Respect: Rob Ford & Toronto Condo Builders are on par

Toronto condo builders complain they get as little respect as Rob Ford because market misjudged

Builders of Toronto condominiums get as little respect these days as the embattled mayor, according to one of the city’s largest high-rise developers.

“I almost know what Rob Ford feels some days because people are always taking runs at the guy,” Barry Fenton, chief executive officer of Lanterra Developments, said at the Bloomberg Canada Economic Summit Tuesday. “The truth of it is we’re good, the market is really healthy still and we have a long ways to go on the upside.”

Toronto, whose mayor entered a rehabilitation center after admitting smoking crack cocaine, is in the midst of a building boom.

The city of 2.8 million people has more condo towers under construction than any other North American city, according to industry researcher Emporis GmbH, fuelling speculation the market is in a bubble. Deutsche Bank AG said in a December 2013 report that Canadian real estate is 60% overvalued, with the highest disparity of home prices to rents and income of at least 20 countries tracked by the lender, including the U.S. and Italy.

“It’s the outside world looking into the amount of construction that’s happening in the city and saying ‘Whoa, what’s going on here,’ but not having the right context,” Jared Menkes, director of development for Menkes Developments Ltd. said at the summit.

Read more @ http://business.financialpost.com/

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