Time spent saving paid off in the form of a new Savanna duplex for Amandeep Khaira

Amandeep Khaira loves her five-year-old daughter Jannat with all her heart. So providing her with a safe and cozy home was at the top of the priority list when the 32-year-old, single mom moved to Canada from India three years ago. She scrimped and saved, and in July, she took possession of her first home – a three-bedroom, two-storey duplex in Savanna, a new section of the northeast community of Saddle Ridge. It was a dream come true.

Thriving community of Sunnyside is beloved by residents and developers alike

A community with an undeniable entrepreneurial and artistic character, Sunnyside is a place where anything can happen, and often does. Together with its western neighbour, Hillhurst, it makes up the funky, inner-city village known as Kensington, with its inspired restaurants and popular watering holes.

Events like the annual summer-time favourite Harry Potter Festival frequently transform the streets. During the Harry Potter Festival, muggles and wizards alike can try on a wand for size or flip through a "Marauder's Map" at Flourish & Blotts (the one-day only rebrand of Pages Bookstore), have tea leaves read, or scoot across town by departing from platform nine and three-quarters at the Sunnyside CTrain station.

Highland Park reimagining could invigorate northwest community 

The former Highland Golf Course in northwest Calgary could be host to a new kind of activity in the form of a major redevelopment.

Developer Maple Projects Inc. recently shared plans for its "reimagining" of the 21-hectare site – which would include up to 2,100 housing units as well as a commercial development along Centre Street N. – at an open house which drew, among others, members of the local community association, who believe the development could provide a boost to the area.

"Absolutely, it can be a huge benefit for the community,"

"Absolutely, it can be a huge benefit for the community," said Paul Engler, chair of the development committee for the Highland Park Community Association. "We are looking very much forward to it. We are working with the developer to come up with something that's awesome for them, for our future neighbours and for our existing neighbours."

Alternative forms of transportation dominates headlines in 2015

Joe Starkman was contemplating buying a car for his daughter while she attended university in Halifax. To his surprise, she wasn't interested.

"That twigged us," said Starkman, president of Knightsbridge Homes, the builder behind N3 in East Village, Calgary's first carless condo. "We started to do some research, and our research showed there's a market in that Generation Y demographic for which car ownership is not a priority.

"We're not trying to change the world, we're just responding to a world that's changing."

As city plans next phase, new study reveals light-rail transit has positive effect on property prices

Light-rail transit could boost the value of your home. At least that's the general finding of a new study from the University of Calgary.

According to new research obtained exclusively by CREB®Now and completed by Economics master's degree student Laura Dick, LRT line development has had a modestly positive effect on the price of housing located close to stations along new lines in Calgary.

"Properties within zero to 500 metres of a station saw, on average, an increase in sales price of about 1.5 per cent compared to properties that are 2,000 metres or more away from a station," said Dick, whose recently completed work is still to be published in an academic journal.

With Ward 12 Coun. Shane Keating pushing for provincial funding, Calgary's proposed Green Line is beginning to take small steps forward. Already having received a $1.53-billion commitment from the federal government, and city council already agreeing to fund their share, the push is on to get an application into the Province in time for the spring budget.

With that time fast approaching, CREB®Now digs into some of the facts and figures surrounding the proposed line.

New feature to join Walk Score on REALTOR.ca

Transit Score will now be made available on select listings on REALTOR.ca, the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) announced recently.

The national real estate agency said the addition is in response to a "demographic and socioeconomic shift toward sustainable transportation." It also noted that in a 2013 Nanos survey, 59 per cent of respondents indicated that the Transit Score would be valuable when assessing listings on REALTOR.ca.

The addition of the Transit Score coincides with the change in the implementation of the already popular Walk Score. Both scores will now be positioned in the new "Walk Score + Directions" tab, rather than at the bottom of the listing details page.

How Calgary is contributing to low-carbon living

It's a number so big, it's hard to comprehend: $17 trillion US.

According to the New Climate Economy report released by the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, that's how much cities worldwide could realize in direct energy savings by 2050 by investing in low-carbon technologies. This includes public transportation, efficiency in building design and waste management.

Is such a target obtainable?

In 2014, the City of Calgary spent $140 million on energy, just for its own facilities, "to keep our pools warm, our street lights on and our LRTs moving," said Arsheel Hirji, leader of sustainable infrastructure with the City.

How Calgary fits into parties' promises

As part of the build-up to the upcoming federal election, the City of Calgary has published a new edition of its Cities Matter survey.

Since 2011, Mayor Naheed Nenshi (on behalf of Council and the City) has surveyed candidates and parties during provincial elections to better understand their positions on municipal issues.

CREB®Now delves into some of the issues surrounding Calgary and the responses provided by Canada's major political parties.

Analysis shows inner-city real estate prices uneffected by LRT

Since 1981, the CTrain has transformed how Calgarians get around town.

Yet what impact has the city's light-rail transit system had on property values?

And do they truly become selling features when buying or selling homes?

An analysis of inner-city communities along the West LRT line, which opened in December 2012, show average benchmark home prices reported by CREB® in neighbourhoods such as Spruce Cliff and Killarney saw increases on par with communities not immediately adjacent to the line such as Altadore and South Calgary.