Beech House Condos, 365 Beech Ave: Big Suites Above the New Beach YMCA

Beech House is the building I bring up when a Beach buyer wants condo convenience but will not shrink into a 550-square-foot one-bedroom. The smallest suites here start near 800 square feet, the building sits on top of a brand-new YMCA, and Beech Avenue runs straight down to Queen Street. It is also young enough that the paperwork matters more than the finishes. I’m Jatin Dua, RE/MAX Quantum Realty.

A condo built on top of a YMCA

The thing that makes this building different is what is underneath it. The ground level holds the Steve and Sally Stavro Family YMCA, a roughly 60,000-square-foot centre that replaced the much smaller Kingston Road YMCA, which was torn down when construction started in 2015. Reporting at the time described a weight room, fitness studios, a full gymnasium and two pools, including a 25-metre accessible lap pool.

Be clear about what that means. The Y is a separate institution sharing the site, not a condo amenity. I would not assume your maintenance fee buys you a membership, and I would ask the property manager how shared areas, the garage and deliveries work between the two uses.

What it does give you is a pool, a gym and programs for kids downstairs, in a neighbourhood where most condo buildings are too small to run any of that themselves. For a family, that is a real daily convenience.

Suites sized for people leaving a house

Condos.ca lists suites from about 788 to 2,339 square feet. That is unusual. There is effectively no small-one-bedroom stock here, which tells you who the building was designed for: downsizers from Beach semis and families who want to stay in the area without a yard to maintain.

The larger plans are where this building earns its keep. In the Beach, a condo over 1,500 square feet is hard to find at all, and buyers who need that much space are usually choosing between a building like this and a freehold townhouse.

The garage, bike storage and a pet wash area round out the practical list. I have not found a published source for ceiling heights or the exact parking and locker allocation, so confirm both on the listing and the status certificate for the suite you are looking at.

Why the dates do not line up

This building has a longer story than most. Excavation and shoring wrapped up in 2016, a crane went up in 2017 and the structure topped off in 2019. A December 2020 report described residents moving in while crews were still finishing parts of the building, and the YMCA opening was pushed back by the pandemic.

The condominium corporation was not registered until July 2023. Condos.ca therefore lists the building as a 2023 build, even though people have been living here since around 2020. A gap that long between occupancy and registration is not a red flag on its own, but it is worth understanding.

Sources also disagree on the basics. Condos.ca shows six storeys and 91 suites. A 2020 news report said six storeys and 95 suites, and the UrbanToronto project file lists seven storeys under Kingston Road addresses. The final registered count is the one in the declaration, so rely on that.

The Beech Avenue and Kingston Road corner

The building faces Kingston Road, which is a working street with buses, a streetcar line and traffic. Beech Avenue is the quieter side, and it runs downhill through a residential pocket toward Queen Street East and the lake. Which face a suite looks out on changes how it lives, so ask before you book a showing.

The automatic panel on this page covers transit, schools and Walk Score, so I will not repeat it. The short version is that the Queen Street shops, the boardwalk and the parks of the Beach are the reason to buy here, and Kingston Road gives you the everyday errands.

Kingston Road is also in the middle of a mid-rise wave. Expect more six-to-eight-storey projects along the corridor over the next decade, which brings construction nearby but also more shops at grade.

For a buyer here, that cuts both ways. New buildings add competing resale supply in a few years, but they also fill in the gaps in the street, and a Kingston Road that feels more like a main street is good for every owner on it.

Price per square foot, and what the fee covers

The building average sits around $809 per square foot. That is lower than several newer boutique buildings on Kingston Road, and part of the reason is simple arithmetic: large suites tend to trade for less per square foot than small ones, even in the same building.

There were no active listings when I wrote this, so I cannot give you a current asking range. With about 91 suites and mostly large plans, turnover is modest, and the TRREB panel on this page will show only a handful of sales in any twelve-month window. Read those medians as a range, not a precise number.

The fee includes common elements, building insurance and water. Heat, cooling and hydro are not listed as included, which is typical for a newer building with suite-level systems. When you compare this with an older Beach building whose fee looks higher, add your own utility bills back in before you decide which one is cheaper.

If you are weighing a large suite here against a freehold, remember the fee replaces the roof, the exterior, snow clearing and building insurance. That is the real comparison, not price per square foot alone.

Building specifications

Amenities at Beech House Condos

The condo’s own amenity list is short and practical: a garage, bike storage, a pet wash and BBQs. The YMCA downstairs is the big draw, but it is a separate organisation, so treat it as a neighbour, not part of your fee.

Jatin’s honest take on Beech House Condos

Beech House Condos — frequently asked questions

Looking at Leslieville, Riverdale, the Beaches, Danforth and Leaside more broadly? Start with my Toronto community guide — the neighbourhoods, what each pocket is like, and how they compare.