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Showing posts from April, 2017

Looking to build a home fast in Metro Vancouver? Head to Langley

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"Compared to the City of Langley, it takes an average of 19 months longer to receive a building permit in Vancouver - a fact that should worry anyone concerned about high home prices in the city because the added time means extra costs that are ... This chart shows how Canada's housing market risks evolved in 2 years While Vancouver, which has seen home price growth substantially reduced about nine months after BC introduced a foreign-buyer tax for the metro area, wasn't flagged for overheating, Victoria received a yellow evaluation.

Try Globe Unlimited- 99¢/week for the first 4 weeks

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Both working professionals, they are raising their two young children in a rented one-bedroom apartment in Vancouver's West End. CMHC report reveals 'problematic conditions' of Canadian housing market Canada's housing market still shows strong evidence of problematic conditions, the federal housing agency said on Wednesday, though it reported signs of improvement in some markets. http://rock.ly/o16ps

Softwood lumber dispute impacting BC home prices

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According to the Canadian Home Builders' Association (CHBA), with the duties now in place, prices in Canada should retreat somewhat as supply builds and perhaps is even stockpiled, though the actual amounts are uncertain. "Over the longer term, ... Housing talk gets louder and angrier in Vancouver - The Globe and ... Frustration and resignation reign as people survey a changing real estate landscape. http://rock.ly/3cyui

Has home affordability actually improved in Vancouver?

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But by then, the market was already cooling, Royal Bank of Canada senior economist Robert Hogue said last week in a report. Housing, economy, leadership feature in final BC election debate So it was really important that our government make sure we did all of our homework," said Clark, adding measures her government has taken like a 15 per cent tax on foreign buyers in Metro Vancouver has helped slow rising house prices. Weaver told ... http://rock.ly/3910z

Trump Slaps Duty on Canadian Lumber, Intensifying Trade Fight

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Trump announced the new tariff at a White House gathering of conservative journalists, shortly before the Commerce Department said it would impose countervailing duties ranging from 3 percent to 24.1 percent on Canadian lumber producers including West ... B.C. political parties make promises for affordable housing ... With housing affordability rating as a top election issue for B.C. voters, political parties have offered a number of promises to tackle sky-rocketing housing costs.

Housing: NDP and Greens tackle money laundering and tax evasion in Richmond

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Eby said house prices should correct in Richmond, in part, with measures his party proposes. With Richmond at the epicentre, foreign money in Metro Vancouver real estate became a hot political topic last year, culminating in the BC Liberals 15 per cent ... Heat or housing? Twitter battle erupts between Manitoba, Vancouver police vying for recruits Police forces in Vancouver and Manitoba are having a tongue-in-cheek battle on Twitter for recruits. It started with the ... Not to be outdone, the Manitoba RCMP threw on their tactical gear and sent out a message about housing prices. "It's OK, the ...

Morning update newsletter: Softwood tariff; RCMP shipyard probe; why housing prices soared

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Over in B.C., the city of Victoria wants to be added to the list of regions where the province's foreign-buyers tax is applied. Heat or housing? Twitter battle erupts between Manitoba ... - CBC Police forces in Vancouver and Manitoba are having a tongue-in-cheek battle on Twitter for recruits.

Vancouver, B.C. and affordability, a cautionary tale for Portland - Portland Business Journal

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Trump Slaps Duty on Canada Lumber, Intensifying Trade Fight Trump announced the new tariff at a White House gathering of conservative journalists, shortly before the Commerce Department said it would impose countervailing duties ranging from 3 percent to 24.1 percent on Canadian lumber producers including West ... Vancouver, B.C. and affordability, a cautionary tale for Portland Until last fall, Keith Lay was a fourth generation resident of Vancouver, B.C. That's when he and his partner, Helen, left that Canadian city to settle in Portland. They eagerly explored their new city - a place they had visited many times over the ... http://rock.ly/6327l

Has home affordability actually improved in Vancouver? - The Globe ...

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The B.C. government unveiled a foreign-buyer's tax last summer aimed at tamping down Vancouver's runaway real estate market and making homes more ... BC Election 2017: Parties tackle hot-button issue of housing affordability, in their own ways Home prices and incomes in Metro Vancouver have become so wildly detached, B.C. real estate economists and experts say, that improving affordability in a meaningful way will be difficult and require profound changes.

The housing fix: Will it stick?

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But with so many other market forces lining up to juice housing demand in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) - not least of which is Ontario's new status as Canada's fastest-growing economy - real estate experts are questioning whether a foreign-buyers tax ... Beware unintended consequences as governments meddle in real estate: Don Pittis Governments don't have the computer power to do that with the Canadian property market. That's a good ... Even though renters don't own their properties, rent controls give them a stake in future property markets in a way that could make them, too ...

The housing fix: Will it stick?

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But with so many other market forces lining up to juice housing demand in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) - not least of which is Ontario's new status as Canada's fastest-growing economy - real estate experts are questioning whether a foreign-buyers tax ... 'A substantial revenue source': But BC's property transfer tax barely mentioned in campaign The property transfer tax (PTT) was introduced by former Social Credit premier Bill Vander Zalm in 1987, when the average price of a Vancouver home was about $150,000, in order to tax speculation on high-end properties. It is levied anytime changes are ...

Buy now or risk saying bye-bye to affordable Montreal home ownership

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And foreign investors are almost certainly already on their way to the next undervalued, untapped real estate market now that Ontario has imposed a 15 per cent tax on foreign buyers in Toronto as B.C. did for Metro Vancouver. More money drives prices ... Bank of Canada governor 'happy' to see plan for GTA housing market Measures to cool the housing market in the Greater Toronto Area have received a warm response from Canada's central banker, who said Saturday it should have some effect on runaway housing prices. "I'm happy there ... The moves included a 15-per-cent ...

Ontario's rent and housing reform: 16 big changes, explained in charts

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Last August, B.C. introduced a 15-per-cent tax on residential properties bought by owners who aren't Canadian citizens or permanent residents, which sent property sales plunging almost immediately. But another side effect has been a dip in property ... BC party leaders' housing-affordability promises pose dilemma for renters B.C.'s provincial candidates have made it no easy task for Vancouver renters to decide who to vote for based on their party's housing-affordability promises. ... The latest data from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. put the average rent in the ...

B.C. is proof foreign buyer tax won't cool house prices

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Scenes from 4/20 Vancouver as 2017 marijuana festival gets going at Sunset Beach Featuring what organizers describe as the world's largest cannabis farmer's market, 4/20 Vancouver has rows and rows of booths offering everything from joints to cookies, extracts, plants, wellness products, clothing, pipes, and jewellery. B.C. is proof foreign buyer tax won't cool hot housing prices If experience in B.C. is any indication, the best Ontario can hope for with its foreign buyer tax is a temporary lull in the dramatic rise in house prices, columnist Cori Howard says. (Google Maps image) ... As one American client told another realtor ...

Vancouver real estate could experience 'market whiplash' as home sales jump: report

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“Vancouver house prices are up compared to the first quarter of 2016, yet this doesn't tell the complete story,” Soper said. Ontario's rent and housing reform: 16 big changes explained The centrepiece of Ontario's new housing strategy is a 15-per-cent tax on home purchases by foreign buyers in the Greater Golden Horseshoe, from the Niagara region to Peterborough.

Spike In Canadian Searches For ‘Housing Bubble' A Sign It's Ending

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Bad news for Metro Vancouver home buyers as prices climb "The principal victims of the B.C. government's foreign buyer tax were Canadians who had planned to sell or buy a home and were frightened away by unsubstantiated rhetoric in which the Chinese were entirely to blame for Vancouver's housing shortage ... Spike In Canadian 'Housing Bubble' Searches A Sign It May Be Ending If there's one truism about housing bubbles, it's that, at first, buyers and sellers don't believe there's a housing bubble. After all, you're probably not going to pay tens or hundreds of thousands over asking if you think prices are going to pop ...

After lull, Vancouver housing prices set for rebound

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The Royal LePage quarterly house price survey, released Tuesday, shows home prices in the Greater Vancouver region dropped 1.9 per cent in the quarter ended March 31 compared with the last quarter of 2016, driven by a decline in prices of detached ... David and Goliath: a priceless Vancouver academic retires, after 45 years grappling with unaffordability That's a comment on just how little [policy] had happened in Vancouver, and the rest of Canada too, although here the stakes are much higher.

Spring fever: Record home sales, prices across country

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The Canadian Real Estate Association said Tuesday home sales through its Multiple Listings Service rose 1.1 per cent in March to top the previous monthly record set in April 2016. Ministers and mayor gather to talk Toronto's hot housing prices Federal Finance Minister Bill Morneau, Ontario Finance Minister Charles Sousa and Toronto Mayor John Tory are meeting today to talk housing. Specifically, what to ... The Canadian Press obtained Omar Khadr's criminal record and, apparently, it contains ...

Gas stations an endangered species in downtown Vancouver

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Let the house hunting begin As housing prices continue to rise in major Canadian cities, especially in Surrey, across Metro Vancouver and in the Fraser Valley, making the most of your investment has never been more important. Property records show Imperial Oil sold 1205 Burrard to 7-Eleven Canada for $25,607,448 last September. ... 7-Eleven has now put five of those properties up for sale, four in Vancouver (1205 Burrard, 1790 West 4th, 1398 West Broadway, 1795 West ...

Housing Speculation An Addiction Canada's Economy Can't Kick

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Reeling in Canada's Hot Real Estate Market For Sale A sold sign is pictured outside a home in Vancouver, B.C., Tuesday, June, 28, 2016. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward). NEEPAWA, Man. - Like an impending disaster, the housing market in two of Canada's largest cities is hard to take ... National home price data covers up the real drama in certain cities, particularly Vancouver and Toronto, but it does show by how much Canadian housing prices have overshot already lofty U.S. housing prices. The chart ... By December, only four months ...

Ontario Liberals to target 'property scalpers' in upcoming housing measures

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A similar practice - called “shadow flipping” - became increasingly common in Vancouver. It typically involved a real estate agent reselling the same previously owned home multiple times before the closing date, driving up the price of the house ... BC election: Profiles of the three major-party leaders The benchmark price for detached properties in Greater Vancouver stood at more than $1.5 million last May, giving rise to complaints about unaffordable homes as tent cities for homeless people sprang up in Victoria and Vancouver. The government imposed ...

In condo crazy Vancouver, downtown's last gas station for sale

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... the value of the dirt, there's just no possible way that just having a stand-alone gas station makes any kind of sense financially,” Tsur Somerville, director of the University of British Columbia's Centre for Urban Economics and Real Estate, told ... B.C. real estate activity slumps by $7 billion as Ontario watches and ponders own solution 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 ...

In condo crazy Vancouver, downtown's last gas station for sale

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Globe editorial: Pop Canada's housing bubble, before it pops the ... From the U.S. housing boom and bust of the 2000s, to Toronto's housing frenzy and crash of the 1980s, we've seen this movie before. | CTV ... With condominiums crowding the city's skyline, there's not a lot of space left to build more. So, when land does become available, it is often scooped up by ...

Today's high house prices could make the next recession ...

House prices can't climb much faster than incomes forever but would Canadians fear or cheer for a correction? TORONTO, April 13, 2017 /CNW/ - A sharp ... http://rock.ly/bn0g1 How Canada's real estate market went completely insane In British Columbia, real estate and related fields such as construction and finance make up an astounding 40 per cent of GDP. http://rock.ly/a52cj

Editorial: B.C. has two economies

Today's high house prices could make the next recession problematic: CIBC report "Given larger average mortgage principals that have been needed to pay for more expensive housing, the Bank of Canada's ability to raise rates during the upswing of the cycle will be severely constrained," says Avery Shenfeld, Chief Economist, CIBC ... http://rock.ly/pjy2o Editorial: BC has two economies House prices remain strong - a mixed blessing - and although still small, our high-tech sector continues to grow. ... The same divide exists on Vancouver Island. ... At $10.85 an hour, B.C.'s current rate is below the Canadian provincial average of ... http://rock.ly/4n0a2

BC NDP promise new tax on foreign speculators

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The influence of foreign money has long been a concern in the debate about how to rein in housing prices in Vancouver, where prices jumped by more than 40 per cent in a single year and where detached homes fetch well over $1-million. How Canada's real estate market went completely insane Skyrocketing house prices. Six-figure bidding wars. A Wild-West mortgage market. How did we get to this point—and how does it end?

Teranet-National Bank home price index posts largest March increase in a decade - NEWS 1130

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Last gas: Vancouver's sole remaining downtown gas station for sale ... After a record-breaking sale for the Chevron station property on West Georgia Street, the sole remaining gas bar in downtown Vancouver has been listed for sale ... Teranet-National Bank home price index posts largest March increase in a decade TORONTO - The Hamilton, Toronto, Victoria and Vancouver markets helped push Canadian home prices higher last month, resulting in the largest March rise in a decade, according to a new report.

Vancouver sticker shock sends ripple effects across BC

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The numbers are stark: while benchmark house prices in the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver's area rose 17.8% in 2016 to $897,600, the price of housing sold through the Fraser Valley and Victoria real estate boards increased by more than 20 ... BC Election Checklist: where do they stand on housing? But with Metro Vancouver's homelessness rate up 30 per cent over three years, tent cities increasing and record low rental vacancy rates not just in the Lower Mainland, but in smaller B.C. cities like Victoria, Kelowna and Kamloops, “we're not doing so ...

Canadian housing price trend 'very similar' to U.S

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just before the crash: National Bank Over half of urban markets tracked by National Bank of Canada are seeing home prices increase by 10 per cent or more a year. Downtown Vancouver's last gas station now on the market Motorists looking for a place to top up their cars in downtown Vancouver and the West End will soon be out of luck - the area's only gas station is now up for sale and potentially heading for redevelopment. The Esso station at Burrard Street and Davie ...