Open Topic

Friday Free-for-all! June 3rd 2016

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206 Comments

Yep, it’s another one.

As we wind down the work week and head into another weekend it’s time for another Friday Free-for-all!

This is our regular end of the week news round up and open topic discussion thread.

Here are a few recent links to kick off the chat:

–Drastic measures to slow market?
–Taxpayers send realtors on trip?
–Dirt earns more than all workers
–Houses hit all time high
–Bubble Timeline
–Replace income tax with property tax
–Scotiabank concern over Vancouver & Toronto
–

So what are you seeing out there? Going to any open houses this weekend?  Post your news links, thoughts and anecdotes here and have an excellent weekend!

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Combat roach

Time will tell but it all looks like that Vancouver will be a textbook example of the western city that got hooked into “China Economy Miracle” so deeply and got FUBAR for centurys to come. It will be a showcase of how things went wrong due to greed and stupidity of politicians over the long period of time.

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tokyorealestateman

I think so–but it was Canadians that sold there properties into the this bull market and many presently love there valuations so there is also a individual dynamic at play too. I take it the demographics have changed greatly their in Vancouver–colonialism without even a gun shot fired….

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bullwhip29

Chinese dream of home ownership defies fear of rude awakening
http://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Economy/Economy/Chinese-dream-of-home-ownership-defies-fear-of-rude-awakening

http://asia.nikkei.com/var/site_cache/storage/images/node_43/node_51/2016/201606/0603n/0603n-china4/4602984-1-eng-GB/0603N-china4_middle_280.jpg

“China still has believers in the myth that home prices defy gravity. Thirty-year-old Yu Zhonghuan is one of them.”

“Everyone around here has become rich buying one or two houses,” Yu says.

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StupidityCheck

We need the Mandarin translation posted here.

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OPENHOUSEMASSACRE

IF WE PUT THAT IN VANCOUVER, WE WILL BE CALLED RACIST

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southseacompany

“The Land Below Zero: Where Negative Interest Rates Are Normal”, Bloomberg

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-06-06/denmark-land-below-zero-where-negative-interest-rates-are-normal

“Scandinavia’s third-largest economy is deep into an unprecedented experiment with negative interest rates, a monetary policy tool once viewed by mainstream economists as approaching apostasy, if not a virtual impossibility. Companies—though not yet individuals—are paying lenders for the privilege of keeping funds on deposit; homeowners, in some cases, are actually making money on mortgages.”

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southseacompany

“Gregor Robertson warns Vancouver’s economy at risk due to housing prices”, CBC

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/gregor-robertson-luxury-tax-flipping-tax-1.3617636

“Last June, the provincial government rejected calls from Robertson to levy speculation and luxury taxes on foreign owners and speculators as a way to keep prices from rising.”

“Premier Christy Clark said at the time that using taxes to drive down prices could hurt current homeowners by reducing their equity.”

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CanNeverThinkOfAGoodName

Every time I hear that reported of Christy Clark I want to scream. What about hurting the financial situation of other people? She has too narrow a view of her constituents. She thinks there’s only one kind of lifestyle. Her policies have reduced MY equity-proxy enormously. Why is my neighbor more worth her protection than me? I pay big taxes.

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bullwhip29

‘Dying Chinese’ Is Reason To Develop Gas Sector, Canadian Politician Claims
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timdaiss/2016/06/06/dying-chinese-is-reason-to-develop-gas-sector-canadian-politician-claims/#61d0f7ca3474

http://specials-images.forbesimg.com/imageserve/516310330/0x600.jpg

“…according to Gordon Wilson, Premier Christy Clark’s hand-picked advocate for LNG, the Canadian province has “moral obligations” to develop its LNG industry to save the lives of Chinese that are dying from air pollution.”

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StupidityCheck

First, they destroyed their environment. Then, they helped destroy our city. Now WE are supposed to help THEM????
Fucking traitor.

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space889

How do you think you get your goods so cheap?

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Combat roach

There are no “goods”. Everything produced in China is garbage or crap of the very low standards. It was western corporate greed that made this trade shit with China happen, not people.

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bullwhip29

Former Owner Of Multi-Million Dollar Teardown In Vancouver Says Property Always Needed Work
http://www.inquisitr.com/3173051/former-owner-of-multi-million-dollar-teardown-in-vancouver-says-property-always-needed-work/
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CkEL6WfXAAE7MD5.jpg

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bullwhip29

The new ‘Earl’ of Shaughnessy breathes life into historic home
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/heritage-shaughnessy-property-1.3615126

http://i.cbc.ca/1.3615351.1464979830!/fileImage/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/16x9_620/owner.jpg
.
“When Mingfei Zhao bought ‘the Rosemary’, a magnificent but run-down Vancouver heritage house, he says he set out to shatter one of the city’s biggest stereotypes — that people from China are serial destroyers of older properties.”

“Zhao is a retired property developer from Beijing who told CBC News he made his first fortune trading in flax and grains before moving on to real estate. Now 60, he admits to a net worth of over $1 billion Cdn and says he chose to retire to Vancouver for the “clean air” and good education for his son.”

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Hyper-mega-Bull

that red and gold color scheme though.

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bullwhip29

this whole mockumentary thing is a sleight of hand trick imho.
as if this is the only property this guy owns in vancity. he’ll probably spend more on the art work than he did on the house too. the cbc are either idiots or complete sell outs. this should also do wonders for fairtradeworks’ bottomline too

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Hyper-mega-Bull

CBC are sinophiles. they are loathed to talk about HAM and entertain any excuse, justification or rationalization available.

also, they are very uninformed. the people at the CBC don’t leave the kits, commercial, downtown triangle and know almost nothing about this city.

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Chinabuyeverything

Vancouver has competition ! Home price CDs in the Bronx area of NYC up 30% in Q1 alone !

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-next-housing-crisis-is-pending-2016-05-04

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Chinabuyeverything

Oops ‘home prices’ not ‘home price CDs”

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Newcoomer

Yes, there is clearly a global bubble. These are the loops of string that form when you push on one. That said, at 250K, the US median price is just plain cute.

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Doomcouver

Developer Amarjit Singh Sandhu, 56, dead after ‘targeted’ shooting in Richmond, B.C. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/richmond-shooting-death-man-rcmp-targeted-1.3617159

Anybody have any background info on this guy? I think you’d have to be into some seriously criminal activities to have someone assassinate you in broad daylight like this. All the CBC says is he has “80 civil lawsuits in B.C. dating back to the 1990s” but doesn’t mention what they’re for. Maybe they built a Chinese gangster a poorly constructed McMansion and they shot him for it.

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OPENHOUSEMASSACRE

IT GOT TO DO WITH ROSS SIKH TEMPLE ELECTION AND THINGS HE WANT TO CHANGE AND IMPLEMENT IN THERE.

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LS in Arbutus

Honestly – why are we not surprised? Economic ‘miracles’ are always born out of debt, are they not? Kind of like Van RE.

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Chinabuyeverything

‘Replace humans with robots’.

What a world

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OPENHOUSEMASSACRE

Our provincial government is crooked—and we have the documents to prove it.

http://www.straight.com/news/711201/sarah-leamon-emails-between-government-lawyers-and-roadsafebc-raise-grave-questions

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Combat roach

There must be a huge pile of shit to attract all those flies to land on it.

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space889

And where do those piles of shit come from? Here’s a hint, look in the mirror.

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StupidityCheck

Shut up, you idiot.

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Newcoomer

He can’t put it any more plainly than that.

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888888

Chrusty say’s she can’t do anything about the house price rise because people will lose equity in their house , so in her world home price’s must alway’s rise ,to bad she doesn’t feel the same way about wage’s.

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patriotz

Rather she has acknowledged that the provincial government can do something, but says she won’t do anything.

And yes this is a deliberate strategy and if the voters want something else they are going to have to show her the door.

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StupidityCheck

We tried warning him years ago! Way to stay in front of the problems, Moonbeam!

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bullwhip29

Ladner houses hit the million club
http://www.delta-optimist.com/news/ladner-houses-hit-the-million-club-1.2270577

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StupidityCheck

Holy crap! For that dump?!

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Newcoomer

Four key forces have been shaping the rise and fall of nations since the 2008 financial crisis, and none of them bode well for China.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/05/opinion/sunday/how-china-fell-off-the-miracle-path.html?

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BubbleTea

Vancouver mayor (again): Do something, province, about “unregulated speculative global capital”
I urge the provincial and federal governments to heed the warnings from the financial sector and implement clear measures to rein in the excesses of Vancouver’s housing market. The CEO of Scotiabank spoke out in support of a luxury sales tax. The deputy chief economist at CIBC supports a ‘flipping’ tax as a measure to reduce speculation. I support both these tools and will continue to aggressively advocate for them to the federal and provincial governments as a way to help create a level playing field in the Vancouver housing market.
http://www.francesbula.com/uncategorized/vancouver-mayor-again-do-something-province-about-unregulated-speculative-global-capital/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

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franko

For some strange reason, comments depicting HAM for our RE woes are getting voted down despite the removal of the downvote option.
Surely a coincidence.

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Combat roach

50-cents party is a huge organization. They deploy resources as per need to protect China interests. They don’t only have content contributors as spaceshit or shit-it-down but hackers and sys-admins to support their criminal plans and programs.

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Shut It Down Already

So very original. I’m neither Chinese nor a realtor. Now piss off.

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Combat roach

Being none of these two categories, still doesn’t disqualify you of being an über-asshole, right?

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Shut It Down Already

Well, they did say it was a “free for all”.

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CanNeverThinkOfAGoodName

This makes me feel scared.

Given the government is not protecting citizens from a take-over of their housing, would it be able to protect citizens from unscrupulous criminal elements trying to squelch Canadians’ criticisms of China’s policies (or of Canada’s policies ala China)?

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BubbleTea

Hong Kong Property Market in ‘Free Fall’: Hayman’s Bass
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-11/hayman-s-bass-says-hong-kong-property-market-is-in-free-fall
Vancouver next?

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