The office-to-residence pipeline, the Home of the Week and more top real estate stories for June 15

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Here are The Globe and Mail’s top housing and real estate stories this week and one home worth a look.

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The capital-gains changes as of June 25

The main take-away for taxpayers from the government’s new guidance on changes to the tax on capital gains is that Ottawa is sticking to what it had outlined in April’s federal budget, experts say. Erica Alini lays out three specific highlights that taxpayers should be aware of as the June 25 deadline for the new tax regime approaches, including the types of trusts the $250,000 threshold applies to, and the lack of options for taxpayers to trigger capital gains at the 50-per-cent inclusion rate beforehand without selling or gifting an asset.

Toronto planners mull allowing more office to residential conversions

Toronto’s planning department is reviewing its office use policies and is expected to make recommendations public in July, including one looking at the requirement that landlords replace lost office space. As Rachelle Younglai and Alex Bozikovic write, eliminating the strict replacement policy would provide a route to transforming underused and vacant buildings into much-needed housing.

“The prepandemic office world is not coming back any time soon,” said Toronto City Councillor Brad Bradford, vice-chair of the city’s planning and housing committee. Over the past four years, 11 office towers have opened in Toronto’s downtown core, including the 49-storey CIBC Square and the 47-storey TD Terrace. That has increased the amount of downtown office space by 7.8 million square feet, or 9 per cent, according to Altus, a commercial real estate consulting firm. While the city is considering rules for both replacing and converting existing buildings, developers have been requesting approval for other office demolitions.

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How much should parents help their kids when it comes to housing?

Parents are often able to start ramping up their saving pretty aggressively in their 50s as the mortgage gets paid off and their kids leave home. This is a time in their life when people can load up their retirement fund, making up for those years when raising kids and paying a mortgage made it hard to save. But supporting adult kids can scuttle this plan, especially if the kids cannot contribute to household costs. As writer Anita Bruinsma notes this week, it’s the kind of help many parents want to give their kids if they’re able – but it can also be a massive retirement sacrifice.

The rise of the traveller’s budget-friendly house swap

With expensive hotel and flight prices, vacationing with free accommodation is an increasingly popular way to travel, and writer Susan Beiderwieden should know – she’s done home swaps while travelling from her B.C. residence 10 times. There’s an economic advantage to a home exchange network, but it’s not the only reason people enjoy them. Travellers may want a home, not a hotel, at the end of a sightseeing day: healthy food, a good bed, reading on the patio, clean laundry and days off to relax. A home base can offer a more authentic and environmentally friendly way to travel and become a way to experience cultural differences. Beiderwieden offers her tips and tricks for finding the right location and keeping her things safe at home during an exchange.

Home of the week: A home built for views and a low carbon footprint

100 Red Sky Place, Kelowna, B.C.

Owned by a former British Petroleum executive and a fashion designer who wanted to make the house as energy efficient as possible, this space is contemporary and even a little industrial, serving as a backdrop for Lake Okanagan and the mountains beyond, and as a showcase for their globe-trotting cultural artifacts.

Inside the front door, the eye is drawn past the stairs and two-storey living room straight outdoors to a covered patio – the whole rear property is one big pool deck and outdoor living space. The rest of the main living space, with the kitchen and dining room, showcases rich warm walnut cladding on the lower cabinets that bridges the paler engineered oak floor with the darker black granite of the central island. On the rear wall is a mix of lower cabinet storage and upper full windows that extend to a secondary bedroom suite (designed for aging in place) with more lake views. The second level is dedicated to the primary bedroom suite with a deck giving stunning lake vistas through a floor-to-ceiling glass wall.

Most of the energy savings (“We’re close to net zero,” says the homeowner) are achieved through insulation above and below grade, as well as from high efficiency windows and a heat pump for most of the heating and cooling. That said, there is a gas fireplace, gas range and even a gas furnace as a backup for those rare Kelowna under-15 degree days.