Paul Boenisch has been posting daily market updates here consistently for years. This gives us an interesting day by day view of the market.
Autumn means more listings, so far sales have to catch up.
Yesterday Pauls numbers show 307 new listings and 68 sold with a total inventory of 9728.
Thanks Paul.
Thanks Paul, you will be my realtor whenever the sanity every comes back to Vancouver.
Thanks Paul.
You’re my first call if I can ever afford to buy in this city.
Another big “thanks” from me too.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Got money to launder? Canadian banks want to help!
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/real-estate/vancouver/canadian-banks-mortgage-guidelines-favour-foreign-home-buyers/article31869946/
I’ve been saying for decades that Canada is the only country in the world that treats foreign nationals better than our own citizens. Funny how the stupid and complacent Canuck finally opens there eyes and says. ‘wa’ happened?’ Was I the only one that noticed the preferential services offered to ‘new Canadians’ from the banks, going back more than a decade? 10yrs ago I cancelled my business with the CIBC over this. Was I the only one that noticed their ads, website and preferred rates, etc?? I guess so. Canada I love, it’s Canadians that make me want to puke. We’ve completely done this to ourselves.
Canadians have become so overly tolerant that we’ve made ourselves an easy mark to be taken advantage of by vermin who are completely ethically and morally bankrupt.
People should be rising up in anger but sadly too many of them are profiting from all the dirty money coming in.
as this all continues to unwind and paper bank acct balances go up in a puff of smoke, places like richmond will become ground zero for increasing number of racially motivated hate crimes, confrontations and general disturbances. it is only in times of distress that people reveal their true feelings. it is no wonder that the donald trumps of the world have so much support and why christy clark did an about face to appease many of these types of voters.
Clark et al, and the likes of them cause trump disease.
Trump’s RNC rally included the introduction of the first gay billionaire who declared to your stereotypically narrow depiction of conservatives that “I am proud to be gay.” He made history and was warmly received. So no race war in Richmond an Christy’s about face hurts many of her voters.
Not to mention there is no unwinding of anything at the moment.
I think the Liberals should be taking a “deep dive” into this situation, or at least, into something.
They are as if drunk. Numb. Oblivious. Dull
I”m going to move the cash I have. I am going to go to every bank and see if any is better than BMO or Scotia with respect to whether they give or have given preferential treatment to foreigners. Spending time establishing your credit is an important step to becoming part of a community. If speculators from China or the US are allowed to skip it and have less hoops to jump in getting a mortgage than do Canadians who live here, I’m going to pick up my marbles and go … somewhere else.
How is this not noticed by anyone local for 10-20 years?
This is clear money laundering enabling by our banks. Where is fintrac, CRA?
As well as it is racist against all Canadians and Landed Immigrants with locally earned money!
Canadian banks allow foreign clients with no credit history, including students, to qualify for uninsured mortgages without proving the sources of their income.
BMO loan officer: “In Vancouver, speculators exploited that, he said, to buy properties they had no intention of living in, hold on to them as demand increased and prices rose and then flip them for a profit.”
“I have seen many people doing this, many times. I have customers brag about it in my office – about how small money they put in and how much profit they got,” he said. “I can say it is a very big share of the mortgage market … it’s out of control.”
I think “income” isn’t important to the banks where The wealthiest 1% and their children are concerned. THey ask 35% down is my understanding. Is this what Eby has “discovered”? What can be done about it? As long as they don’t pass risk onto CDN taxpayers they can take as much risk as they like.
CMHC has to stop providing guarantee to foreigners! Its there to help Canadians, not to blow up the enormous bubble.
The offer requires 35% down, CMHC insurance not needed.
Fintrac says realtors bad, imposes tiny, infrequent fines…
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/real-estate/the-market/watchdog-found-significant-deficiencies-at-nearly-500-real-estate-firms-data/article31874778/
Fintrac is clearly not doing its job as the CRA. “The federal watchdog issued monetary penalties only nine times during the almost five-year time span, the document shows.”
Fintrac and CRA needs a complete house cleaning.
Fintrac found ‘significant’ deficiencies at nearly 500 real estate firms: data
http://www.ctvnews.ca/business/fintrac-found-significant-deficiencies-at-nearly-500-real-estate-firms-data-1.3071259
Details on the empty home tax to be unveiled
http://www.news1130.com/2016/09/14/details-on-the-empty-home-tax-to-be-unveiled/
>>> will be very interesting to see how they define “vacant”…
vacant could be an apt description for the facial expression of Qu Zhang Mingjie in her mugshot photo
http://www.macleans.ca/politics/gregor-robertson-his-pop-star-girlfriend-and-a-corruption-trial/
Vancouver real estate shrugs off tax on foreign buyers as prices rise for 20th straight month
http://business.financialpost.com/personal-finance/mortgages-real-estate/what-correction-vancouver-and-toronto-lead-gains-as-canadian-home-prices-rise-in-august
>>> obviously all this manipulated and massaged data, price charts and what not which say one thing or completely the opposite (depending on motive) is totally meaningless
Province stingy with new data on foreign home buyers
http://www.news1130.com/2016/09/13/province-stingy-with-new-data-on-foreign-home-buyers/
>>> thought this data was supposed to be released on a regular monthly basis? maybe the folks working on the file have come down with pneumonia or some serious allergic condition?
Vancouver commercial real estate deals shatter record with 34% leap in just one quarter
http://business.financialpost.com/news/property-post/vancouver-commercial-real-estate-deals-shatter-record-with-34-leap-in-just-one-quarter
>>> i guess everything is hunky dory in Julia Lau’s neck of the woods…
I’ve heard terribly scary stuff about HAM now that the tax is in and other steps are being taken to cool residential. I’ve heard the Big foreign money is now paying insane amounts for commercial lots. Also that they aren’t interested in Being landlords so they are kicking or will kick out their commercial tenants instead of renewing leases. Apparently a sale like this has just gone thru for an entire block of West Broadway and MacDonald. Like the Safeway itself or the part of WBroadway that has multiple small businesses on it. Just when you thought it was over, it’s not. What will Gregor do Then? Empty houses and empty commercial blocks.
even Lululemon has gone to the dark side…
https://jingdaily.com/lululemon-helps-chinas-affluent-young-professionals-ath-leisure/
I wonder whether the Lulus acommpanied Trudeau to China. Apparently there were 52 deals struck. Wouldn’t it be interesting to know which they were?
“COMING UP LIVE Vancouver mayor to roll out plans for vacant home tax”, CBC
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/vancouver-vacant-home-tax-1.3761496
“Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson is promising to roll out his plan to increase the supply of rental housing in the city by taxing vacant or empty homes.”
And all the suburban real estate wanna be Warren Buffets just sighed a big ‘thank you Mr Mayor’ for pushing the Ponzi scheme our way!! Once again, the stupid, politically correct Canadian, afraid to offend puts everyone but our own citizens first. This is entirely a federal issue; reduce immigration numbers and only allow citizens to buy real estate, residential, industrial or agricultural. Problem solved. Unfortunately Santa McCallum has a differing viewpoint and will run this country into the ditch from his throne.
LOL. Good luck with that Moonbeam. Enforcement will not doubt be enhanced by building bike lanes thorough living-rooms.
“IMF’s Lagarde talks about ‘risks’ in housing markets for Toronto, Vancouver”, CTV video
“On Tuesday, International Monetary Fund’s Managing Director Christine Lagarde spoke about the housing markets in Canada, specifically in Toronto an Vancouver and as well how to possible prevent any risks in those markets.”
Fuck. With the state of Europe, you’d think she’d have other things to do.
“BC’s foreign buyer tax has ‘little’ to do with Vancouver sales slump and GTA spike: economist”, BuzzBuzzNews
http://news.buzzbuzzhome.com/2016/09/bcs-foreign-buyer-tax-vancouver-sales-slump.html
“The foreign buyer tax had very little impact on Vancouver home sales, which have been on a downward trend since February,” writes Paul Ashworth, chief North American economist for Capital Economics.”
““That supports our claim that, rather than foreign buyers, it is irresponsible lending and rising domestic debt that has been driving Canada’s housing bubble,” he continues.”
Thought so.
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A point of criticism for you guys… I think you are overlooking the role that interest rates have played in our market. The Bank of Canada should not have cut rates a year ago and they created the bull market in real estate this past year.
This upside risk in this market is further interest rate cuts. I think the Federal government should be pressured to make it a political issue. In theory the Bank is independent, but in reality, they are like every other sycophant that wants to please the PTB.
A second point of criticism is the role of taxation and bureaucracy in creation of new housing. Anybody who has had to do that appreciates this point. New supply is seriously constrained by municipal governments.
Don’t bother Dave, I doubt any bears believe there can be any cause other than Chinese dirty money.
What kind of new supply do you suggest, Dave?
Wait, let me guess.
MOAR CONDOS!
Don’t listen to HALT. I suggested the interest rate factor on their Facebook page and got blocked for my trouble. Ignore.
Hope you are not born in mainland China or have mainland parents. Locust scum are not welcome on this blog and everyone born in PRC is a lying scum as per this blog definition.
We have zero tolerance for racism and activity ban people from our Facebook page for race-baiting.
That won’t work. This is a racist endeavour at best because you will be attaching people with names, faces and nationality to money. Just watch to see what happens. Good luck.
– HALT money laundering and tax fraud by individuals hiding their money in our housing market
– HALT Immigrant Investor Programs that bring in owners who do not contribute to our income tax base
How is this racist? Halting Immigrant Investor Programs is not the same as halting immigration. Money laundering and tax fraud? I know some posters here think that is a racial attribute but it isn’t.
Look at the rest of their suggestions:
– HALT corporate donations to political parties. For too long, our governments have served moneyed interests and not the interests of the citizens of our city and our province
– HALT AirBnB of our rental stock. We need regulations in place to protect our renters
– HALT demolitions of affordable rentals that are being replaced by unaffordable luxury condos marketed to offshore buyers
Racism?
So why are you on here then? Unless you don’t think BPOM & Co are upstanding citizens defending Canadian values, multi-culturism, and tolerance?
Agreed, I can attest that they block people on their Facebook page if you don’t toe their viewpoints exactly. For example, they are completely delusional when it comes to the interest rate dynamic and debt-to-income ratios that have enabled speculation across the country.
Interest rates have been a huge factor driving up prices for many years and especially immediately after the 2008 crash. The last 2 years has seen different factors at play as Cdn currency has devalued and a mass exodus of foreign money has sought refuge in Canada.
Raising interest rates is a blunt instrument that clubs the entire economy, not just housing markets in Vancouver and Toronto.
Okay, Oracle has made a modest adjustment to his forecasts.
He now thinks perhaps not 7,000 listings by September month-end. It’s been adjusted to a year-end target.
And flat prices.
Will his omnipotence prove accurate?
I, for one, don’t think so. That said, he is Oracle and I am not. Wish I was as smart as him, everything he seemingly touches turns to gold.
Yep.
Canadian banks allow foreign clients with no credit history, including students, to qualify for uninsured mortgages without proving the sources of their income – a practice that exempts non-Canadians who have money in the bank from the scrutiny domestic borrowers face when buying a home or an investment property.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/real-estate/vancouver/canadian-banks-mortgage-guidelines-favour-foreign-home-buyers/article31869946/
Money laundering helps bank to make huge profit. You cannot allow thieves to police themselves?
But BPOM and team have maintained that EVEEY mainlander is a lying, cheating, locust scumbag that needs to be squashed. How is this even possible? My world is now upside down. How can there possibly be an honest mainland Chinese?
When China sends their people over, they’re not sending their best. They’re corrupt officials, embezzlers, fraudsters, tax evaders, money launderers…..
And some, I assume, are good people.
Uhm…first, China don’t send people over. They came out of their own free will. Second, so that’s why you repeated called for nuking China? Kill all the good ones left there…
“Big Number” is the name of the game. That’s why people call that immigration from China should slow or preferably be canceled. With the big influx of people, the huge amount of garbage comes in too.
re vacancy tax
-clock starts in 2017 calendar year w/ initial bills due in 2018
-homes declared as “principle” residences will be exempt (whether occupied or vacant)
-homes under development, renovation, awaiting permitting, probate among other reasons also exempt
-tax rate of 0.5 – 2.0% on assessed value being considered
-amt of penalty for violations not known
-audits to be random and complaints based
File a ridiculous or incomplete permit application. Refile when rejected. Problem solved.
When any of our incompetent leaders come up with these plans they should invite a group of mainland chinese “immigrant investors” to the discussion table and ask them questions about what tactics they would use to get around any new laws being proposed.
Kind of a think tank, if you will.
If you want to find out how to cheat the system, go straight to the experts.
So why don’t you run for mayor in the next civic election, with all your disciples for the council seats? With such vulgar and racist charisma, I’m sure you will get tons of votes like Trump! And you will be in charge of the policies! No more corrupt politicians selling out to dirty Chinese cuz you are in charge! You can now do everything you want the city to do, i stead of complaining on here. Heck, you can probably run your own Chinese scum death squads too.
re vacancy tax cont’d…
-will be hard to police with properties constantly changing hands
– will motivate owners to employ caretakers, other tactics to throw nosy neighbors off trail
– authorities will need to review reams of data to parse out addresses that are both “secondary” residences and “vacant”for more than the prescribed limit
– cheats will assign properties to family members who will then exploit principal residence loophole
– if worse comes to worse, owner can fund rental (at attractive rate) for family member and pay income tax (lesser of two evils)
one question remains, however, and that is how will landlords who are not declaring rental income prove their property is rented out for more than a token amount without exposing themselves to potentially other scrutiny?
This will be heaven for usual cheaters and tax dodgers to master their creativity. Wonder if a girlfriend helped writing the bill.
This is crazy! “Principal residences exempt from Vancouver vacant home tax”
http://bc.ctvnews.ca/principal-residences-exempt-from-vancouver-vacant-home-tax-1.3071861
If no one is living in a house, then it is empty, regardless claim of principal residence. Mayor Moonbean, give your head a shake!
” Penalties for not declaring are still being worked out by the city, and the city says it will conduct random audits once the tax is in place.
“The penalties for not declaring need to be significant enough that it might be preferable to pay the tax,” said Kathleen Llewellyn-Thomas, general manager of community services for the City of Vancouver.
She added that the audit and complaint process will “keep people honest.”
I’m sure they’ll come up with some paltry fine that nobody will care about.
How about seizing the property from anyone who cheats?
That will get their antennae up.
Would be much easier to just publish the addresses…and let squatters solve the problem.
I don’t know how is that going to work all of a sudden? Vancouver is full of those Chinese shady eateries and other dubious dealings where only cash is accepted and no receipt given without questions being asked. Probably in CRA books it is tracked as a “racist risk”.
And I thought those hand written ‘cash only’ signs on the door were a religious edict!
I guess you never run a small biz with very low margins,like a casual eatery.
You people have an excuse for everything being illegal, fishy and questionable, rather presenting it as a convenience and a logical outcome. Did party teach you such things?
Yeah, I like to see people take responsibility every once in awhile instead of making excuses for themselves every single time, without fail.
You mean like buying RE earlier when they were bitching about how high the prices are, when the prices are say 30%+ lower than now? Instead of blaming it all on Chinese?
Maybe you can run a casual eatery on a 10% margin and let’s see how long you will take CC that charges 2% to 5%. Let me know how that goes.
If you worry about tax dodging underground economy, I would go after the home reno market which last I check aren’t dominated by Chinese, but rather locals who aren’t yellow looking. That’s a way bigger underground economy than casual eatery ever will be.
And gov’t audits those casual eatery pretty regularly due to worry about tax dodging. So stop trying to see evil lurking around every corner and being a paranoid racist freak.
Many many many people have low margin biz’s. They all have to pay tax.
Right, but they don’t all accept credit cards either.
They need a snitch line where snitches keep half the tax.
They can out with a limited version of that already.
What a fool Greggor Robertson is. First off the tax is going to be .5% to 2%. That is $500 per year on a $1 million condo. Who cares. Nobody will rebt out a vacant place just to save $500. They claim it will raise $2 million in revenue to go towards rental housing. Wow that $2 million can build 2 rental apartment units. That should solve the problem. Putting effort towards cracking down on ABnB would get way more rentals to market. Vision are fools.
$5,000 actually.
better check your math,..
easy and legit way to dodge tax is to create phony rental paper trail complete with utility bills and the like. income tax payable on hypothetical rent would be a small fraction compared to vacancy tax. you would also be able to claim other writeoffs and deductions too, so it all ends up being a wash when all is said and done.
Foo
Math fail
$5K minimum per million it is. My bad. Greggor is not as dumb as I thought. Still Air BnB is the better target to increase of rentals. I think the tax will push people to put their home up for sale just to avoid the tax or potential hassle of fighting it. Vacant homes are not as attractive as they used to be with the market going down not up. Add in a tax and it is time to sell. Just another straw that breaks the camels back.
Dude, its so easy to claim this exemption. Even with multiple houses. Tick, Tick, Tick. Keep changing multiple residences when time to sell. Like CRA is going to audit them. S/
They don’t release those capital gains numbers purposely. They would not dare rock the RE boat. This is all a shell game to get people like those that frequent this blog into actually thinking something is happening. Look at ZOLO. Richmond recovered all its losses.
There are enough Astronaut families and PR former wealthy students that simply keeping immigration numbers high will rocket detached prices higher.
What they needed to do IF THEY WERE SERIOUS was to tax 2nd homes at 5% annual levy added to the property tax. Simple as that. gets rid of speculation from locals.
When pigs fly.
They have to claim somewhere that it is a principle residence I suppose, such as on their income tax filing. Presumably they can’t just claim to the city that it is their principle residence without also proving it is their principle residence in respect to tax filings.
You are forgetting the Home Owner Grant application, which the city processes in the first place. Making a false declaration is an offense.
And this is a non event. How they going to tax those that live in their condos for 1 month out of the year? Wealthy have multiple homes around the world.
If anyone believes this has teeth, then good gawd theres no hope for you.
No kidding.
The City doesn’t have the ability to enforce this. Pure optics. No chance they believe their own BS either.
This isn’t the party who supports affordable housing. Sadly, such a party doesn’t exist.
Why is that hard. If they live there only one month out of the year, they should be taxed. Like a hotel tax, sort of.
Does this chart remind you of the “V” shaped recovery in 2009.
Richmond average prices have recovered all their losses. Up 32% this month. As soon as local HAM sees this, frenzy will resume.
The Christy Clarks, De Jongs are not releasing the foreign tax numbers because the foreign buying activity shifted to attached and condos. 15% of $600,000 is affordable to the wealthy (Its 1 year of expenses for the typical foreign student).
that makes no sense. HAM that is laundering cash thru a single $6M transaction or 10 @ $600k a piece would in theory be paying the same amount of foreign tax. failure to release data proves HAM is a much larger factor than advertised. anecdotal evidence showing sales picking up on island, ok, sunshine cst and other tax free regions post tax rollout also supports this notion (as does activity on toronto)
as mentioned previously all this data is meaningless in a thinly traded mkt where a small handful of transactions can skew the average
Its way to early to what lack of sales is going to do to prices.
The trend is your friend.
Are you as, less or more confident about this latest prediction than you were with your 7,000 listings by the end of September?
Just curious.
Dude, look at the link to Zolo posted below. Sadly, we got more important things to worry about now.
Are you as, less or more confident about this latest prediction than you were with your 7,000 listings by the end of September?
Just curious.
I would think the banks discriminating agaist locals based on nationality is a human rights issue and the banks may be in for some law suits. Hopefully a law firm takes this up and starts a class action by locals who have been turned down for mortgages in the past with damages being the amount RE went up.
I almost would help with volunteer work were someone to pursue such a case. I am so angry at the banks.
I have been following this site for years and rarely post. I would like to throw in my thanks to Paul B for keeping us in the loop with all the numbers.
Our real estate situation is just a mess and it desperately needs a complete overhaul but our PM just open the immigration door wide open to those that are abusing it.
Thanks Paul. I’ve been on this site at least 7 years and always appreciate your posts.