Tag Archives: price drops

BC, debt, economy, opinion, prices

Time to cut our losses on Olympic Village?

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The City of Vancouver still owes lots of money for the Olympic Village condo development.

They aren’t saying how much but it looks like it’s currently at least a couple hundred million.

Is it time to cut our losses?

Developer Michael Geller thinks so. In this Province article he says it’s time to cut the prices and get out while we can.

As Vancouver’s real estate market cools, losses on the troubled Olympic Village development could soar above $225-million unless condo king Bob Rennie quickly drops prices on unsold units that have languished on the market for too long.

That’s the view of developer and architect Michael Geller, a former NPA council candidate, who suggests flawed pricing and weak marketing is turning the fiasco on False Creek from bad to worse.

Read the full article here.

What do you think? Does the city stand to lose more by holding out for ‘maximum price’ or by selling quickly at a discount?

Canada, debt, economy, opinion, predictions, prices

RBC: No Toronto Condo Bubble

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Royal Bank says everyone should stop worrying about the condo bubble in Toronto.

Policy makers in Ottawa and various economists just need to chill.

There is no Condo Bubble in Toronto.

Can someone ask them about Vancouver?

There are more condos under construction in Toronto than any other city in North America, and more residential building is taking place in the Greater Toronto Area than ever before.

Mr. Flaherty’s fears about overpriced real estate, and condo markets in particular, prompted him to surprise the market last month with new mortgage insurance rules that aim to take some of the wind out of the market’s sails. He’s trying to engineer a gradual slowdown of the market, fearing that otherwise it could crash at some point.

Mr. Hogue’s lack of concern about a bubble does not mean he thinks the market will boom, however. He expects condo prices to fall by perhaps 2 per cent to 7 per cent from their peak. He predicts that a two-tiered market could emerge, with condo prices softening while the market for single-family homes is resilient.

Full article in the Globe and Mail.

BC, economy, prices

Whistlers nasty collapse

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117 Comments

They say bubbles inflate from the center, working their way out to peripheral areas. They then tend to collapse in reverse with outlying areas crashing first as the equity vacuum works its way back to the center.

Right now Vancouver is seeing unseasonably high listings and lower than normal sales. Prices are softening, but there’s no dramatic crash yet.

Meanwhile Vancouver Island, The Sunshine Coast and the BC interior are all seeing dramatic price drops.

Just north of us you’ll find Whistler BC, the ski resort where prices just keep on melting. The Village Whisperer points out this 65% asking price drop since 2005.

On a similar note Makaya pointed out this delightful instance of Whistler bottom-calling in 2010. The supposition was that since prices had been dropping, they wouldn’t any more.

For people expecting the real estate prices in Whistler to drop after the Olympics, I’m afraid you’re going to be sorely disappointed.
According to George Klimock from The Whistler Real Estate Company, property prices in Whistler today are already 15-25% lower than previous prices in 2007. In fact, current prices in Whistler are down to 2001 levels.
With a high level of inquiries and good prices, Whistler is considered to good value in the resort market, with, for example, a 2 bedroom condo is now listed at $ 519,000 as opposed to the more expensive $ 630,000 a few years earlier.

Meanwhile prices just keep sliding down the mountain..

UPDATE: The whistler bottom-calling article linked above is not currently working. Ant saved a copy of it here on Vancouver Peak.

Open Topic

Friday Free-for-all!

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Yeah, that’s right. It’s the end of the week and that means it’s time for our regular end of the week news round-up and open topic discussion thread. Here are few recent links to kick off the chat, the first one see’s our very own Vancouver Real Estate Roller Coaster show up on the evening news:

–No Bubble in Vancouver (video)
–Inventory now under 10 year record
–Average house prices for the last year
–What housing bubble?
–Vancouver drags Canadian real estate
–Canadian banks not immune to bubble
–Half of Canada to retire with mortgage
–CMHC insurance protects the lender
–‘Condo king’ says bubble talk just hot air
–‘Condo king’ on BC housing commission
–Does Canada have ‘Dutch Disease’?
–Professional women go it alone
–Instant house
–Real estate crash in China underway
–VCI now on Twitter
–

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

BC, data, Open Topic, prices

Shopping for deals? Vancouver Price Drop.

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44 Comments

An Observer has started up a new Vancouver RE blog focused specifically on tracking price drops!

Right now at vancouverpricedrop you’ll find number of asking price drops by area and a ‘top eleven’ list of price drops in the Vancouver and Fraser Valley region.

These drops are all over the map, some have dropped asking price by a million and are still a million over assesment.  There are a couple that seem serious though with new asking prices several hundred thousand dollars under assessed value.

It’s fantastic to see a new addition to the Vancouver bubble blog crowd, especially one that is focused on specific data.  Looking forward to watching this one in the future!

Here’s that link again: vancouverpricedrop.wordpress.com