Television series about home buying are a dime a dozen, but Buying the View takes the genre to new, unexplored heights. Debuting on W Network with two back-to-back episodes on Tuesday, the program focuses on properties with killer vistas, whether that be the water, mountains or the city.
“It’s a catch-22 in a city like Toronto,” says Jay Egan, who works out of Toronto’s Forest Hill Real Estate. “In Vancouver the view is never going to change, but in Toronto your property better be 40 storeys or more because of the redevelopment that goes on. Your client is relying on you to find something where the view isn’t going to change.” Egan is one of a handful of realtors charged with finding the perfect plot for their clients in episodes that jet to Whistler, B.C., Miami, Manhattan, Toronto, Oakville, Ont., the Niagara and Muskoka regions of Ontario and Vancouver.Â
Tuesday’s debut stop is in Whistler, where a couple yearns for a home that ticks everything on their list, including being able to lay eyes on water, mountains and a glacier. Egan, meanwhile, first appears in Episode 6, helping Vancouver father Mark find a Toronto property he can use during business trips east and for his daughter, Julia, to stay in while she’s at university. Mark’s budget? A cool $10 million thanks to a successful career in the gold industry. In the running are three prime locations, including a spot in tony Yorkville and a condo in the Trump International Hotel & Tower. The trio have one thing in common: killer views of the city. Of course, part of the fun of watching Buying the View is trying to figure out which location the clients will pick, and Mark and Julia’s choice might surprise.
Egan, who is in the midst of hunting down a first home for his daughter, became slotted into the niche market of high-end home sales because his clientele trends that way due to referrals. He appears in two more Season 1 instalments, unveiling properties in Southern Ontario.
“These are very different properties because the clients are looking for different things,” he says. “In both of those episodes, the wife wants a house and the husband wants a condo, so we go back and forth on that. People want everything, and that’s truly possible.”
Buying the View airs Tuesdays at 10 p.m. ET/PT on W Network.