|
Guest2553 posted:Holy gently caress If you think this is bad, you should cruise around the quieter neighborhoods some times. The new trend to bypass red tape is to demolish everything except the front 5 feet of a century old house, backfilling the rest of the lot with some shitstick mcmansion. By saving the facade and, like, a chimney or something, you get around what little regulations Vancouver has to preserve our built heritage.  They don't even salvage the materials, it all goes to the landfill. Stained Glass? Landfill. 20' long old-growth douglas fir beams? Landfill. Don't even get me started on the fact that they almost universally pave the remaining yardspace and tear out any trees on the property. This city is a loving disgrace.
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 19:50
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 12, 2024 14:25 |
|
|
I lived in a century-old house for the first 10 years of my life or so. It's only a nice thing if they were actually built with high quality materials at the time; houses don't improve with age like wine or anything. Barring having some sort of special historical or architectural significance, I don't think old-but-modern houses/buildings ought to be protected. A lovely fuckin' house is a lovely fuckin' house no matter when it was built.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 19:56
|
|
|
Really part of the problem is that modern architecture is embarrassingly bad. I don't think anyone would be objecting if modern houses weren't visually offensive. If you're replacing a beautiful old house with a beautiful new house, not so bad, right?
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 19:58
|
|
|
Brannock posted:Really part of the problem is that modern architecture is embarrassingly bad. I don't think anyone would be objecting if modern houses weren't visually offensive. If you're replacing a beautiful old house with a beautiful new house, not so bad, right? True. In the case of the 100-year-old house I lived in, it was nothing special (and its replacement is very nice-looking, since it's on a huge chunk of land and isn't built to maximize space on a small lot), and demolishing that piece of poo poo was pretty much the only way to get rid of all the poo poo living in the walls (extermination didn't work, because other creatures would always find their way in).
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 20:03
|
|
|
Making it outrageously prohibitive to demolish existing houses by leveraging bylaws such as requiring a full engineering inspection detailing that the house is unsalvageable, as well as requiring that any new houses built must be a accompanied at time of construction by a laneway house of at least 500sqft (excluding garage), would go a very very long way to massively improving the market in this city. Straight up making it illegal to pave over your front & back yards would be a great leap forward. If the house is unlivable, sure, get rid of it. I live in one right now that this should happen to. But for christs sake stop sending the material to the landfill, we aren't exactly drowning in old-growth timber on this planet any more and the materials in most of these houses is a straight up irreplaceable resource. When they tore down the Pantages on Hastings they left the proscenium arch rotting in the lot for a year. A 100' solid span of old growth lumber from a single tree, curved, probably worth $20,000 on the open market. Cut it up and sent it to a loving landfill.  And yes, modern "architecture" is beyond a travesty. I blame idiots like Erickson for locally popularizing the race-to-the-bottom trend of building poo poo as cheaply as you possible can out of the worst possible materials. Rime fucked around with this message at 20:16 on May 14, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 20:08
|
|
|
If "laneway houses" were allowed by the zoning people would build them. You don't need to force them with heavy handed laws, which would still require the zoning to change. If you let people build poo poo they'll build poo poo. For every huge house built that doesn't include a suite or lane house because the builder just wants a big mansion there's 100 more that would have added such things but local zoning and nimby's don't allow for it. (or the incredibly specific situation where the house has a lane doesn't exist)
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 20:19
|
|
|
I also doubt I am the only one that would prefer to not be forced to build a rental unit that I would have no intention of using. Though considering the number of marble staircase mansions built including a mortgage helper I may be a small minority.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 20:29
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:If "laneway houses" were allowed by the zoning people would build them. You don't need to force them with heavy handed laws, which would still require the zoning to change. If you let people build poo poo they'll build poo poo. For every huge house built that doesn't include a suite or lane house because the builder just wants a big mansion there's 100 more that would have added such things but local zoning and nimby's don't allow for it. (or the incredibly specific situation where the house has a lane doesn't exist) Totally agree. Requiring people to build a certain way on their own property will just cause them to go to hilarious lengths to circumvent the regulations if they disagree with them. See pictures in this thread of people taking hideous slices of old houses to dodge heritage preservation rules. I don't think lane way houses are bad per se but if someone told me I had to put one in next to my dream house or not receive a permit I'd tell them to get hosed on principle and go build somewhere else. Incentivizing people to build them on the other hand; offer property tax breaks for any property that has one, provide clear legal / zoning support for it, and you'd have people that might not otherwise build one consider baking it into their plans.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 20:36
|
|
|
Those incentives currently exist, and have resulted in homeowners building 250sqft favelas that they then try to rent for $2000+ a month. The idea of someone not buying a property because they can't just tear it down and fill it entirely with a mcmansion, rather than enforced mixed density, is a positive thing for the lower mainland, that's exactly the outcome I was proposing. Hell, at this point I'd be in favor of a 100% moratorium on issueing permits for single family dwellings in Metro Van. Rime fucked around with this message at 21:30 on May 14, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 21:27
|
|
|
Rime posted:Those incentives currently exist, and have resulted in homeowners building 250sqft favelas that they then try to rent for $2000+ a month. Yeah, density needs to be increased - and as far as I know there's been major push-back from homeowners at the very idea of lane-way housing as somehow devaluing properties, never-mind any kind of regulations forcing the building of such properties.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 21:34
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:If "laneway houses" were allowed by the zoning people would build them. You don't need to force them with heavy handed laws, which would still require the zoning to change. If you let people build poo poo they'll build poo poo. For every huge house built that doesn't include a suite or lane house because the builder just wants a big mansion there's 100 more that would have added such things but local zoning and nimby's don't allow for it. (or the incredibly specific situation where the house has a lane doesn't exist) Vancouver both allows and encourages laneway houses. http://vancouver.ca/home-property-development/building-your-laneway-house.aspx E: Rime posted:Those incentives currently exist, and have resulted in homeowners building 250sqft favelas that they then try to rent for $2000+ a month. Do you have links to that? The ones I've seen go up have looked like decent sized dwellings, usually two stories and slightly larger than most apartments.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 22:45
|
|
|
Lead out in cuffs posted:Vancouver both allows and encourages laneway houses. http://www.lanecraft.com/index.php/Projects/sophia_street I've seen many that are smaller. They are almost always two stories because most of the ground floor is a garage, which is usually used by the landlord not the tenants of the laneway. Rime fucked around with this message at 23:28 on May 14, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 23:03
|
|
|
Those look cute. Some people have tried to build things like that in Victoria, although lanes are very rare here but there's a few cases where a block is thin enough that some of the houses property spans between the streets. There was a house turned into apartments that had a small garage out back. They wanted to build a new larger garage with a single suite over top. It took like a year of red tape and neighborhood protest to finally allow. But that's victoriadevelopment.txt Almost every house seems to have a basement suite these days, legal or not. More would do it but the city seems to make it as difficult as possible to make existing suites legal and allow future ones. They just rolled out some new very limited zoning bylaw to allow tiny little accessory building sized rental "garden suites" in people's back yards but there's still a billion hoops to jump through and you still need neighbourhood approval to do it and still need all the off-street parking requirements which most lots can't meet so it's useless. \/ Exactly that. Developers like to say it's a supply and demand issue, but it's an easy credit and speculation issue. Baronjutter fucked around with this message at 23:40 on May 14, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 23:13
|
|
|
I don't think anyone is going to argue that building more homes, especially those that are larger than those stupid loving 500 sqft "sky homes" is a bad idea. Supply isn't the problem. Easy credit is.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 23:18
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:Almost every house seems to have a basement suite these days, legal or not. More would do it but the city seems to make it as difficult as possible to make existing suites legal and allow future ones. They just rolled out some new very limited zoning bylaw to allow tiny little accessory building sized rental "garden suites" in people's back yards but there's still a billion hoops to jump through and you still need neighbourhood approval to do it and still need all the off-street parking requirements which most lots can't meet so it's useless. Sounds like Burnaby. Both Laneways and basement suites are completely illegal there, however the city does nothing to enforce it. If they set up a task force to cruise craigslist, view illegal suites undercover, and then fine the owners both for the suite and for the multitude of egregious health & safety violations present in them, they could run a really nice budget surplus. Even in Vancouver where basement suites aren't expressly illegal this would go a long way. Much like the TFW situation, the kind of people being forced to rent a suite with pay laundry (or laundry outside in a mud floored shack) and a hot plate can't afford to report their landlord and risk eviction. The current trend with basements is that an old house will split it up into two or even three suites and charge each what the rent of the entire basement would have been a decade ago, and new houses will have these tiny little prison cells built into them during the construction phase by default. This makes it completely impossible to find somewhere to live if you are out of your twenties, or have kids, and not upper middle class. Hell, I looked at a 1/3rd of a basement last summer that was a single dark room with a 5' ceiling, a hot plate, no laundry, no shower, and the shitheads were charging $650+Utilities for it. Gleefully told me they were financing their daughters condo in New West, wouldn't get back to me till the following week because they would be vacationing in their cottage on Galiano. loving Boomers.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2014 23:29
|
|
|
ocrumsprug posted:Point One: Housing isn't an investment Real estate is an investment. However, you invest based on cashflow generated, not capital appreciation. If you have a chance to get 5% rental yield after all is said and done, go out and buy as many houses as you can afford. If you are speculating that house prices will increase 20% and you can lever that into an 80% return, you deserve to lose your money.
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 01:02
|
|
|
on the left posted:Real estate is an investment. However, you invest based on cashflow generated, not capital appreciation. If you have a chance to get 5% rental yield after all is said and done, go out and buy as many houses as you can afford. If you are speculating that house prices will increase 20% and you can lever that into an 80% return, you deserve to lose your money. Not to mention the first thing they teach you in investment class is diversification. One of the women I used to work with had no stocks, mutual funds, or any other investmetn besides rental properties. She pushed hard on it, "why dont you get into it?" Shes about 10 years away from retirement, or 30 years.
|
|
#
?
May 15, 2014 01:28
|
|
|
http://www.straight.com/news/646311/bob-rennie-speaks-about-housing-affordability-wealth-seniors-immigration-and-david-suzukiquote:OLDER PEOPLE IN Greater Vancouver are sitting on phenomenal housing wealth—and this will transform the residential real-estate market in the coming years. I loving love that Rennie keeps telling people that the average price of real estate is much lower once you remove the top 20% of properties from the sample. That's some robust loving stastistical analysis.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 19:18
|
|
|
That's hilarious. "Oh hey this value is really high, let's just change the population and... Here we go, much more reasonable." Anyone have a median for the same data? And what kind of 31k/yr income family buys a 320k home?
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 19:24
|
|
|
All I'm getting out of this is that there is $100B+ in imaginary equity floating around balance books, since "the market" cannot absorb all that property at its currently inflated prices once these elderly or their estates try to liquidate.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 19:59
|
|
|
Well "Boomers sitting on $160B worth of their children's future earnings, and how they hope to get it" is a more accurate headline, but I can see why Bob Rennie didn't use it.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 20:04
|
|
|
Rime posted:All I'm getting out of this is that there is $100B+ in imaginary equity floating around balance books, since "the market" cannot absorb all that property at its currently inflated prices once these elderly or their estates try to liquidate. That is an awesome comprehension. 
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 20:13
|
|
|
FrozenVent posted:That's hilarious. "Oh hey this value is really high, let's just change the population and... Here we go, much more reasonable." Anyone have a median for the same data? Just think of it as a deferred penalty.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 20:15
|
|
|
Rime posted:All I'm getting out of this is that there is $100B+ in imaginary equity floating around balance books, since "the market" cannot absorb all that property at its currently inflated prices once these elderly or their estates try to liquidate. That's mostly how I read it as well.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 20:19
|
|
|
Rime posted:All I'm getting out of this is that there is $100B+ in imaginary equity floating around balance books, since "the market" cannot absorb all that property at its currently inflated prices once these elderly or their estates try to liquidate. But....the Chinese investors!!
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 21:03
|
|
|
Chinese coolie investors. 
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 21:29
|
|
B-but it's so hard being white! Waaaaaagh!
|
Vaginapocalypse posted:Chinese coolie investors. 
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 21:49
|
|
|
Rime posted:All I'm getting out of this is that there is $100B+ in imaginary equity floating around balance books, since "the market" cannot absorb all that property at its currently inflated prices once these elderly or their estates try to liquidate. The moral is if your kill your parents now you'll be rich. Just don't let your parents die after everyone else's.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 21:51
|
|
|
Dusseldorf posted:The moral is if your kill your parents now you'll be rich. Just don't let your parents die after everyone else's.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 21:53
|
|
|
Rime posted:All I'm getting out of this is that there is $100B+ in imaginary equity floating around balance books, since "the market" cannot absorb all that property at its currently inflated prices once these elderly or their estates try to liquidate. The boomers aren't all going to die off simultaneously, you know - it's not like there's going to be some uncontrolled tidal wave of big family houses all coming onto the market at once to purge the shite out of the system, it's just going to be a slow and steady flow over a period of two decades or more.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 21:54
|
|
|
Peaceful Anarchy posted:No need to kill them, just have them declared senile or something and get power of attorney to sell their house. Then you have to get them into a home, and that's gonna suck the RRSP dry before you can get to it; gently caress that noise.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2014 21:55
|
|
|
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Private+sector+role+addressing+housing+affordability/9847047/story.htmlquote:
These loving idiots like ransford need to stop propagating this myth that there's a housing shortage, and that's what inflates the cost of housing , at least in Vancouver.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 16:40
|
|
|
Historically low interest rates, government-insured mortgages, and lax lending standards have nothing to do with it. No, we're simply a cut above New York, London, Paris, and we're running out of land, in Canada. And this is what people actually believe.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 17:01
|
|
|
Wasting posted:Historically low interest rates, government-insured mortgages, and lax lending standards have nothing to do with it. No, we're simply a cut above New York, London, Paris, and we're running out of land, in Canada. With the exception of Vancouver aren't most markets not constrained by geography?
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 17:15
|
|
|
etalian posted:With the exception of Vancouver aren't most markets not constrained by geography? Vancouver isn't constrained by geography. It's constrained by land use policy.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 17:24
|
|
|
It certainly isn't constrained by conservative lending practices.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 17:27
|
|
|
they used Vancouver as a stand in for SF in Godzilla, must be good city
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 18:38
|
|
|
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/05/17/canada-real-estate-market_n_5340655.html?ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000067quote:
Capital economics report is inline in the link. e: scribd link: http://www.scribd.com/doc/224668746/Housing-Correction-Only-a-Matter-of-Timing
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 21:20
|
|
|
Does anyone have a link to that website/article detailing historical long (Canadian) housing appreciation rates, vs increases in square footage, inflation, etc.? It used data from the US up until Canadian data was available in the 1970s I believe. I know it might be futile, but I'm trying to save a few of my friends who are considering buying in Vancouver now. Or at least make sure they know it is not an 'investment' that will have great returns.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 22:18
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 12, 2024 14:25 |
|
|
rhazes posted:Does anyone have a link to that website/article detailing historical long (Canadian) housing appreciation rates, vs increases in square footage, inflation, etc.? It used data from the US up until Canadian data was available in the 1970s I believe. I know it might be futile, but I'm trying to save a few of my friends who are considering buying in Vancouver now. Or at least make sure they know it is not an 'investment' that will have great returns. Start here: http://housing-analysis.blogspot.ca/ You might find this one interesting: http://vreaa.wordpress.com/ e: If you really want to convince your friends to wait, make them read this http://www.scribd.com/doc/224668746/Housing-Correction-Only-a-Matter-of-Timing namaste friends fucked around with this message at 22:50 on May 17, 2014 |
|
#
?
May 17, 2014 22:25
|
|