Kathryn Ivy has fond memories of the time she spent with her parents and her four siblings at their family cottage on Minnicock Lake, Ont., in the ’80s and ’90s. “We’d go every weekend and all summer,” says Kathryn. But as the years passed, the cottage upkeep became difficult—and costly—to manage. They sold in 2000. “We were heartbroken,” says Kathryn. “We loved that cottage.”
After having her first child in 2018, Kathryn yearned for her family to have the same cottage experience she did. So she rented cottages on Minnicock Lake with Sarah, one of her sisters. The duo contemplated buying a place together, but at the time, they were priced out.
In 2022, after the sisters had saved up more money for a down payment, they revisited their cottage-buying dream. Sarah had also had her first child and, like Kathryn, wanted them to experience life on the lake. They sought a waterfront spot with three bedrooms, one bathroom, and kid-friendly lake access. They agreed on a budget of $350,000 for an off-grid cottage and $500,000 for a place with electricity. Location-wise, they wanted to be within a three-hour drive from Toronto, where Kathryn and her husband, Patrick, live. Sarah and her husband, Josh, are based in the Arctic where they work as teachers, spending their summers in Ontario.
Kathryn took the lead on viewing properties, video calling Sarah and Josh during her walk-throughs. Sometimes the sisters’ parents would join. By April 2024, Kathryn had viewed ten properties, four of which the sisters unsuccessfully bid on. “We were starting to feel a little desperate,” says Kathryn. They decided to pull from additional savings, increasing their budget to $750,000.
Shortly after, Kathryn and her parents viewed a promising cottage on Portage Lake in Haliburton. They asked their agent to put in an offer at the top of their budget. After the viewing, Kathryn’s parents stuck around, deciding on a whim to view another potential property in Minden, Ont. “They ended up getting lost and found themselves close to Minnicock Lake, so they visited our old family cottage for fun,” says Kathryn.
That’s when they saw the property next door—one the Ivys knew well—had a “for sale” sign. “We knew it as the Wilson’s cottage,” says Kathryn. “Sometimes we’d swim off their dock because their stretch of lakefront was nicer than ours.” Kathryn’s parents called the selling agent and learned that the owners (no longer the Wilsons) had just put the sign up that day. The cottage would hit the market the following day at a fortuitous price of $750,000.
When Kathryn heard the news, she frantically called her agent to see if it was too late to cancel the Portage Lake offer. She was in luck: he had yet to submit it. The next morning, Kathryn drove up to Minnicock Lake, bringing Patrick and patching in Sarah via video call. “The cottage was freshly painted and the bathroom had been upgraded, but it still had that cabin charm,” says Kathryn, pointing to the floor-to-ceiling knotted pine interior and a table that had belonged to the Wilsons. The place met the required number of bedrooms and bathrooms, and featured a wood-burning fireplace in the living area with a large, lake-facing, A-frame window.
The sisters submitted an offer at the asking price, the sellers accepted, and the pair took possession of the cottage at the end of May 2024. “We spent the whole summer there as a group with our kids,” says Kathryn. They plan to do the same for many more summers to come.
As for their neighbouring childhood cottage, which has changed hands since they sold, Kathryn says they’re happy to be nearby. “It’s wonderful to see the old cottage with new life,” she says. “We’re lucky to share the view of a lake we love so dearly, and the fact that our kids get to be part of it now, it just feels like divine intervention.”
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