The Oakville, Burlington and Hamilton Waterfront at Every Budget: From a Stoney Creek Condo to a Morrison Estate

By Jatin Dua · Broker of Record, RE/MAX Quantum Realty · Updated 26 September 2026 · 10 min read — the western shore of Lake Ontario from Hamilton’s Beach Strip to the Mississauga border laid out as a ladder of budgets, from the Hamilton and Stoney Creek condominium averages through Burlington’s downtown towers and townhouses, Stoney Creek and Brant detached houses, LaSalle, West Oakville, Bronte, Roseland and Shoreacres, then Ford, Old Oakville and Southwest, and Morrison at the top, with what changes at each rung and why none of it carries a municipal land transfer tax.

What is the same on every rung

None of Hamilton, Burlington or Oakville charges a municipal land transfer tax, so every rung on this ladder carries Ontario’s tax alone: 0.5 percent to $55,000, 1 percent to $250,000, 1.5 percent to $400,000, 2 percent to $2 million and 2.5 percent above that for a property with one or two single-family residences, with a first-time buyer refund of up to $4,000. Non-residents pay Ontario’s 25 percent speculation tax and most cannot buy until the federal ban ends on 1 January 2027. Below $1.5 million the purchase can be insured at 5 percent down on the first $500,000 and 10 percent on the rest; above it, 20 percent is the floor and the appraisal governs. Two conservation authorities divide the shore: Conservation Halton for Oakville and Burlington, the Hamilton Conservation Authority for Hamilton and Stoney Creek, and both regulate the shoreline, the creek valleys and the Beach Strip sandbar. Read conservation authority permits on shoreline property.

How to read the ladder. Each rung is a published average or median from TRREB’s August 2026 Market Watch or its April to June 2026 community reports, for a whole community and home type, not for waterfront addresses. A rung tells you the budget at which a given type in a given place is the typical sale; the lake-facing addresses in that place sit above the rung, sometimes far above. The point of laying the rungs out in order is that a buyer can see which step they are on, what the next step costs, and which neighbourhood the money changes as it climbs.

A word on the figures before you read them. Every number below is a published average or median from TRREB’s August 2026 Market Watch or its April to June 2026 community reports, or from the Cornerstone, Niagara and Central Lakes associations’ August releases where TRREB does not reach. They are averages for whole communities and home types, not for waterfront lots, and in a small community a single sale can move them. Their job here is to tell you whether your budget sits above, at or below the typical sale in a place, which is the honest first question. What a specific house on a specific street sold for is a different question, and the answer is in the sold record, not in an average.

The ladder

$400,000 to $520,000: Hamilton, Stoney Creek and the Burlington towers

The bottom of this ladder is the least expensive way onto Lake Ontario in the region. Hamilton’s Lakeshore community, the strip along the lake east of the Beach, had condominium apartments averaging about $395,000 in the spring across ten sales; Stoney Creek’s about $423,000 across eight; Burlington’s LaSalle community, along the North Shore on Hamilton Harbour, about $467,000 across twelve. Burlington’s city-wide condominium apartment average was $514,550 in August 2026 with a $482,500 median across 36 sales and a $511,800 benchmark, and that number reaches the older towers downtown near Spencer Smith Park. The Cornerstone Association’s Hamilton composite benchmark, all home types, was $670,600 in August, which frames the whole Hamilton shore. Everything here is insured with a thin down payment, and the questions are the building’s. Read Stoney Creek, Aldershot and North Shore and Burlington lakefront condos.

$700,000 to $900,000: townhouses, the Beach Strip and Stoney Creek houses

At about $700,000 the ladder reaches Burlington’s condominium townhouses, Roseland’s at about $696,000 across nineteen spring sales and Brant’s at about $747,000, and Hamilton Beach’s detached houses, three spring sales averaging $727,000 on the sandbar between the lake and the harbour, a figure to treat as a signpost rather than a price. At about $875,000 Cornerstone’s Burlington composite benchmark, $875,700 in August, marks the city’s typical home, and at about $893,000 Stoney Creek’s 57 detached sales, with an $801,000 median, mark the typical house on Hamilton’s eastern shore, on the flat streets between the QEW and the lake from Confederation Park to Fifty Point. This is where a freehold house near the water first becomes routine on this shore, and it is still under the insured cap. Read the Beach Strip and Beachway and what $900,000 buys.

$1 million to $1.45 million: lakeside condominiums and the first Burlington and Bronte houses

Around $1 million the ladder does something unusual: the condominium rung reappears above the detached one. Brant’s condominium apartments averaged about $1,005,000 across 42 spring sales with a $728,000 median, and Bronte’s about $1,021,000 across eleven, because both communities hold newer waterfront towers whose larger units trade in seven figures while the older buildings hold the medians down. At $1.3 to $1.45 million the detached rung arrives: Brant’s detached houses averaged about $1,328,000 with a $1,143,000 median, Burlington’s city-wide $1,421,482 with a $1,250,000 median across 89 August sales and a $1,209,900 benchmark, and Bronte’s all-types average was $1,550,640 with a $1,443,500 median. That is the typical house in downtown Burlington’s older grid and the typical Bronte home, a few streets from the water, with the insured cap just above. Read West Oakville and Bronte and what $1.2 million buys.

$1.65 to $1.9 million: LaSalle, West Oakville, Bronte, Roseland and Shoreacres

This is the rung where the western shore’s established lakeside neighbourhoods sit at their averages, and it is crowded. LaSalle’s detached houses averaged about $1,657,000 with a $1,325,000 median; West Oakville’s about $1,708,000 with a $1,394,000 median across 71 sales; Bronte’s about $1,758,000 with a $1,635,000 median across 52; Oakville’s town-wide $1,787,896 with a $1,604,000 median across 103 August sales and a $1,586,700 benchmark; Shoreacres’ about $1,878,000 with a $1,608,000 median; and Roseland’s about $1,891,000 with a $1,616,000 median. The medians cluster between $1.3 and $1.65 million and the averages between $1.65 and $1.9 million, and the gap is the lakefront: the Lakeshore Road lots in Roseland and Shoreacres and the lake-facing streets of Bronte and West Oakville pull the averages up. So $1.65 million buys the typical house in any of these and $1.9 million the first house that meets the lake in the more affordable of them. All of it is above the insured cap, so 20 percent down and the appraisal apply. Read Roseland, Shoreacres and Lakeshore Road and what $1.5 million buys.

$2.4 to $3 million: Ford, Old Oakville and Southwest

East of Bronte the ladder climbs into Oakville’s estate communities. Ford, east of the harbour, averaged $2,395,388 across all types with a $2,140,000 median in the spring; Old Oakville $2,508,024 with a $2,381,000 median across all types and about $2,954,000 with a $2,800,000 median for detached houses; and Southwest, the lakefront run west of downtown, $2,863,688 with a $2,700,000 median across sixteen sales. So $2.4 million buys the median Ford house, $2.5 million the median Old Oakville home and $3 million the median Old Oakville detached house or Southwest home, and at each of those the lakefront lots sit above. Ontario’s land transfer tax runs at 2.5 percent on the excess above $2 million here, and nothing else does, which at $3 million is the largest single advantage this shore has over the Toronto one. Sale-to-list ratios of 92 to 94 percent and days on market in the thirties to fifties mean offers are negotiated. Read Old Oakville, what $2 million buys and what $3 million buys.

$4 million and up: Morrison

The top of the ladder, and the top of TRREB’s community tables for any lakefront neighbourhood in the GTA, is Morrison: $4,198,968 across all types with a $3,326,722 median across 30 spring sales, and about $4,189,000 with a $3,320,000 median for detached houses. The lots along Lakeshore Road East between downtown Oakville and the Mississauga border are among the largest on the Canadian shore of Lake Ontario, the houses on them range from originals to recent rebuilds, and the land is the value. $4 million buys the typical Morrison house; the frontage trades above it. Conservation Halton regulates the shoreline, the town’s heritage register reaches some of the older houses, and the appraiser, the insurer and the shoreline engineer matter more than the list price. Read the southeast Oakville estates and what $5 million and up buys.

Choosing your rung

• Financing and appraisal. Lenders lend against the appraisal, not the price, and waterfront appraisals come in conservative. Keep a financing condition and cash beyond the minimum down payment.
• Insurance, separately. Get a written quote on the address before you waive. Overland water is optional and unavailable for roughly 850,000 Canadian homes; earth movement is excluded everywhere.
• Conservation authority mapping. Free, fast and decisive for anything near an edge: TRCA, Credit Valley, Conservation Halton, Hamilton, Niagara Peninsula, Central Lake Ontario, Ganaraska, Lake Simcoe Region or Kawartha, depending on the shore.
• Status certificate or survey. A condominium needs the certificate read by a lawyer; a freehold lot needs a current survey that locates the water’s edge and top of bank.

One note for this shore: the ladder is geographic as well as financial. Each step up moves you east, from Hamilton through Stoney Creek and Burlington to Bronte and then Oakville proper, and each step east is a step closer to Toronto on the Lakeshore West GO line. A buyer deciding between a Stoney Creek house and a Burlington condominium at $900,000, or between a Roseland house and an Old Oakville one at $2.5 million, is choosing a commute as much as a lot. The estimator below will tell you what the home you own now puts toward any of them.

Where I fit

I work the whole western shore from Stoney Creek to Morrison, and the file I build for a buyer starts with which rung the budget really lands on and what the lake-facing addresses on it have actually sold for. Book a call, or run the estimator below on the home you own now.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• Ontario — Calculating land transfer tax (updated 22 April 2026) — marginal rates, $400,000 example
• Ontario — Land transfer tax refunds for first-time homebuyers — $4,000 maximum refund
• City of Toronto — Municipal Land Transfer Tax rates and fees (modified 7 April 2026) — tiers from 1 April 2026, 10% MNRST
• Financial Consumer Agency of Canada — Minimum down payment — 5% / 10% / 20% rules
• Department of Finance Canada, 16 Sept 2024 — Insured mortgage cap to $1.5 million — effective 15 Dec 2024
• OSFI — Minimum qualifying rate for uninsured mortgages — greater of contract + 2% or 5.25%
• Ontario — Non-Resident Speculation Tax — 25% since 25 Oct 2022
• CMHC — Prohibition on the Purchase of Residential Property by Non-Canadians Act — extended to 1 Jan 2027
• TRREB — Market Watch, August 2026 (released 3 Sept 2026) — monthly tables and HPI
• TRREB — Community Housing Market Report, Oakville, Q2 2026 — April–June 2026 community tables
• TRREB — Community Housing Market Report, Burlington, Q2 2026 — April–June 2026 community tables
• TRREB — Community Housing Market Report, Hamilton, Q2 2026 — April–June 2026 community tables
• Cornerstone Association of REALTORS® — August 2026 market update — Hamilton $670,600 and Burlington $875,700 composite benchmarks; CREA board page

Related reading

• Waterfront homes in the GTA: the complete guide
• Burlington lakefront homes: Roseland, Shoreacres and Lakeshore Road
• West Oakville lakefront homes: Bronte to Coronation Park
• Old Oakville lakefront homes
• Stoney Creek lakefront homes
• The Mississauga waterfront at every budget