How I helped a couple sell in Caledon and buy in St. Thomas

The situation

A couple who’d bought their Caledon townhome in 2016 for $490,000, moving two hours down the road to St. Thomas. Three bedrooms, two and a half baths, two storeys, freehold, with a garage. They still owed $189,000 on a mortgage fixed at 1.54%.

They came to me through the cycling club.

What made it hard

They’d committed to the new house before this one went on the market. Seller consultation at the Caledon house June 10, 2024. Out viewing in St. Thomas June 14. Cleaning the Caledon house to prep for listing June 21. Home inspection booked on the St. Thomas house they’d go on to buy, June 27. Purchase recorded around $750,000 by July 1. The Caledon listing went live July 16.

The purchase was conditional on selling this house first, which is what tied the whole thing together. They’d found the house they wanted in June, written an offer that only became binding once their own house sold, and then had to actually sell it. A conditional offer isn’t a safety net so much as a countdown.

And the market turned underneath them. In July 2024, Caledon townhouses were selling at 102% of asking in 20 days. By August, the month they sold, that had fallen to 98% and 38 days.

What the numbers said

Caledon is a small market for this property type. Only 15 attached and row townhouses sold in the whole municipality in July 2024, 16 in August, at an average of $915,313 to $922,800 and a median of $927,500 to $940,000.

Fifteen sales a month means a handful of buyers, not a crowd, so reaching the right ones mattered more than volume of exposure. And the swing from 20 days to 38 between July and August is the difference between a comfortable deadline and one that isn’t.

No TRREB figure applies to the St. Thomas side. It sits in Elgin County, on a different board.

What I recommended

List at $880,000, below the Caledon townhouse average for both months, the right read for a three-bedroom in a market whose average gets pulled up by larger stock.

What I did

• Listed July 16, 2024 at $880,000. Ran evening showings Monday to Thursday, 5pm to 8pm, with open houses that weekend.
• Represented them on the buy side at the same time, on a St. Thomas house that had already sat for two and a half months, and negotiated $14,000 off the ask.
• Drove them around St. Thomas to look at more than one house before they settled on the one they bought.
• Booked the house cleaning at the Caledon end myself.

What happened

Both deals firmed the same day, August 12, 2024. The Caledon townhome sold for $845,000, 27 days after listing, 96% of asking, eleven days faster than the August average of 38.

The two closings landed a day apart: Caledon October 3, St. Thomas October 4. They never carried two properties, never moved twice, and the condition never lapsed.

They’d bought the Caledon townhome for $490,000 in 2016 and sold it for $845,000 eight years later, a gain of $355,000, on combined volume of $1,590,000 across both deals.

A deadline met, a linked purchase negotiated down, and two closings lined up a day apart, in a market moving faster than either side could really afford to wait on.

In their words

“Selling our home and looking for a new one in a different city would normally be a stressful life event but Mats was able to find a buyer in a challenging scenario and gave us so many options of new houses that made the process easy and as close to stress free as you can get! Would gladly work with Mats again!”

Gustavo J., Google review, February 2026

“Working with Mats was fantastic! He understands the market and how to attract the buyers, is incredibly fun and creative with marketing and works non stop to help his clients reach their goals. Mats is also very open and frank and will tell you what needs to be told, not what you want to hear and that’s an amazing quality! I would work with Mats again in a heartbeat and highly recommend him to anyone thinking about buying or selling”

Juliana C., Google review, October 2024