Last week, real estate marketing guru, Bob Rennie was speaking with Bill Good about a “new type of buyer” in Vancouver…or, rather, the type of buyers he advises developers to build for. Read more…
It’s a buyer’s market in Vancouver. You know what that means, right? Not a whole heck of a lot for the average person…nevertheless, as we see prices deflate ever so slightly and product on the market increase – perhaps we can dream of owning a little piece of 604 paradise. Let’s say you’ve been waiting for your golden opportunity to buy that dream home of yours and you have modest budget of about $3 million…you could buy this: Read more…
Although I am not a huge Tom Cruise fan, one of my all time favorite cheese-ball movies is Jerry McGuire. I love the story of the unethical wheeler-dealer who switches gears in the interest of getting back to being human and doing “good business.” Recently I (and many others) saw a local realtor make a bold move. When the REBGV and media are saying BUY, he is saying SELL. I read Keith Roy’s blog post with a critical eye and was speculative about what his true intentions were. I wanted to know more about what compelled him to write what he did, considering most of his professional industry is trumpeting the exact opposite of what he is. Today his post has been edited on his site, saying the original “… was deemed by some of my colleagues to be disrespectful to the industry of which I am a part.”
Was it about “help me help you” or is Roy cleverly marketing himself to a demographic that are thinking this is their last opportunity to cash out before a crash? You be the judge and read my interview with Keith. Read more…
When you think of a millionaire’s home what comes to mind? For me, I hear Robin Leach’s voice from Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous…”champagne wishes and caviar dreams,” baby! I imagine myself sipping a martini and sitting in a beautiful living room like the one in this 5 bedroom $3 Million dollar San Francisco home: Read more…
Six hundred thousand dollars, is (IMHO) a lot to spend on a home. Imagine if you had six million?? Read more…
Yesterday, CMHC released a report stating that we can expect to see a close to 5% increase in housing prices in Greater Vancouver by this time next year. This news comes as a shock to many who have been consistently hearing experts sate we can expect a market correction, bringing prices down by at least 15%. It is an age old debate in Vancouver…and, honestly, I feel like the imminent bubble burst is a bit of an urban legend. Read more…
Let’s get really and truly absurd this week. Imagine for a moment that you have won the lottery. You have $4.5 million dollars to spend on the home of your dreams. Really, since money is clearly no object, you should get the biggest bang for your buck. So…what would you choose?
Mark Hasiuk has been addressing this issue in his recent articles featured the Vancouver Courier, which have been considered controversial. I’ve even heard it said outright that he is a racist.
The conversational pot about housing unaffordability and foreign investment in Vancouver has been stirred yet again. Peter Ladner, former Vancouver City Councillor and Mayoral Candidate, took quite a bit of heat when he addressed this issue last year. When I was interviewed on the Bill Good show about my Absurd Vancouver Property posts, I was asked about the “elephant in the room” (i.e. foreign investors). Cam Good of thekey.com, followed me and insinuated that people who think foreign investment is a factor in lack of affordability to the average Vancouverite are “unfairly blaming visible minorities.” Mike Smyth, anchoring for Bill that day, shared the same view as me which is that, for most people, it’s not about racism. People are simply frustrated by and concerned about the inability for local buyers (or those who want to be) to get into a house.
Allen Garr, also of the Courier, states that “blaming Chinese for high house prices in Vancouver is racist.”
Pete McMartin, in his recent Vancouver Sun article, says “…as multicultural as Metro Vancouver is, and as tolerant as it claims to be, real racial resentments exist here. We may voice these resentments in our homes and among friends and we may dress them up in terms of dollars and cents, but we are too polite, or too cowed, to admit to them openly.”
People believe what they see and hear with their own eyes and ears. When we see empty houses in our neighbourhoods, we wonder who owns them and where they are. When our friends and children move away because they cannot afford to stay in their hometown, we wonder why. Perhaps a better job needs to be done by our media and government in explaining all of the contributing factors behind the lack of housing affordability in Vancouver? Because, like it or not, lots of us are talking about this and we are feeling confused and frustrated and angry.
Personally, I do not consider myself to be racist. I love the diversity and ethnicity in my neighbourhood and city. Further, isn’t almost everyone from Vancouver originally from somewhere else? Aren’t most of us the product of years and years of immigration into this country? One of the concerns I hear from people is particularly with foreign investors who are using the city as a place to “bank” their money. Not having restrictions on this, as Ladner points out (in the YouTube video below) can have “…unpleasant effects on entire communities and neighbourhoods” (which we saw illustrated in Hasiuk’s most recent article about the Trafalgar neighbourhood on Vancouver’s westside).
I believe that there are many contributors to the high cost of real estate in Vancouver and foreign investment is only one of them. However, labeling those who see foreign investment as a factor in the state of local real estate as “racist” is as absurd as placing the blame solely on foreign investors themselves.
This week’s Absurd Property is truly a steal by Vancouver standards. Described on Realtor.ca as an “Old Timer” this house “needs renovation.” Seriously? Is someone really going to renovate this? Who are we kidding? It’s a tear down. The “motivated overseas seller” is getting $1430/month rent for this beauty, but wants to cash in…
Listing price $1.68 million. Located about 20 minutes outside of downtown in prestigious Kerrisdale (home to “the creme de la creme in Vancouver” – sorry, Pamela Sauder, you are never living that one down), the house is right on busy West 41st Avenue. Transit is super accessible; the bus stop is right outside your front door! The home is a few blocks away from the property I featured a few weeks ago…and is $1 million dollars less. Hooray!!!
Or…for $1.6 Million you could purchase this 8 Bedroom 4 Bathroom home in Brooklyn, NY (20 minutes outside Manhattan):
Or this seaside home in Dublin, Ireland (Howth is 15 Km outside of Dublin’s City Centre) – you can be certain this low price is the result of Ireland’s own recent real estate bubble burst.
Or, finally, you could have owned a piece of cinematic history. The home used in the famous John Hughes’ film “Home Alone”, located in the Chicago North Shore suburb of Winnetka, was recently sold for $1.6 million:
Vancouver…are you f*%#ing kidding me!!???
