And the maintenance free-lifestyle enjoyed by owners in the community’s 84 units was a big part of the attraction.  “I wouldn’t necessarily look for it but I certainly embrace the lifestyle of it,” Ryan says. “Somebody shovels my driveway and cuts my grass.”

“Now we have to train them to pick up dog poop,” jokes sweetheart, T.J. But for this pair, buying into the condo lifestyle was a fluke.

In 2005 Pickford was renting when he decided to buy what would become his first home—and he wanted to do it right. “I looked at 50 houses,” Ryan says. “My real estate agent hated my guts.” Some might call him stubborn or terribly picky, but the 33-year-old says he was simply doing his due diligence. Unrealistic, perhaps, but he wanted “a mansion for under $200 Grand,” or at the very least, three bedrooms, two baths and a garage, he says. “I knew what I wanted and figured it was out there.”

His real estate agent found what Ryan had been looking for in his future home on a quiet cul-de-sac the very day it hit the market. And, four months after his search began, his patience finally paid off. “Originally, I was looking for a condo in my price range and I just happened to find a house that was a bareland condo in my price range,” Ryan says. “I was just sick of renting and decided to invest.”

As far as investments go, he says it’s been a sound one. The three-bedroom, two-bath, 2,300-square-foot house bought for $205,000, in today’s market would likely fetch $425,000. The newer house didn’t need renovations—although the couple replaced formerly laminate floors on the main floor with ceramic tiles and painted over “bile-yellow-and-navy blue” bedroom colour schemes to make the spaces their very own. They fell in love with the 20-foot ceiling in the front room, big windows and a sprawling kitchen. “It’s a good kitchen to entertain in, that’s why we put a couch in here,” T.J. says. “Every party ends up in the kitchen,” Ryan adds.

Albeit accidental, this pair of condo owners now counts themselves a couple of converts, along with resident canine Cooper and a nasty cat named Lucky.

T.J. is a sales rep for Billabong and Ryan does the same for Burton Snowboards, work which leaves little time for the typical homeowner chores—which in their case, for a $90-a-month fee, gets done by someone else. “We’re gone early, home late and would rather be riding dirt bikes in the summer than cutting the grass,” he explains. “Both of us are on the road so much it just wouldn’t get done.”

That’s not to say they’re slugs. The active couple takes advantage of bike paths outside their front door, often hits a nearby park where Cooper can swim, and regularly fires up the barbecue on the back deck with friends.

A $287 annual fee gives them access to the community centre a short walk away, where there’s a skating rink, paddle pool, basketball and tennis courts. As owners they can attend regular condo board meetings but they say the events are a bit too frustrating.

“I went to one but was so discouraged by the bickering, I kind of gave up on it,” Ryan says. “It’s always about parking and always someone with issues, who lives at the other end (of the community).”

For the most part, though, T.J. and Ryan agree their fellow residents, many of them young families, are another coup. “We have awesome neighbours and a great sense of community,” Ryan says. And many live there for similar lifestyle reasons to theirs, says Ryan. “Young people are getting lazier,” he muses. “We just want things handed to us.

“We spend nine to 12 hours a day in the office and when we have a weekend off we would much rather be riding a bike or having a beer—anything but cutting the grass.” As with all condominiums, there are rules, but the couple concedes they aren’t limiting. “They are pretty mellow,” Ryan notes.

Owners need approval to make changes to home, for instance and there are, of course, rules about where they can park, with visitors sequestered to a certain part of the street.

“It’s common sense things like you can’t park a beaten up truck on someone else’s lawn,” Ryan says. “I think there’s one where you have to put your pets on a leash, a reasonable rule we don’t have to follow,” T.J. jokes, only half-heartedly.

Still for T.J. and Ryan, living in a bareland condo is like having the best of both worlds. “I really like having a house that’s not attached to anybody, your own space, especially if you’re banging on the drums,” Ryan says.
And the location on the city’s northwest edge is ideal. “She was raised in Banff, so the rule was she had to see the mountains,” Ryan says.

“There were definitely some guidelines even though I didn’t do any of the looking,” says T.J., who was working in Edmonton when Ryan originally began house hunting.

Despite the perks, the couple says one downside of living in “the ’burbs” is the fact you have to get in the car to go anywhere. “I miss a small town, where, if you forget bread it takes you five minutes to walk back to the store or if you have a party night you don’t have to worry about driving,” T.J. says.

“Calgary is fine for now. Our lives are here, our work is here—but I don’t want to live in the suburbs forever.”

Photos by Don Molyneaux

The couple, who met after Ryan moved from Ontario to Banff to snowboard and hooked up after his sister “forced” them on a date five years ago, hope to one day settle elsewhere, but for now say where they are is the next best thing.
“Eventually you have to grow up and leave make-believe land,” Ryan says of the move to the city. Wherever they end up, they haven’t ruled out another condo in their future.

“Actually, it doesn’t really matter to me,” T.J. says. “She still wouldn’t cut the grass anyway,” Ryan adds.