A price/rent sample for you all.

This house http://tinyurl.com/7owdfcl was recently sold for ~$920k, about 20k over asking. I know because my brother-in-law put in a losing (winning?) bid. A few weeks later it's on the rental market for $2180 / month for a healthy price/rent multiple of 422!

That's the smart money all right. The lucky renters, I mean.

@CashedOut: Happily, this turn of events now has my brother-in-law and family seriously considering renting for the first time.

It's hard for them to ignore that the same house that they were willing to put up almost a million dollars for can be rented back for fraction of the price.

I personally know of three individuals who are going to be putting their houses on the market this spring. Elderly, with taxes and upkeep increasing, inflation in everything they need, getting very, very little income from their investments, they are going to pull the plug.

No mention of a housing crash coming; they just feel squeezed!

That's three during a simple conversation.

This is the top rated (386 up votes) comment on the CBC website under the Kelowna foreclosures story:

Investors who scooped up properties blocked hard working families from being able to own. If it is the flippers and investors losing these homes… all I can say is, "Ain't Karma a beautiful thing?!"

The heard is now running for the cliff! My parents have finally coerced my widowed grandma to sell her east van special on a double lot! Its amazing how the mind set of people changes when they see its to late….

@mattymatt123:

The heard is now running for the cliff!

Is that what you herd from the heard?

New American Dream is renting to get rich:

"Examining 250 properties around the U.S., and going through close to 40 client files to project the financial impact of owning real estate versus liquidating it, Arzaga, an adjunct professor in personal finance at the University of California at Berkeley, found that, "100 percent of the time it was better to rent, rather than own."

That's right: 100 percent."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/15/us-hous…

@patriotz: Think so? What happens to the houses and condos that they don’t buy?"…when RE slows down/crashes, the # of day on market increases and inventory rises. When this happens there is a higher % of vacant units in the city compared to when inventory is lower…this puts upward pressure on rents. I house sitting on the market is more likely to be vacant.

#8 @Patiently Waiting: "he indicated I should expect higher rent this year."

Where are you? I'm in Abbotsford and I checked this two weeks ago. Still lots of "one month free with 1 year lease" and nominal rents are only slightly above 2005. The SFH market out here is soft and the condo market is listing (like a ship), with lots of inventory piling up at the low end. Does anybody recognize this? The overall economy seems fine.

Interested to hear other assessments of the Fraser Valley.

@Not much of a name…: "Did the REBGV achieve what it wanted"

If they have distorted their index to make prices look higher at or near the peak, the benefit to them will quickly sour.

@Not much of a name…

Yeah, I like his message but the numbers are bit wierd. The chart seems to end mid 2011, and they say that a new record average high was reached in January (which doesn't jive with REBGV). Maybe they are using only Vancouver proper?

Too bad he didn't mention that the average was skewed upwards by ~ $50k due to three huge, outlier sales that month.

It seems every article i see/ read has a different number for what prices did last month.

@patriotz: Do you agree that a house on the market is more likely to be vacant? Yes or No