Thinking of buying a new home? You may not be alone in your thoughts.

According to the BMO Housing Confidence Report, nearly half of Canadian homeowners intend to buy a property in the next five years signalling a high level of confidence in the housing market.

Despite reports of a cooling down in market, in our eastern Ontario neighbourhood 'For Sale' signs are popping up everywhere. The houses are only staying on the market a few weeks -- if that.

It seems that everyone on our street is catching the moving bug after witnessing their next-door-neighbours packing up and heading for larger homes in desirable neighbourhoods.

Most homebuyers shopping in a choppy market are taking their time. But, if you're in the minority of people who have a deadline - because of an impending birth or a new job - this environment offers both opportunities and challenges.

Some people who move too quickly are motivated by timing pressures related to relocation, while others worry they'll be living with their parents because they've sold their home a bit faster than expected.

But the bigger issue is often with stressed sellers who are simply too anxious to get out in a hurry.

When a homeowner is desperate to sell and a buyer is ready to fork over the cash, the truth about a house is often swept under the rug, experts suggest.

Smoking is not only bad for your health but it's also bad for your house.

According to a new survey, smoking in your home can lower it's resale value.

In fact, it can lower the property value by up to 29 per cent. And, based on an average Canadian house price of $378,532, that's a loss of over $109,000.

Is there an ideal price tag attached to the dream of home ownership?

Well, first-time homebuyers in Canada think so. In fact, they are zooming in on the $300,000 price range when looking for a new house.

And, they plan on putting down about 16 per cent ($48,000), according to a new BMO First-Time Home Buyer's Report.

All of us carry sets of numbers in our heads that, without us realizing it, can weigh down our decisions.

One of the more common behavioral mistakes we make when it comes to investment decisions is the tendency to anchor to a certain value or price, says Carl Richards, author of The Behavior Gap: Simple Ways to Stop Doing Dumb Things with Money.

You pay $500,000 for your home, and a few years later you need to sell it. Well, you're damned sure you're going to get at least what you paid for it. Ok.

Sales of existing homes in Canada fell again last month, the Canadian Real Estate Association announced today, one more example that Canada’s runaway housing market is slumping.

What’s more interesting, however, is that actual sales for December, while not seasonally adjusted, were off 17.4% from a year earlier. That's quite a drop, given that interest rates remain essentially unchanged over the period. 

But rates don't matter if you can't get a mortgage in the first place.

It seems that Finance Minister Flaherty’s latest round of rule changes, which included cutting the maximum length of insured mortgages to 25 years from 30, may be making even more of a dent than expected.

Remember all that talk of a pending crash or, at the very least, a pending slowdown in Canada's housing market?

Finally, after much speculation, it's here. According to Royal LePage, a reduction in home sales will hit Canada in for the first half of 2013 -- a mild, brief slump, but a slump all the same.

Of course, all this is for the peasants.

Because when it's time to discuss the nation's million-dollar homes, the market's hot, hot, hot across the country.

Nearly four years ago, when I started on this very blog, the prevailing money story of the day was the Toronto housing market, which was so bloated it would burst any minute.

Specifically, we were talking the city’s condo market. Dubai was still the city most synonymous with construction cranes, but Toronto was getting there.

The question, even then, was: who’s buying these things?

As 2012 comes to a close, visitors to Toronto will notice the cranes haven’t left, and in fact they’ve grown in numbers, making Canada’s largest city the skyscraper capital of the western world.

What's your property worth? Well, according to the Municipal Property Assessment Corp., likely a bit more than you think.

Ontario property owners can expect to start seeing MPAC assessment notices in the mail any day now, as 2013 marks the beginning of another four-year property assessment cycle.

If your home’s value has increased since the last assessment in 2008, that jump will be phased in equally over four years. If it's dropped in value, the change will be recognized immediately, however.

You can check your assessment here, at www.aboutmyproperty.ca. and compare the value of your  property to others in their neighbourhood and community.

Don't like what you see? Well, let MPAC know.

Canada’s real estate market isn’t sizzling – despite strong recent numbers, home sales and prices dropped in June – but for it all its sluggishness, America’s got it much worse.

The U.S. housing sector is still a place where you can buy a home for the price of a Prius, but what does it all mean at the ground level?

For the average Canadian and American consumer, rough real estate means a tough go in selling your home, yes, but it also means a severe recalculation of your net worth.

At the end of it, here’s the news: for the first time in history, Canadians appear to be richer than their American neighbours.