By Ritika Dubey
“For years, I’ve been on this journey of looking for a cottage that might work for us,” she stated.
However Evanoff and her husband didn’t need to incur the burden of fixed cottage upkeep — spending trip days fixing decks and pruning timber. They opted as a substitute to lease through the years, nonetheless hoping to sooner or later purchase.
Then, it occurred. They discovered a cottage not too removed from residence — for a fraction of the value they thought they’d should pay, due to fractional possession.
Additionally referred to as co-ownership, it permits individuals to purchase a share of a property with others, whether or not it’s household, buddies and even strangers.
Affordability sits on the coronary heart of fractionally owned cottages. Many Canadians nonetheless discover themselves priced out of the market, at the same time as cottage costs have declined from peaks seen throughout the pandemic.
Re/Max brokers and brokers anticipate a nationwide common worth improve of about 1.8 per cent throughout the Canadian leisure market in 2025, a Might report by the true property agency, confirmed.
On their first go to to take a look at a potential cottage final fall, Evanoff recalled strolling right into a lake-facing cottage with giant home windows at Frontenac Shores in Cloyne, Ont., about 300 kilometres northeast of Toronto, and was bought.
“We sat in these Muskoka chairs on the seaside and our ft are within the water, and I simply felt the stress shredding off me,” she stated.
“That is the dream that I’ve been dreaming for all these years … and that is inside attain.”
Evanoff and her husband now personal one-tenth of a million-dollar cottage, costing them lower than $100,000 for his or her share — and affording them 5 weeks a 12 months on the property.
Fractional possession of a cottage just isn’t like a timeshare, stated Realtor Mike Lange, who has been coping with co-owned cottages for about seven years in Kawartha Lakes, Ont.
“With a timeshare, you place your identify in requesting a location, you haven’t any assure that that’s going to be accessible,” he stated. “There’s been plenty of heartaches over them through the years.”
Timeshare properties might be owned by for-profit firms, leaving much less autonomy for these staying there.
Don Smith, who co-owns a property in Kawartha Lakes, purchased right into a cottage within the mid-2000s after he noticed a newspaper advert about fractional cottage possession.
“I used to be within the workers room studying the newspaper as a arithmetic and pc research instructor,” he recalled. “As a math instructor, that caught my eye: What’s this fraction all about, this cottage, this concept?”
For the Smiths, fractional possession wasn’t a monetary funding however a life-style funding that has paid off over the previous twenty years.
“That is the place my daughter realized to swim, that’s the place my daughter realized to kayak, that’s when my daughter had realized to understand animals.”
But it surely will not be for everybody.
Smith stated fractionally owned cottages are often 100 per cent debt-free. Which means new co-owners sometimes can’t safe a mortgage towards the property from conventional banks and should depend on private loans or a line of credit score to purchase their share.
Private touches to the cottage can be lacking with fractional possession and other people can’t simply present up at any time, he stated.
“It’s not like you’ll be able to personally put all of your favorite photos and put all the junk that you simply don’t need in your house storage and take it up there and depart it,” Smith stated.
Actual property developer John Puffer has years of expertise constructing cottages and promoting them in fractional possession preparations in Ontario’s cottage nation areas.
When he first obtained into the enterprise, Puffer assumed the patrons would principally be individuals of their 30s with younger households. As a substitute, they occurred to be individuals of their 50s and 60s, shopping for cottage shares for his or her grownup youngsters and grandchildren, or individuals who don’t need to commit the {dollars} and fear about upkeep.
“That’s a part of the Canadian cottage expertise in Ontario … that’s the place households congregate on the cottage and (it’s) multi-generations,” stated Puffer, president of Chandler Level Corp.
Tanya Walker, litigation lawyer and managing companion at Walker Regulation, suggests potential patrons ought to get a superb contract lawyer and deal with the contract “as if it’s a pre-nuptial settlement” earlier than signing on to be a co-owner.
She stated patrons going into fractional possession ought to ask questions on who the opposite co-owners are, the voting rights individuals get for his or her share and what occurs once they need to promote their stake.
Walker added it’s additionally essential to look into who manages the property, the financials of the property in addition to how a lot time you’ll get to make use of the cottage and when.
Puffer stated individuals actually have to know what they’re shopping for into. He recommended individuals learn the contract and discover out who’s in management, what their obligations are, and discuss to individuals who already personal.
For Evanoff and her husband, will probably be their third time heading as much as the Frontenac Shores cottage subsequent month.
“It’s like, wow! That simply looks like a present,” she stated.
“This (fractional possession) looks like the best-kept secret however I feel it’s going to catch on … and also you’re going to see lots of people faucet into this market.”
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Final modified: June 20, 2025