How Does BurtonHicks Do It?

We help families break out of the rent trap and buy their own home with a “Long Term Agreement for the Sale of Land” – a traditional, secure way to purchase a house.

Let’s talk about everyday life.

If your rent is just $750/month, in 5 years you will have paid $45,000. Gone. If you’re paying $1,000/month, that adds up to $60,000! And if you think the last 5 years went fast, the next 5 will go even quicker.

So which would you rather do with $60,000?

Give it to a landlord?
Or put it toward your own home?

If you’re at all like most people, you’d rather have a house to show for it. One of our goals is to help families buy starter homes for about what they pay in rent to make it easier to go from renting to owning.

The problem is what it takes to get started:

House prices that seem to rise faster than income
Finding extra money to save for a down payment
The size of a down payment – which is increasing
The additional cost of CMHC mortgage insurance (Central Housing and Mortgage Corp.) required by most mortgage lenders
Past credit issues that make it difficult to be approved for a regular mortgage with a bank, trust company, credit union or other “primary lender”
“Alternative lenders” that will accept the “risk” but charge much higher interest, so payments are higher and take a lot longer to pay down the mortgage.

BurtonHicks lowers the barriers to buying a home

We help families get into starter homes that can easily increase.
We make the down payment very affordable – as low as $3,500 and up to $10,000*, subject to credit history.
We offer interest rates that are as good as the banks’.
We work with motivated people that just need a way to get started.

* You’ll need to factor in the normal costs such as house insurance, property and land transfer taxes, lawyers’ fees and utilities.

Two ways to buy a home

Usually people buy a house in this sequence:

Get a mortgage
Buy the house
Move in
Make house payments.

BurtonHicks changes it up and makes it easier

Move in
Make house payments
Get a mortgage
Buy the house.

The Key: A Long Term Agreement for the Sale of Land

BurtonHicks sells homes with a Long Term Agreement for the Sale of Land, and here’s how it works:

You sign an Agreement with us now, to buy the house in the future – you give us a small down payment, we provide the financing for the house.
You move in now and make regular house payments to BurtonHicks like a mortgage payment – at rates similar to the banks.
Under the Agreement, the price of the house is fixed – it will not go up, even as the market continues to rise.
As the exclusive buyer in the Agreement, you can move in right away and treat it like your own … because it will be!
No one else can buy your home, and we can’t sell to anyone else, while it’s under the Agreement.
After a while (usually within 5 years) some of your loan’s principal has been paid down, your home’s market value has gone up**, and you’ve established a pattern of consistent payments – so you have both equity and a credit record to get a regular bank mortgage.
We complete the Agreement and transfer the title to you when you pay BurtonHicks for the house with that bank mortgage.

** No one can guarantee that the real estate market will go up, or that the value of your specific house will increase, but this is generally what happens. Certainly over the long term.

In summary, the BurtonHicks purchase Agreement is a way of spreading out the process of buying a home over several years, with a small down payment – we give you the financing to buy your home from BurtonHicks, at a guaranteed price, with payments structured to “feel like rent”. BurtonHicks uses this type of Agreement for buying and selling a home because it’s traditional and proven – it’s just a bit different. BurtonHicks will pay you an agreed amount for you to get independent legal advice from your lawyer so you are confident about what the Agreement says and how it works. If you have questions, please take a look at our Frequently Asked Questions page, or call us toll-free at (855) 393-5055.