TORONTO — Young married couple Travis and Jessica Kirkman report managing to hide their secret desire for a Toronto housing market implosion from the home-owning guests at a recent housewarming party.
Travis, a 29-year-old registered nurse, and Jessica, a 31-year-old teacher, recounted several close calls as they covertly wished for the failure of their friends’ real estate investments. “Everyone else at Kate and Spencer’s housewarming was complaining about property taxes,” recalled Travis, “and it was so hard to just nod along while silently wishing financial ruin on the lot of them.”
“If they’d known that Jess and I spend most nights in our windowless basement one bedroom praying for an economic cataclysm to return home inflation to pre-1990 levels, then they probably wouldn’t have enjoyed the guacamole we brought,” Travis confessed.
The Kirkmans led reporters on a brief tour of their drab, wood-paneled apartment, including a stove which never ceased making a “weird noise”. Afterward, they described an evening of strained congratulations and repressed rage as various acquaintances lectured them on how they are “wasting so much money on rent, when you should be paying off a mortgage”.
“There was one dicey moment when Michael asked when we were going to buy a home,” recalled Jessica. “I almost snapped back ‘as soon you share your trust fund’, but at the last second I managed to quietly jam a fork in my hand.”
In addition to putting aside savings and speaking to a financial planner, the Kirkmans have also taken to actively and repeatedly envisioning the utter collapse of Toronto’s housing market. “I don’t know if it still counts as ‘positive visualization’ if it’s this spiteful, but either way I’ve got my vision board and a well-worn copy of The Secret,” Jessica confessed.
The Kirkmans report spending upwards of 40 combined hours per week willing a Toronto real estate apocalypse into being, in hopes that they too one day might be able to afford a mortgage on their own holy grail:
“A semi-detached two bedroom that isn’t in Barrie,” explained Travis. “That’s the dream. The pathetic, yet completely unattainable dream.”
At press time, Jessica Kirkman was mentally preparing for another upcoming housewarming by indulging in that fantasy where Brad and Susan lose everything and have to live like old-timey hobos.