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Friday Free-for-all!

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Hey! It’s the end of another winter work-week.  That means it’s time to do our regular end of the week economic news round-up and open topic discussion.  Here are a few links to kick off the conversation:

–Bureaucrats to ration homebuying in 2010?
–BOC rates prompt housing boom bubble talk
–Carney cautions borrowers to be ‘prudent’
–BOC: rising debt threatens market stability
–Vancouverites camp out to buy a condo
–Portrait of a Vancouver Realtor
–Floating high on a delicate housing bubble
–Property tax may take a leap
–BOC warns of debt peril
–Why didn’t Canada’s market pop?
–Japan compared to USA and Canada
–US Homeowners lost $5.9 Trillion since 2006
–Bubble concerns over low rates? Here’s an idea

So what are you seeing out there? Post your news links, thoughts and anecdotes here and have an excellent weekend!

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Vancouverite

#65

Takes 0 balls to be a bear

No balls means do nothing because DOOM WILL COME TO ALL!

Takes HARD BALLS to be a Bull in any market!

No risk No gain!

Bulls will thrive in any market because they know.

Run away bears, run away!from everything!

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Anonymous

63 see 61

Everryone here will ignore you.

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Anonymous

#61 see #63

Everryone here will ignore you.

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Lyn

Worth the read: Study shows cleaners more valuable than bankers.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8410489.stm?l…

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scullboy

Hey Supra:

I think the real question is: Why aren't YOU loading up on houses?

C'mon big boy, put your balls (and money) where your mouth is. It's one thing to sit in Mummy and Daddy's basement and type whilst waking to photoshopped Rennie porn. It's quite another to pony up.

If you don't have the balls to get in the game yourself maybe it's time to STFU.

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other ted

Supraboy makes a point about people who have no balls. i know tonnes who own houses. i know tonnes who know the market will crash yet won't sell. I guess it takes balls to be a bear sometimes

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logic

"If the banks are willing to lend, why not jump in and load up on houses"

—-

Because… oh f**k it, I'm not going to bother. Enjoy your trolling life.

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Supraboy

@other ted:

She doesn't need to answer you on people with low wages bidding on crack houses. The point is people have money and gutts to bid on the houses. Just because you have no balls to take risks in life, don't call them crack houses. And just because people have low wages, that doesn't mean they haven't saved money.If the banks are willing to lend, why not jump in and load up on houses?

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Disbelief

Patriotz
I am not pumping Van RE. I know Van has had it's share of ups and downs but while the oil is flowing along with the money Alberta looks like a good place but when the well runs dry they stop and see the dry dusty plain and get the hell out of dodge. A great example is Ft Mcmurray what a hell hole but when there is money to be made even hell can be tolerable.

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KashMoney

Why Was the Subprime Market in Canada Smaller?

Geez, could it be because Canada is 1/10 the population of the U.S.?

Give your heads a shake, it's not like anyone on this blog is actually stupid enough to think the market is going to do anything except tank really hard.

Trolls think it's funny to act stupid and write dumb things ,for their own amusement, but none of them have been able to express a literate, coherent, or plausible scenario.

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Anonymous

if her dad was there and not her manager or pimp, then I predict the latter.

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other ted

vultureboy funny you mentioned that, I was with my dad at one of his open houses. it was busier than i expected. one guy was sure in a panic to put a bid in on behalf of his daughter. When i heard the amount they were pre aproved for, i thought she makes a lot or we are in big trouble.

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VultureBoy

Open houses this weekend were perhaps the slowest I've seen. Realtors sure looked bored. Maybe just the season, but, hey, nice to have some elbow space as we toured the 'hood 🙂

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other ted

The woman on the plane next to me today was from Ontario. She informed me the economy rebounded, and how did she know real estate has rebounded. When I mentioned that interest rates have dropped creating or adding to the existing bubbles across the country, she quoted almost word for word the article that was posted(can't remember what rag it was from and what economist) how canadians are more conservative in real estate than americans. Of course she had no answer why people with low wages are bidding on crack houses over a million dollars in vancouver.

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patriotz

@Disbelief:

The fact remains that both Alberta towns are boom and bust and will continue as such for the forseeable future.

Like Vancouver isn't? Where were you in '82?

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trackback

[…] trade indicator in the same way that the Baltic Dry Index indicates international trade. This from joycer at vancouvercondo.info 12 Dec 2009 10:44 pm […]

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observer

Interest rates are low but banks balk at refinancing http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/13/business/econom… What do people think? Will the fed continue to buy MBS (already in trillions) after March? If not, will mortgage rates rise? Calculated risk says this program only lowered mortgage rates a little bit (0.5% or so). Others say more, to the tune of 1%. My take is it lowered rates much greater than this because during the crisis the spread between MBS and treasuries were diverging greatly. So one can say by preventing a total collapse of the MBS market, this did have a bigger effect than 1% reduction. On the other hand, people buying in the US now are getting in at low rates and lowered prices which makes the sustainability of future MBS's better. While in Canada, getting a two year heads up on things to come… Read more »

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Disbelief

Sorry for speaking down to the Albertans but if there is no Ocean then it's not a place I want to spend much time in. I have lived in Vancouver minutes from the ocean all my life. This probably distorts my perception of beauty. Flat arid landscape IMHO is not attractive in the slightest. The fact remains that both Alberta towns are boom and bust and will continue as such for the forseeable future.

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patriotz

@crabman:

Should have known. Well there's another double top to lead into a bust in the near future. Idiocy knows no borders.

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crabman

@patriotz: Those Calgary stats are out of date. Since the beginning of the year, prices are up 11%.

http://www.creb.com/public/seller-resources/housi…

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patriotz

The simple truth from Mish. Substitute "Harper, Flaherty, CMHC", etc. for "Obama, HUD", etc. and delete "The ultimate irony is that prices are falling yet still not affordable by any means" (absurdly, prices in Canada are rising again) and you describe the situation north of the border perfectly: The Obama Administration, HUD, FHA, Congress and every state in the union are missing the affordable housing solution. The solution is to end government sponsorship of GSEs, tax breaks for houses, ownership societies, and all the efforts to prop up home prices. If and when that happens, we will have affordable housing. The ultimate irony is that prices are falling yet still not affordable by any means, yet government is acting to prop up housing prices. It will not work because it cannot possibly work. The reason is as I stated above… Read more »

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RennieWhereRU?

Real estate never go down. all you fools renta paying $1,400 a month on a $650,000 house are stupid idiots, buy that $650,000 house now or be priced out forever! ha ha these time will not be repeated in our life time. the cards are a collapsing, be prepared, this comes from the very highest level………….

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joycer

Was at dinner tonight with a friend who works for the post office, he is a supervisor there. He said they aren't hiring casuals this year for the busy holiday season (first time ever since he started working there) and parcels are WAY down from last year (over 20 million less).

I also noticed on Google Finance they have a new feature called domestic trends that lets you see how/what people are searching on google.

For example, note the clear effect of Cash for Clunkers:
http://www.google.com/finance?q=GOOGLEINDEX_US:AU…

Here's electronics and computers which I believe is a large part of retail for the web.
http://www.google.com/finance?q=GOOGLEINDEX_US:CO…

You can clearly see the spikes for Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping but the spikes aren't nearly as high this year. Recovery?

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!(EconomicsDegree)

Calgary and Edmonton have about the same rents as Vancouver. Three guesses why.

Calgary and Edmonton have higher family incomes but people aren't willing to pay as high a portion of their incomes to rent as do Vancouver residents. I assume this is because both cities are considered, on average, less desirable places to live than Vancouver.

why are purchase prices cheaper

There is less speculation. Why? There's less crystal meth in the water supply. That, and most people are making better scratch from oil and gas.

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other ted

back in vancouver for a couple of days. The transit is still a joke. I was starting to believe all the hype how the transit situation has improved unitl I got stranded. Skytrain closed at 9:45 and had to wait a half hour for a bus downtown. then it slowly made its way until I got as far as I could go as buses were no longer running to get my last connection. You would think with no traffic at night I would be able to make downtown to coquitlam in under two hours.

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