I never understand why people are obsessed with space. The advantage of being in a big city is the buzz and the range of people and things to do: no small town can match that. I keep an apartment in the big city (it is worth a million or so) but also have a home in the Alps and one on a Greek island: both cost very little since I built them myself before the property bubble. 

I love this life: when I get sick of the city, I go to one of the other homes and chill. No parochial small-town Ontario town/city can match that.