We have "market value assessment" here in Ontario. If your property is more desirable, i.e., the view is better, the taxes are higher. The assessment on my river-front cottage in Ottawa just went up 45%, it's so darned desirable, no property improvements whatsoever. So the "view" thing does not surprise me a bit.

I've been looking at my credit card agreement, and found it--Foreign Currency Mark-up 2.5%. That's my Mastercard. Unfortunately I believe that pertains when I pay RSSC, since I'm paying in USD :( . Let's see: I paid C$3,167.31 , and that was for US$1299*2=2598. At today's rate, that would be C$3,087.81 If my calculations are right, that means a markup of about 1.2%. (Ah, they claim the rate was 1.219135, that's about right.) I guess that means they don't consider USD "foreign". I'm going to have to ask them about this, very perplexing. Who knows about my Visa.