BDK posted a link to this article in Vancouver Magazine titled ‘sitting out‘ which shines some light on the hidden world of real estate bears and bulls that lurk online in the lower mainland.
Its quite a good article, outlining the basic points that go back and forth on both sides of the Vancouver boom/bust argument and profiling a local couple that recently sold:
In 2002 Felicity Stone and Jim Patton stumbled onto the real-estate mother lode, trading up from a house in rural Langley to a thoughtfully designed home on two acres in the Elgin Chantrell area of South Surrey. Patton, a communications consultant, and Stone, who works in public relations, were happy to pour work and money into the place, expecting to live there the rest of their lives. Then their outlook began to change. Much as they loved the 1962 gem, they also saw what nearby property was selling for. In August 2007 they decided to list, and by November they’d accepted $1.616 million—a 240 percent increase from the $475,000 they’d paid a half-decade earlier. Now they’re renting a house in the Bayridge area of West Van, paying $2,500 a month while they watch the market and wait for prices to drop.
They even link to several of your favorite blogs (VancouverCondo.info included) – my only complaint is they seem to have munged up the link to this site and they left out three interesting and useful sites which I’ll link to here:
Paul Boenisch and his amazing REBGV statistics
Mohicans analysis at langley-financial-planning
and the interesting new Vancouver RE anecdote archive
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