Furnaceface posted:

Just how many loving people in this country are employed as realtors now?

Mozi posted:

In the deep sea of realty you're either a shark or a minnow and if you don't grab the bull by the horns you can't get off the tiger while the train has left the station.

Furnaceface posted:

Just how many loving people in this country are employed as realtors now?

Rime posted:

Is this a church community center being sublet as lovely residential? For reals?

Meat Recital posted:

It's the biggest sector in BC's economy.

Myriarch posted:

Sorry CI - no rate hike.

quote:

The average price of a Canadian home sold in May was $509,460, a 13 per cent increase in the past year and the highest figure on record.

The strong gains are largely tied to hot markets in Ontario and British Columbia, according to the numbers released Wednesday by the Canadian Real Estate Association.

Stripping those two markets out of the calculations, the average price of a house sold in May declined 0.7 per cent in the past 12 months, and sold for $310,007 in May.

quote:

Evidence of Vancouver Real Estate Speculation Piling up

...

I went onto my Realtor’s MLS system to see what I could dig up. What I found even surprised me. I searched all the sold houses for Vancouver West detached homes for the month of May 2016. Here’s what I found:

Houses sold in May for Vancouver West: 179
Houses sold in May that were also sold within the last year: 28
Percentage of homes flipped for a profit: 15.6%
Average profit made per house flipped: $1,140,957.83

Here’s a good example of a home in South Granville, marketed as a tear down, bought and sold 4 different times over the past 2 years. No changes made to the home.

Sold Jan 2014- $5,088,000
Sold Nov 2014- $5,450,000
Sold July 2015- $6,380,000
Sold May 2016- $7,600,000



...

EvilJoven posted:

When the housing bubble implodes I'm pretty sure Winnipeg is going to be the only place with a functioning economy left in the country.

We still export things here.

Arivia posted:

Like what, racism?

EvilJoven posted:

When the housing bubble implodes I'm pretty sure Winnipeg is going to be the only place with a functioning economy left in the country.

We still export things here.

HookShot posted:

EvilJoven posted:

Winnipeg exports a ton of poo poo including the occasional Antonov AN-124 loaded with tractors headed to Russia. The vertical stabilizer on that thing is so loving tall I saw it from the river and biked up there super fast so I could watch it take off.

Why Russia imports tractors from Canada is beyond me but apparently it happens regular enough that they fill that big rear end plane up with farm equipment a handful of times a year and off it goes.

Meat Recital posted:

How does Montreal's housing market manage to avoid becoming like Vancouver and Toronto? It's a similar size to both, and a lot loving nicer.

Meat Recital posted:

How does Montreal's housing market manage to avoid becoming like Vancouver and Toronto? It's a similar size to both, and a lot loving nicer.

PT6A posted:

Incredible protections for renters and the fact that most people don't want to deal with some of the political situations there. Also, it has the worst loving winters on earth.

Meat Recital posted:

How does Montreal's housing market manage to avoid becoming like Vancouver and Toronto? It's a similar size to both, and a lot loving nicer.

Femtosecond posted:

Here in Vancouver two of my friends were recently evicted because their place was supposedly to be renovated, and a few weeks later they spotted their old places up on Craigslist for an over 100% rental price increase. Neither are in the position to buy anything themselves.

yippee cahier posted:

Sounds like easy money in court to me.

quaint bucket posted:

Dawson Creek and Chetwynd are flooding. Chetwynd declared a state of emergency.

Great time to buy.

quote:

Vancouver plans to impose tax on owners of vacant homes

Vancouver’s mayor says the city will impose a tax on property owners who don’t live in their residences as part of an effort to make housing more affordable, but Gregor Robertson acknowledges his council will have to figure out a way to work around a provincial government that has rejected previous efforts to tax empty houses.

After months of demanding action from the provincial and federal governments on the affordability crisis, Mr. Robertson said Tuesday he has no faith that the province in particular will intervene. He said city staff are looking at all options, even if it means navigating around the province, which has jurisdiction over such a tax.

The mayor said the city wants access to an estimated 10,000 empty houses in Vancouver, a figure based on data that city staff released in March. But he didn’t say how high he thinks the tax would have to be to persuade those owners to rent out their houses.

Mr. Robertson also did not explain how the tax would work, saying he was waiting for staff to come up with a detailed plan.

As the cost of housing in Vancouver has skyrocketed and the rental market has been squeezed, speculation has grown over how much foreign investment is driving the price escalation. But Mr. Robertson’s plan would tax all homeowners who do not live in the properties they own, from overseas buyers to snowbirds from elsewhere in Canada. Mr. Robertson did not detail how much time owners would have to spend in their homes to avoid the tax.

“We would love to have thousands of those homes in the rental market right now when there’s almost no vacancy and a real crunch on affordable housing,” he said. “We’d like to see more supply created from the empty homes that are just sitting there in the city.”

Mr. Robertson said he expected a report from city staff in coming weeks on best options for proceeding with the plan.

“We’re looking at what we might be able to do here at the city without the province’s help. There might be more limited options,” Mr. Robertson told reporters at City Hall during a break in a council meeting.

The mayor set a tight timeline for action, saying it is “imminent” because council takes a break from the end of July to September.

A year ago, Mr. Robertson sent a letter to B.C. Premier Christy Clark asking the province for a tax on luxury housing and measures to fine property owners who do not live in the units they own. Ms. Clark rejected the requests and suggested the city could find solutions in better land-use planning.

A B.C. Finance Ministry statement issued Tuesday did not respond specifically to Mr. Robertson’s vacancy-tax proposal, but said the B.C. government is examining a broad range of policy choices to help British Columbians access “appropriate housing in the short term” and that a plan will be presented when that work is done.

“It’s good to see Vancouver is considering what action it can take within its authority,” the statement said.

One of three councillors representing the Non-Partisan Association party on the council dominated by Mr. Robertson’s Vision Vancouver party said the NPA is generally supportive of the vacancy-tax idea, contingent on the details, but skeptical about the mayor’s timeline.

“I’m not sure we will be able to move forward by summer break,” Melissa De Genova said. “This is a huge issue. It’s an issue that needs to be approached cautiously. We need to consider the ramifications.”

She said Mr. Robertson’s enthusiasm raises some questions. “If the mayor is fired up and ready to go, I question why he hadn’t moved forward on this sooner.”

She also said, speaking for her NPA colleagues, that there may be merits to a regional, as opposed to a City of Vancouver, approach.

Femtosecond posted:

I always feel bad for the nameless "city staff" that have to do the work to fufill these vague and unworkable requests from city councilors.