Farm Greenway Condos, 43-153 Farm Greenway: 84 Parkwoods Townhouses

Farm Greenway Condos is a 1975 townhouse complex of 84 homes in Parkwoods, and it answers a question I hear often: how do you get a house-style home with your own front door in North York without paying freehold prices? The answer here comes with a 50-year-old corporation, so the paperwork deserves as much attention as the kitchen. I’m Jatin Dua, RE/MAX Quantum Realty.

A 1970s townhouse community, not a building

Farm Greenway Condos is a townhouse corporation, not an apartment building: 84 homes numbered from 43 to 153 along Farm Greenway. Condos.ca records it as one storey, which is how its database often codes low-rise townhouse complexes, so do not read that as the number of levels in each home. Ask for the floor plan and walk the unit.

With 84 homes, this corporation sits in a useful middle ground. It is large enough to employ a professional manager and spread the cost of big projects, and small enough that owners can still know the board and follow what is being spent.

Splendid Construction Co. is recorded as the builder. Little else about the original construction is easy to find today, which is normal for a complex of this age, and it is one more reason to rely on the corporation’s own records rather than marketing history.

With a corporation of this size, governance is worth a direct question. Ask how often the board meets, how many owners attend the annual meeting, and roughly how many of the 84 homes are owner-occupied. Those answers tell you how decisions about the next big project are likely to go.

What the fee covers, and what it does not

Condos.ca lists common elements, building insurance, parking, water and cable TV in the monthly fee. Parking and water in the fee are useful for a family, because water use in a townhouse is closer to a house than to an apartment.

Heat and hydro are not listed, so each home most likely pays its own utilities. Ask the seller for a year of bills, and check the age and type of the furnace and air conditioner, since those costs are yours.

Cable TV in the fee is a holdover common in corporations of this era. Ask whether the bulk contract still makes sense for how you watch, and when it is up for renewal, because some corporations have dropped or renegotiated these deals.

Building insurance in the fee is the corporation’s policy. You still need your own unit-owner policy for contents, upgrades and any deductible charged back to an owner after a claim. Check the deductible amounts in the status certificate.

Fifty years in: the age question

A 1975 townhouse corporation has been through at least one full cycle of roofs, windows, paving and pipes, and is likely planning the next. The reserve fund study tells you where the corporation is in that cycle, and whether contributions are keeping up.

In townhouse condos, the declaration decides who pays for roofs, windows, doors, decks and fences. That line varies a great deal from one complex to another, and it decides whether a repair is your bill alone or shared among 84 owners. Read it before you firm up.

Inside the unit, look at the electrical panel, the plumbing supply lines, the windows and any basement for signs of past water. Renovations done by previous owners also deserve a question about permits and board approval, since many corporations require sign-off for structural or exterior changes.

Parkwoods, day to day

Parkwoods runs between Highway 401 and Lawrence Avenue East, from the Don Valley Parkway east to Victoria Park Avenue. It is known for winding streets, rolling ground and a ravine system that includes Brookbanks Park and Deerlick Creek, a branch of the Don Valley network.

The ravines here have a long human history. Archaeological digs in backyards along the Brookbanks ravine in the late 1980s and early 1990s turned up artifacts thousands of years old and early Iroquoian pottery, and archaeologists have suggested the Deerlick Creek valley was a seasonal pottery site.

The homes south of York Mills Road were largely bought between 1957 and 1962, and many original families or their heirs are still there. Farm Greenway, registered in 1975, belongs to a later wave of North York housing, when townhouse condominiums became a common way to build family homes on less land.

For a buyer, the appeal is practical: quick access to the 401 and the Parkway, established parks, and a townhouse with its own entrance at a price well below a detached house in the same area.

Pricing a townhouse here

There were no active sale listings at Farm Greenway when I wrote this, so there is no current asking range to quote. With 84 homes and long ownership, sales come up steadily but not often.

The fairest way to price a home here is against recent sales of similar-sized townhouses in this corporation and in other Parkwoods townhouse complexes, adjusted for condition and fee. A renovated unit and an original one can be far apart in price on the same lane, so compare finishes as well as size.

Budget beyond the purchase price as well. Ask the seller for the current fee, property tax bill and a year of heat and hydro costs, then add a reserve for the furnace, air conditioner and windows if they are near the end of their life. In a townhouse of this age, those owner-side costs can matter as much as the fee.

Because parking and water are already in the fee, compare total monthly cost rather than fee alone when you look at other complexes. The sales panel on this page shows the aggregate figures for this building, and my building sold report can give you a fuller sold picture.

Building specifications

Amenities at Farm Greenway Condos

There are no shared recreation facilities, so the fee is mostly about keeping the property itself in good shape. For a townhouse buyer, visitor parking and permission to barbecue on your own space are the amenities that actually get used.

Jatin’s honest take on Farm Greenway Condos

Farm Greenway Condos — frequently asked questions

Looking at York Mills, Don Mills, Lawrence Park, Bathurst Manor and midtown-north Toronto more broadly? Start with my Toronto community guide — the neighbourhoods, what each pocket is like, and how they compare.