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Now, a year later, the potential legal fees for our project are starting to look like the down payment on a modest apartment condo in Currie Barracks, and we’ve shelved our laneway project.

We thought we had a creative solution for retiring in our community. What we’ve really learned is that, even with the best intentions and the city’s approval, a legal agreement from the middle of the last century has the final say about what we can (and can’t) do with our property today.

All this leaves my wife and I with a lot of questions—most pressingly, what do we do as we approach retirement? And then there is the overarching question of whether this covenant, though it may have helped build a great community in 1952, has anything to offer now or in the future.

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My wife and I bought our bungalow in southwest Calgary in 2002 when our son was six. It backs onto a busy street but it was what we could afford. It’s a modest house on the edge of a good neighbourhood.

Fifteen years later, Richmond Road is busier and noisier. Our son will finish university next spring and the odds are good he’ll move out soon. The door on our ancient garage doesn’t work anymore and we hardly use the backyard. The mortgage is paid off. It’s time to consider where to live next.

We looked at the traditional options for downsizing, but it didn’t feel like it was time to move into a condo or a townhouse. We considered major renovations to our house, but couldn’t justify carrying so much debt into retirement. After talking with realtors, planners and an architect, we hit on the laneway house. These little homes are a popular alternative for working couples and retirees in cities like Vancouver, and they’re popping up around Calgary. It seemed like the perfect solution: our land was already paid for and we could cover the construction costs—at least partially—by renting our main house if we chose to.