The president of the home builders' association in Brantford and Brant County says local trends somewhat reflect a recent nationwide, Royal Bank survey that found an increase in the number of people planning to buy a new house.
While he feels the main reason is that people want to lock-in mortgages at current low interest rate levels, Kevin Fergin says another reason is the 13-percent "Harmonized Sales Tax" which will take effect in this province on July 1st.
Meantime, Fergin and his fellow association members are expecting a very good spring for single family home starts, and possibly another surge later in the year when the impact of the "H-S-T" is better known.
.
C-T-T On The Road
With the goal of promoting Waterloo Region, officials of "Canada's Technology Triangle" have joined the "Ontario Technology Corridor" caravan which is touring California.
This week's tour will make stops in Los Angeles and San Francisco.
The "C-T-T" representatives will be touting Waterloo Region's advances in the digital media sector to animation, special effects, and video game companies in California.
.
Visible Minority Shake-Up
Some startling demographic forecasting from Statistics Canada.
The federal agency says that Caucasians will become a visible minority in Toronto and Vancouver by the year 2031.
Stats Can projects that by then, nearly 14-1/2-million residents of this country will be considered visible minorities, which would be one-third of the nation's population.
.
Scotiabank Close To Joining Billion Dollar Club
Another one of our big banks has exceeded earnings expectations in its latest quarterly report.
Scotiabank earned close to one-billion dollars during its most recent quarter, which was up seventeen-percent from the corresponding three month period from last year.
While "The Royal" was the sole exception, the big banks have reported profits ahead of what analysts had forecast for the last quarter.
.
1380 Sports
N-H-L........A shocker in Washington as the Dallas Stars---0-and-3 since the Olympics break--- rallied from a 2-0 deficit in the third period to edge the Capitals 4-3 in a shootout, snapping the Caps' four game winning streak and ending their string of fourteen home victories. The Stars' Marty Turco made a career high 49 saves, although he was beaten twice by Capitals' star, Alex Ovechkin....In last night's only other game, the Los Angeles Kings ended a three game losing slide by rolling 6-0 over the struggling Columbus Blue Jackets.
Meantime, the N-H-L's thirty general managers seem no closer to a solution to reduce the incidence of "head shots" than when they began their annual meetings in Boca Raton, Florida. But, in day two of their gathering they'll break up into smaller groups to further discuss "head shots" and other issues. Their challenge is to cut down on the number of concussions while maintaining the physical nature of the game.
CURLING......At the Tim Horton's Brier in Halifax, Glen Howard's Ontario rink had wins over New Brunswick and Nova Scotia to improve its first place record to 5-and-0. Kevin Koe of Alberta is second at 4-and-1......Meantime, at the world junior championships in Switzerland, Rachel Homan's foursome has a perfect 5-and-0 record to share first place on the women's side with Sweden.....and....on the men's side, Jake Walker's rink has a 3-and-1 record, and shares top spot with five other teams.
EXHIBITION BASEBALL......The Toronto Blue Jays cruised to a 4-1 victory over the Houston Astros, and improved their pre-season record to 5-and-1.
