Tag Archives: whistler

BC, debt, economy, foreclosure

Sunshine coasts largest developer files for Bankruptcy

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84 Comments

Last week over at VancouverPeak Skook posted about the bankruptcy filing of Wakefield Construction.

We missed that posting here at VancouverCondo.info, but it’s got some interesting details about the impact to the economy and a number of subcontractors on the sunshine coast, Vancouver, Whistler and Bowen Island.

There are no winners in this situation – not the employees, not the subcontractors, not the local businesses nor suppliers, not the community and not Lance Sparling. As the list of “Unsecured” creditors shows, he borrowed from himself, too, to keep the ball rolling. His waterfront home was put on the market a year ago and remains unsold despite a -25% drop in the list price; but, as we know those million dollar plus properties have been slow to move on the Sunshine Coast – only 17 sold in 2014 out of a total of 123 listed – that’s barely 14%.

Skook also relates a personal memory:

Like so many others living in and north of Sechelt I wondered what would replace the old “Wake-in-the-Field” Inn and then was fascinated by those uniquely curved roofs of that replacement – the Wakefield Beach development. When I moved down to Sechelt, I had the opportunity to walk through the project and it is a very special and attractive development. The company, Wakefield Construction, was born from that development and at least in this instance the company name lives on.

While Skooks posting is almost nostalgic in tone, the first major media to pick up this story is Business in Vancouver. In their story the Realtor is surprised:

“They ruled the world up here,” said Sechelt realtor Susanne Jorgenson,” “I don’t know how they could have failed.”

..The chamber of commerce is shocked:

“I was shocked,” said Kim Darwin, president of the Sechelt and District Chamber of Commerce. “[The Coast] has a number of new construction projects coming up, so I hope our smaller contractors can step up.”

And the customer is angry:

“They screwed a lot of people,” said Brad Copping, general manager of South Coast Ford Sales Ltd., which had hired Wakefield Construction to complete a 9,000-square-foot addition to its Sechelt dealership. Copping is now paying three of the former Wakefield employees to continue work that is now half complete.

“This will cost a couple of hundred thousand dollars,” said Copping, whose company is not on the creditor list. “They [Wakefield Construction] over billed us and then didn’t pay their sub-contractors. So we are paying twice for the same work.”

Read the full article over at Business In Vancouver.

 

Open Topic

FFFA! Affordability, Overpriced, Comparisons

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106 Comments

It’s that time of the week again!  This time, we’re going to use the assistance of commentor Snake who posted most of these links.

Thanks Snake and everyone else who contributed links.

But as a general reminder, if you post more than one or two links your comment will get held up in moderation. Inconvenient yes, but better than getting inundated with spam links.

Ok! On to the links:

–Most Over And Undervalued Markets
–Market overvalued, but crash worries ease
–7 Remarkable Numbers From Canada’s Housing Market
–Carney To Stop Mortgage Funding Scheme
–Housing Bubble? Canada’s Top Banking Regulator Refuses To Say
–Vancouver Real Estate Canada’s Least Affordable: Report
–How much house can you handle?
–Home affordability worsens, new report shows
–The Chase: Toronto couple’s search for a $650,000 house
–Goldman Sachs recommends shorting CAD$
–Babies ‘R’ Expensive
–Angry in Whistler
–

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

BC, data, predictions, prices, supply

31% of apartments for sale are vacant

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81 Comments

This is kind of amazing.

yvr2zrh posted this analysis of the percentage of property listings for sale that are vacant:

Across REBGV 19% of listed SFH are vacant and 31% of attached/apartments are vacant. So – 50% as the comment from Jesse is higher than actual but not completely out of reach for apartments. Some variations are noted.

SFH Vacant stats (number/%)(in order or highest to lowest)
Richmond 175 – 24%
Van West 148 – 23%
North Van 55 – 21%
Port Coq – 22 – 21%
Whistler – 39 – 21%
Van East – 87 – 20%
Burnaby – 71 – 20%
etc . . .

For Apartment/Attached, the following are the vacant properties
Whistler – 177 (42%)
Maple Ridge – 94 (34%)
Van West – 522 (34%)
New West 110 (33%)
Van East – 169 (33%)
Burnaby – 261 (31%)
Richmond – 298 (31%)
North Van – 115 (30%)

–
So, even if you have people who just want to hold back, why would they when there is cash outflows to carry the property and the future outlook is for price decreases?

Those who just hold off selling, where they are actually living in the unit, and are waiting for prices to increase, are bound to die living in that unit.

Later today, I will post my predictions for the 2013 market based on my model. What is really helpful is the MOI/monthly price change graph. That has been a really good indicator of price movements. Thus, I will post the projected MOI movements for 2013 and then we can see where the prices fall. It is important to know that listing volumes are down from last year. This is sufficiently so that we may see 2013 inventory intersect the 2012 inventory possibly at the end of the Spring and then track 2012 for the rest of the year.

This will be interesting to watch because once we are down 10-15% from peak prices – how can they continue to say things like prices are flat and this is a soft landing? I would say any decrease of 20% from the peak is not good as you immediately remove even more move-up buyers and put 1000′s of people underwater immediately.

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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139 Comments

It’s the end of another work week and that means it time for the free-for-all!  This is our regular weekend news roundup and open topic discussion thread.  Here are a few recent links to kick off the chat:

–Tiptoeing towards sub-prime
–Get ready for more bidding wars!
–Carney hints at rate hikes
–Is Carney actually driving?
–Vancouver might get a new tower
–Want to RE blog for G&M?
–Higher learning in Whistler
–Translink puts on the brakes
–

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