I think there should be restrictions, just because for citizens, it's hard to buy property that is in-line with work-life balance. Especially when housing is artificially inflated by foreign investors all the while Canadian citizens cannot afford anything because they are governed by local salaries/minimum wages/provincial taxes/job markets/etc, which foreign rich investors aren't invested/affected by in one iota.
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Vancouver Housing Market: 33% of Home Sales to Chinese Buyers
- Thread starter gamechanger87
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Junior Mint
Member
The difference is cities like Seattle, San Francisco, LA have gigantic companies anchoring the economy. Vancouver is an economic wasteland where people are proud of relative nobodies like Hootsuite.
You have to be joking
Lol wish this would happen to alberta, otherwise I would still be employed. Honestly though, I am surprised that no investors has look at alberta at all, condos are half the price of Vancouver, houses are 1/3 - 1/4 the price. Both Edmonton and Calgary are decent enough cities.
shortsFortallPeople
Banned
Miami is going through the same thing, tons of foreign investors buying up condos and homes and pricing out the average resident. I'm dying to leave the city and go somewhere where I dont feel like im barely making it every month.
starchild excalibur
Member
I moved to Pasadena from the Midwest 6 years ago and currently live on the border between San Gabriel and Temple City. It's alarming how much housing (or at least rent) prices have risen just in the past 6 years. As bad as it sucks for me, I guess I can't complain too much because I came from the Midwest out here for a career and I'm not a local looking to start a family here.
In my defense, I underpaid for my first apartment here and have lost subsequent apartments due to not wanting/being able to overpay the going price for the unit.
In my defense, I underpaid for my first apartment here and have lost subsequent apartments due to not wanting/being able to overpay the going price for the unit.
With the way things are going right now, it's definitely going to be a very loud "bang".
For myself, my mum & I had just finish paying the mortgage for our home in North Vancouver, & it has definitely taken a load off our minds. I can finally start saving again, for starters.
jellies_two
Member
Sydney has the same problem
Non residents can only buy new build by law : so condos are filling up with overseas owned apartments to let (or empty). They are built toe marketed overseas.
But there is no gift tax in Australia so resident but Chinese origin students and Chinese Australians with connections buy anything they can get their hands on with money from the mainland.
The median price has been over 1m for a house anywhere, and most of Sydney, by land area, is barely more than suburban sprawl, far from jobs and services.
There is a lot of simmering anger but the boomers are too busy making coin selling up their family homes for inflated numbers, so the government literally had no statistics on it and doesn't want any.
Non residents can only buy new build by law : so condos are filling up with overseas owned apartments to let (or empty). They are built toe marketed overseas.
But there is no gift tax in Australia so resident but Chinese origin students and Chinese Australians with connections buy anything they can get their hands on with money from the mainland.
The median price has been over 1m for a house anywhere, and most of Sydney, by land area, is barely more than suburban sprawl, far from jobs and services.
There is a lot of simmering anger but the boomers are too busy making coin selling up their family homes for inflated numbers, so the government literally had no statistics on it and doesn't want any.
shira
Member
Bronetta
Ask me about the moon landing or the temperature at which jet fuel burns. You may be surprised at what you learn.
Firstly, rich people don't pay as many taxes because of capital gains and dividends in Canadian tax law.
Secondly, no there are no additional taxes for expensive home purchases in Vancouver apart from the standard taxes. There have been recent speculation and vacant house taxes proposed by various politicians and/or academics, but they've been shot down.
Zoe
Member
That's happening to Austin ISD. Families are moving out to the suburbs while DINKs or investors are buying up properties in the city. Most of the funding comes from attendance, so low student enrollment means less funding.
Its just a hot topic in the news recently but nothing has changed that I have seen since I bought a house 15 years ago.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
Maybe there is some deeper metric here, but without details this just sounds stupid.
I love that Vancouver is a kind of Asian-British hybrid city. That's specifically why I like it.
If there's some specific point about school competition becoming too serious, or PRC style authoritarianism sneaking in, we could talk... But I don't personally give one shit about preserving the pure "Britishness" of Vancouver. The Asian immigrants are what make this place half interesting...
Haha. Absolutely nothing.
Crossing my fingers that the bubble will eventually burst. They've been crossed for 15 years.
gutter_trash
Banned
hey! maybe this is their chance to re-vitalize Atlantic Canada!
Young people should go East Coast
IndoAssassin
Banned
This has caused a rippling affect to the suburbs. $500,000 -$600,000 for a 3 bedroom house in a town with a population of <40,000.
Does Canada not have adverse possession laws?
Properties like that would be prime candidates.
That works within the confines of a market, but market rules get distorted when there is a large influx of wealth from outside the market. By comparison, there are more people in California than Canada. On a purely mathematical level, foreign investors could easily dominate the local housing market.
There is nothing inherently wrong with a country restricting property ownership to citizens and permanent residents.
For example, unless things have changed recently, buying residential property in China requires that one be a legal resident of China. Buying commercial property in China requires that the purchasing company be a Chinese company.
Mike Works
Member
Jokes on them, us Vancouver young people are going to buy a bunch of houses in China now.
Disgusting. As far as I am concerned, the more Asian Vancouver looks, the better. These "British" North American cities are all mostly and boring. More cities in Canada should embrace their unique qualities. Montreal is a good example of a beautiful and unique North American city with its French style.
I wouldn't mind if there were any incentive but as things are now, Atlantic Canada is such a dump for employment that people leave to work in Alberta. If the Canadian government actually tried to revitalise the place with jobs, infrastructure and immigrants, I would definitely be down for it.
psynergylover
Member
it like Field of Dreams: If you build it they will come....33% of the property will be owned by the Chinese
...was the directors cut, just like I remember
...was the directors cut, just like I remember
StrongArmSteady
Member
Jacky Mao buying up real estate
Condos and houses sitting empty aren't good for the economy. A big part of the problem is that some of these ppl don't live here nor do they rent out their places. We're winding up with areas that have building density but without the population density to go with it.
Yeah, I more than welcome immigrants but that does pose some problems and something has to be done because it's so wasteful. Politicians have been very slow to move on this issue.
Wolf Dawgz
Member
As a First Nations person, I'm not interested in keeping the Britishness of Vancouver. In fact I enjoy that Vancouver is such a diverse place. The problem is however is that British Columbia was planned with Vancouver and Victoria being the hub for people. The skytrain, focalization of government services tends to be in these populated areas. This has led to a discrepancy with every other area that is not Vancouver/Victoria.
One of the problems with this is that diversification has not really happened in B.C outside of Vancouver/Victoria. Those cities are relatively small in area compared to the province they lie in. For the most part services such as healthcare and transit have also been heavily focused in the lower mainland area. Emphasis for economic growth in these regions tends to be with mainly just resource extraction(logging, oil, mining, mills). While these aren't necessarily bad(varies from who you ask), it makes for a sore lack of alternative job options. This makes all the other areas of B.C have less appeal due to the opportunity for different jobs. So while moving out could be an option for current skilled/non-skilled Vancouver residents, the places they would move to are likely not to be within the province. It also makes it harder for people who have disabilities, or those who need health access because you need to go to Vancouver to get these services.
One of the problems with this is that diversification has not really happened in B.C outside of Vancouver/Victoria. Those cities are relatively small in area compared to the province they lie in. For the most part services such as healthcare and transit have also been heavily focused in the lower mainland area. Emphasis for economic growth in these regions tends to be with mainly just resource extraction(logging, oil, mining, mills). While these aren't necessarily bad(varies from who you ask), it makes for a sore lack of alternative job options. This makes all the other areas of B.C have less appeal due to the opportunity for different jobs. So while moving out could be an option for current skilled/non-skilled Vancouver residents, the places they would move to are likely not to be within the province. It also makes it harder for people who have disabilities, or those who need health access because you need to go to Vancouver to get these services.
I would do two things to fix this:
1. Report the identity and source of funds for any non-citizen to their home country's government. That kills corruption and criminal money.
2. Triple property taxes on any house not occupied 183 days or more a year, either by tenant or by owner.
I have no problem with offshore money buying property, but I do have one when it's criminal money or the houses are empty. Empty houses kill cities.
1. Report the identity and source of funds for any non-citizen to their home country's government. That kills corruption and criminal money.
2. Triple property taxes on any house not occupied 183 days or more a year, either by tenant or by owner.
I have no problem with offshore money buying property, but I do have one when it's criminal money or the houses are empty. Empty houses kill cities.
Septimus Prime
Member
Yes, it's true. I live in Arcadia, and even though English works fine for me when I'm at work, I lose all the phonemes once I commute back into the city limit.
AliasGreed
Member
I feel and understand the pain of my Vancouver friends.
I live in miami and all the rich south american people move to miami. Makes it really hard for the locals to compete.
English works fine but everyone speaks spanish everywhere all the time.
I live in miami and all the rich south american people move to miami. Makes it really hard for the locals to compete.
English works fine but everyone speaks spanish everywhere all the time.
Conscience Falls
Member
Great episode of the CanadLand podcast about this with one of the writers from the paper/site Hongcouver.
Yeah, if you want to work for the Irvings <3
Well, NB at least.
Yeah, if you want to work for the Irvings <3
Well, NB at least.
PumpkinSpice
Banned
This is the part that really bothers me. Boomers are having a fucking field day with buying and selling homes and because they're the biggest voter block nobody wants to do anything to fix the affordability problem.
A lot of kids that go to Halifax for school seem to end up staying there. It's probably the main thing offsetting the exodus of young people out of pretty much everywhere else in NS.
Mr Nash
square pies = communism
Yeah, I saw that thing about the arbitration a little while ago. It's clever.
I don't see how this can end well. In the very least, professionals will move elsewhere to parts of the world where the cost of living is much more reasonable. There have been so many stories in the news about companies having a hard time attracting talent since more and more people are finding out how expensive it is to live in Vancouver. Then there's issues like nursing shortages. I can see more people in that field taking their expertise elsewhere for better pay and cities with a lower cost of living. Continually upward spiraling real estate prices without adequate high paying jobs to support it will turn a city like Vancouver into a withered husk eventually as people are forced to move somewhere else.
catpurrcat
Member
One of the newspapers had an interesting piece with somebody who gave Guelph as an example of a good happy medium for professionals. $300k for a townhouse if I remember correctly?
But I know what you mean about TO. In a large social circle, I still have yet to meet anyone who bought their own home without parental help in some way, not necessarily money up front but other ways to help them "save" (eg free car, free rent, pays tuition if they live at home, buy starter condo for them then let them keep the equity growth $ after selling 4 years later).
entremet
Member
Lmao
Vancouver did a study on this very recently and around 99% of detached houses and townhouses are actually occupied. Around 12% of condos are unoccupied, but that rate has been completely flat throughout the massive rises in housing valuations in recent years, so that level of unoccupancy is not a driver of house prices.
This 33% study has some deeply flawed methodology, but there is certainly a significant amount of foreign capital flooding into the Vancouver area, and that has real effects on the valuation of houses in the entire region, even outside of Metro Vancouver.
This is actually not an issue in Vancouver. There is not a problem of unoccupied homes.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...but-condos-most-likely-empty/article29072573/
Foreign millionaires are immigrating to Canada and living here.
You need to have lived or worked in China for a year first and then you still won't ever own the land your property is on. Unfortunately there's no reciprocation to be found here, just increased housing prices wherever they decide to start snapping up properties.
Anyone noticed the changing attitudes of white liberal minded people that live in Vancouver/Victoria/Lower Mainland? I'm sure 20 years ago they were of mostly progressive/pc mindset. But the ones I've been meeting that are moving back to the prairies or meet on trips in SA and Europe are pretty sour about the whole thing. I've heard some pretty harsh words for the Asians in particular in B.C.
I suppose a lot of that anger comes from people that grew up in the core or a suburb with their boomer parents, only to be stuck with their parents with absolutely no hope of owning or living in the city they grew up in.
But I thought it was an interesting contrast compared to what one would typically think of as a "open and inclusive" West Coaster. Diversity has its limits maybe, when it actually starts affecting people personally.
I suppose a lot of that anger comes from people that grew up in the core or a suburb with their boomer parents, only to be stuck with their parents with absolutely no hope of owning or living in the city they grew up in.
But I thought it was an interesting contrast compared to what one would typically think of as a "open and inclusive" West Coaster. Diversity has its limits maybe, when it actually starts affecting people personally.
TemplaerDude
Member
That report and the methodology used has enough holes in it to strain my kraft dinner.
People need to start to realize there are many issues at play here and not just one big problem.
There are unbelievable amount of closet racists in this city that seem to think it's okay to just start blathering their bullshit lately. Unfortunately that meant for a long time that even suggesting that foreign ownership could be at play here got you shut down as a racist. The bubble has gotten so big, though, that people are starting to get very angry and all sides are being listened to a bit more.
What are some? There some potential problems but in my opinion they're pretty minor, and if you read the report the authors acknowledged their limits and tried to compensate for them.
This unoccupied housing study was well received by most of the media and academics that follow the Vancouver housing affordability problem. I don't think many people had any issues with it.
Dreams-Visions
Member
....huh. Interesting.
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