Tips for Criminal Masterminds: the Secret Lair

As a criminal mastermind you need more than a hideout. You need a base of operations suitable for developing your nefarious plans to take over the world.

The Diefenbunker - too obvious?

Here in Ottawa there are many properties that will require very little retrofitting to meet your needs. Most are not currently on the market, but as an evil genius, you should be able to overcome that challenge.

The great news is that you'll be able to tour many sites without suspicion this coming Saturday and Sunday as part of Doors Open Ottawa.

Of course, you'll want to see the Diefenbunker. It is closed on Saturday, but open on Sunday. In my opinion, the Diefenbunker is too obvious a location for a secret lair, but you're the evil genius.

There are a good number of embassies on the list as well as churches and schools that could meet your needs. Lisgar Collegiate used to have a rifle range on its 4th floor.

Traffic Operations - inspiration?

Even if you don't want to acquire one of the Doors Open properties, you might get some good ideas. For example, the City's Traffic Operations Unit at 175 Loretta Ave has control and monitoring systems you might like to study.

There is one possibly ideal location not on the Doors Open list we expect to be up for sale in the next few months. It's only a block from Parliament Hill and has escalators going up and down to a large basement. I'm talking about the Zellers at 156 Sparks. It's one of the few Zellers outlets that have not been bought by Target.

Your new lair?

If I were a criminal mastermind, I'd snap this Zellers up as soon as it comes on the market and keep it a low price retail store. Not just for the income stream, but also so that my minions could come and go without notice and I could buy their uniforms wholesale.

The light rail tunnel construction starting soon would also cover up the noise and waste from any excavation I wanted to do for extra sub-basements or my own secret tunnels.

Good luck wherever you decide to locate your lair. Feel free to invite us to the house warming party. We'll be sure to bring a suitably evil houseplant.

Annoying phrase of the day: Housing Bubble

Sounds of summer

Casa Coyote's entrance is beneath a fencepost right where four downtown highrise properties meet. This, felicitously, means that if the relevant property management companies ever notice, they're gonna have trouble agreeing on the legalities of eviction. They hate each other. And I'm proactively lawyered-up... but I digress, already. Possibly a speed record, even for me. And I just digressed, there, again. Dammit, this isn't starting well.

No, this screed's subject is, ummm, green yard care companies. Four property managers, so four contractors. What they have in common besides motley fleets of green trucks full of implements, is what looks to dumb coyotes to be a fanatical hatred of actual plants.

Anything green that isn't a truck disturbs 'em. They assault quiet with fanatical will. Platoons of beefy college and university students are their foot soldiers. Ill-muffled chainsaws, chemical sprayers, lawn mowers, edgers, hedge cutters, sweepers and blowers are their weapons. Based on the number of noisy, reeking little two-stroke motors alone, it's safe to say that they don't really like nature much. It's stunning the environmental damage one motor of a couple of tablespoons' displacement can spew in a few minutes. You could look it up. These guys have full-on arsenals. The irony of them purporting to be green-care gardeners is not lost on me.

Spring's opening attack is to serially butcher trees on the property lines from all directions, chainsawing potential overhangs until any hint of shade is gone. I'm pretty sure they're paid by the pound, because all of 'em buzz and chip trees regardless of whether they've already been ummm, pruned by their brothers in arms.

Then they gear up for summer: serial waves of earmuffed infantry hit the different properties, spraying noxious-smelling stuff, cutting, and blowing up a storm. They leave lawns no nappier than pool tables. They force shrubs into smooth lollipop shapes. And interestingly, they lavish more love on parking lots than they do on herbiage. Complete pressure-washing after winter, weekly sweeping, vacuuming and blowing through the high season to make sure not a pebble, grass or hedge clipping mars the hot asphalt.

I imagine someone thinks they make things look nice, but the constant noise and the half-burnt petroleum and dust that hang in the air throughout the summer kinda belie this.

Now, ya don't have to be a coyote to know that cities are about noise. And crap. Wake up any weekday before 6 a.m. to swivel your (pointy) ears, and you'll hear Ottawa's duller overnight hum crescendo to a full-blown roar by no later than 6:30. It's what cities do. But if each of these allegedly green companies have to issue their foot-troops with earmuffs to keep 'em from damaging their hearing, waddaya think it does to nearby denizens of high-rise condos - and low-rise dens - who hear all of 'em? And who are left to suck up the smog that squelches any nostalgic aroma of new-mown lawn?

I'm just sayin'...

Google Street View Comes to Stornoway

The Official Residence of the Leader of the Opposition

(click photo to enlarge)

Buy Curious

It is not the first time, that I have been left confused rather than curious about a real estate ad.

5 questions popped into my head as I stared at this ad:

1. Is it a condo for the bi-curious?
2. Is it a condo for nudists?
3. Are those the real-estate agents or models?
4. Is the guy on the left looking down at the woman's coochie or at the guys schlong ?
5. Why isn't there a fifth (person)?

Buy Me

I took a picture of this ad last August because something about it weirded me out.

Also, notice how:

1. She is not that much taller than he is, but her waist is much higher than his.
2. Her belly button is showing.
3. She looks much younger than him.
4. Her forearm looks like it belongs to a much older woman.
5. Skip to number 6 (this space is reserved for Aggie's "there is no 5th thing").
   
6. She is looking right past him.
7. He is looking right past her.
8. Her eyebrows are plucked in the 70s style.
   
9. He has a visible tan line on his wrist.

If you want to know the subliminal message that I got from this ad that disturbed me, check the labels for this post.

SOLD!

Last spring when I was in the process of preparing my house in the Woods for sale, Conch Shell happened to write about the Ottawa housing market. Taking advantage that she and Audrey were real-estate experts, I asked the following question in the comments:

My agent says that I shouldn't leave pictures of family and friends out... they say that the person visiting wants to be able to picture themselves in my home[...] Who do you think is right?

My question generated a glut of comments from readers as to what I should and should not do to stage my house properly for a quick and easy sale. A few weeks later, I posted the following comment:

Thank you all... this is great advice. I have had most of the place painted a light neutral color, and it looks good in both daylight and artificial light... all the trim has been repainted too... and I am removing all the clutter. I hope to make it look spacious, bright and homey. I want people to walk in and feel that it won't be too much work to make it their place with their colors... I will leave family photos out.

Well, three weeks went by during which I had fifteen showings, but received no offers.

The fourth weekend that my little house was on the market, I had to be away overnight on the Friday. Even though my son, Erratic Genius, had been allowed a sleepover, I was not concerned because he is a responsible young man. I knew he and Karate Kid, his sleep-over friend, would cooperate to make the beds and clean-up before the scheduled Saturday one o'clock viewing. I was due back by noon which gave us plenty of time to fluff things up and make everything picture perfect.

I arrived home just after noon and found the place looking ransacked. Standing in the middle of the chaos was Erratic Genius. He looked shell-shocked and desperately pale. Karate Kid was nowhere to be found.

“What happened here?” I asked calmly horrified.

All in one erratic breath he explained, “Karate Kid and I were woken up by these (expletive) people just walking into the house at 10 a.m.… and last night Karate Kid cut himself – there’s (expletive) blood in the (expletive) bathroom sink, on the (expletive) mirror, and on the (expletive) linen cupboard doors…It's real blood this time. We tried to clean up but it just got (expletive) smeared…I can't believe that (double expletive) people just walked into the house this morning without (expletive) setting up an appointment… there was a (expletive) real-estate agent and a couple… they had 3 (triple expletive) kids… the (expletive) kids jumped all over your made-up bed and on the sofas… they were (expletive) running around the house (expletive) yelling and touching stuff… Karate Kid and I tried to clean-up the pizza boxes and pop cans from our sleep-over, but then another (double expletive) agent showed up with more clients… they walked in with their (expletive) shoes… they left (expletive) mud prints everywhere… then a third (expletive) agent showed up with her (expletive) client and started asking us all kinds of (expletive) questions, so we just ran off…I just got back... I waited until they were all (expletive) gone to come back… I’m so sorry Woodsy! We will never sell our place!

Some people must prefer a lived in look, because a few days later I had an offer from the third visitor that day!

2nd best fortune cookie ever

Ottawa Housing Market: Up or Down?

The spring housing market is upon us, and I have some friends who are now looking to buy property, and I thought I’d turn this discussion to thoughts on Ottawa’s real-estate market.

Garth Turner, who has just published, “The Greater Fool: The Troubled Future of Real Estate” says no-one should be buying a home now. Others disagree. Loads of economic forecasters say the market will keep rising, although perhaps slower than before. Others say we could be in a condo bubble. Others that condos are solid because of our aging population base. Others say the U.S. economic meltdown will soon hurt our own housing prices. I also find myself wondering about all those people who rushed, as speculators, to buy in Calgary/Edmonton. Forecasts now are that these markets have flat-lined.

It’s a gamble. An old house on my street (Central Ottawa) just sold for well over $500,000, and I thought it was worth about $350,000. These new owners must think it’s worth it.
Well, for those of you who want to buy, but really, really don’t want to lose money – and are not made of it -- here’s my thoughts (okay, I’m no expert, but nonetheless):

First, don’t go into the suburbs. Everyone’s into minimizing their carbon footprints, and that means inner-city neighbourhoods are in. For several years now the city core neighbourhoods have been climbing in value faster than the outlying areas, and I think this trend will continue and intensify. (Besides, studies tell us that suburb life makes people fat and a little less happy than they would have been, country homes excluded).

Second: if you can at all manage it, buy a house that actually has a yard. There are $600,000 properties out there with no yard, and there are $300,000 ones with beautiful back yards. As the city grows, that urban yard will become much more valuable, plus it gives you room to expand (when you can afford it) without having to move.

Third: If you must buy a condo, see #1 and be even more stringent. That’s uber-urban core, and by this I also mean the hip-urban core of areas like Westboro and the Glebe. Places where there’s not a lot of crappy homes/old warehouses that could get torn down for future condos to compete with yours (and glut the market). I’d say, make sure your condo is within a 10 minute walking distance to three coffee shops. Let’s say that two will suffice if said condo is also within a five minute walk to water.

Fourth: Try not to be directly on a busy street. Don’t buy on Main St., or Parkdale, or Holland, or Scott, if you can avoid it. It might seem like a good deal now, but it’ll be hard to sell in the future, especially if there’s a downturn, plus all that carbon-monoxide and extra stress will take years off your life. Not a good deal.

Fifth: Don’t buy somewhere where you can clearly hear the Queensway hum. Again, it’s not just noise pollution, it’s also that carbon monoxide stuff taking years off your life.

Sixth: Do buy in the “annex” neighbourhoods, the poorer cousins to the rich ones. So: Dow’s Lake, Bronson-West/Little Italy/Hintonburg (Mechanicsville), which annex the Glebe and Wellington Village/Westboro. Preferably seek out a neighbourhood that has a cool and already vibrant “High Street”. A main drag that looks like it could develop further. For the strong-willed and smaller budgeted, I’d also suggest Vanier, but close to Beechwood, not MacArthur.

What do you think, are prices going up or down? What Ottawa neighbourhoods are the best ones to buy into now?