Breaking down charges on new homes in Vancouver. Sample case, a 1000sqft condo in a 20 storey concrete tower on West Broadway in 2020. Of course there are other fees and taxes that I am unsure how to calculate or unaware of and have thus not mentioned. One big one is the sales taxes on building materials, the taxes on companies developing/building, etc. which I couldn't figure out how to estimate:

Regional District-Transit DCC $1545 a Condo
https://www.translink.ca/About-Us/Ta...t-Charges.aspx
Regional District-Sewage DCC $1072 a Condo
http://www.metrovancouver.org/boards...solidation.pdf
City-Utility DCL $10.09/sqft =$10,090
https://bylaws.vancouver.ca/consolidated/12183.PDF
City-Broadway DCE $425/sqft = $425,000
https://vancouver.ca/files/cov/devel...appendix-c.pdf

For a total of $437,707 in fees to the city and regional district.

Now on to taxes. Although it would definitely need to be priced higher, for tax purposes lets assume that its priced at $1,000,000 and that the land value is 20% of the price and that there are 100 units in the building.

Federal-5% GST on new units $50,000
Provincial-Property Transfer tax when developer buys is $9,187.60
Provincial-Property Transfer tax when Owner buys is $18,000
Provincial/City-Property tax (estimated 4 years) is $2049
Provincial-Additional School tax during development time (estimated 4 years) Approx $3200
Municipal-Vacancy tax while waiting on permit (estimated 1 year) $2,000
Muncipal-Property tax during development time (estimated 4 years) Approx $2000

For a total of $88,436.60 in taxes.

$437,707+$88,436.60=$526,143.6‬0 to various levels of government.
That means for a $1 million dollar condo located outside Downtown Vancouver on Broadway, you will pay more than half the price to the government.


I hope other Canadians can see why Vancouver has problems building affordable housing. Note that its not "greedy" developers or "foreign money laundering speculators" that are the biggest problem here. How can a developer make an affordable condo in this socialist economy. The reason Vancouver housing prices went up is that we have high demand and its impossible to build new housing for less, so we build at super expensive prices which drives demand towards used housing which of course drives up their prices until new housing seems reasonably priced. And then government increases charges which repeats the process.

"Development Contribution Expectations (DCE) policies in conjunction with interim rezoning policies are intended to limit land value speculation in areas undergoing community planning. These policies provide buyers and sellers of land in community planning areas with clarity regarding the City’s priorities in community planning areas and expectations for contributions towards amenities and affordable housing as a result of community planning"

Basically what they are planning to charge. I know downtown is much higher so this seems like a good sample to base an estimate on.

CAC's are negotiated Downtown for residential based on 70-80% on the $$ lift in value. All other area specific CAC's are only as high as $100/sf.

Why do you continue to repeat these inaccurate statements? You're in entirely the wrong thread as well, as the question of taxes, and especially CACs, has nothing to do with Ecodensity, or sustainability.

The lower tax numbers you quote are probably in the ballpark. GenWhy is correct, the $425 per square foot DCE is to stop anybody being stupid enough to rezone along West Broadway while the plan for that area is being prepared. There's no indication, and no likelihood that it will be the level of CAC suggested once the plan is complete. This was explained to you by several posters last time you produced the same, wrong, argument.

To illustrate - one of the biggest land lift calculations recently was at 1500 West Georgia - the Bosa / Ole Scheeren tower. There are 220 units and they offered to pay a CAC of $56,938,245, which was accepted. Those are seriously luxury tower units on 43 floors, and the residential space is all 'lift'. It works out at $259,000 a unit, or $222 per square foot of additional residential space (as that's 256,000 sq. ft.). West Broadway isn't as prestigious a location, and won't generate anything like that level of lift.

They are asking over $600/sqft on some coal harbor sites.

Who is they? The City don't ask for anything. Developers make an offer. City Council decide if they consider it a reasonable offer, based on the advice from the Real Estate Department.

There are no Coal Harbour sites left to develop. There's a condo building under construction now, at 1255 W Pender which is the last Coal Harbour private development site. They paid a CAC of zero, because they didn't rezone. The last site will be non-market housing over a new school.

Even if it's not transit-related, I would still take anything that Condon says with multiple grains of salt.

The city staff may whisper it or hint at it.

High-density neighbourhoods leave room for trees, says Metro Vancouver

New report finds that high-rise neighbourhoods have more space for urban forest than those with big houses
Chad Pawson · CBC News · Posted: Sep 22, 2019

https://i.cbc.ca/1.5292502.156918536...-with-tree.jpg
A new report from Metro Vancouver says that some high-density neighborhoods in Metro Vancouver have more space for trees than low density neighbourhoods with big houses on small lots. (Ben Nelms/CBC)

Picture a green and leafy neighbourhood. If you're imagining houses with yards, a new report from Metro Vancouver urges you to think again.

Officials found that from about 1960 to 2000, areas with high-density housing, such as condo and apartment towers, had more trees than areas with low-density housing, such as single-family detached homes.

"Let's really pay attention to how we are developing our communities and make sure that trees are a part of that," said Josephine Clark, a regional planner for Metro Vancouver and the author of the report.

"They are going to make our communities much more livable, sustainable places."

...

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/briti...rees-1.5291636

I've argued about this before. Yes! The taller you go with the high density, the more places on the ground are available for greenery and trees. That's why Burnaby is retaining so much of its green space. The same thing cannot be said about Olympic Village, unless a whole chunk of low-density parkland is dedicated to the neighbourhood.

From said article: not very tall, but still very green.

From an article about California housing being expensive:

That sounds really familiar...

In the comments: "Promote mixed residential, commercial and industrial zones similar to Vancouver." It seems the grass really is greener on the other side of the fence. ;)

You don't even have to leave SSP. Other forums have the occasional poster wondering why they only have highrises and SFHs in Toronto... or that they don't want "canyons" of "too-tall towers" in Salt Lake or Austin like Vancouver does!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DzzclQGU...name=4096x4096https://twitter.com/alfred_twu/statu...627813376?s=20https://twitter.com/alfred_twu/statu...627813376?s=20
https://twitter.com/alfred_twu/statu...95393793572865

The USA one looks like a walled prison. Oh wait: it must be!

Must be nice in China to have huge playfields and parks, not to mention the views from the well spaced structures.

In Canada, we should build double the heights of those in China, so we get a higher density than all of the above. :)

Obviously Europe has the best of both worlds.

Hm, Doesn't that look just like the Olympic Village? Although South East False Creek overall is denser than that. (As you well know!)

Could use some height variation (a uniform 6-8 floors gets a tad monotonous), but yes, that would seem to be the compromise.

Anecdotally, when the Asians who've lived in the "towers above in park" model emigrate, they beeline for the suburbs (or the countryside) and buy a house - even a run-down one. Guess they want a space of their own.