Samantha Kennedy was looking for a home that she could buy mortgage-free with cash.Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail
Samantha Kennedy grew up in the small community of Berwick, N.S., about an hour and 20 minutes northwest of Halifax. She moved to Ottawa in 2014, at 18, to study at Carleton and has been based in the country’s capital since then, most recently renting a one-bedroom apartment for $1,300 a month.
Ms. Kennedy, now 29, works as a tantric yoga teacher and pleasure coach, hosting retreats and working with clients online. For as long as she can remember, she’s yearned to buy property. “I’ve always felt like I have wanted to have my own little place,” she explains. Determined to make a mortgage-free purchase with cash, in her early 20s, she toured plots of land around Ottawa and Gatineau which were priced under $40,000. But none fit the bill – they were either too far from the nearest town or didn’t have water access, which was a must for her.
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As the years passed and Ms. Kennedy saved more, her budget increased and she began to consider a cottagelike property near water. Ultimately, Ms. Kennedy’s search led back to her hometown of Berwick and the small rural community of Canada Creek, 20 minutes north of Berwick, on the southern shore of the Bay of Fundy.
Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail
Her realtor, Robert Graves, Mr. Graves says that the real estate market in rural Nova Scotia has changed dramatically over the past decade. “Sixteen years ago, we were suffering a population decline with young people moving out of province,” he explains. But the pandemic brought a wave of new interest with both out-of-province buyers and returnees like Ms. Kennedy buying properties.
By the end of 2025, Ms. Kennedy had saved up $150,000 to purchase a home. She considered taking out a small mortgage to push her top budget up to $300,000 for a move-in ready house, but she was up for doing renovations on a cheaper property. Her only must-have was to be close to the water. “The water was the biggest thing to me,” she says. “I find it very cleansing and grounding. I feel very connected to the energy of the water.”
Here were Ms. Kennedy’s top three options:
Three-bedroom, one-bathroom home in Berwick
Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail
Ms. Kennedy considered this home because it was so close to where her parents lived. “We walk past it all the time,” she says. The house, built in 1964, was a two-level bungalow spanning 987 square feet with three bedrooms and a full basement. Ms. Kennedy thought about turning the additional rooms into a work studio and a guest bedroom. The property, which spanned a quarter acre, also came with a shed. It lacked any water access, so she’d have to drive 15 minutes to reach the coast. This home was listed at $299,999, which was at the top of Ms. Kennedy’s budget and would require her to take out a small mortgage.
One-bedroom waterfront cottage in Canada Creek
Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail
This 477-square-foot home was the smallest of Ms. Kennedy’s options, but its location right above the shoreline was the closest she could get to a body of water and she was charmed by its cottagelike aesthetic. It has a single bedroom, a sunroom, a kitchen, a dining area and a bathroom, but the property wasn’t winterized and would need to have insulation and heat installed before she could live there in cold weather. She would also need to build a driveway, and there was no laundry in the home. The home, which sat on just over a quarter acre of land, was listed for $162,500.
Dated two-bedroom home in Canada Creek
Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail
Ms. Kennedy considered this two-bedroom, one-bathroom, 720-square-foot home which was listed for $185,000. It was winterized, had a laundry room and also came with a larger plot of land – about half an acre – with multiple structures: a shed and garage that she could use as additional flex spaces. But Ms. Kennedy wasn’t fond of the home’s interior decor which was dated and would require extensive renovation. It was just a 10-minute walk to the coast but far enough not to have any water views from the home.
Her home: One-bedroom waterfront cottage in Canada Creek
Samantha Kennedy inside the home she purchased.Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail
With proximity to the water being her No. 1 priority, Ms. Kennedy’s choice was easy. She was immediately smitten with the waterfront cottage and the sound of crashing waves which she could hear from inside it. “I knew this was the one right away,” she said. Winterizing the cottage with insulation and heating, along with installing a driveway, felt like manageable projects that she could take on with the help of her dad in Berwick.
Since the cottage had been on the market for almost a year, Ms. Kennedy tried her luck with a lowball offer of $130,000 and settled on a final price of $145,000, just under her cash budget. She finalized the purchase in February, 2026, and moved into her new home in June.
As for the work her cottage needed, Ms. Kennedy has painted the kitchen and set up heating. She’s in the process of installing a driveway and will work on insulating the home before the coming winter. In the future, she’ll insulate a shed on the property to use as a studio space for virtual classes. While the lack of laundry is an annoyance, she’s at her parents’ home in Berwick often enough to make washing and drying an easy chore to complete there.
After dreaming about it for so long, Ms. Kennedy says that reaching her goal of home ownership is a relief. “To have accomplished that, it really feels surreal,” she says. “I’m happy I waited for the perfect one.” She sees the waterfront cottage as her forever home, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll be her only property. “I would love to add to my real estate portfolio and have a place where I travel to in the winter,” she says. “But this is always going to be my home base in Nova Scotia.”