Canada Housing/Debt: Trust me, I'm a landlord.

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Canada Housing/Debt: Trust me, I'm a landlord.

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Juul-Whip: Mar 10, 2008

100k non-profit units is huge though

# ? Apr 13, 2017 20:10

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# ? Jun 12, 2024 19:58

Femtosecond: Aug 2, 2003

THC posted:

The BC NDP has released their election platform. What's the NDP's plan to make housing more affordable?

(the good kind though I guess maybe)

The most significant policy proposal I'd heard was the proposal to give cities the ability to zone for exclusive purpose built rental, but I don't see that here. Too wonky for a high level website maybe? I think I read it in that live tweeting of the Eby vs Coleman debate.

# ? Apr 13, 2017 20:51

Square Peg: Nov 11, 2008

The Butcher posted:

Serious though it's actually pretty dope your gf's parents are tossing you cash to invest.

Both my and my partner's family are decently well off, and I'm fairly certain they would gift/loan us a substantial chunk if we wanted to buy a property beyond our current means. Everybody's doin' it. Especially if we got her knocked up first. Gotta think of the grandbabies you know? Can't grow up in an.... apartment building. *shudder*

My partner's dad had a stack of cash put aside to help her with university, but then at the last minute he decided that he was going to hold on to it and use it as a down payment on her first house instead. So now she's getting her degree using student loans and living with me, in the 3 bedroom townhouse I own, and he's still sitting on that money. I guess it's real estate or nothing with that generation.

# ? Apr 13, 2017 21:00

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

Remember how I've been harping on misallocation of resources, oh, this whole thread

# ? Apr 13, 2017 21:35

Professor Shark: May 22, 2012

Square Peg posted:

My partner's dad had a stack of cash put aside to help her with university, but then at the last minute he decided that he was going to hold on to it and use it as a down payment on her first house instead. So now she's getting her degree using student loans and living with me, in the 3 bedroom townhouse I own, and he's still sitting on that money. I guess it's real estate or nothing with that generation.

That money doesn't exist anymore

# ? Apr 13, 2017 23:00

Rime: Nov 2, 2011; by Games Forum

The Butcher posted:

Don't listen to this man. Buy weed stocks.

And Blackberry.

Call that number in the ad I posted a few pages back if you need more advice.

I made just about $5k by liquidating my weed stocks position earlier in the week during the spike. Considering I started with $5k in November, that's pretty fuckin' sick. The guys who played the game with $40k+ positions are laughing right now.

OTOH, who was it who suggested peeps buy TD a few weeks back when it tanked? It's continued to tank and is still circling the shitter. :smuggo:

# ? Apr 14, 2017 05:00

The Butcher: Apr 20, 2005; Well, at least we tried.; Nap Ghost

Rime posted:

OTOH, who was it who suggested peeps buy TD a few weeks back when it tanked? It's continued to tank and is still circling the shitter.

Lol also me. I didn't actually buy any TD, was just spitballing that the house always wins in the end. Give it time!

Don't take hot stock tips from the something awful dot com comedy forums kids.

Except for weed stocks.

# ? Apr 14, 2017 05:25

The Butcher: Apr 20, 2005; Well, at least we tried.; Nap Ghost

Okay out of curiosity I checked the post to see exactly how wrong I was and I said an easy 10% in 1-2 months.

We are currently one month out from that post and you would presently be down -3.2% had anyone bought then.

I've still got another month to prove myself the oracle of the markets but I'm not holding my breath there.

:v:

# ? Apr 14, 2017 05:36

Femtosecond: Aug 2, 2003

Finally had a chance to look at the NDP platform and there is a short line there about rental zoning and a hint of anti-airbnb legislation

quote:

We will also tighten the rules that protect good landlords and tenants, and provide the necessary resources for the Residential Tenancy Branch to do its job and resolve disputes fairly and in a timely way. And, we will provide local governments the tools they are asking for to zone areas for rental housing, and tax short-stay home rentals that take properties out of the rental pool.

I think this is pretty significant. Purpose built rental is cheaper than rental via condos and right now the only way cities have been able to guarantee rental buildings get built is with negotiations with developers and covenants. Being able to zone for rental would streamline and simplify the whole process.

# ? Apr 14, 2017 06:04

Guest2553: Aug 3, 2012

peter banana posted:

Everything ~~to do with the~~ Canadian ~~realtor profession~~ is the loving worst.

# ? Apr 14, 2017 15:24

Square Peg: Nov 11, 2008

Professor Shark posted:

That money doesn't exist anymore

I'm certainly not counting on it. I'm pretty sure it went into the new kitchen he and his wife are giving themselves.
Gotta get that ~~granite~~ QUARTZ countertop equity!

# ? Apr 14, 2017 17:23

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

http://business.financialpost.com/n...rs-own-solution

quote:

B.C. real estate activity slumps by $7 billion as Ontario watches and ponders own solution

British Columbia realtors report March sales were off almost 22 per cent from a year ago and blame the shortfall on a lack of new supply hitting the market.

Across the province, the British Columbia Real Estate Association said Thursday active listings in March dropped 18.1 per cent from a year ago to 25,020 but in spite of that decline, the average price of a home sold across the province was down 10.5 per cent during the period to $690,597.

�Consumer demand continues to normalize following blockbuster sales in 2016,� said Brendon Ogmundson, an economist with the group that represents 22,000 realtors across the province. �However, the supply of available for sales has not recovered and is still declining in many markets around the province.�

Ontario politicians continue to watch the British Columbia housing market, in particular Vancouver, closely, as they consider measures to cool the Greater Toronto Area resell market where March prices rose on average 33 per cent from a year ago.

Effective August, 2016 British Columbia imposed a 15 per cent additional property tax on foreign buyers � a measure many, including Doug Porter, the chief economist of the Bank of Montreal, have called for in Toronto.

Those opposed to the tax have talked about the detrimental impact it has had on the Vancouver market. Over the first three months of the year, Vancouver sales are down 37 per cent from the same period a year earlier.

On a province-wide basis, there has been $14 billion in sales activity through the first three months of the year, but that�s down from almost $21.6 billion a year earlier. The dollar volume in the Greater Vancouver market was $7.4 billion over the first quarter, down from $13.3 billion a year ago.

Prices in Greater Vancouver continue to fall and declined 9.3 per cent from a year ago to $991,690.
�Although the average price in B.C. was down year-over-year due to a shift in the composition of sales away from higher-priced homes in Greater Vancouver, home prices in most markets are being pushed higher due to severe supply constraints. This is particularly true for the Victoria region, which currently has just over one month of inventory for sale, as well as for the apartment and townhouse market in the Lower Mainland,� said the organization, in its release.

Realtors have suggested foreign buyers in the province have shifted their focus to Victoria and other parts of the province where the additional tax doesn�t apply, a worry Ontario politicians have about a tax in Toronto and how far it would extend beyond the metropolitan area.

The C.D. Howe Institute warned this week that Ontario should not follow B.C.�s lead and pointed out a tax that reduces home values will penalize people who have already purchased property.

�B.C. was not the first to impose a tax of this nature. In fact, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Australia have imposed similar taxes. Hong Kong�s identical 15 per cent foreign-buyer tax lowered transaction volumes by 35 per cent, while dampening housing price increases by a monthly pace of nearly one per cent one year after implementation. Similar effects were observed in Singapore�s housing market,� said the group in a published article.

C.D. Howe says its research shows the foreign-buyer tax has led to nearly 40 per cent fewer transactions than would have occurred without it and average prices that are 4.5 per cent lower.

The group claims the people who have really felt the sting of the provincial tax are homeowners who already purchased property and not foreign buyers.

�The B.C. government�s intent was to lower prices and stabilize the market, but the drop in prices and number of sales shows that locals looking to move feel the harm of the tax. The attention now turns to Toronto�s housing market,� said the group. �The government of Ontario should take a close look at the harm of Vancouver�s foreign buyer tax and not follow suit.�

# ? Apr 14, 2017 17:55

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

I'm seriously curious what housing bulls perceive to be a healthy market with affordable housing. It doesn't seem include reduced prices because that would diminish homeowner equity and punish new buyers!

# ? Apr 14, 2017 17:57

peter banana: Sep 2, 2008; Feminism is a socialist, anti-family, political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.

namaste faggots posted:

http://business.financialpost.com/n...rs-own-solution

hahahaha, I'm really sure Wynne will really put her A-Team on the task force to crash the economy.

# ? Apr 14, 2017 18:08

Jordan7hm: Feb 17, 2011; Lipstick Apathy

Square Peg posted:

I'm certainly not counting on it. I'm pretty sure it went into the new kitchen he and his wife are giving themselves.
Gotta get that ~~granite~~ QUARTZ countertop equity!

Parents don't owe their kids money.

# ? Apr 14, 2017 18:13

Square Peg: Nov 11, 2008

Jordan7hm posted:

Parents don't owe their kids money.

Obviously. I still get to poke fun of them spending a bunch of money on unnecessary renovations to their house that won't pay off in this, the Canadian House Bubble thread.

Meanwhile in Calgary realtors are celebrating a big uptick in new housing starts, even though it seems people still aren't buying what's already built?

quote:

In Calgary, specifically, housing starts are up 33 per cent in the first three months of 2017 compared to the same time last year, but they remain below 2014 and 2015 levels.
...
And while more are being built, the number of new homes sitting unoccupied has grown to a record level, according to the CMHC data.
That has primarily been driven by a growing glut of empty apartment-style condos.

Maybe more oversupply will spur more demand!

# ? Apr 14, 2017 19:31

Ccs: Feb 25, 2011

namaste faggots posted:

What do you mean "invest in the stock market"? For the love of God read the Canadian finance thread in bfc

Index funds, basically.

# ? Apr 14, 2017 21:17

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/committee-urges-ottawa-to-aid-first-time-home-buyers/article34709288/

quote:

Committee urges Ottawa to aid first-time home buyers

A nearly year-long parliamentary study of the Canadian housing market has concluded with a call for Ottawa to help first-time home buyers, but to otherwise stay on the sidelines.

The House of Commons finance committee released a report Thursday with a set of cautious recommendations for how Ottawa should approach the calls for government action, particularly in hot housing markets such as Toronto and Vancouver.

While recommending a response to the concerns of first-time home buyers, the committee also urged the federal government not to make any quick decisions. Only seven months have passed since Finance Minister Bill Morneau unveiled a series of policy measures aimed at discouraging Canadians from taking on too much mortgage debt.

The committee called for Ottawa to wait until a clear picture emerges of how those changes have influenced the market before taking any further action.

�We�re saying take a pause in terms of the national policy approach,� said Liberal MP Wayne Easter, who chairs the committee. �But I think in terms of specific housing markets, Vancouver and Toronto, they are going to be looked at very specifically and there may be things that can be done at the provincial and municipal levels to either cool those markets down or assure some greater stability in them.�

The committee advice comes ahead of a Tuesday meeting in Toronto where Mr. Morneau will meet with Ontario Finance Minister Charles Sousa and Toronto Mayor John Tory to discuss the Greater Toronto Area housing market.

On Thursday, Mr. Sousa took aim at speculators in the housing market during a prebudget speech in Toronto, calling them �property scalpers� and saying that they were partly responsible for limiting the supply of homes as prices skyrocket in the Greater Toronto Area.

While Mr. Sousa said he will table a balanced budget on April 27 that will include a large boost to health spending, he warned that any response to the housing market will be limited to avoid unintended consequences.

�Market forces will ultimately prevail, but we�re just trying to figure out what we can do without overcorrecting the system while at the same time providing for greater support for those who want to get into the market,� he told reporters.

The federal committee report mentioned that some witnesses listed speculation as a factor influencing rising prices, but the MPs did make a specific policy recommendation on that issue.

The report does not make a specific recommendation as to how the government should help first-time home buyers either. In a dissenting report, Conservative MPs pointed to testimony from the banking, real estate and construction sectors that said first-time home buyers were most affected by changes made last October. The Conservatives said a stress test imposed as part of those changes should be altered for first-time home buyers.

The October announcement extended to all insured mortgages a stress test already in place for high-ratio mortgages � where the down payment is less than 20 per cent. The government said the change was aimed at ensuring home buyers could still afford the payments in the event that interest rates were to rise.

The stress test means home buyers seeking an insured mortgage must qualify at the Bank of Canada�s five-year fixed posted mortgage rate, which is usually higher than the rates offered by mortgage lenders.

Mr. Easter said the committee study was extremely challenging because of the large amount of conflicting information and advice from organizations involved in the housing sector. He expressed hope that new money for housing market data announced in the March 22 budget should help inform future policy decisions.

In testimony to a Senate committee hearing in Ottawa on Thursday, Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz and his top deputy, Carolyn Wilkins, again expressed their concern about the Toronto and Golden Horseshoe housing markets. Ms. Wilkins repeated the central bank�s view, laid out in its quarterly Monetary Policy Report released on Wednesday, that �speculative forces� appear to be behind the most recent price spikes, and cautioned that the price surge may not be sustainable.

While Mr. Poloz acknowledged that years of low interest rates from the Bank of Canada are �playing a role in creating that situation,� he remained adamant that rate increases would not be the best way to address the problem. He said higher rates from current levels wouldn�t dissuade speculators who have been betting on 20-per-cent-plus annual price appreciations, and would have a negative impact on other regions and other parts of the economy.

�The Bank of Canada�s interest rate is for all of Canada, not just the Toronto market,� Mr. Poloz said. �It�s not the right tool for the job.�

CIBC chief economist Avery Shenfeld argued in a research note Thursday that higher rates could actually be a good thing for Canada�s housing market.

�Raising rates within the next year would be a natural policy step as part of any plan to keep the economy from spilling beyond full employment into an inflation problem, and would also help moderate house prices,� he said.

is maryam monsef on this loving committee

all you dumb motherfuckers who voted liberal go kill yourselves

# ? Apr 15, 2017 00:04

EvilJoven: Mar 18, 2005; NOBODY,IN THE HISTORY OF EVER, HAS ASKED OR CARED WHAT CANADA THINKS. YOU ARE NOT A COUNTRY. YOUR MONEY HAS THE QUEEN OF ENGLAND ON IT. IF YOU DIG AROUND IN YOUR BACKYARD, NATIVE SKELETONS WOULD EXPLODE OUT OF YOUR LAWN LIKE THE END OF POLTERGEIST. CANADA IS SO POLITE, EH?; Fun Shoe

namaste faggots posted:

all you dumb motherfuckers who voted liberal go kill yourselves

It was either strategic vote Liberal or let the riding go to Joyce Bateman and as loving poo poo as the Liberals are when I set my shitposting aside I'm still not quite ready to actually adopt accelerationism.

But maybe in 2019 I will be.

# ? Apr 15, 2017 00:58

Subjunctive: Sep 12, 2006; ✨sparkle and shine✨

namaste faggots posted:

is maryam monsef on this loving committee

I think the math is too complex for that.

# ? Apr 15, 2017 01:08

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

http://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/inside-the-taming-of-cmhc/

quote:

Inside the taming of CMHC

Evan Siddall, the chief executive officer of Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp., likes to give books to people he is getting to know. A favourite is This Is Water, an essay about self-centredness by David Foster Wallace, which begins with an allegory:

�There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, �Morning, boys. How�s the water?�

And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, �What the hell is water?� �

CMHC was a lot like that insular fish when Siddall arrived at the end of 2013.The agency, created in 1946 to build houses for veterans of the Second World War, liked to describe itself as the �heart of housing��an enormous Crown corporation that dominated the mortgage insurance market, guaranteed complex, bond-like assets called mortgage-backed securities, and subsidized the building and upkeep of First Nations and social housing.

Yet CMHC seemed oblivious to the outside world. In 2012, it held assets worth nearly $300 billion, making it one of the largest financial institutions in Canada. Even so, CMHC had none of the supervision accorded to the country�s large banks, which appeared to suit the agency�s leaders just fine. It flat out rejected any suggestion its insurance schemes were inflating house prices. It had a weak commitment to transparency and hoarded data the Finance Department and Bank of Canada would have found helpful. And it had earned a reputation for bullying critics on Bay Street into silence, which it could do because the big banks were hooked on CMHC insurance. In 2011, Maclean�s profiled the institution, declaring it a menace to Canada�s economy.

That CMHC no longer exists. In 2012, the agency was given the added responsibility of helping Finance and the central bank secure financial stability. Siddall discovered an institution poorly suited for that job, so he cleaned house to make room for about 100 new workers with backgrounds in risk management. CMHC now publishes more data, including stress tests of its ability to withstand economic shocks and regular assessments of �problematic conditions� in the housing market. But the biggest change might be the new attitude at the top. Siddall thinks speaking frankly and publicly about CMHC�s role in the housing market is part of his job, and he did just that in a wide-ranging interview with Maclean�s just after the release of the federal budget in March.

From the outside, those interested in policy and governance can be forgiven if it all seems too good to be true. If experts had been asked to perform a theoretical overhaul of CMHC a few years ago, many would have designed the agency that exists today. And in fact, Siddall�s efforts are now taught at Harvard Business School. In a span of a couple of years, he and his lieutenants fired more than 200 people, reassigned 500, hired 435 and added several hundred more through temporary contracts. �That�s a lot of churn,� says Harvard�s Boris Groysberg, who published a case study of Siddall�s overhaul in November. �He has a lot of courage.�

The only worry now, with house prices reaching stratospheric levels, is that it has all come too late.

ANOTHER FAVOURITE BOOK of Siddall�s is House of Debt, a highly regarded study of the correlation between excessive mortgage debt and ﬁnancial crises. Atif Mian, an economics professor at Princeton, and Amir Suﬁ, a professor of ﬁnance at the University of Chicago, conclude that economic disasters are �almost always� preceded by a large increase in household debt. They say the correlation is so strong that the relationship is as close as you can get to an empirical law in economics.

Canadians� debt is rising signiﬁcantly faster than their paycheques. The ratio of household debt to disposable income is at a record 169.4 per cent, a jump of 23 percentage points from 2006. In 1996, the figure was 99 per cent.

�I don�t want to be the CEO of CMHC when there is a financial crisis that was triggered by something related to housing,� Siddall says. �I worry about our responsibility for that. I think about that a lot.�

CMHC can�t control the housing market, he continues. �That�s a misunderstood factor about CMHC. We and our colleagues at the Department of Finance are constantly accused of not solving the problem. We�re standing in front of a lot of core economic reasons for why housing prices are higher.�

They sure are. The most familiar reasons are low interest rates, booming big-city economies, immigration, foreign and domestic speculation, and not-in-my-backyard rules that restrict supply. Less discussed is the role of CMHC and the many federal and provincial tax incentives that tempt Canadians to buy homes instead of renting them.

CMHC sits at the centre of this system. The agency�s job, in effect, is to unburden banks of their exposure to housing so they can lend more. It�s a sweet deal for lenders, who enjoy virtually risk-free profit on their mortgage businesses. Canada�s homeownership rate surged to about 70 per cent in recent years, among the highest in the world.

But prices also surged, an inconvenient truth for an agency committed to affordable housing, forcing Canadians to take on bigger mortgages to keep pace. Governments have implemented numerous measures to restrict demand, but debt and prices kept rising. Talk of a homegrown financial crisis is no longer a fringe concern. Michael Chong, a contender to lead the Conservative party, says CMHC has made such a mess of the housing market that he will sell it if he ever gets the chance. (Incidentally, Siddall has some experience with that sort of thing. In the 1990s, when he worked for BMO Nesbitt Burns, he was a key member of the consortium of bankers that organized the sale of the Canadian National Railway on behalf of Jean Chr�tien�s government.)

Siddall has the ear of the finance minister, but an auction isn�t one of his policy recommendations. CMHC is �an invaluable instrument of public policy,� he says. He would rather protect the agency from politicians such as Chong by restoring its credibility. One way he is doing that is by ceding market share. The value of CMHC�s assets dropped to $252 billion in 2015, down 14 per cent from 2012.

�The Maclean�s story [from 2011] correctly identified the strategic drift of the organization,� Siddall says. �It had gone beyond that core of what it needed to do. It had become part of the problem.� He adds, �We should be willing to weaken CMHC if it strengthens the system. We are here to service Canadians, not ourselves.�

Historically, politicians drew from the real estate establishment to fill leadership positions at CMHC, raising the risk it could be captured by a certain point of view. Siddall�s predecessor, Karen Kinsley, worked at a Toronto developer before she joined the agency, and spent 25 years at CMHC, 10 as the boss. Kinsley is widely remembered for her brief embrace of 40-year mortgages, a reckless decision that drew a rebuke from former Bank of Canada governor David Dodge.

Siddall�s previous employers include Goldman Sachs and Lazard Fr�res & Co., two of the world�s top investment banks. When he got the call to join CMHC, Siddall was working at the Bank of Canada, helping to devise highly technical schemes to end �too big to fail,� post-crisis shorthand for the perception that governments would rescue the biggest financial institutions whenever they got into trouble. �Evan is consistently analytic, thoughtful and highly effective,� says former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney, who hired his fellow Goldman Sachs alumnus in 2012.

Siddall, 51, spent his first three months at CMHC doing little but observing and asking questions. �That was the hardest thing ever,� he says. �I made a pact with myself, and my colleagues and the board, that within those first 90 days I would listen and learn. I didn�t know the organization. I was an outsider.�

Then, with his facts assembled, he implemented one of the largest organizational overhauls Ottawa ever has seen. Carmen Foglietta, the facilities manager, orchestrated 2,000 �moves� in 2015, more than double the number of people who shift desks in a typical year. �It was very, very intense,� she says. �I was taken aback at first.�

Siddall says he discovered that most of CMHC�s employees were driven by a �sense of mission� but were held back by a bureaucratic hierarchy that slowed decisions and removed personal accountability. So he eliminated sπeveral layers of middle management. The technology was a mess too, so Siddall hired a veteran of Ottawa�s tech scene as chief information officer, outsourced routine tech chores and shifted CMHC to the cloud.

Importantly, Siddall and his management team also wrote a new mission statement that emphasized the agency was about satisfying housing �needs,� not wants�a key distinction for an organization that long saw boosting homeownership as part of its mandate.

Groysberg says he has rarely seen such a dramatic overhaul implemented so quickly. Many executives are good at coming up with a plan, but they often tire of the day-to-day stress of implementing it. �I have known a number of CEOs who knew they needed to make big changes, but would never do it,� he says. �Those CEOs ended up in Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.�

IF BEING WRITTEN up by Harvard hasn�t captured Ottawa�s attention, Siddall�s penchant for truth-telling will. The heads of Crown corporations say virtually nothing in public, and when they do, they avoid comments that might offend politicians or lobbyists. The notion is so entrenched that even Stephen Poloz, the governor of the Bank of Canada, avoided talking publicly about the potential benefits of deficit spending until he worked under a prime minister who agreed.

Siddall is unbridled. In a speech in Vancouver last fall, he called out politicians who favoured taxing international buyers as a way to deflate the city�s bubble. He agreed foreign speculation was a factor, but said CMHC research showed domestic speculation was a bigger issue. �When a white person buys a house, we don�t notice,� he said at the event, hosted by the Vancouver Board of Trade. �If somebody of a different colour does, we do. And that�s not good economics.�

Siddall has questioned the level of government support for first-time homebuyers, and has challenged banks to accept a greater share of the risk associated with the mortgages they sell. Other Crown chiefs may offer such advice, but none does it so openly.

It�s put him in the political firing line at times. In February, Ron Liepert, a Conservative member of Parliament from Alberta, called Siddall �arrogant.� The CMHC boss had just given testimony at the House of Commons Finance Committee that effectively called out critics of tighter mortgage-lending rules as self-interested.

Incidentally, Liepert was wrong. Siddall is confident, not arrogant. He constantly shares credit, saying, for example, that the thing he dislikes about the Harvard study is that it is too much about him. What Liepert was reacting to was a rare brush with a public servant who was willing to engage with politicians in an actual debate. �Public servants often worry too much about the negative perception of what they would say,� Siddall says.

It makes you wonder whether a housing bust would be the existential threat it is now if Siddall had arrived sooner. In an interview, he�s asked if he thinks he�s in a race against a financial crisis. He struggles with the answer. �Boy, that�s . . . I don�t know,� he says.

Siddall mentions another book, The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. Taleb�s contemporary classic is enjoying something of a renaissance after Brexit and Donald Trump�s victory in the U.S. presidential election, with its argument that humanity rarely sees the truly life-altering shifts coming. �I was quite affected by it,� Siddall says of the book, first published in 2007. �I don�t think it�s interesting whether I think we�re in a race against a financial crisis. It�s interesting whether I worry we�re in a race against a financial crisis.�

Just to be clear, Siddall�s worried. That means the rest of us can worry a little bit less.

# ? Apr 15, 2017 03:54

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

lol david foster wallace

this country is doomed

# ? Apr 15, 2017 03:56

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

Evan Siddall, the chief executive officer of Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp., likes to give books to people he is getting to know. A favourite is This Is Water, an essay about self-centredness by David Foster Wallace, which begins with an allegory:

# ? Apr 15, 2017 07:07

UnfortunateSexFart: May 18, 2008; ð» ððð« ð·ððð·
ð ð ð ð« ð®ð ð¾ð ð ð¡ððð

Watch to the end, it's worth it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rpNuZ5XtEU

# ? Apr 15, 2017 07:17

Ccs: Feb 25, 2011

Hahahaha, so was that video financed by her political opponents?

# ? Apr 15, 2017 19:16

Lain Iwakura: Aug 5, 2004; The body exists only to verify one's own existence.; Taco Defender

Ccs posted:

Hahahaha, so was that video financed by her political opponents?

The Twitter account has some interesting followers:

And interesting follows:

Gee.

Lain Iwakura fucked around with this message at 20:22 on Apr 15, 2017

# ? Apr 15, 2017 20:18

Juul-Whip: Mar 10, 2008

# ? Apr 15, 2017 20:27

Ccs: Feb 25, 2011

So the Canadian alt-right is making videos about Surrey...

# ? Apr 16, 2017 00:07

HookShot: Dec 26, 2005

I think my favourite part is how they misspelled "a while" by making it a single word.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 01:16

UnfortunateSexFart: May 18, 2008; ð» ððð« ð·ððð·
ð ð ð ð« ð®ð ð¾ð ð ð¡ððð

Ccs posted:

So the Canadian alt-right is making videos about Surrey...

Isn't Hepner on that side of the fence? She refuses a safe injection site, worries about "disruption to the businesses" on the strip, and promised 100 more cops to solve crime.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 06:56

quaint bucket: Nov 29, 2007

So I went to visit inlaws in Mission and noticed they were surrounded by wetland.

I asked them how did they manage to get a septic field. They did not because the govt passed a law that it is illegal so they are stuck with a septic holding tank that fills up every 2 weeks for $300 a time to drain.

To connect to the city sewage will cost them 5 figures.

This real estate market.

e: they said they have a lawsuit pending over this because the previous owners hid the septic tank module?? Not sure on the details.

But hey, at least they have a lake view!

quaint bucket fucked around with this message at 16:37 on Apr 16, 2017

# ? Apr 16, 2017 16:28

EvilJoven: Mar 18, 2005; NOBODY,IN THE HISTORY OF EVER, HAS ASKED OR CARED WHAT CANADA THINKS. YOU ARE NOT A COUNTRY. YOUR MONEY HAS THE QUEEN OF ENGLAND ON IT. IF YOU DIG AROUND IN YOUR BACKYARD, NATIVE SKELETONS WOULD EXPLODE OUT OF YOUR LAWN LIKE THE END OF POLTERGEIST. CANADA IS SO POLITE, EH?; Fun Shoe

The 5 figures sounds steep until you do the math. They're paying $7800 a year to get rid of their shitwater.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 16:33

quaint bucket: Nov 29, 2007

EvilJoven posted:

The 5 figures sounds steep until you do the math. They're paying $7800 a year to get rid of their shitwater.

Yeah told them it would take 2-3 years to pay it back but they want to wait for the guy across the street to develop his empty lot.

Told them that I'm pretty sure they're waiting for them too.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 16:39

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

http://www.theglobeandmail.com//opinion/editorials/globe-editorial-pop-canadas-housing-bubble-before-it-pops-the-economy/article34709215/

quote:

GLOBE EDITORIAL
Globe editorial: Pop Canada�s housing bubble, before it pops the economy

History doesn�t repeat, but it sure does rhyme.

Revisiting the bubble and bust of the American housing market in the early 2000s, and the financial crisis and Great Recession that followed, doesn�t tell us exactly how today�s housing bubble will end. And recalling how Toronto�s housing prices exploded in the 1980s, and then cratered, doesn�t precisely predict what Toronto housing will do in 2017 and beyond.

But there�s every reason to believe that, if today�s housing bubble is allowed to burst, the sound it makes, and the fallout it leaves, will be familiar. We may not have seen this particular movie yet, but we�ve seen all the prequels.

Over the past year the housing bubble in the Greater Toronto Area has evolved from a question mark to a flashing, screeching, neon-red exclamation point. It�s no longer possible to ignore.

In March, home prices in the GTA � for both houses and condos � were up 33 per cent compared with a year earlier, according to the Toronto Real Estate Board. The Teranet-National Bank index, using a different methodology, has GTA prices up 25 per cent. It also shows the impact spreading through Southern Ontario. In the year to last February, prices rose 29 per cent in Oshawa, 26 per cent in Barrie, 20 per cent in Hamilton and 24 per cent in St. Catharines.

Something similar is happening in British Columbia. Metro Vancouver�s housing prices, long the most bubbly in the country, actually reversed course late last year, after the B.C. government brought in a tax on foreign buyers. But due in part to measures watering down and counteracting the tax, Vancouver prices are rising again � and the pace of increases in Abbotsford and Victoria is outpacing those in Vancouver.

National Bank economist St�fane Marion recently wrote that �close to 55 per cent of regional markets in Canada are reporting price inflation of at least 10 per cent. This record proportion is very similar to that observed in the United States in 2005, at the peak of the market.�

No, the Canadian banking system in 2017 is not the U.S. banking system in 2005. There are no �zero income� loans, buyers have more equity in their homes, and Canada does not have �no recourse� mortgages that underwater owners can simply walk away from. No, history is not going to precisely repeat. But every economist and housing analyst is looking for a Canadian phrase that rhymes with �American housing crash.�

It�s why the ratings agency Moody�s describes Canada as being at risk of a housing price correction. It�s why Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz this week called Toronto�s price frenzy �unsustainable,� and described it as being driven by �speculative demand or investor demand, as opposed to just folks that are buying a house.�

�There�s no fundamental story that we could tell to justify that kind of inflation rate in housing prices,� he said. The economy is growing, but hardly booming. Average wages are barely rising. And yet Toronto home prices are on a record tear.

What to do? On Tuesday, federal Finance Minister Bill Morneau is to meet with his Ontario counterpart, Charles Sousa, and Mayor John Tory of Toronto.They�ve got to take action. And they�ve got to take the right action.

This is a national issue, threatening harm on the national economy and the national banking system. But the site of the problem is localized in Southern Ontario, and to a lesser extent B.C.

Home prices in Greater Montreal, Canada�s second largest city, are up by a mere 3.5 per cent in the last year, according to Teranet-National Bank, and are no higher today than they were in mid-2014. It�s a similar story in Calgary and Edmonton: Both cities are cheaper than they were at the market peak of a couple of years ago. Halifax? Prices are below 2013 levels. Ditto Quebec City.

That�s why a one-size-fits-all, national policy can�t work. Mr. Poloz said this week that higher interest rates, while slowing to an already sluggish Canadian economy, would do little to cool Southern Ontario�s speculative frenzy.

�When you�re looking at making an investment that you think will make you 20 per cent or more over the next 12 months,� said the Bank Governor, �and you have to borrow the money to make that investment, is a quarter point or a half a point (in extra interest) going to make a difference?� No, it isn�t.

Toronto and Ontario have to learn from B.C.�s experience � both positive and negative.

Yes to a foreign buyers� tax: This isn�t anti-immigrant, since it doesn�t apply to immigrants. It isn�t anti-foreign investment in productive Canadian assets, like new plant and equipment. But the overheated housing market is already oversupplied with buyers. And B.C.�s foreign buyers� tax did cool overall market psychology, at least at first.

Vancouver also has a tax on empty units, to encourage owners to rent out unoccupied homes. It�s a reasonable step.

No to accidentally boosting prices: Politicians love to talk about housing affordability, and those running for re-election love to address it by handing out subsidies to first-time buyers. That�s what B.C. did late last year. Problem: Taxpayer subsidies to first-time buyers have the unintended consequence of pushing up home prices.

Don�t get bamboozled by developers: Every developer in history wants �less regulation,� and sometimes they�re even right. But at the moment, there�s little evidence that the GTA is undersupplied with new housing construction. There�s no shortage of land to build on, and there�s been so much new building over the past few years that the ratio of homes-to-people in Toronto has been rising, not falling.

Act now: Toronto is gripped by a speculative frenzy. The frenzied enemy is all of us. Buyers and sellers are behaving as if prices were going to the moon, but they aren�t. They can�t. Policy has to bring the housing market, and all of us, back down to earth.

this is so loving precious

# ? Apr 16, 2017 17:39

ductonius: Apr 9, 2007; I heard there's a cream for that...

They're paying slightly less to get their poo poo trucked away as I was when I rented a bachelor in Surrey.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 17:40

Femtosecond: Aug 2, 2003

namaste faggots posted:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com//opinion/editorials/globe-editorial-pop-canadas-housing-bubble-before-it-pops-the-economy/article34709215/

this is so loving precious

quote:

...

This is a national issue, threatening harm on the national economy and the national banking system. But the site of the problem is localized in Southern Ontario, and to a lesser extent B.C.

Home prices in Greater Montreal, Canada�s second largest city, are up by a mere 3.5 per cent in the last year, according to Teranet-National Bank, and are no higher today than they were in mid-2014. It�s a similar story in Calgary and Edmonton: Both cities are cheaper than they were at the market peak of a couple of years ago. Halifax? Prices are below 2013 levels. Ditto Quebec City.

That�s why a one-size-fits-all, national policy can�t work. Mr. Poloz said this week that higher interest rates, while slowing to an already sluggish Canadian economy, would do little to cool Southern Ontario�s speculative frenzy.

...

First off, "..lesser extent BC..." Jesus loving christ Toronto really is the centre of the universe.

Secondly the reason that the problem is "localized" in Southern Ontario and BC is because setting those spots aside the Canadian economy is completely stagnant or declining, with the entirety of job growth in the entire country being localized in Southern Ontario and Southern BC. A big portion of this job growth is probably in housing associated industries and due to the housing bubble too.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 19:40

Mandibular Fiasco: Oct 14, 2012

Femtosecond posted:

First off, "..lesser extent BC..." Jesus loving christ Toronto really is the centre of the universe.

I was dumbfounded by this statement, too. Belies a complete lack of understanding on the part of the writer.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 20:52

mashed: Jul 27, 2004

So that 4 bed Coquitlam house in my bareland strata went 60k over asking at ~900k without having an open house.

:shepspends:

I guess because this end of the market is still sort of doable for people with normal human Vancouver jobs or something.

# ? Apr 16, 2017 21:32

namaste friends: Sep 18, 2004; by Smythe

http://www.businessinsider.com/wild-housing-speculation-driving-canadian-economy-2017-4

quote:

Wild housing speculation is driving Canada's entire economy

Here�s another data point on the Canadian housing bubble, how immense it really is, and how utterly crucial wild housing speculation has become to the Canadian economy.

Housing starts surged to 253,720 units in March seasonally adjusted, the highest since September 2007, according to Canada Mortgage & Housing Corp. Of them, 161,000 were multi-family starts of condos and rental units in urban areas. In Toronto, one of the hot beds of Canada�s house price bubble, housing starts jumped by 16,600 units, all of them condos and apartments, defying any expectation of a slowdown.

Housing starts are an indication of construction activity, a powerful additive to the local economy with large secondary effects. Housing construction gets fired up by the promise of ever skyrocketing housing prices, and thus big payoffs for developers, lenders, real estate agents, and the entire industry.

National home price data covers up the real drama in certain cities, particularly Vancouver (British Columbia) and Toronto (Ontario), but it does show by how much Canadian housing prices have overshot the already lofty US housing prices.

The chart below by St�fane Marion, Chief Economist at Economics and Strategy, National Bank of Canada, compares US home prices per the Case-Shiller 20-City index to Canadian home prices per the Teranet-National Bank 26-market index. Both indices are based on similar methodologies of comparing pairs of sales of the same home over time. The shaded areas denote recessions in Canada. Note that during the housing crisis in the US, there was only a blip in Canada�s housing market:

Marion added in his note today:

"Home price inflation has become THE hot topic of discussion in Canada. Surging prices are no longer confined to greater Toronto and Vancouver. As today's Hot Chart shows, we estimate that close to 55% of regional markets in Canada are reporting price inflation of at least 10%.

This record proportion is very similar to that observed in the United States in 2005 at the peak of the market.

When 55% of the market is on fire, the use of interest rates to cool things down is justifiable. The Bank of Canada must change its narrative and abandon its easing bias as soon as this week."

He was referring to the Bank of Canada�s meeting this Wednesday.

How important is real estate and housing construction to the Canadian economy? Hugely important! It accounts for an ever larger proportion of the Canadian economy. For all of Canada, according to data by Statistics Canada, housing construction and real estate activities combined account for 15.5% of GDP, up from 14.7% in 2011.

This chart shows housing construction and real estate activities in the largest four provinces as percent of the province�s GDP in 2015, and for Canada overall. StatCan data for 2016 are not yet available. Note British Columbia: 22% of its economy is based on residential construction and real estate activities � due to Canada�s number one housing hot-bed Vancouver:

This is why neither the Bank of Canada nor the governments at the provincial and federal levels are eager to step on the brakes. BC tried with its housing transfer tax aimed at foreign non-resident investors. After it was instituted last summer, it temporarily froze up the market, with sellers and buyers too far apart, and transactions plunged.

By December, only four months after the transfer tax was implemented, the prospects for 22% of the provincial economy heading into a sharp decline or even a major bust motivated the BC government to step back on the accelerator to prolong the speculation � with an ingenious trick.

The province began offering a subsidy to first-time homebuyers: an interest free loan for a down payment of up to $37,500 to match the buyer�s own down payment. It was an effort to allow buyers to get around the down-payment requirements set by the federal government designed to curb wild housing speculation.

It seems the BC government has figured something out: if anything curbs this housing speculation, on which the province is so dependent, the overall economy is going to tank.

Canadian cities are desperately dependent on property taxes for their budgets. Toronto, for example, is facing major budget strains. In February, city councilors approved a 3.3% increase in the residential property tax and they raised the municipal land transfer tax. Under the new budget, property taxes would provide 38% of the revenues, and the land transfer tax 7%, for a total of 45% of the C$10.5 billion in tax revenues for this fiscal year. In other words, the city will extract a record C$4.7 billion from property owners to delay falling into a fiscal and financial sinkhole.

That kind of tax extraction is bearable for property owners only as long as the value of their property soars year after year. Once that value declines, owning this property becomes a massive liability.

This is why the housing bubble and the accompanying crazy housing speculation must be maintained and further inflated, no matter what. It has become an addictive drug for the Canadian economy. Average household indebtedness is among the highest in the world. Many households are carrying little or no debt. But many others are suffocating under a mountain of debt, and a sharp decline in house prices would wreak havoc among them.

The entire economy � including government revenues and thereby the services offered by these governments � depends on wild property speculation. And everyone is praying that it can somehow be maintained.

So are these prices based on fundamentals? You gotta be kidding. Read� Toronto House Price Bubble Goes Nuts.

Somehow I missed this article.

# ? Apr 17, 2017 01:26

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# ? Jun 12, 2024 19:58

James Baud: May 24, 2015; by LITERALLY AN ADMIN

namaste faggots posted:

http://www.businessinsider.com/wild-housing-speculation-driving-canadian-economy-2017-4

Somehow I missed this article.

Garbage article. Property transfer taxes matter, property taxes themselves are entirely moot.

# ? Apr 17, 2017 01:31

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Canada Housing/Debt: Trust me, I'm a landlord.

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