Yorkville Condos, Homes and Real Estate

Officially, Yorkville is a part of the larger neighbourhood of The Annex, yet the area bordered roughly by Bloor in the south and Davenport in the north, and reaching east from Yonge to Avenue road has long had its own unique cachet — although not always the upscale image the name now invokes.

Founded in 1830 as a residential suburb of the Town of York, Yorkville was incorporated as a village in 1853 and just 30 years later became the first village annexed by the growing City of Toronto.

Life on the quiet back streets of Yorkville remained essentially unchanged over the next 80 years, as the city expanded far beyond the original village. By the 1960s, what began as a suburb was now located in a thriving city’s midtown, and the construction of the Bloor-Danforth subway would usher in the first great change in Yorkville’s identity.

Through the 60s and early 70s, Yorkville gained national attention — and notoriety — as a haven for hippies and folkies, centred primarily on Yorkville Avenue, where residences were converted to coffee houses. Names such as The Riverboat, Purple Onion, Mynah Bird and The Millwheel still resonate with a generation who flocked there to see some of the greatest names in folk music and blues. But other forces were ensuring that this change could not last.

The transition from bohemian playground to exclusive shopping district came courtesy of the city’s official plan, allowing higher densities as the east-west subway was completed. Land values increased and, in a short space of time, local retail along Bloor Street was replaced by office towers and major department stores, such as The Bay and Holt-Renfrew. Real estate values climbed steadily in the 1980s and 90s, spurring the purchase and conversion of the residential buildings along Yorkville Avenue and Cumberland.

With the introduction of high end retail stores, luxury hotels, fashion boutiques, art galleries, cafés and fine dining, Yorkville’s rebirth as the 3rd most expensive retail space in North America was complete. And yet, while today’s Yorkville owes its cachet to names like Prada, Gucci, Hugo Boss, Louis Vuitton, Harry Rosen and Holt Renfrew, the original residential village core remains just beyond the glitz and glam.

North of Yorkville Avenue, retail merges seamlessly into residential. Lovingly restored Yorkville homes on leafy side streets include some of the city’s best examples of picture-postcard Victorian architecture, but the selection also includes small worker’s cottages on McPherson, heritage homes on Hazelton, and a wide choice of older and new condos.

For Yorkville condos and Yorkville homes, “bargain” is strictly a relative term. On Macpherson, a tiny two-bedroom semi, with a small yard and no parking, will sell in the $600,000s. New condos on Yorkville and Bay offer some of Toronto’s priciest homes—remaining suites at the future Four Seasons complex (to be completed in 2012) start at $1.5 million. However, at a few older condo buildings on Yonge Street, a large but rather standard resale two-bedroom unit can fetch up to $500,000.

For current information on available listings for Yorkville condos, homes and real estate, please see the listings tab on this page. Listings are updated multiple times daily, so we recommend that you bookmark this page and check back frequently.