Jeannine Sutherland was fed up with the annual repairs required to maintain the family's older Saanich home and decided it was time for a change.
"We had just put in a new deck and new railings on and just thought, 'what is going to happen next year?' " said Sutherland, whose husband, David, has retired. "I thought let's just downsize now."
They sold their 3,500square-foot house and, in June, moved, with daughter Andrea, into a smaller twostorey, three-bedroom home in Langford at the 209-hectare Westhills development. The house came with a detached 600-square-foot coach house suite, a rental revenue-generator with its own parking space. "It gives us a little bit of financial freedom," Sutherland said.
She loves the easy-care house with its tall ceilings. The location is ideal because it's close to shopping, trails and sports facilities. And their oldest daughter already lived in Langford. "It has really worked for us," she said.
Plenty of other homebuyers seem to agree. While other regions are showing slowdowns in new residential construction and slack existing real estate sales, Westhills is enjoying a comparative boom.
By the end of this year, 450 homes will be built and occupied at Westhills, said Jim Hartshorne, president of Keycorp Consulting, Westhills development manager. Sales to date are close to $200 million, he said.
This year alone, 150 homes in varying sizes and layouts are to be built. Hartshorne figures that 200 to 300 annually will be the norm at Westhills, depending on how long it takes to develop lots.
Westhills is a planned community still in its early days. Zoning allows for 6,000 homes. Plans call for 2,500 single-family houses, 1,000 to 1,500 townhouses, and the rest condos, Hartshorne said. The first 68-unit condominium is nearing completion.
Once built out, an estimated 25,000 people will live at Westhills, he said. That puts the development close to Langford's 29,000 current population.
The Westhills plan allows for six million square feet of construction in the business core, where groundfloor retail, services, offices, a hotel and aboveground residential are permitted.
A pub-restaurant and small marina on Langford Lake are coming, too. The marina is probably two to three years away, said Ryan McKenzie, Westhills Land Corp. manager.
Details on a partnership between the YM-YWCA, Langford and Westhills for a new fitness facility are expected to go before Langford council next month, Hartshorne said.
As excavators carve out new lots, Westhills is aiming to forge a sense of community by staging events such as a recent barbecue and Christmas light-up competition. It has an online newsletter and a Facebook page.
Westhills is not the region's first planned community. The Bear Mountain development, also in Langford, is partly completed. HSBC, the original financier, won control of its assets in 2010 after a courtordered restructuring. That project includes golf courses, a hotel, restaurants and homes.
The capital region is known as one of the priciest in Canada. July's average single-family house price in the region was $581,746 and, in recent years, it has topped $600,000.
Last month, the average in Langford was lower at $502,122.
Developers looked to the West Shore to supply lowerpriced land. Building on smaller lots makes single-family houses more affordable. In the first half of this year, Langford accounted for 45 per cent of 273 single-family house starts in Greater Victoria, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. said.
Other developers are keeping their eyes on the West Shore. The Urban Development Institute Victoria office is hosting a West Shore tour of projects next month.
Hartshorne said 95 per cent of those purchasing homes at Westhills are local. Many early buyers were first-time owners.
Now, about 65 to 70 per cent are 55 years old and up. It is common to find different generations of one family in a house with a suite, or living close to each other, he said.
Westhills single family houses range from $399,000 to close to $600,000.
The company can be flexible, adjusting its offerings based on feedback, Hartshorne said. "You have to be ahead of the market because if you are responding to the market, you're behind."
When buyers downsize, they want to have some money in their pockets. That's one reason that 65 per cent of houses have legal suites, he said. Westhills is also building more two-car garages, more homes with a main bedroom on the ground floor and lots are now typically larger than in earlier parts of the development.
Because the project will be continuing for another decade or more, it is critical to maintain a reputation for quality, Hartshorne said.
> Langford's boom continues despite economic woes, B6 > Building Westhills has been a family effort, B6
