale at the same size it was sold to me. I think it's basically okay.
 
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