Real Estate discussions

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by kikin

so the governments need to stop taxing us to death where we work for more than half the year to pay taxes

You mean “so real estate needs to lower prices to what people will pay for them.” The government’s hardly responsible for developers trapping themselves in a bear market; they should be eternally grateful somebody’s willing to save them from their own mistakes.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by whatnext

We seemed to have no problem keeping prices stable to about 2005, coincidentally about when foreign capital really started flooding in.

What's your source of data to back up this statement?

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by Changing City

What's your source of data to back up this statement?

Are you really going to try and argue that? Were you living in Vancouver during those years?

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by kikin

so the governments need to stop taxing us to death where we work for more than half the year to pay taxes

You don't. The Fraser Institute calculations understate the income of Canadians, overstate their taxes, misuse the concept of averages, and are often misleadingly applied only to families with at least two members.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by whatnext

Are you really going to try and argue that? Were you living in Vancouver during those years?

Yes. I was employed analyzing housing data.

What is your source of your statement that foreign capital flooded into real estate from around 2005?

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by kikin

a long time ago, housing and renting have been far from free market capitalism in Canada for a long time, the government meddles and ignores "the basic laws of capitalism" over and over again in this country, right now we don't even have the most basic guarantees of private property rights

How can I tell you get all of your information from twitter?

[kikin]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

How can I tell you get all of your information from twitter?

I don't, I have studied economics and philosophy for decades, way before twitter existed.

How do I know you have your elbows up and would probably vote for Carney tomorrow if there were an election? It really feels like this country is beyond saving with the overall lack of reasoning ability and logic in the population.

I'm not voting Conservative either in case you were assuming. Poilievre's recent populist bandwagon jumping statements have been a turn off.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by Changing City

Yes. I was employed analyzing housing data.

What is your source of your statement that foreign capital flooded into real estate from around 2005?

LOL. Well apparently so much of a thing that a Bloomberg article today on China's crackdown on wealth leaving the country through Hong Kong still singles us out:

....The changes are likely to cascade well beyond Hong Kong. China’s billionaires have invested globally, from family offices in New York, to land in Australia and condos in Vancouver. About 30% of net new money that London-based Standard Chartered Plc generates is from “global Chinese” clients with capital already offshore.

More mainland Chinese nationals are now inquiring about passports from countries such as Turkey that have relatively low requirements — or applying for Hong Kong residency through various programs, according to two more people familiar with wealthy clients. Others are seeking to move their money beyond the Asian wealth hub. An adviser to the rich said some clients are opening accounts in Switzerland and the US....(bold mine)

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/...oom?srnd=homepage-americas&sref=x4rjnz06



And you've said before you're quite familiar with Andy Yan's work to quantify the amount, so no need to be disingenuous when it has been out there for ten years.


Andy Yan, the analyst who exposed Vancouver’s real estate disaster
Hated by politicians, speculators and money-launderers, Andy Yan’s data on Vancouver housing has earned him the right to say, ’I told you so’
By Terry Glavin
February 14, 2018

Andy Yan is a 42-year-old East Vancouverite who came up out of the proud working class ranks of Van Tech high school, toiling on weekends in the kill tank at the old Hallmark Poultry Factory on Clark Drive. He set out on a career in urban regeneration and applied demographics that took him to projects in New Orleans, New York City and San Francisco.

Nowadays he’s the director of the City Program at Simon Fraser University, and while he’s too modest to boast about it, along the way he’s picked up a couple of exceedingly rare civic distinctions.

The first is the enduring enmity of all the politicians, real estate speculators, white-collar currency pirates and money launderers who have turned Vancouver into a global swindler’s paradise for real estate racketeering...

....Three years ago, Yan was anxious to get a handle on the role foreign capital was playing in Vancouver’s weirdly convulsing real estate market. At the time, Yan’s main gig was his work as an urban planner with Bing Thom Architects, on contract as an urban planner. When Yan published the results of his research in November, 2015, it came as a shock, for two main reasons. It seemed to conclusively prove what everybody knew but nobody was supposed to say out loud. And it broke a taboo that was enforced so absurdly that Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson resorted to dismissing Yan’s research as racist....

https://macleans.ca/economy/realestateec...exposed-vancouvers-real-estate-disaster/

Ahh, the good ol' days with Gregor Roberston as mayor, what's he up to these days...oh wait..bailing out condo developers thanks to Carney's disastrous pick of him as his Housing Minister..

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by kikin

I don't, I have studied economics and philosophy for decades, way before twitter existed.

How do I know you have your elbows up and would probably vote for Carney tomorrow if there were an election? It really feels like this country is beyond saving with the overall lack of reasoning ability and logic in the population.

I'm not voting Conservative either in case you were assuming. Poilievre's recent populist bandwagon jumping statements have been a turn off.

Ahh do we have a libertarian on our hands? Voting for Maxime Bernier maybe?

I'd love to hear your detailed solutions to our endless problems.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by whatnext

LOL. Well apparently so much of a thing that a Bloomberg article today on China's crackdown on wealth leaving the country through Hong Kong still singles us out:

We're been over the 'Andy Yan is a racist' discussion many times. Gregor Robertson didn't call him a racist, he suggested racists would focus on his study, as it only looked at Chinese names buying property in a small pocket of Vancouver's West side.

Nobody has ever argued that there was no investment from overseas into Vancouver property. What you continually want to argue is that it's the main reason why property prices rose. You don't accept any suggestion that lower interest rates, or easier credit, or local residents seeing prices rising and thinking 'I want a piece of that' and buying a condo to rent out might all play a part too.

I'm sure nothing will change your mind that it was 'foreign buyers, foreign money and foreign students pretending to be poor' (and explicitly, Mainland Chinese, rather than any other source) that explained rising house prices here. In reality what happened here wasn't so different from other major Canadian cities until around 2015. In 2005 prices were rising in most Canadian major cities.


[macrobusiness].

[djmk]

anecdotally, it looks like the government of canada is not the only player in town looking to bulk buy condos on the cheap.

I've now heard of two large investment groups looking to purchase 100's of units from struggling developers for up to a 40% discount.

of course, this is hearsay

[Changing City]

"Local financiers are becoming somewhat concerned over the increasing scarcity of foreign capital In this city. “Business here," said a leading real estate dealer, "depends more than in other cities upon the inflow of outside capital. It is not Vancouver money which is buying the land and building residences, offices and shops.”

Vancouver Sun, September 7, 1912

[ecbin]

Robertson comes out on Twitter and says the program will buy condos at below market rates:

Through this partnership, we will acquire units in bulk, at a discount to market value, at a time when prices and sales are already both low.

Source: https://xcancel.com/gregorrobertson/status/2069902399909593535?s=46&t=VCt52D6OFCFYNBW1xGZUWA

Howard Chai's writeup today with answers from the BC Ministry of Housing tacitly acknowledge that the condo buying program is part of the Attainable Housing Initiative:

“The Province’s condo acquisition partnership with the federal government will provide a more accessible pathway to home ownership by converting over 2,000 existing market condo units into attainable homes.

We know that many hardworking British Columbians — including young people and families — are working good jobs, paying a lot in rent, and want to own a home but are unable to access home ownership because saving enough for a down payment in today’s housing market is so difficult.

Discussions are underway between the Province, Federal government and stakeholders to explore innovative financing approaches that reduce up-front barriers and make better use of existing housing supply that is currently sitting empty.

While we do that, our province will continue its historic $19 billion investment into housing, which has helped deliver 99,000 homes, completed or under construction, for British Columbians since 2017.

We will have more to say as details are finalized.”

https://howardchai.substack.com/p/canada...1s50z0&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true

This therefore seems to suggest/confirm that this is BC's program and not the Fed's program - the Feds are just the funding arm for what BC wanted which then explains why this announcement came out so much later than the Ontario one (because BC wanted a different program than the GST rebate).

[BaddieB]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Your property taxes would go up significantly. I'm sure you'd be fine with that and we wouldn't hear an ounce of complaint.

Or you know, cities can cut their budgets. People like city-run pools, theatres and libraries, and bloated fire and police departments because they're not directly paying for it and it's obfuscated via taxes. Once the developer cash cow runs out I doubt many voters will want to keep these things if they have actually have to pay for it.

[BaddieB]

Originally Posted by ecbin

Robertson comes out on Twitter and says the program will buy condos at below market rates:

FACT: If the prices for the condos were at or below market, they would have sold on the market and not needed a bail out.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by BaddieB

FACT: If the prices for the condos were at or below market, they would have sold on the market and not needed a bail out.

FACT: Wholesale prices tend to be below unit price. How much below is a different question. If it's true that other investors are trying to buy in bulk at discount I'm not inherently against the federal government doing it and capturing the proceeds.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by BaddieB

Or you know, cities can cut their budgets. People like city-run pools, theatres and libraries, and bloated fire and police departments because they're not directly paying for it and it's obfuscated via taxes. Once the developer cash cow runs out I doubt many voters will want to keep these things if they have actually have to pay for it.

I agree the VPD budget could take a giant haircut.

The state of pools in Vancouver indicates they are already underfunded.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by chowhou

FACT: Wholesale prices tend to be below unit price. How much below is a different question. If it's true that other investors are trying to buy in bulk at discount I'm not inherently against the federal government doing it and capturing the proceeds.

If private sector investors are looking at bulk buying then the government is just getting in the way and competing with them. Given that Robertson is involved I hope the developers they choose are very closely scrutinized as he his time in municipal politics allowed many interactions with developers. No favourites or donors should be in play.

The biggest fail is that it stops the government from doing what they should be doing to solve an affordability crisis - going all in on a Vienna or Singapore model and building affordable housing they will own in perpetuity thus providing a stable source of low income units not tied to development incentives. Not subject to privatization by a future government. I question why the government would help people buying condos when by definition someone in a position to buy aren't those who really need affordable housing.

And that leads me to my next point. Rental absorption is slowing, why do condo developers get a bailout but not those who stepped up to build rentals?

[BaddieB]

Originally Posted by chowhou

FACT: Wholesale prices tend to be below unit price. How much below is a different question. If it's true that other investors are trying to buy in bulk at discount I'm not inherently against the federal government doing it and capturing the proceeds.

Then why not let other investors buy in bulk? Why hasn't that happened? Probably because the business case makes no sense as the asking prices are again, above market. If it's not selling, it is above market. If there are no buyers, you either lower prices until you get a sale or hold it and not get a sale.

But instead of letting house prices fall, the government steps in to artificially inflate demand and prices so a lucky few people can get subsidized housing. Housing is more expensive than it needs to be for everyone else, via taxation and inflated prices, so that two thousand or so people can have subsidized housing.

I just need to subsidize demand

[Glow Fun City]

Originally Posted by BaddieB

Or you know, cities can cut their budgets. People like city-run pools, theatres and libraries, and bloated fire and police departments because they're not directly paying for it and it's obfuscated via taxes. Once the developer cash cow runs out I doubt many voters will want to keep these things if they have actually have to pay for it.

Vancouver Civic Theatres is actually a revenue generator for the City, not taxpayer funded…