Lexicon posted:

A friend of mine's brother had a recent close extrication from an actual yoga cult in the area. No joke - they had this kid near-brainwashed, and routinely hallucinating, etc.

Baronjutter posted:

I'm shocked at the amount of Nanaimoites in the thread. Vancouver island seems really over-represented.
Other than housing what is cheaper in Nanaimo? (oh and used cars, used cars cost less in Nanaimo!) A lot of people cite "cost of living" for the reasons of living in various places but I'm always curious how much cheaper things are. Like is basic food and utilities cheaper in other cities? Things in Vancouver all seem the same prices as in Victoria, it's just rents are higher but most everything else seems on par. The incomes and job prospects in small towns seem to more than make up for any cost of living savings too. But I guess if you can get a rare good paying job in a small town that can translate to pretty comfortable finances.

leftist heap posted:

I don't find Victoria to be all that leftist to be honest. Just look at the response to Tent City.

quaint bucket posted:

I'm gonna be laughing all the way to the bank when they eventually build a physical bridge across to vancouver island.

Lexicon posted:

Its a myth at the national level too. Canadians only have 'socialist leanings' insofar as they like it when someone other than themselves pays for things. The Nordic notion of "high taxes => high level of social services" is utterly absent.

cowofwar posted:

Vancouver Islanders are used to pretty lovely infrastructure so they tend to be low tax libertarians.

leftist heap posted:

I don't know where you get this particular impression, it doesn't really ring true for me. Pretty much the whole island votes pretty strongly NDP or even Green. And I don't find anything particularly onerous about the infrastructure (relative to the rest of the country).

I think ChairMaster has it pegged pretty well with the "Love me, I'm a Liberal" style liberals. That's basically the exact comparison I've used for the island as well. A lot of fairweather progressives.

quote:

Value of building permits sought doubles from 2015 despite 'problematic' Ottawa housing market

Ottawa construction firms nearly doubled the value of residential building permits they sought to acquire in the first two months of 2016, according to Statistics Canada.

The federal statistician released its monthly reports on building permits Thursday, and said during the months of January and February, Ottawa homebuilders sought to acquire $230.2 million worth of residential building permits, an 86.4 per cent jump over the $123.6 million they sought to acquire during the first two months of 2015.

Building permits do not signal an immediate construction boom. Instead they signal the industry’s intentions in the months ahead.

However, the builder’s intentions to ramp up construction in the near future appears to fly in the face of criticism recently issued by the country’s national real estate researcher Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp (CMHC), which has warning that a large numbers of unsold homes in Ottawa, specifically condominiums, is putting the housing market on shaky ground.

The number of unsold units has pushed Ottawa’s entire housing market into a category of “moderate risk” and caused CMHC to raise red flags for builders who might be planning further construction in the capital.

“Our model detects some problematic conditions that there is a high number of completed and unsold units,” said Anne-Marie Shaker, market analyst for Ottawa at CMHC. “But building permits are an intention to build. We don’t know when they will materialize.”

Shaker said the mass increase in residential permits being sought by builders this year may have little to no impact on Ottawa’s housing market. She said it all depends on how quickly the builders choose to actually begin construction.

In December, it seemed as if builders were heeding the warnings released by CMHC as they scaled back the pace of construction. The value of building permits sought also fell drastically towards the end of 2015.

According to the Statistics Canada data, the biggest jump in permits acquired was in multiple dwelling units, which include condominiums and townhouse or row homes. Builders were looking to acquire a total of $121 million worth of residential multiple dwelling permits during the first two months of the year, a 140.1 per cent increase over the $50.3 million in permits they acquired in January and February 2015.

Single units and detached homes also remained popular among Ottawa home builders. The builders acquired $109.2 million in permits in the first two months of 2016 for single detached homes. The amount marks a 49.2 per cent increase over the $73.2 million in permits they sought during the same time period last year.

The average price of a residential property in Ottawa is now around $368,000. CMHC expects that to increase to $376,000 this year and $385,000 in 2017.

Throatwarbler posted:

I just moved here from Calgary/UAE and I'm astonished by how small the roads are relative to the number of cars, especially in Langford. Go to Langford on like a weekday afternoon and it's complete gridlock. The one time I tried to go down the trans Canada during rush hour was worse than anything I experienced in Beijing.

cowofwar posted:

The Langford squeeze is awful. Naturally, my brother just bought a house there but works on the other side of the squeeze.

large hands posted:

C'mon man, it's the colwood crawl

jm20 posted:

Throatwarbler posted:

I just moved here from Calgary/UAE and I'm astonished by how small the roads are relative to the number of cars, especially in Langford. Go to Langford on like a weekday afternoon and it's complete gridlock. The one time I tried to go down the trans Canada during rush hour was worse than anything I experienced in Beijing.

leftist heap posted:

The really easy solution to this is to not go to Langford. That clusterfuck is not really representative of the city at all IMO. I've lived here 5 years and driven through there once on my way to nicer places.

McGavin posted:

But how else are you gonna get to Costco?

jm20 posted:

Professor Shark posted:

Haven't you seen the picture of those people waiting for the bus? They're a flawed people who cannot interact with each other, unlike us

Reverse Centaur posted:

Funny you mention this, someone I follow on Flickr posted this recently. In Vancouver obviously

Rime posted:

So they announced the closure of 6 schools in the south Okananogan this year. Took a boo at the economy: average home price is between $380k and $500k, with a significant chunk of real estate near or over $1m. $250k will buy you a 3 bedroom 80's rowhouse with what looks like crackheads for neighbours. Lots of commercial up for grabs, LOTS of businesses going under.

There aren't really any jobs in the south okananogan. Certainly nothing above minimum wage unless you are a medical field import.

I do wonder how long BC can continue to strangle the province on the vine before dying communities become an economic liability.

Femtosecond posted:

I don't visit the area often, but my view from the outside is that in recent times the South Okanagan has strongly pivoted toward tourism, especially serving as a playground for Albertans on vacation. With the economy of Alberta in the shitter, it wouldn't surprise me if this area is doing worse than usual.

From my recollection this area was hit pretty hard in 2008, as recreation property was one of the categories of homes that fell in value the most and there were a lot of builders quitting projects. I'm curious things have rebounded at all and people have started building new recreation property again.

ocrumsprug posted:

That isn't a recent pivot, it has been the status quo for 30-40 years now. Everything south of Vernon is retirement communities and recreation. Most of the industry that Kelowna had when I was a kid has largely shuttered while huge amounts of farm/orchard land has an adult only condo building or 55+ gated community on it now.

The boutique wine industry is the only bright spot anymore, but 3 month retail jobs have been the job situation for decades.

Femtosecond posted:

You're right the area has been a recreational playground for a long time. Do you think the transition from orchard to condos has been more some recent change or was it a sort of inevitable result of sprawl? I guess I was thinking the growth of the wine industry had accelerated development. I don't visit there enough to have a real good feel for the area so I'm probably wrong on everything.

I went to Osoyoos on summer vacations when I was a kid in late 80s early 90s and it was certainly a family friendly tourism place where you went water skiing etc. Wine didn't really seem to be a big thing yet and my memories are all of orchards and road side fruit stands.

Rime posted:

The problem with a tourism economy is who the gently caress has the leisure time and money they did 40 years ago?

Rime posted:

The problem with a tourism economy is who the gently caress has the leisure time and money they did 40 years ago? I go on a road trip I'm not stopping in somewhere for a few days because it looks nice, I'm going to a very specific place and spending the minimum of time and money to get there (if I even go that far afield from my residence). That economy is in the death throes.

James Baud posted:

What would you rather do, fly 3-4 hours to a tropical all-inclusive or drive six hours and spend just as much money on some dumpy unrenovated 50s motel?