Discover the picturesque communities of North Vancouver with me, Jacquie McCarnan, as I share the delightful nooks and crannies of this coastal city. From the serene waterfront of Deep Cove to the post-war charm of Norgate, we'll explore the distinct personality of each neighbourhood. Imagine waking up to the sight of kayakers in Deep Cove or the breathtaking views from the high market-value homes in Roche Point and Raven Woods. And if community spirit is what you're after, wait until you hear about the tight-knit residents of Blue Ridge and the Windsor secondary school catchment area. Whether you're considering a move or just love hearing about uniquely beautiful places, this episode is your personal tour guide to North Vancouver's lifestyle and housing gems.
As our journey unfolds, the diversity of North Vancouver's neighbourhoods comes to life, from the varied housing options in lower and central Lonsdale to the industrial chic and recreational blend of the Harbourside area. I'll also reveal my special connection to Pemberton Heights, a community treasure with an endearing local hill and a sense of belonging that's hard to find. If you're curious about the real estate landscape, the final chapter of this auditory stroll provides a no-strings-attached invitation to get your questions answered. So, lace up your most comfortable shoes, and let's step into the vibrant tapestry that is North Vancouver—a place where every street has a story waiting for you to discover.
Discover the picturesque communities of North Vancouver with me, Jacquie McCarnan, as I share the delightful nooks and crannies of this coastal city. From the serene waterfront of Deep Cove to the post-war charm of Norgate, we'll explore the distinct personality of each neighbourhood. Imagine waking up to the sight of kayakers in Deep Cove or the breathtaking views from the high market-value homes in Roche Point and Raven Woods. And if community spirit is what you're after, wait until you hear about the tight-knit residents of Blue Ridge and the Windsor secondary school catchment area. Whether you're considering a move or just love hearing about uniquely beautiful places, this episode is your personal tour guide to North Vancouver's lifestyle and housing gems.
As our journey unfolds, the diversity of North Vancouver's neighbourhoods comes to life, from the varied housing options in lower and central Lonsdale to the industrial chic and recreational blend of the Harbourside area. I'll also reveal my special connection to Pemberton Heights, a community treasure with an endearing local hill and a sense of belonging that's hard to find. If you're curious about the real estate landscape, the final chapter of this auditory stroll provides a no-strings-attached invitation to get your questions answered. So, lace up your most comfortable shoes, and let's step into the vibrant tapestry that is North Vancouver—a place where every street has a story waiting for you to discover.
Hey everybody, welcome back to Keeping it Real, the Vancouver and area residential real estate podcast that aims to keep it real. My name is Jackie McCarnon and I am your host for Keeping it Real. I am a North Vancouver, west Vancouver, downtown Vancouver kind of all over the lower mainland and Squamish residential realtor of all over the Lower Mainland and Squamish residential realtor. On most of these episodes I include a disclaimer saying that all the stuff you hear is my research and my opinion, but in this case it's all fact. You'll see why in a second. I'm currently coming off the great high of last week's episode, because last week's episode was a true crime one and it had more downloads than all my other episodes put together. So I guess I know now what you guys want to hear. But I can't really do every single episode on true crime, so I have to break it up.
Speaker 1:
So this week's episode I'm going to talk to you a little bit about some of the neighborhoods in North Vancouver. There are a whole bunch of them and they all have their own pros and cons and I just I put it out there to my Facebook group and people suggested that this is something that other people might want to know about North Vancouver. Even if you live here, you might want to know more about each of the neighbourhoods. So, without further ado, here's this week's episode, alrighty? So if you don't know, north Vancouver is actually made up of two municipalities the District of North Vancouver and the City of North Vancouver. And even though they sound alike, they are not all that much alike. There's a whole lot of differences.
Speaker 1:
So I thought what we would do is we would start with our most easterly hamlet, I guess, neighborhood. It's called Deep Cove and if you're looking at a map it's kind of east but also kind of north. It's confusing. But anyway, deep Cove is on the water. It's absolutely stunning. There's this great park called Kate's Park there. It's really big. You can go and rent kayaks there. You can rent kayaks down in Deep Cove itself at Deep Cove Kayak Center, which is owned by a friend of mine. It's honestly, it's absolutely gorgeous.
Speaker 1:
You can get a house in Deep Cove. Well, actually in Indian Arm you could get a house for under $500,000, but it would be boat access only. There's one there that's 300 square feet, six bedrooms and two baths. It's on leasehold but it's got oh, and it's off grid, so the hits keep coming, but $500,000, not bad right. A couple other really cool things about Deep Cove are Corrie Rock, which is this great hike. It was closed almost the entire time through the pandemic, which was awful for those people who absolutely love to hike there, and I'm sure some of the locals snuck in there.
Speaker 1:
Honey's Donuts super famous place where you get some dough. That's mostly sugar and dough and it's deep fried and it's honestly god's gift to pastry. It's just unbelievable. And a lot of times you'll see celebrities who post about um being to honey's donuts, which is kind of fun. I, um, I'm always very excited when I see one of those.
Speaker 1:
Uh, the the problem with deep cove is that there's really only one road in Okay spoiler, the road is called Deep Cove Road and because of that in the summer months it's really really busy. There's the Deep Cove Marina, which is up and around the corner, but to get there is kind of it's almost a single lane road because cars are parked on each side the whole way along it. It's really very, very busy in the summer. That's because it's an absolute playground in the summer. So if you're thinking about buying a deep cove, it's expensive. In my opinion it's worth it because it's really beautiful. Possibly it rains a little bit more than most of the other neighborhoods because the further east you go, the more it rains. But if you're considering Deep Cove there's a mix of single family homes and condos and townhomes and it's honestly it's stunning, amazing, beautiful. I love it there.
Speaker 1:
If you drive along Dollerton Highway, well, deep Cove Road becomes Dollerton Highway. If you drive along Dollerton Highway back toward the main part of North Vancouver, up on the hill is an area called Roche Point and part of that area is Ravenswood. And Ravenswood is this huge development that is on Indigenous land and it is on a 99 year lease, which you would think would make it lower than market market value. But, um, it's not really. The places in there are pretty expensive, um, you know, still like we're looking at between six and $900 a square foot, um, but I mean, the view is incredible. You're kind of you can sneak back through the back and go over to the Seymour area. I don't know, it's kind of a deep cove or well, deep cove adjacent, but also like North Van lifestyle, beautiful place to live. Everybody there has a bike, probably a kayak, paddleboard, all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1:
Moving in a little closer to civilization, I guess, is the Blue Ridge community, which is just this absolutely beautiful area kind of up above Seymour Parkway and the school catchment. There is Windsor, which is the high school, and then there are a bunch of really great elementary schools around. Same with Deep Cove they have. Deep Cove has a tiny little um high school called seacove, which is just adorable. Um, but lots of kids go to windsor as well, which is a beautiful school with a soccer dome. It's honestly gorgeous. But, um, most of blue ridge was built in the 80s. It's got a great community. They even have like a community, um, like website, facebook page. It's really cool. Um, I have a fun fact about deep cove. So, or, I mean sorry, blue Ridge, uh, it's um, you can get to Blue Ridge from Lynn Valley If you go over twin bridges which I don't know 2015 or so 2016, and got washed out, so they had to build a new bridge.
Speaker 1:
But my girlfriend and I were mountain biking in Lynn Valley and we wanted to go over to Seymour, so we went over there and it was pouring rain. We thought we would do something pretty chill. And she said let's do bridal path. And in my head when I heard bridal, I thought, you know, bride and groom, bride like a wedding, kind of like something nice and pretty, but really it's spelled B-R-I-D-L-E, so horse and rider. So anyway, this mountain bike trail is honestly much more suited to horses than mountain bikes, in my opinion, because I went over the handlebars, yeah, and I hit a rock and it was awful. I mean, I rode out and it wasn't that bad, but uh, and also it was, you know, just proof that I was not the best mountain biker. Alrighty, let's just continue on our journey.
Speaker 1:
So you go along, uh, seymour Parkway and you end up in kind of the Lower Lynn Valley area which is near Fibbs Exchange, which is the big bus exchange in North Vancouver which makes this area Lower Lynn Valley. I think we're going to call it developer's heaven. And if you haven't been to North Van in a while, you will be surprised at the number of buildings that are now very close to that Fibs Exchange. In the last six, seven, eight years we've seen about 1,300 new units built in that Lower Lynn Valley area. That's where most of the density is for the district, and if you go back to one of my older episodes on the new provincial legislation, you'll know that they're allowing even more density in there. So I think we are probably going to see some more buildings be able to. I think they can build up to well. One of them is 29 stories, one's 32 stories. The apex is 32 stories with 276 units. So this is where, if you're going to live in the district and you want to live in an apartment, a condo, this is probably where you're going to go for the most part. They're between $950 and $1,300 per square foot, which is, you know, pretty much covers all of the lower mainland or between those numbers pretty much, although there are some areas that are considerably higher than that and some that are a little bit lower. If we stay south of the highway and we keep moving west, we're going to hit Moodyville. There's lots of density in Moodyville too, and there's been a lot of building here in the last several years.
Speaker 1:
I think the OCP redevelopment plan was really well. Originally it called for 1500 new homes between St Patrick's and Queensbury and along Keith Road, and they've definitely been working hard to hit those targets because there's a lot of density there. All you have to do is drive along 3rd and you're going to see so much new building. Lovely, this is part of the city, so the city of North Bend. The plan was, I think, to tidy up that area east of Lower Lonsdale with a mix of multifamily housing options, retail, parkland, and I think they did a really good job of that and we even have our own ale trail there now. So if you, if you're down kind of along Esplanade or First, you're going to see a ton of little microbreweries, which is very cool, very popular with young families. So you still have single family homes kind of north of Esplanade and east of Lonsdale, but definitely more and more we're seeing less and less industrial and more and more residential along there.
Speaker 1:
The only problem with having young family down there in lower Lonsdale, in that area of Moodyville, is that there aren't many schools. There's Ridgeway, which is kind of Grand Boulevard, which is further east, but not a ton of schools, and the closest high school is Carson, which is not really that close to anything. So if you have a kid you'll be driving them to school for sure. Which brings us to Lower Lonsdale, which is the heart of the city of North Vancouver. You see a lot of younger people here, like before they have kids. There's a lot of younger people here before they have kids. There's a lot of density here.
Speaker 1:
I think it's one of only a few places on the North Shore that has waterfront available. So we have Victory Shipyards, which is a big development that's right on the water. You can walk everywhere. It's really attractive to people who are downsizing out of the family home and want a condo with some nice amenities. The cool thing about lots of the buildings down by Victory Ship is that they get to share in the Pinnacle Hotel amenities, which is I don't even know how to explain it. I should put up a picture for you. It's stunning Like you look out over the North Van shipyards, the Seabus terminal, which doesn't sound nice, but it actually is really pretty, and then you look into the harbor, which is stunning, and you see across to the lights of the city. Lolo is that's the nickname. Lolo is absolutely beautiful.
Speaker 1:
Super fun fact about this part of town is that just a little bit west of Lower Lonsdale is the Mosquito Creek Marina and in there they have float homes. Some are boat sheds that have homes built into them and some are legit float homes. Now, uh, some of those float homes, which are beautiful, don't get me wrong Absolutely stunning. They're over a million dollars, like one and a half, I think, and uh, there's no land. So I'm I don't know. It depends on who you are and what you want. Uh, I think it would be pretty cool to live in a float home, or, but a boat shed would be kind of cool too, especially if you get the boat with it. There's one for sale right now where you get the boat, and it's only $200,000. So hit me up if you want to take a look at that one.
Speaker 1:
I want to backtrack just a little bit. Go back east a little bit, to where the new developments are on 3rd in Moodyville, because if you take a drive along 3rd Avenue in North Vancouver toward Moody, you will see that there are a couple of homes nestled between new development, a couple of really old homes, and I used to think, oh, I wonder if those people were just holding out for a better price from the developer. But it turns out that the big greenhouse that you will see that's very visible is called the Clapham Residence. It was built in 1912, and it has Heritage A status, which means it can't be torn down. It's owned by the Unitarian Church, or was owned by the Unitarian Church, but it was sold in 2023. The property is protected from destruction by city bylaw and it must have been a bit of a drag for the developer who was able to buy up all the land around it and then have to build around it. And it looks kind of weird when you go down there.
Speaker 1:
I mean, they did a great job, it's lovely, but still, I mean, what do you think? Do you think we should keep the old heritage homes? Some of them are falling into disrepair. This one is not. This one seems like it's in pretty good shape, but what do you guys think? Do you think we should keep them or should they be torn down to make room for more density? I'm on the fence.
Speaker 1:
If you move north from lower Lonsdale, you're going to get into the central Lonsdale area and the closer you are to Lonsdale, the more density you're going to see. But as we move both east and west, away from Lonsdale a couple of blocks, we start to see more single family homes or more townhomes or even duplexes and triplexes, so it's a whole mix of housing available there. Again, the school's not very close to any of this stuff. I guess if you're in central Lonsdale around 22nd, you'd be pretty close to Carson Graham High School. But if you're I don't know if you're east of Lonsdale, your kids are walking. And kids don't do that these days as far as I can tell. I mean, at least my kids didn't. I used to have to drive them to elementary school and high school, and the elementary school was no word of a lie. I could have thrown a rock and hit it. It was probably 500 meters Not that I can throw a rock 500 meters, but it was very, very close, but I still had to drive the kid there.
Speaker 1:
Once I started doing this episode, I realized I was going to have to break it up a bit. So I'm only going to do two more North Vancouver neighborhoods on this podcast and then I will do some more on another one, and I'm going to stay south of the highway and I'm going to take you guys over to Harborside. So Harborside is this weird little area that you kind of. You go west along 3rd which dips down, and then you go over a bridge and you're in the Harborside area of North Vancouver and for a very long time Harborside was a couple of buildings, an international school for students, thomas Haas, chocolates.
Speaker 1:
Go there, but only if you don't care about how much weight you gain. Also, their coffee is very good, but there was very industrial down there. So there are lots of um, like. There's a tag cycling and lots of physio places and there's a um uh, spa utopia, which is spectacular, and there's a dog park, which is weird because the dog park is on the water, like in the most beautiful. It's a beautiful dog park, although I can't take my dog there cause she bites little dogs. Well, it's a beautiful dog park, although I can't take my dog there because she bites little dogs. Well, that's a podcast for another day.
Speaker 1:
Anyway, harborside, their company built North Harbor Development, which is absolutely stunning. Several phases of this. If you drive down there you'll see that I believe phase one is well, well underway. Phase two is underway. I'm not exactly I haven't driven down there in a little bit, but these units are spectacularly beautiful. Even their display suite was incredible. They had a really cool electronic display where you could show how the light hits particular units so that you could pick out your unit for pre-sale. It was an amazing building and it's going to have a lot of development down there. But they're going to put in some retail and some other amenities there, which makes that North Harbor development just really attractive to people. It's not cheap because it is one of the only places in North Vancouver, next to Victory Ship, where you can have a house on the water, a condo on the water, so I think you know a penthouse. There is a lot, I'm not even going to venture to guess. I can't remember the prices, and they've probably changed since the last time I checked. Continuing west.
Speaker 1:
We run into this great little community called Norgate, which I actually kind of love. Norgate is made up exclusively almost exclusively anyway of ranchers that were built after the Second World War to house the men coming home from the Second World War who were working in the shipyards, because there was a big boom in the 50s, lots of work, and these were smaller homes. They were never meant to be permanent homes, so they were put up quickly. They all look similar. They're all flat lots. They're around 1,700 square feet. The beauty is, though, that because they're a bunch of little homes on smaller lots, there are lots of families there and there's a great little school, norgate School. It's a very quiet neighborhood. I would suggest you have your map open on your display, because it's pretty easy to get lost in Norgate, or at least get turned around, because even though it's grid, oftentimes the streets end with no warning and I have been stuck in there for a while. I really do like Norgate, though it's almost like the ignored middle child of the North Shore. The houses tend to be a little bit less expensive, but mostly because they're small and the lots are smaller. But if you are looking for and actually I've seen lots of houses there put in a suite, you know, I think eventually you're going to be able to put in. You know, given the new provincial mandate, you could probably put in a couple of units there. I guess time's going to tell if there's enough space on those lots. But Norgate's great. I love it. It's very cute and you can walk almost anywhere. You have, you know, you have really great access to all the restaurants and amenities on Marine Drive and also they have a wicked nice field. So that's, that's Norgate.
Speaker 1:
I'm going to finish this episode up with Pemberton Heights. Pemberton Heights is near and dear to my heart and there are people who have lived in North Vancouver for 10 years who don't even know how to get to Pemberton Heights. I love it. Well, I mean, I'm biased because I live in Pemberton Heights. The houses here are gorgeous. There is a mix of beautiful, updated, spectacular, architecturally designed homes and you know Vancouver specials almost there are some ranchers and the thing with Pemberton Heights is that it's relatively flat. There's one hill which is great for hill repeats if you're a runner. I am not any longer a runner, so I am not on that hill, but there's lots.
Speaker 1:
It's just a really pretty neighborhood and I would encourage you to take a drive through Pemberton Heights, but just don't tell anybody where it is, where you found it. I think I'll cut the tour off there because we haven't even got to the district, although Pemberton Heights is in the district, but we haven't really got to the district, like Canyon Heights and Forest Hills and Edgemont and Lynn Valley and Upper Lonsdale and Delbrook and yeah anyway. So we haven't really covered those ones. But I'm going to do that in another episode. But I'd be really interested to hear what you love about your neighborhood if you live in North Vancouver and if you do not live in North Vancouver, tell me which one of these sounds best to you. Let's go find you a place. All right, even though I said that I didn't want you guys to come to Pemberton Heights.
Speaker 1:
I do feel like I should promote the restaurant that is here. It used to be called the Cornerstone Bistro and I do think that they have kept that name, but I could be wrong, but it's still on the sign. Cornerstone Bistro was a really cute little place, but it was purchased by a Mexican restaurant and they now have taco nights. I think they're Tuesday nights, which makes sense, taco Tuesday but on Thursday nights they have kept up the tradition of the Cornerstone by having live bands, which is amazing. So live local bands play in there and the neighborhood is filled with music and it happens all year long. But in the summer it's the best because they can open up the side of the building and, oh my gosh, it's so much fun, it's so nice and it's all over by like 930, which is perfect for a little bedroom community of Pembroke Heights.
Speaker 1:
As always, I like to share a little bit of you know what I've been doing Sounds a little narcissistic to say it that way, but so look, my daughter, who is 25, started watching Dexter with her boyfriend and she won't shut up about it. First of all, she loves murder podcasts, which was why I was inspired to do a murder podcast last week, but also once she started talking about Dexter, I remembered how much I liked it. So I have started rewatching it and, wow, does it ever hold up, you guys? Ah, so good If you need something to binge, I think there are six or eight seasons of Dexter, and then there's the sequel too, which is even cooler, which came out in 2020. Just really enjoyed the series the first time and I am really enjoying it the second time. So check out Dexter. It's on Netflix, so I think that's probably where all this came from. It's recently been added to Netflix, I guess. Anyway, I hope you like it as much as I do.
Speaker 1:
Well, that's it for me for this week. Thanks again for tuning in. You can get Keeping it Real on Spotify or anywhere. You get your podcasts or you can get it at NorthVanHomeSalescom slash podcasts and if you have any real estate questions, just hit me up. I'm always here to answer any questions you have. There's no, you don't become my client the second we pick up the phone, so we can just chat anytime. Give me a call.