Friday Free-for-all!

It’s that time of the week again, Friday Free-for-all time!

Lets do our regular end of the week news round up and open topic discussion thread for the weekend, here are a few recent links to kick off the chat:

What’s going on with HCG?
45 brokers falsified income
…for $1billion worth of mortgages
5 booming markets not VAN or TO
Don’t hurt property values!
Do retirees really want to move here?
Shadow lender feast on subprime

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

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realist

@ 41 Shut It Down Already “As for all the talk about taxes, you really all are a bunch of 99%ers.”

We don’t know most posting here. And no need to make assumptions about income: we’re interested only in the substance and quality of arguments, on which income percentile/net worth have no bearing.

“Paying low income tax doesn’t necessarily imply having no cash to play with each month.” Correct, police fraud squad and CRA think the same! Has house, Ferrari, boat, & no visible means of support. Hmmm…

gungho

Watched some friction in action last night at a family gathering. Cousin is married with a a young baby, roughly 2 years old. His father was pressuring him to buy a house through insidious remarks like “Oh, Kathy could use a bigger kitchen”, or “Wouldn’t Kathy love throwing Adrian into the backyard?”, and finally after a few drinks, the cuz lost it a little. Turned around and said to the dad “You want to earn the right to urge us to buy a house in Vancouver? Give us 300K as a downpayment, or say no more about it”. Family went silent, Grandpa shut up, and from the look on his face it’ll be a while before he brings it up again. We need to invent a metric for the intersocial friction caused by the housing bubble. I suggest the REFrictometer,… Read more »

[…] –Why won’t this guy buy? –TD warns of frothy market –What to do with housing gold –Liar loans –High prices not magic –Protect house prices –Seattle bubble blog back –Money laundering welcome? –important roll in the economy –Worst non-recession in 50 years –Vacant homes as dumpsters – […]

Boomer_Hate

@ 231 Mortgageslave

Next time read the comment,before responding and posting dribble, a#s hat.

I’m guessing you must be a boomer lacking reading comprehension skills.

BTW, I am a caucasian Gen-Xer.lol

Shut It Down Already

Garth-the-goat, thanks for confirming that you’re basically full of it. I’m not surprised the listing agents tell you that you cannot speak with the owner.

Either way it’s quite a leap to conclude that “out of town right now” means “lives outside of the country permanently”.

Why not post some of the data you have if it’s so strong?

realist

@ 249 realist

should have read “they are holding forth” etc. I won’t correct my lesser grammatical errors. The excitement of their debate overtakes my grammar!

realist

@ 246 Garth the Goat “Or… you could just keep your head up your ass and pretend like it isn’t happening”

It is a very uncomfortable moment for a Canadian, who is likely to be quite a decent person, comes to the realization that their politicians have sold out their interests out to foreigners, for the benefit of certain other Canadians (and the Grosvenor, and Guinness, and you-name-it families). But they have…and their holding forth on the telly right now.

w

An amazing announcement has just been made. China will be hosting the 2022 winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Corrupt in Canada

ZERO talk about housing in the debate, we are on our own folks..

Garth-the-goat

@ 244

I do have better access to data than you, from several sources, including listing agents.

Sorry – you will just have to accept that or better still do a search of recent sales in West Van in the last year, see how many have been relisted using the same realtor pictures, but for $300-800 K more. In one year.

then you can go and check out the tax records of the properties and see who owns them.

then call the listing realtor and tell you are very interested in the property and want to ask the owner some questions and you will be told the owner is out of town.

Then you will get to where I am.

Or… you could just keep your head up your ass and pretend like it isn’t happening.

Disgusting

Even Garth turner is supporting Harper. He is bashing the NDP and Liberals on his blog.

Shut It Down Already

Garth-the-goat, so how did you establish these sales were to offshore buyers then? Some ridiculous assumptions based off the realtors surname maybe? You clearly have access to better data than us, so please share.

realist

@232 Oracle “Own a $2 million house…like hell I will pay for your meds.”

Your frustration is not only understandable, it is justified. In by-gone decades, universal programs were an avenue that provided governments an work-around for the much-disliked and stigmatizing “means testing” of social programs, as well as sanctimonious way to buy middle class votes with middle class money. House ownership is no bar to many income-transfer programs. This is why West Vancouver and Richmond abound in child poverty (cough cough).

realist

@ 212 B!B!B! “WTF?? china is the second biggest economy on the planet. everyone is hitched to it.”

Your statement is not without foundation, but to the extent that any hitching has occurred, we look forward to the unhitching…a reprise of our economic relations with Japan, post-December 29, 1989.

Garth-the-goat

There are several homes bought last year, in West Van, by off-shore money (who knows what their official status is- probably ‘non-tax paying residents) and relisted for several hundred thousands dollar more.

But shhhh…don’t tell garth or dim-wit Christy…coz there is no data for the off-shore buying.

paulb

New Listings 246
Price Changes 61
Sold Listings 277
TI: 12423

http://www.paulboenisch.com

Westside Realtor

I stand by my view.

CRASH coming. Epic.

Imho

WSR

VanRant

Wow, we’re early this week. Friday free for all on a thursday.

space889

@Shut It Down Already – Garth is wrong because he turned 180 degrees and stopped calling for a RE crash, raising interest rates, deny there is a HAM factor, and instead went into the asset mgmt biz and telling people how equities will outperform real estate.

I guess many bears feel betrayed by him.

Shut It Down Already

Oracle, how has Garth been proven wrong? Many many times he’s said over the past years “Sell Canada, but America”. I can provide links if you like?

He’s also said (as many times) to diversify, rebalance periodically, but provide a smaller weighting to Canadian funds.

bullwhip29

@ #223 i doubt it has much effect. many homeowners have already spent huge $$ in recent yrs. will those living on the edge have another 5k to spend and/or the willingness to rack up another 5k on their visas? maybe, maybe not. will those that are flush with cash delay a reno until next yr just to claim a tax credit? certainly not esp given that harper might not even win the election. even if he does, who is to say he doesnt reneg on yet another election promise. or perhaps we find out in the fine print that some other credit has been eliminated to make room for this (ie. increase UCCB but cancel old child tax credit). in a perverse sort of way, this program might put a halt to some spending in the short term by… Read more »

Corrupt in Canada

“You can make money in any kind of environment. You know what an inverse ETF is, right?” ROFL just like I am sure you made so much money during the 08 recession right? Reminds me of a joke Lady: Do you smoke? Guy: Yes I do. Lady: How many packs a day? Guy: 3 packs. Lady: How much per pack? Guy: $10.00 per pack. Lady: And how long have you been smoking? Guy: 15 years Lady: So 1 pack is $10.00 and you have been smoking 3 packs a day which puts your spending per month at $900. In 1 year, it would have been $10,800. Correct? Guy: Correct. Lady: If 1 year you spend $10,800, not accounting for inflation, the past 15 years puts your spending total at $162,000. Correct? Guy: Correct. Lady: Do you know if you hadn’t… Read more »

Oracle

As for issues boomers caused they should should not be subsiDized for pharmacy re or MSP if they have more than 50% equity in a house.

Own a $2 million house…like hell I will pay for your meds.

Mortgageslave

@Boomer_Hate

RIGHT, everybody stop knocking the corrupt money launders from China. They are really nice people. Just don’t have any morals like this idiot. Next time you get a bright idea you want to share on this site, just don’t bother. What a stupid post!!!

“Caucasians are the problem, not Asian money launders.” What a F’in idiot you are….you’ve just justified a lot of ppls opionions by writing this biased post on trying to defend your people.