In Toronto if you don’t like the rent being asked, suggest your own. So many condos on the market, so many empty units, so many noveau landlords, so many failed flippers happy to get whatever they can to cover the costs on their mistakes. And this is but the start, as thousands of new condos in dozens of buildings guarantee 2011 will be spec hell.
In Calgary, a doctor making $400,000 a year bought a $750,000 house two years ago and pumped $150,000 into renos. He put down 10%, mortgaged the rest and stuck the home improvements on his line. Total house debt, he told me, is now north of $800,000 – and the place has just been assessed at $639,000. “If I wanted to sell it, which I don’t,” he says, “I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this.”
In Edmonton 18 months ago a couple helped their adult daughter buy a trendy downtown condo, co-signing the $220,000 mortgage as a favour to the twenty-something. She then used her savings of $30,000 to upgrade the kitchen, and four months later lost her job. The unit’s been for sale for more than 150 days and, at $179,000, there are no offers. Hell, no showings. The parents, in their late fifties and struggling, are despondent.
In the Gulf Islands off BC’s coast, Rick and Linda’s romantic piece of land with the old growth and water views closes next week. It sat on the market for nine long months, despite a series of price decreases, until they finally accepted selling at a loss. “We made use of it, camping there,” he says. “But I have learned two lessons. It is easier to buy than to sell. And real estate can be a prison.”
In downtown Vancouver, the symbol of real estate excess, big-city penal envy and delusion among the populace, sits unloved and now debased. What was once the Olympic Athletes Village, then Millennium Waters, and a billion-dollar nightmare for the taxpayers dragged into financing it, is repossessed, renamed, repriced and rejected. Condo units that were marketed at prices 30% higher than downtown Toronto will now be sold at up to half off. With scores of others, the receiver won’t even try, opting instead to rent them out.
What do these five little vignettes have in common?
In a word, illiquidity.
An illiquid asset cannot easily, quickly or effortlessly be converted into cash. Stocks, marketable bonds, ETFs, mutual funds, trust units, preferred shares – all are examples of financial assets you can sell in minutes and turn into money within a couple of days. They offer the ability to jump into the comforting arms of cash the moment danger is sniffed. The reason: financial markets matching big institutional players and millions of individual investors with almost always a buyer for every seller.
In comparison, the real estate market is crude, tiny, inefficient and intensely local. You can wait months, or longer, for a single interested party to roll up your driveway or click on your little red dot on mls.ca. In fact, it now takes an average of 1.2 years for the average US house to sell.
So, this is a new danger for many homeowners. As the market declines further, and especially as the realization hits the media and the citizenry, many housing markets across the country will become astonishingly illiquid. As sellers outnumber buyers by a wide margin, there’ll be only one overriding factor when it comes to bailing out – price.
Sadly, many people will be unable to sell at any price. The young couple in Mississauga, for example, who bought a $400,000 home on 5/35 terms. A market correction of 15% means if they sell at $340,000, they have to show up on closing day with a personal cheque for $75,000 – just to get out of the deed. But they can’t. They have nothing. This is what happens when people without money buy houses. And in Ontario, they can’t even walk. Only bankrupt.
There’s no doubt housing values will fall this year and sales stagnate. The illiquid nature of this asset will shock many vendors. The bidding wars will be over. The multiple offers gone. The days of having to leave the house vacuumed and immaculate, endless. As I’ve said here often, only consumer sentiment drives real estate, and that can change on a dime.
I talked to a wise man last night in a town where everybody’s ape for houses. He just sold his home – one week, eight showings, three offers, $2,000 over asking. “When I tell people I did it,” he says, “they look at me like I’m an idiot. And then they tell me how much my house is worth, and I’ll never, ever be able to buy in again.
“And it’s in that moment, I know I’m right.”
308 comments ↓
Great topic – and very real in the US these days.
I hear that folks chasing jobs can’t sell their illiquid homes, so must rent and leave, and rent in another state.
1st !
Vancouver will go down as the biggest bubble in history.
First..!
Garth,
Great post again…! Eventhough statistics support for a housing melt, I totally agree with your point of consumer sentiment.
I was just thinking how you shape your mind set before writing this blog… interesting ever and free flowing… each day…! Couple of shots of votka…?
Cheers…
Yep – Toronto condos are past the point of no return… prices are already dropping, and all of those happy stories about record new condo sales just mean that there will be even more underwater people in 2-3 years when those buildings are completed. How can anyone expect to get a reasonable offer on a condo in these downtown Toronto buildings where you have 30-50 units on the market at the same time!?!?
Houses in the GTA seem to be holding up, including a number of bidding wars for any half-respectable home. Blame that on the lack of listings (which you always have in the winter months)… and that could change quickly come spring.
me first!
Oy Vey:
Family member..oil field worker, lives in Northern Alberta.
Bought a condo in Edmonton….. for their daughter to use as she atternds U of A…..near to completing her degree.
She and her boyfriend (both less than 25 years old ) recently announced they no longer want the $ 250/month rent her parents are “asking” for the condo…….they want to buy.
WTF is going on…..
Second! Lawlz
What I think we’re going to see over the next 5 years in Canada, overall, is a flat market…if the average Canadian home currently sells for $340,000, I think this will be approximately the same number as in 2016.
However, I think how we get there is a different story than an average, overall ‘melt’. I think there will be a melt in bubble cities and in the suburbs of lesser-bubble cities. But I think increases in central locations (downtown condos, places within walking distance of city hot spots, great rental locations etc.) will occur over the next 5 years.
One has to ask themselves what type of real estate do they own?
I love hearing anecdotal stories, but the problem with that type of evidence is that there are always stories with the opposite message, and indeed some of the anecdotal stories in today’s post support that Canadian banks have solid lending practices (i.e., they lent money to a doctor, and they required a co-signer in one of the other stories).
I have some anecdotal evidence. I have two great uncles (both older boomers, one retired and one almost retired), one who has bought a condo in Toronto within the past couple years for his use in retirement. The other is contemplating selling their ‘suburb’ home in Mississauga in order to buy a condo in Toronto. How many other boomers are thinking/acting this way? I also know other boomers that are planning on staying in their Mississauga mansion….figuring out what the boomers are going to do seems to be a crap shoot to me.
I read today that 1/3rd of the U.S. citizens have a 660 credit rating which will disqualify them to buy a home.
The U.S. recovery is a long way off with that stat.
TD came out with this lovely report on Assessing the Financial Viability of Households across Canadian Regions.
Lots of interesting comments and charts.
I like the chart on page 7 which shows what happens when the overnight rate is adjusted from 1% to 3%.
That is a tip off.
Canada is in for a wild ride. Going to be lots of fear, stress and pain. We all going to feel this one.
It is only a matter of time before H,F and C are going to wish they had more humility.
http://www.td.com/economics/special/db0211_householddebt.pdf
Dead on Garth. For every speculator, there are many rentals available to be had for cheaper and cheaper. The funny part is that more condo units and apartment buildings still being built.
Last week the Calgary Sun was boasting that multi-family permits are outpacing SFH’s. And according to the experts “that’s a good thing”.
Friends of mine purchased a s x s in Wpg for $190,000 with 10k down. Incredible price and although the place is nice, I sometimes wonder how easily they will be able to sell the place if they required to. Together they have a family income close to $100,000 but all signs point to a change in prevailing market conditions. I wonder if the sellers market in Wpg might last a little longer than than some other spots in Canada…Thoughts and reflections are appreciated
Some local Toronto info (paging T.O. Bubbleboy!): along the short strip of King St. West between Spadina and Simcoe (Roy Thompson Hall) there are a tons of new condos and proposed condos/applications underway; I count at least 3000 units slated to hit the market if all applications are approved, with one tower almost completed, another with foundations, and then five proposed towers along or just behind this small strip.
Edmonton has trendy downtown condos?!!!
Lets face it, no one can deny that statistically we are due for a “return to the median” as far as real estate values go. Talk to any old timer and he will remind you that there have been many periods in time where real estate has gone south. History has a habit of repeating itself. I’m just surprised that its had such a long run up in prices. As a tailing edge baby boomer born in 1965, I feel this could be an opportunity to finally enter the recreational property market. Ive always been “late to the party”, when it comes to real estate. I’m not sympathetic to the boomers who have always watched their properties rise in value excessively, and will now see their nest eggs diminish.
I have been playing a game for a few days. Been going on Realtor.ca and searching. When I put Toronto in you can see the amount of listed residential rentals. This has been increasing by approximately 70 a day since last week.
We now at 6,420. I left the numbers at work but as I recall it was 5,640 earlier last week.That is just Toronto. Not the 905 area. The number does not include large rental buildings or other marketing vehicles.
Can you say glut. Supports your observations Garth. But of course (they) will argue that we have 85,000 immigrants a year coming to Toronto. The trouble is the vast majority cannot find jobs.
Ontario is going to be in serious trouble very shortly. The majority of hiring has been in Construction and Government. God Bless us all…..
http://www.realtor.ca/map.aspx?&vs=VEResidential&beds=0-0&baths=0-0&minr=0&maxr=0&area=Toronto&trt=3#acr:false;ac:false;baths:0-0;beds:0-0;fp:false;gar:false;pmin:0;pmax:0;rmin:0;rmax:0;openh:false;pool:false;stories:0-0;buildingstyle:-1;buildingtypeid:;viewtypeid:;waterfront:false;forsale:false;forrent:true;orderBy:A;sortBy:1;LisStartDate:;mapZ:3;page:1;mapC:63.15435519659188,%20-91.75781250000001;curView:0;curStyle:r;chkSchl:false;chkTran:false;chkPol:false;chkMed:false;chkWrk:false;chkFire:false;chkAll:false
The Vancouver Sun is publishing an article in tomorrow’s (Saturday) paper that the bidding wars are back… Apparently it’s a seller’s market again in Vancouver.
In late 1999 – we hosted a dinner party. It was December. I was a stockbroker at the time.
We had 10 couples over and the talk drifted from one topic to the other.
Of course at the time the Tech Bubble was raging and everyone was an instant expert on tech stocks – of course they were.
When the talk finally made it over to the Tech market – everyone owned the best stock with the biggest upside potential. Something like everyone owns the best house on the street.
Every expert in the room and there were many said the following – “earnings don’t matter anymore”. Yes they were very serious.
When everyone left – this was a Saturday evening – I said to my wife – I am selling every tech stock we own 1st thing Monday morning. I did exactly that. Took about 5 minutes because the market was in fact liquid.
Four months later at the beginning of April the NASDAQ cratered. It topped out at 5000 and is now still under 2500. That’s ten years later.
Hmmm – could that happen to Real Estate. No – it is different this time and valuation doesn’t matter…
Geez Garth, you are the tunnel at the end of the light…
You might as well be standing with a sign around your neck saying end times are coming, because most people I try to mention this to think it’s pure nonsense…
Did I not just write that? — Garth
We need to end this obsession with homeownership as the be all and end all to justify our lives.
Look at Germany – a country with a ferocious approach to industrial policy, and one that has a reputation for prudence.
The homeownership rate in Germany ? – LESS THAN 50%
If it’s not a stigma to rent in Germany, why the hell is it a stigma to rent in North America? Last I checked, Germany is doing pretty damm well economically – not only in terms of GDP per capita, but how distributed the income is over the broad populace.
fer gawd sake will u all ” I’m first” crowd give it up…it is so yesterday…GO TWEET something & leave us alone
Does anyone know how many taxpayers (homeowners) there are in Van City? Their fancy website says there were 253,000 private households in the ‘06 census. This probably includes apartments, so a conservative guess would be 250,000 homeowners / taxpayers. I will exclude businesses from this mess. It is almost a certainty now that the loan loss on this will be $200 million. Susan Anton, current opposition party city councilor (and whose party started this mess) was quoted that the loss would be in the range of $50 million to $150 million based on the new listing prices…..but folks, this will come in much higher than that. This is without even having reduced the prices and re-listed the higher-end condos…..in an already peaked out housing market…..in a city where the average person has had a negative savings rate the past 10 years (a nice TD Bank research piece released this week)….where emergency level interest rates will be history by June…..and where F finally tightened mortgage lending rules. Clearly this is a mess. I think it is almost a certainty now that the loan loss (not loss, but loan loss) on this will be at least $200 million. Did I mention that already? This City also was not paid for the approximate $200 million land sale (developer made only a token small down payment). Therefore, including the land loss, this would be an approximate $400 million loss to taxpayers…..at the very, very least. Based on 250,000 taxpayers, this equates to around $1,600 per taxpayer…..not chump change…..just for this one project! Also, we will forget to mention all of the city funded new infrastructure at the site including the approximate $50 million community centre that does have enough people going thru it daily to justify even keeping the lights on. And this is the City that will not replace the 102 year old clay sewer pipe at the front of my house that they have to clean every July when it is choked with tree roots! A taxpayer referendum should be held to sell the waterfront social housing (yes, waterfront social housing) in this disaster. This is an ugly, ugly work-out situation. When the City originally tendered this project, several prominent long-time established developers in town were quoted as saying that the land price paid was way too much to economically develop the site. This was the 1st of many warning signs of things to come. I’m out.
I am new to investing, have my own corporation but most financial managers seems averse to ETFs. Why?
One said that he opposed ETFs on “philosophical” grounds.
Beats me
Those are not ‘financial managers.’ They’re mutual fund salesguys. — Garth
Ain’t that the truth. The real estate perma-bulls always say they can just sell their houses and get out. But when the market isn’t entertaining multiple offers (which is most of the time, and nearly ALL the time when these amateurs want to sell), selling a house isn’t a simple proposition. It takes a lot of time and money.
If you happen to be living in it, it is, at best, a colossal hassle and headache. Having to keep the place decluttered and spotless for all the weekend open houses, and vacating at a moment’s notice to let in impromptu visitors and tirekickers. Sinking in thousands of dollars to correct inspection deficiencies, and to bring the place up to modern standards (none of which you will end up enjoying), such as appliances, flooring, bathrooms, windows, paint, etc. Possibly juggle multiple mortgages.
If you want a taste of what the normal real estate market is like, check out episodes of The Unsellables and Buy Me (which has many Canadian stories) on the house porn channel HGTV. Full of sordid stories of people who can’t take on an exciting new job, because they can’t (afford to) sell their house, or commuting 2 hours each way for the foreseeable future, or carrying two mortgages, or becoming unwilling landlords, renting out their beloved house to fratboys (and still bleeding cash), or sinking whatever life savings are left to renovate and impress picky buyers (who want a ready to move into place), or moving back in with parents, or raising a family in a 1 bedroom condo.
But I’m sure nothing like that could ever happen to you. And had you treated housing like shelter that it is, a basic need, not a casino chip or an ATM, then you’re safe. Probably.
Ouch, I feel for the 50 something couple trying to unload their daughter’s condo in Edmonton. The only thing worse than trying to sell a house in Edmonton right now is trying to sell a condo.
“What I think we’re going to see over the next 5 years in Canada, overall, is a flat market…”
Utterly deluded.
“The Vancouver Sun is publishing an article in tomorrow’s (Saturday) paper that the bidding wars are back…”
Yawn.
Shot or deported. it’s all the same.
:-) … Liquidity !!! :-)
But Garth … sure “they” can get out the minute they “sniff” trouble … but really … perhaps 5-10% of the population is bolted together in a way that makes that a realistic notion. Let’s face it – people either have hyperactive sniffers that make them see trouble in everything – solution? GIC’s :-) or … they have dead sniffers altogether coupled with a whole lot of “knowledge” that was somehow infused during their last alien abuction and while it makes sense (to them) has no aplication whatever anywhere inside the asteroid belt – now they might follow your advice – but not in an exacly connected way … and … well … you know…
Just look at all the R.E. geniouses – flying high … no clue why … and most of them – realtors, flippers, paddle wheel gamblers … will end up losers.
John and Jane Doe ? Totally screwed … no money anyway … no pot to piss in … no idea what’s going on in the world – hikonomy’s an operation maybe? … liquidity???? ‘corse I’ll have a beer”
Oh lordy … nice tryin’ tho’.
Never comented on a picture before … but geeze … that’s one sad, ugly cat.
U.S. to overhaul mortgage system…
http://tinyurl.com/4uc23od
Hmmm. Those pesky rules keep changin’…
Canada to overhaul mortgage system…
…Not ‘if’….’when’. (Well actually they started already, didn’t they)
I Luv Sno-cones.
“An illiquid asset cannot easily, quickly or effortlessly be converted into cash. Stocks, marketable bonds, ETFs, mutual funds, trust units, preferred shares – all are examples of financial assets you can sell in minutes and turn into money within a couple of days.”
Right on the money! Both class of assets can & are sold at a loss if sold at the wrong time. The fallacy of this argument is in believing that there is no Stock/Bond melt-downs. Wrong as history proves!
“I talked to a wise man last night in a town where everybody’s ape for houses. He just sold his home – one week, eight showings, three offers, $2,000 over asking. ”
Right on the Money again. As history has proven over and over gain… Real Estate values go in cycles. When the 25/30 percent correct kicks in The seller can get back in. But _he_ will get back in. Bet on it!
And so it goes.
You miss the point, Financial assets are instantly liquid in any market. Real estate is famously illiquid unless in a rising one. — Garth
Another top drawer post from our host.
Was it only last week that you asked, “And what did you do Friday?” Today the Egyptian people resoundingly answered that question, moving even my preternaturally cynical 17-year-old daughter to tears. And then to laughter when she heard that the Swiss had frozen Mubarak’s bank accounts.
Karma has spoken too. She told Mubarak in no uncertain terms that “his people” hate him. Which hurts more you can only wonder. But today was about the people and the power they have when they come to realize it. And when enough of them say, like Mario Savio at Sproul Hall in 1964:
There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart that you can’t take part! You can’t even passively take part! And you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus — and you’ve got to make it stop! And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it — that unless you’re free the machine will be prevented from working at all!!
The Egyptian people are deservedly celebrating now before the hard work of turning this victory into something lasting and worthy. Meanwhile, from Riyad to Tel Aviv there are some people starting to look over their shoulder. Meanwhile, الصيحة
Yep, this is all reminiscent of the high-tech boom. Suddenly no one cares that they’re buying an old, ugly house for a million bucks and taking on a whole whack of debt. Why? Because prices are going to the moon! Every time I hear a news story about real estate, I just don’t listen. Just like I didn’t listen when those so-called “experts” on the news used to tell us about a “New Economy” and promote Nortel as a great investment. It’s all a bunch of garbage. At least back then people weren’t up to their ears in debt over high-tech stocks. This time it will be much, much worse.
“And it’s in that moment, I know I’m right.”
—
The definition of a moment of clarity.
For those looking to relocate to Ottawa:
$549,000 for 5 bedroom house in the glebe, walking distance to Dow’s lake, Bank St. amenities, short drive to downtown etc.
http://www.realtor.ca/propertyDetails.aspx?propertyId=10278271&PidKey=-1314987789
And, yes, Ottawa is a little bit of a sleepy town (with some ‘population’ envy for Toronto). I live near a busy road and near the major highway and it’s quiet by 7pm–which I don’t mind, it sure beats daily sirens in downtown Hamilton. It’s a fantastic place to raise kids, a shitty place to try to meet your significant other, and there are many options for outdoor activities. The parliament buildings, canal, rivers that snake throughout the city (the Ottawa and the Rideau), beaches (Petrie Island), museums, history, embassies, dedicated transit system and proximity to Quebec (i.e., cheap booze–can buy from Costco, Gatineau hills, skiing, lakes) is pretty cool too.
It is a federal government town, but being in the tail end of Gen X I’m seeing the public service renewal first hand and let me tell you the people are educated, dedicated and out for the greater good. We as Canadians are lucky to have these types of people working for us.
Actually, come to think of it, it is the best place I’ve ever lived (compared with Hamilton, Mississauga, Toronto, Kingston, Barrie, Orillia).
30th!
On a more trivial note, the link that TS provided in #11 *is* an interesting read, especially page 7: http://www.td.com/economics/special/db0211_householddebt.pdf
It shows the average home price to income ratio in Canada in 1999, before the current housing bubble started to inflate, was 3.2. It’s now 5.9! Reverting to the mean could be painful. Especially if we revert pass the mean to a ratio less than 3. Duck, and cover!
The crash in 1990 in Toronto hammered the condo market much harder than SFD and history is poised to repeat itself. Condos are always the first choice of investors/speculators because the maintenance and upkeep is easier and prices are lower so it’s cheaper to get in the game. It’s only logical that when the highly-leveraged speculators/non-resident owners start to bail it happens very quickly since most don’t have to personally move. Plus, the lower proportion of owner-occupied dwellings in condos vs SFD neighbourhoods mean proportionately more properties get dumped, driving condo values down much more rapidly and severely. It also seems that condo units get overbuilt much faster in a rising/hot market than SFD. I’m in a business associated with the development industry and I can’t believe the number of units in the pipeline right now, it could be even worse than the early 90’s for the condo market this time around.
Stocks et al. more liquid yes but also susceptible to loss.
So perhaps from an investment standpoint it makes sense to mention this, but for those living in a house just to live in, within the parameters of their means liquidity makes little difference.
As you’ve said, depression and the implosion of the US/north american economy is not going to happen.
Many of the old-farts who may feel the impacts of real estate being less liquid probably bought the house back when Trudeau was chasing skirts, so for them, it shouldn’t matter if they have to take a cut. That is unless their greedy little cholesterol and blood pressure pill soaked blood streams curdle with the thought of selling for less than ‘they think’ they dump is worth.
“I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this-
Bravo! Every buyer who dont have the real facts before buying should follow this line, sue CREA for giving you only parts of the numbers and keep the public in the dark regarding the *bad data* .Only A pro have ACCESS at all the numbers and can make a clear and impartial judgment. The buyer should know that before any action from is part.
–
“Getting out of 2011 will be spec hell.” — Ahh yes, 1980 when mtge. rates were around 21%, 1989 and others — sheeples don’t bother to learn from history. It doesn’t take too much effort to get a little research under one’s belt.
“If I wanted to sell it, which I don’t,” he says, “I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this.”
But the realtor never got him into anything; just showed a nice, expensive (vanity, for show) home which is lessening in value. So another one who can’t see beyond his eyelids tries to blame his misfortune on someone else.
Don’t shoot the messenger — take responsibility for yer own choices.
*
#19 zimmerp — “Four months later at the beginning of April the NASDAQ cratered.”
Great post in listening to what the herd are doing, follow your own gut feeling and do the opposite.
#222 Hoof Hearted on 02.11.11 at 10:36 pm — “What is the size of your firm . . .”
Both retired, so no firm. Get all my stuff done and outta the way in the morning, then the afternoon is free.
Hyperlinks are easy to set up and use — either Google it or e-mail me (Garth has my addy so I can forward the instructions on), then it’s a question of whether the story holds interest, and FWIW, I stick with a half-dozen to a dozen or so sites. Some days there’s nada, others plenty.
Cheers!
#225 jess on 02.11.11 at 11:03 pm — “Stop Tax Havens”, . . .”
Although Cdn. by birth, my bro. and I grew up in Jersey, largest of the Channel Islands, 14 miles off the north coast of France.
The C.I. have been tax havens for decades; rock and movie stars, mafia and criminal organizations hide their money their and an awful lot of money laundering goes on — a very male-dominated society, not too healthy for ladies.
If the EU ever forces the UK to adopt the Euro, it means the C.I. will lose their tax haven status and become akin to the Hawaiian Islands, which is obviously why they are fierce opponents of the Euro and EU.
It costs more to fly or boat from Jersey to Southampton than it does to fly from Glasgow to Barcelona. Great place to grow up in, not a good place to live. Bankers, financiers and lawyers are the only ones who make money.
*
Inflation Slowly beginning in US, then cross over here.
Three gold links — One; Two; and Three. JPM cornered London’s copper market and is up to its neck in silver. What’s next? Are they taking heat off GS?
CIA – Mossad linked? As said earlier, sometimes the devil you know is better than the one you don’t, replacing one with another. Globoctopus tightens its tentacles so in reality, Egypt has gone sideways. No change at the top.
Self Sufficiency Off the grid, grow food without Monsanto’s help.
NWO Hungry person charged with stealing, when the food had already been thrown out.
Vaccines Avoid them!
3:10 clip Foodometer. It’s getting outta whack.
Cherry Juice Apparently, it’s good for recovering from injuries.
Atlantis on Google maps?
Gittin’ Closer Asteroid kisses us on its way past.
There will be no government assistance for housing. How can a smart guy like you be so stupid? –Garth
————————————————–
Garth, I can’t believe the blog dogs let you get away with that one. I’m going to have to call you out.
The government is already providing assistance for housing (I guess this debate really centres on what one’s definition of what a ‘future government assistance’ program might be).
Currently we have:
1) CMHC insurance
2) they allowed/created RRSP home buyers plan
3) they provide a land transfer tax break
These measures are largely directed at 1st time buyers–this seems like government assistance for helping home ownership to me.
What is preventing them from creating some other type of assistance as you so explicitly stated (before lambasting OttawaMike)?
Get serious. The more the real estate bloat continues the greater the adjustment from it and the worse the overall economic consequences. That is exactly why steps are being taken to reduce credit and ease of entry. Rates will rise, the market will correct. There will be no new measures. — Garth
Garth,
with some of these condos dropping by 50%, at what point does it make sense to buy? What price to rent ratio?
Well, all markets are liquid if the bid/offer spread is tight. While house will never sell in seconds like stocks, if they are appropriately priced they should go within 3 to 6 months.
Problem is they are not appropriately priced. Sellers are still “imagining” the price they would like to sell at and listing accordingly, and then refusing to budge.
If you want to sell, list aggressively, and then entertain offers even if they are below your “price”. Sell to the highest bidder. It will sell.
But right now realtors are telling people not to even bother bidding if it’s below the list, because they know the delusional sellers think they are going to get list or better.
Oh, and back to stocks or what have you. Any market can go illiquid, even stocks. I’ve been involved with natural gas trading when the market went illiquid. When it was illiquid to the high side, selling was easy. Just undercut the offer on the board by a tiny bit, and you are done. But when the market is illiquid down, and everyone has pulled their bids, there is only one thing you can do. Sell at whatever price you can rummage up a bid at. The company I was with actually sold a small amount of day gas at $0.01 per GJ. Commodities can’t go to zero? Oh yes they can, for a short period of time, if there is over supply, some sort of time constraint to balance, and no storage available.
As the flash crash proved, you might always be able to sell a stock. But once the panic is in, 40 cents on the dollar is not impossible. And as Nortel proved (and BreX, and the NASDAQ, etc.) waiting isn’t always a better option. If you don’t have time to wait, panic early and avoid the rush.
Did you buy high but now the trend appears to have changed? Sell and preserve what cash you have left, or put it in something that has good fundamentals. Sitting on the loss until “it comes back” is the instinctive thing to do, but it can be dead wrong. The right thing to do is cut your losses.
As a wise boss I had some years ago instructed me, there is no such thing as the right price to buy or sell, only the right time. When it’s time, you have to accept the market price.
Today, in Canada, it is the right time to sell real estate. It’s still the right time to sell in the US. Don’t get me wrong, inflation is a part of life in a socialist democracy, and houses will one day trade at twice where they are now again. But it won’t be this year, next year, or probably even this decade. For now they go down.
Sellers in Canada are definitely using a “hold until the market gives me my price” philosophy. It might work, but I hope they can hold out 5-10 years.
Check out the latest Re/Max garbage re: Vancouver real estate. Do these people have no shame?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7x1RYFWWl84
#23 Ground Zero
Last stat I read….over 50% of Vancouver residents live in multi family units…not sure re: ownership.
RE#23 Olympic Village up False Creek…
Amazing, given the ineptitude and incompetence of the Vancouver City councilors who negotiated this deal in the first place, speculating in real estate instead of trying to manage the city. A colossal screw up, yet not one City Councilor has been fired or held accountable or even apologized! Why do we pay these boobs?
Bottoms_Up: there will be a melt in bubble cities and in the suburbs of lesser-bubble cities. But increases in central locations
well I agree there will be differences between suburbs and inner city with the inner city holding up better than the suburbs especially the outer suburbs. Tony, Brampton is going down but you already know that. A great deal depends on the price of oil – if it goes up the price of housing in the outer suburbs goes down.
Here’s a guess: Canadians banks are better prepared than the American banks. They have better documentation on their mortgages and are prepared to foreclosure faster and with less fuss.
“real estate can be a prison”
Great quote, worth repeating.
Greater Vancouver listings his 12,005 today as expected. Current growth in listings and dearth of sales means we’ll hit 13,000 listings by the end of February. That represents a 38% growth rate in listings since start of year. But you’ll never read or hear this in the MSM. And dinner party talk around here still triggers guffaws at anyone who believes this market will adjust. They still truly believe Vancouver in special.
Hey Nostradamus Mad Vlad, have your sources picked up any chatter about the City piping Prozac into the municipal water supply?
#19 zimmerp
Ahhhh the 1990’s
Remember people talking about Bre-X……Nortel…feeling like such a loser for not buying……yet listening to Warren Buffets “where’s the beef’ this makes no sense…… Some may have thought him as an out of touch fool…but what he said even then made sense.
Bre-X…unlike a tech stock…was a real eye opener. People ignored fundamentals,….didn’t want to see the truth…blatantly ignored it…till the shite hit the fan.
Sound familiar ???
So you mean stories like the ones you mentioned dont happen in the booming market, this can happen anytime whether the market is up or down, these people they dont know anything about Money Management, due diligence, which everybody has to go through before buying anything not just RE, there are also stories about people who bought now and everything is going smoothly with them like the one I mentioned before who bought a Penthouse for 4.1 Million, why you only mention the people who are suffering and not the people bought and are happy with their decision and things is going as they expected?
Bad decision can happen in good and bad market.
Once the housing market start to devalue,
The owners cannot use the house as an ATM. Then the Wealth effect will disappear
The People holding on better hope the climate doesn’t change and people perception of the housing market will be compared to the US, which have lost 50 to 70 % of their value.
Garth, is there a way to profit from the coming bust? ETFs of some sort? Can I short something to profit from the misery ahead?
Thought this might be of interest. Very relevant to recent topics here.
http://www.financialpost.com/m/money/story.html?id=4252327
Love the part about raising the rent on the negative cash flow condo investment.
Carlyle from Milton here.
My brother just sold his house a few days ago. Same class as mine but the smallest unit (1010 sq ft town, no back yard).
He got almost 300k setting a record for that unit type. This is a home that 6 weeks ago would have fetched 10k less (as would have mine which as some of you will recall also sold at a record breaking price). In november his house was going for about 270k. … We are talking a 30k rise in less than 3 months. 3 years ago he paid 180k btw.
I talkedvto my realtor about this today … He flatboat told me he can’t believe what people are paying right now … And interesting this metoric rise of prices has been limited almost exclusively to mattamy’s starter town home models.
My realtor flat out said that people are now way overpaying thanks in part to the march deadline on 35 yr mortgages as well as the quarter point rise of rates serving to push first timers even harder to buy now … But a further raise in interest rates combined with hitting the march deadline will be the iceberg that stops price rises cold and then sinks the ship.
First…!!!
Reminds me of a joke in the early eighties in Alberta.
Which would you rather have, a condo or syphillis?
Syphillis, because you can get rid of it.
Cheers
20
sorry GT, so obvious now…(palm of hand smacks forehead)
To the folks who prefer Ottawa over Montreal: I saw a postcard that epitomizes Ottawa. It was titled “Ottawa by Night” It was pitch black! lol. The town lacks soul. At least Montreal has character, awesome architecture and the best public transit system in Canada. I rarely had to use my car when I lived there
Cute doggie (blood pressure going down).
Rock ==> Harper <== Hard Place
————–
…the tragic disappearance of Harper’s grandfather, Harris Harper, in Moncton, New Brunswick, in 1950. Harris Harper, a high school principal, was, like his grandson, of a gloomy disposition. His failure to return from a doctor’s appointment led many to believe at the time that he had thrown himself from a bridge and into the Petitcodiac river, committing suicide. Harris Harper’s body was never found.
There was a scandal surrounding Harper’s grandfather. Rumours said he ran off with a woman, but I always thought there was more to that story. Joe used to tell his co-workers that Stevie was difficult to handle and often sought their advice according to the author of The Pilgramage of Steve Harper.
Read for 28 page free preview at Google books:
http://books.google.ca/books?id=5v3EzVm9kPMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=The+Pilgrimage+of+Steve+Harper&source=bl&ots=qwzFp7CiWb&sig=3YFkp5BlGgyoOaoZ95G66_crDAo&hl=en&ei=-gYnTfOOG4jPngfp3O3QAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false
♥
You forgot to mention transaction costs as a big difference between owning real estate and securities… I can sell 2,000 shares of BNS for $9.99 at my discount brokerage… That’s a 0.0083% commission.
Try that with a real estate transaction worth 120K…
The Chinese newspaper just reported that RCMP has analyzed incoming WIRES of funds ($$$) from CHINA has increased 10 times more than it usually do from 2009 and previous…Hmmm…I remembered that GLOBAL TV news pumping headlines about Offshore Chinese loading up real estate in vancouver soon and I figured no wonder Canada housing bubble didnt burst and it was propping up that well until now !!!
#16 ScottyMac wrote…..
As a tailing edge baby boomer born in 1965, I feel this could be an opportunity to finally enter the recreational property market.
———————————————————-
Wait Scotty. Don’t do any buying yet. Be patient.
The market you are interested in will be the one with some of the most severe declines as the housing melt unfolds.
It is always this way. Rural properties, second residences, mobiles in the country and lake front cottages can actually crash in value and will be available for dimes on the dollar when urban prices flatline.
The asking prices can sometimes be less than dimes on the dollar during and following a real estate correction. Occasionaly, these once sought after properties can actually be had for free (or for taxes only).
Keep your eyes posted on prices and watch for signs of distress. Today’s big shots who brag of owning rental homes, cottages and lake front beauties and yet have heavy mortgage obligations will be amongst the first to dump surplus property in order to service costs on their primary asset.
The family home comes first. All else is just fluff and so those extra properties gets thrown out in times of need. When a large number of people sell resort and second properties all at once then the market takes a bath. Always.
By “bath” I mean, prices crash. Sometimes to zero.
Worse yet, realtors will often not even carry these rural listings. They are a waste of time and effort as asking prices are small compared to cities and commissions are therefore negligible. Furthermore, in times of corrections, there is virtually no significant buying interest.
This is just one more real-world example we have of the current ongoing experience in the US. Do I need to keep repeating myself here every single day. LOOK SOUTH to know what comes next in your own backyard.
So Scotty, if you budgeted 100k for a nice little cabin on the lake then just be patient and you might just get two or three for the price of one.
Be disciplined. Wait. Pounce when the time is right.
My view on GTA is that there will be more people (ones that are not financially capable) will use their last chance before march to load up any homes, condos as quickly as they can at unaffordable cost but cheap debt (90% would be variable mortgages) since they all believe real estate will always goes up, mortgage is just better than throwing rent payment out to mr.landlord or if i dont buy before march, it will be price out forever story…Once march comes, market will be dried up with real estate agents asking homeowners to delist from the market first and remove those red dots on mls plus the realtor’s online portal to make people believe that dont sell now and wait until someone puts up a price for sale (so they can create some stories on less supply but all homes are sold over asking by xx %), slowly releasing those inventories into the market and drag on to 2012…Those who leverage too much or just starting to pay their mortgage in their underwater homes or condos will have to cut alot of their personal expenses (means less dining out, buy food with clearance tags, much less shopping (bad for malls and businesses), PS3-ing at home all weekend long) to either rent it out at a discount to cover the cost, utilizing their lines of credit to prop it up or refinance into longer amortization to stay afloat…
Yep, in Vancouver the Olympic village isn’t exactly flying off the shelves, but a house on the city’s east side recently listed for 650k and sold for 800k, so there are fools with money (or financing) out there yet.
#16 ScottyMac wrote…..
As a tailing edge baby boomer born in 1965, I feel this could be an opportunity to finally enter the recreational property market.
———————————————————-
Scotty,
I just wanted to say a few more words about recreational property.
It was well over a year ago now that I wrote on this site my analogy of the response a person might have when they fell into a lake of frozen water.
In that circumstance, the arms and legs become useless as the cold takes over and all the energy is diverted to the body core to protect the essential functions of life itself.
Real estate ownership and investments work in a similar way. When the primary home (the body) is under threat, then the funds (money) stop flowing to the extremities (rural and rec property).
That is why even small negative changes in the major markets can have outsize effects on cottages and lands away from town and it is why the biggest opportunites to buy often exist there when the hot-zones cool a little.
If you are familiar with the precious metals markets you will have noticed how silver is much more sensitive to market changes than gold. The price both rockets ahead and similarly crashes based on sentiment readings in the major gold market.
Recreational property is no stranger to the same kinds of influences and so that is why you can bide your time when you see a major trend change taking place in urban sales.
Hope this helps.
#182 Tiffa on 02.11.11 at 6:13 pm
Yes the “new” listings are a pet peeve of mine. Anyone considering buying a property should insist on seeing a printout of the history of a property (don’t take the realtors word for it). It will show them when and for how much the property was sold for and when and how much it has been listed for in the past. Just as annoying is the “Sold!” listings in the newspapers that are 3 months old, to make it look like things are moving.
As for the new developments in Squamish I have to give my head a shake. I have no idea who’s meant to be buying them all. From what I can tell things are not really moving. I’ve noticed in the last week that there are a couple of realtors setting themselves up as discount agents. I guess the realtors are feeling the pinch and starting to undercut each other.
It’s a shame that so many people will be hurt but what can one do? Increasingly people I have spoken to are aware of what’s going on but it seems that the more one has at stake the less they want to hear anything negative about real estate.
Very glad that I have “Bailed”
>In Calgary, a doctor making $400,000 a year bought a
>$750,000 house two years ago and pumped $150,000
>into renos
I am sure you don’t have to worry about this guy. All he has to do is bill OHIP for couple of years and voila! no more mortgage! Not like the rest of blog dogs like us!
Record exports data and Cnd dollar rises and this bodes well for jobs! No correction in the spring and summer…but wait until the fall … lol
But wait…
On CNBC today (Kudlow report), several guest commentators basically said Canada’s in trouble…that their goverment is “very worried” and that banks continued to lend because the government backs every loan (CMHC)…the anchor seemed stunned as this was like new news to her… Thought I’d balance the views here :)
On the immigration front, Canada is to receive 11,200 parents / grandparents in 2011. In 2010, it was 16,200. Basically it means it will take parents 6-7 years to get here (as opposed to 3-4 before) after an application is filed. Result: Those entrepreneurs, skilled classes, investors, temp workers/students, etc. will think twice about immigrating to Canada especially if it will take 7 years for family reunification. What a move and barely reported by MSM!
Just watched a hilarious 60 Minutes episode about the US housing mess. They profile one guy who paid just over 400 thousand in Phoenix for a place now worth at most 85 grand. He is finally walking away and Morley Safer is trying to say the guy should either feel guilty about it, or just stick it out. The absurd basic premise is that eventually the house value will recover, someday. Think about it-even in a very very strong market picking up a place for 85000 that goes to over 400000 is a very big move-it is literally unfathomable in a market like Phoenix.
I think whistle is an analogy to the re bubble in Vancouver… Every resort is pretending everything is hunky-dory (the RE industry). Some accommodation is going for $4000 per night (the $1m crack shacks in Vancouver bought by the greatest fools) but on the other hand there are so many rooms available for cents to the dollar because no one is coming, like mine, the suite next to tue $4000 one, which I got for $420 a night (I’m a smart renter).
The place is DEAD despite the long weekend and excellent snow.
The local businesses are struggling – get a load of this, I haggled the Avalanche pizza co and got 25% off our order.
Did the same at the ski shop and got a pair of free gloves…
A far cry from the olympics despite the ongoing and sickeningly pathetic reminders of the glory of a year ago… Just like Vancouver…
I have just had a really strong argument with a friend. He took out a HELOC to do a granite-n-steel refurb
Plus the mandatory Porsche panakake (panamera) for the drive.
He had to have a new one as well with an immediate depreciation attached.
I reminded him how he borrowed money against his stock options in the .com days and how he wound up with a loss that took him 5 years to repay.
He said “it is different now, as property always goes up in Vamcouver, unlike the overinflated expectations of .com”.
Then he criticized me for renting (a very nice, just renovated 2500 sqf townhouse in Shaugnessy where the owner gave me a 3 year lease) and having an ’09 Jeep (bought in cash) Libby.
When we looked under the covers and I explained I have $500k in a diversified portfolio (made me $56k in netreturns last year) and my expenses are only rent allowing me to max out my and my wife’s TFSA, RRESP and save for the kid’s education. This still leaves me about 50% of my disposable income (of my base salary, commissions always go to non reg savings) to enjoy my debt free life.
I think a year from now, I’ll buy his pancake-American porkie for cents to the dollar. He needs his commissions to make ends meet. If he loses his job, he’s in fire sale land.
If I lost mine, at my current burn rate I could survive quite well for just under 10 years.
I live KNOWING my family is safe, he lives HOPING everything stays as it is…
I do have a property, it is in Rome, Italy, where I will retire, I bought it second hand, only about 400 years old…
John Clarke and Brian Dawe are Australia’s most brilliant satirists. Here’s a short video wherein Clarke, as a banker, explains the subprime crisis. This was recorded in March of 2008.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLlzcPgCYSk&NR=1
I enjoy the blog Garth, can you please put a facebook link up so that I can share it with all off my delusional house horny friends and family. Also could you work on getting an e-reader version of your books for those few of us on this blog that were born post 1975….keep up the depressing apocalyptic work!
Facebook link here. – Garth
>#18 chris on 02.12.11 at 12:00 am
>The Vancouver Sun is publishing an article in
>tomorrow’s (Saturday) paper that the bidding wars
>are back… Apparently it’s a seller’s market again in
>Vancouver.
That’s because the chinese are out buying up the places from their perches high up in the air, in helicopters!
However, I think how we get there is a different story than an average, overall ‘melt’. I think there will be a melt in bubble cities and in the suburbs of lesser-bubble cities. But I think increases in central locations (downtown condos, places within walking distance of city hot spots, great rental locations etc.) will occur over the next 5 years.
Phhht. Tell that to Phoenix. Houses in the historical districts are getting hammered just as badly as houses in the barrios.
I’d like you (or anyone) to trot out even one example in the recorded history of real estate where the inner city (however you want to define it) goes up while the burbs (however defined) are going down in the same city.
#21 Mike – you are right about Germany but it is more different than you think. The market for new property is very small. Germans buy and keep. If they have to move, they don’t sell, they let their property and rent in the new location. Thus there is almost no way to make money by buying and selling property.
Also Germans don’t like debt. Unlike most Canadians that treat rent as thrown away but interest on a mortgage as “building equity”, Germans find rent a normal cost of living but interest as “throwing money at the banks”
Let’s be clear.. I am no real estate pumper. However I can only write here what I have seen here in Toronto. Basically , houses are selling and inventory is quite low.
A medium bungalow but a few blocks away sold for almost 200K above asking price. This happened but a few days ago. It was completely renovated and had a very good lot but 900K for a bungalow is just retarded IMO. This kind of thing is happening all through the city as I have realtors sending me examples daily. Most of them are happy clams who are making a great living with minimal work to say the least. They only whine that there are just not enough houses in inventory. Just look at guava.ca to see how the charts show compared to previous years. Inventory is low but prices are much higher. Have a peek.
#10 Bottoms_Up: “What I think we’re going to see over the next 5 years in Canada, overall, is a flat market…”
If by “flat” you mean “falling”, then sure.
Unfortunately, the housing bubble has become a driver of the economy, rather than the other way round. A flat housing market would mean significant lay-offs, precipitating price drops, further lay-offs, etc. The virtuous cycle becomes vicious.
I know a couple of people in construction management and the lay-offs have already begun. One fellow’s company finished a construction project in Vancouver and they have absolutely no new business, so the company has been decimated by lay-offs. The other fellow says that his company has only a week’s work in the pipeline, and recent jobs have all been small, a fraction of the revenue they used to do. My friend sees the books and wonders if the company will survive.
And everyone in construction bought into the bubble, so there are going to be homes lost when these people lose the highest paying jobs they’ll ever have. It’s going to get fugly out there.
Vancouver and the rest of BC has had negative savings rate for over a decade.
http://financialinsights.wordpress.com/2011/02/11/credit-risk-across-the-nation-whos-most-at-risk-from-an-interest-rate-shock/
They are only making ends meet by taking out home equity. It all but assures a credit crisis in BC and a substantial drop in home values.
You’re all crazy! Houses never goes down in value!
Oh, wait, the U.S. Housing Market has now lost almost *$10 Trillion* since the peak in June 2006, including $800B in Q4 2010:
http://oolaah.com/?p=17248
I had a laugh in the Thursday Blog, when it was mentioned that a Calgary realtor wanted a $10,000 deposit to list a house for sale. People should have to provide this deposit as it keeps the people who are not legtimately trying to sell a property form wasting everyones time. You see the same thing all the time with free classified advertising, while those who pay money to autotrader, local papers, etc are more legtimate sellers.
#24 Those are not “financial managers” there mutual fund salesguys.
Those who ‘sell’ the idea of mutual funds.
Those who ‘sell’ the idea of ETF’s
I would argue they both have their own agenda to push.
I would also argue that the product an investor buys into is not nearly as important as the behaviour he exhibits
Nobody makes a DSC or trailer fee selling EFTs. The conflict of interest borne by most MF salesguys is immense. — Garth
I came across this blog trying to figure out what to do with our home. I have a home in King City thats been for sale now for over a year. Not one offer. I have reduced to $900k but cant go any futher because we would lose money….I know at 750-800 we would sale but I would lose over 100K…Is this going to get worse or should i get out now…..
figuring out what the boomers are going to do seems to be a crap shoot to me.
————
Yes, they have quite a few choices but if you analyze all available choices they all seem to be dictated by either less spending or lower prices. Not good for an economy priced for constant growth.
600 grand for a two garage townhome 2000square foot on a 29 foot by 80 lot at dufferin and king side road, Zancor homes.
Meanwhile a 75 by 160 foot lot with an old home in a beautiful treed pocket across same intersection can be had for the same.
Why? Because of the obsession with buying ‘new’ and the belief that because it is going to take a couple of years to complete said townhome it will be ‘worth ‘more
once buyer closes.
My builder contacts(of which I have many) keep telling me that there are no new serviced lots coming down the pipeline here in GTA so prices will remain strong.
I tell them does not matter as they pick up the full glass of ’86 Barolo to take another sip.
What is preventing them from creating some other type of assistance as you so explicitly stated (before lambasting OttawaMike)?
———-
California is probably the most liberal state and when the bubble burst and the state coffers went empty, they stopped issuing cheques to the disabled and other groups.
When the bubble bursts, the helpless will fall through the cracks. That’s a constant.
I read a comment yesterday describing apartment design in Korea, and how liveable it is. Especially compared to the ‘tube like’ units being foi-gras fed down the throats of property virgins. In Euorpe, many of the apartments are small, but allow for family living and function.
Has anyone ever done a report on where all these Developers live? Knowing a few of the boys, I will tell you. In mansions in Forest Hill/Vaughan/Richmond Hill. None of them live in condos. This can explain why the designs are horrific. Why they turn walk-in closets into master suites. Why many young condo dwellers realize that Mom’s old couch won’t fit thru doorways, a double bed is a lost dream, and that storage for anything other than a couple changes of clothes is impossible.
In Europe/Korea, Developers live in apartments and are sympathetic to design. Here, they live in $5mill mansions w/underground garage/car washes, pool houses. And they still love to squeeze the buyer for every last inch of space at a premium.
Spoiled, rich, uneducated bullying developers, who run their Daddy’s companies, and who are driving this market into the ground.
This has been a good week, Garth has been describing what real people are experiencing.
Not theory only – but real life.
#21 Mike on 02.12.11 at 12:06 am (http://www.greaterfool.ca/2011/02/11/getting-out/#comment-83123)
[If it’s not a stigma to rent in Germany, why the hell is it a stigma to rent in North America?]
Why would anyone plunk down a large deposit and put themselves into personal poverty to make mortgage payments, plus commit to several hours each weekend for maintenance, just because they are afraid of what other people will think of them?
I guess it’s the same reason why many people will go into debt to pay for the big screen TV and fancy car.
“People spend money they haven’t earned, to buy things they don’t want, to impress people they don’t like.” – Will Rogers
Garth, your facebook link in #73 is borked, use this:
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=685850231
You oughta know by now
Who needs a house out in Hackensack?
Is that all you get for your money?
And it seems such a waste of time
If that’s what it’s all about
Mama, If that’s movin’ up then I’m movin’ out.
Billy Joel, Anthony’s Song
#35 Bottoms_Up,
hate to break this to you, but the first lie in that listing is that the house is in the Glebe, “One of the best neiboughood [sic] and location [sic] in town!” It is not, being located in Ottawa South. It also doesn’t tell you that Sunnyside happens to be the busiest street in Ottawa South.
The house might sell for double its asking price in Van since it looks like a lot of the uggers that have been shown on this site, but that does not equate it to a “move to Ottawa and buy” recommendation. The front view and back deck/yard pics should tell you how much care has been lavished on the place. New paint, cheap baseboards and refinished floors can put a lot of lipstick on a pig. Why do you suppose it’s been on the Ottawa market since the fall and has already seen a substantial price reduction?
We all know that real estate in Ottawa is chaper than in Vancouver, but we should also know that RE marketing is not different here.
#71 BC is even better than ten best place on earth
“I do have a property, it is in Rome, Italy, where I will retire, I bought it second hand, only about 400 years old…”
———————————————————-
That’s kind of funny to me. My family has a place in Italy too, near Naples, closer to the volcano actually and it is still standing strong and in great shape after more than 400 years.
One day I really have to go see it.
Garth’s reply to Bigrider #82 “MF salesguy conflict of interest”
Fine that is a legitimite point but I would argue that the cost of fees bourne by an investor in an investment product should not nearly be as an important an emphasis on this blog or in the slew of articles in the newspapers as behaviour modification.
The constant bashing of mutual funds over ETF’s ignores the fact that most people save in neither product, again ‘behaviour’ issue. In an incresing effort for writers to appear “smart” the fee avoidance emphasis continues unabated. More importantly, it also ignores the fact that most ETF investors defeat themselves by over trading there accounts. Poor timing and poor management due to the ease of trade execution means lower returns as well as increased trading costs. You know the statistics bear this out Garth.
By all means ETF’s are a cost effective ,useful tool no argument there.
Education and behaviour modification is what needs to be emphasised in the material that people read day in and day out, not so much fees.
Can anyone recommend a news aggregator that is not a partisan/ideological/commercial propaganda venue?
I finally lost it with National Newswatch this morning when it contained all three.
Greetings: I am acquainted with a couple (small child) who live in a bedroom community north of Calgary. They have a 4 year old McMansion on the market, unable to sell. They are in the process of having a new home built in NW Calgary. Mindboggling!! I suspect their present builder is involved in some sort of deal that involves both houses, anything to draw in a Greater Fool!!
http://www.leslievillepost.com/2011/02/04/its-febrrruary-but-the-toronto-real-estate-market-is-hot/comment-page-1/#comment-235
Take a look at this. Apparently the market is booming for sellers!
Sure. Written by a very credible author. — Garth
@TS #17
“I have been playing a game for a few days. Been going on Realtor.ca and searching. When I put Toronto in you can see the amount of listed residential rentals. This has been increasing by approximately 70 a day since last week.
We now at 6,420. I left the numbers at work but as I recall it was 5,640 earlier last week.That is just Toronto. Not the 905 area. The number does not include large rental buildings or other marketing vehicles.”
Ryerson, York and U of T students going home for the summer. March 1 is the last day they can give 60 days notice from the 1st of the month. Many negotiate mid-April departures, so their landlords are putting the places on the market right now.
You need at least a year of data to do a comparative analysis.
The hound dog in the photo today (redbone coonhound?) is bred to hunt raccoons, amongst other prey. Difficult to change our taught instincts also, we’re not supposed to get treed…
Just sharing the irony GT…
#95 Herb on 02.12.11 at 11:10 am
Can anyone recommend a news aggregator that is not a partisan/ideological/commercial propaganda venue?
———————————————————
Hi Herb, while some may disagree with me but I think our own Globe and Mail is still one of the best papers around, certainly top drawer in Canada and some of the reporters there do an outstanding job of getting the stories out every day.
Personally though, I am hooked on Al Jazeera lately and the ad free content of their site. Fascinating stuff and great coverage of international events.
Just sticking to the majors here of course. The Telegraph out of London is another I like for daily anlaysis but you need to use your own head to read through the Euro-bias. Ambrose Evans Pritchard writes for them and is usually a good read.
@ #87 Toronto Girl –
100% agree, completely. This is probably one reason that I love my mid-century concrete Toronto apartment – it’s meant for real family living and I can actually walk around my queen sized bed without hitting a wall. Oh, and it’s 1/2 as much per month for a comparable tube-condo, and i’m in a nicer location with 1.5 to 2x the sq footage.
Only complaint? No dishwasher. :(
Who is really in charge in Egypt now?
Reports out this morning by Al Jazeera are that the Egyptian stock exchange will not open as planned and that there will be a further delay until at least Wednesday.
Questions abound about who is actually leading the country now and what the status of Mr Suleiman will be. It is clear to me though that he will not participate in any significant way going forward as he is too tarnished by having been a Mubarak loyalist.
I now anticipate restrictions (caps) being placed on the amount of capital leaving the country each day as the Army attempts to determine who is shifting money abroad and why.
As the stock market will eventually open again I think we can also expect that insider trading bans could take effect (as temporary emergency measures) to soften any potential blow to the markets and limit Government members and Mubarak cronies from dumping shares in anticipation of reviews involving state corruption and interferance in business.
Worries persist in financial markets and the sooner that the military establishes a provisional civilian led government and states its goals and agenda, the better.
The Egyptian pound may still be at risk of a serious correction and the very small information being disseminated in the form of communiques from the military is not an encouraging sign for foreign investors. More is needed. Open dialogue is important now.
The one thing Egypt now desperately needs is clarity and transparency in the operations of the decision making process of the armed forces who have taken charge.
It would be interesting to know too if Mr Mubarak is in fact under house arrest and if he was in fact forced to step down by orders of the military. We hear he has moved to his residence in the resort city of Sharm-El-Sheikh but do not yet know if that move was voluntary or not.
Was this in fact a coup that we just witnessed? One that was essentially imposed on the Army by overwhelming public demands for change?
The coming days will be interesting, no doubt.
My mom sold real estate all through the 70’s in Regina, and I’ve seen a couple of these “ups & downs” through the years. Having recently relocated to Edmonton from Saskatoon (& having a sister who lives in Calgary) provides lots of anecdotal discussion about real estate despite my personal ambivalence.
I’ve noticed a couple things over that time: excess liquidity in the system creates asset bubbles of whatever kind (oil price rise in the 70’s) & when there’s a lot of dept overhang within that same system the interest rates seem to rise. (hello 1980) I’ve also noticed that in economic terms, people have very short memories…
I’m sure the “herd mentality” plays a large part as well…race to the entrance & then stampede to the exits! Human nature being what it is, perception IS reality.
Home ownership should not be an albatross tied around your neck…one of my grandfathers immigrated from Ireland in 1908, (born 1881) raised 5 kids (first born 1912, last 1927) lived all over Canada chasing work for almost 40 years…retired 1950; bought his first house in 1955! He felt no compunction to buy, not knowing where he might be in 2 years…more importantly, he felt no “societal pressure” to buy; he bought when HE could afford to. That sensibility disappeared from the population decades ago.
Secondly, the president of ING did a revealing interview a few years ago…he was asked what his default rate was in mortgages; he replied “…five, no wait, maybe six.” Out of tens of thousands of mortgages your bank writes, the interviewer asked, how do you even know that? He replied that people who DON’T HAVE ANY MONEY shouldn’t expect HIS bank to but THEM a house! 20% down please…& we don’t have to worry about the loan loss provisions!
Anyway, a couple of very common sense (IMHO) perspectives that have stuck with me…and until my GF & I can purchase a house that could be rented out for approximately our mortgage payment, we’ll pay the landlord instead of the bank. That’s MY common sense perspective!
One last point: nobody I’m hangin’ with or working for mentions housing prices in total terms anymore…all they care about is the monthly payment. Ooops, bi-weekly payment. As the interest rate rises, the price will obviously crater but the monthly obligation might not change too much in the short term…until the prices really drop thru the floor.
It would be interesting to know how many people are holding onto 2 or more houses and condo’s.
I personally know of 2 people that own more than 1 condo. The second was bought from increasing the mortgage on the first and using the rental income on the first to carry the mortgage and qualify for a mortgage on the second.
100% leverage…..
My stock broker won’t give me leverage like that….
So how about an informal survey of your blog fans.
How people do you know that own more than 1 piece of real estate are are landlords?????
The greater this number the worst the train wreck…
I have a brother that just transferred to Whitehorse for a contractual 3 year Gov. position, along with a nice promotion and a significant increase in pay. He started to scare me with talk of buying another house there, while renting his home here on the east coast. He is renting his home here because it languished on the market for over a year now….no buyers. His house was on the market for 350 k, the same basic house in Whitehorse 650 k. The cost of ownership in Whitehorse is astronomical, as it is a preferred place to live if you like the cold and snow…. I guess.
Thankfully, armed with information I have gleened from reading this website over the past year, I was able to convince him to rent a home in Whitehorse, which by the way is basically paid for by the rent he is collecting from his own; then invest and bank what he is saving on the costs of home ownership over the next three years. Since his plan is to return home to Nova Scotia anyway at the end of his contract, the big difference will be he’ll have a pocket full of money…and returning to a place where a million is really worth a million.
So far he is listening…..Thanks Garth
All I can say to this topic is it’s absolutely wonderful being debt free, and having investments that are liquid.
Vancouver Sun pump job article only available for digital edition subscribers. I guess they don’t want to be ridiculed too badly except to those stupid enough to pay to read that crap.
Headline says “Real estate ‘going crazy’ “. Let me guess, Remax or Lepage ? Disgusting.
#66 Bailing in BC on 02.12.11 at 2:54 am
I look at two random condo ads on MLS, for Squamish, and one stated “Court ordered sale”, while the other listing said selling for $20,000 under its assesed price…
Condos are the new debtors prison. 500-800 square feet, kind of a white collar prison that requries 60 hours of hard labour each week. But we are free to leave at any time…right? We live in the Land of Freedom, Home of the Free and Land of the Brave, not like those “poor barbarians” overseas — see in images used by the TV to scare us — right?
Quoting the Eagles:
“We are all just prisoners here of our own device”
And in the master’s chambers they gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives but they just can’t kill the beast
Last thing I remember I was running for the door
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before
“Relax,” said the night man, “We are programmed to receive
You can check out any time you like but you can never leave”
786 sq. feet….
http://tinyurl.com/4osp5s6
.#30 Timing is Everything
Isn’t this another example of socialize the losses no rule change here….
What does one expect when cosmetic ads are your mantra “We’re worth it!”
Fannie, Freddie may be abolished rule changes
Mortgage Giants Leave Legal Bills to the Taxpayers
By GRETCHEN MORGENSON
Since the government took over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, taxpayers have spent more than $160 million defending their former top executives in fraud lawsuits.
===============================
Six Years ago as the clock flies…. accounting improprieties erupted at the private entity known as Fannie Mae. Ohio Public Employees Retirement System and the State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio, is being heard in federal court in Washington. Still no trial date. The > the Depositions= + fees but 160m????
MAY 19, 2003
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_20/b3833125_mz020.htm
A talk with Fannie Mae CEO Frank Raines on the agency’s goals and housing’s future
According to the Los Angeles Times:
In 2007, then-Freddie Mac CEO Richard F. Syron had a base salary of $1.2 million and total compensation of $18.3 million, according to SEC filings. In the same year, Daniel Mudd, the chief executive of Fannie Mae, had a base salary of $987,000 and total compensation of $11.7 million.
Those were the days, when you could in a single year be made wealthy for destroying a company and causing scores of billions of dollars of losses to the taxpayers. The title of Akerlof & Romer’s famous 1993 article has never looked more prescient — “Looting: the Economic Underworld of Bankruptcy for Profit.”
=========
Mr. Black says:
Aurora Loan Services from 2003 to 2006. Lehman owned Aurora. Aurora specialized in purchasing and reselling “liar’s” loans.
Freddie (and Fannie) should be suing Aurora/Lehman for their frauds. Freddie and Fannie should be making thousands of criminal referrals against Aurora’s fraudulent loans. Witherell would be a key witness in the cases. Freddie placed him in impossible positions due to his conflicts of interest.
Aurora was notorious — why would anyone, much less Freddie, hire a top official from one of the firms most responsible for the frauds that destroyed Freddie and cost the taxpayers billions of dollars in losses? Is there anything that a business leader can do that disqualifies him from receiving millions of dollars annually — paid for by the taxpayers? It’s bad enough that our elites now loot with impunity. Do we really have to make them even richer?
Fannie and Freddie have no need to pay these high salaries to senior managers. It was the perverse executive compensation that drove the accounting control frauds at Fannie and Freddie — as the SEC explicitly charged. Executive compensation created the perverse managerial incentives that destroyed Fannie and Freddie. This was an unanticipated consequence of their privatization. Because Fannie and Freddie were privatized, their officers designed their compensation system in the same perverse manner as most firms (Bebchuk & Fried 2004). The mangers stood to gain enormous compensation if they inflated short-term accounting income, and as Akerlof & Romer famously observed, accounting fraud is a “sure thing.” Mr. Raines explained in response to a media question what was causing the repeated scandals at elite financial institutions:
I testified before the House Financial Services Committee on April 21, 2010 about Lehman and Aurora’s pervasive accounting fraud. A copy of that testimony can be found here.
Public Policy Issues Raised by the Report of the Lehman Bankruptcy Examiner
William K. Black
University of Missouri at Kansas City – School of Law
April 20, 2010
Suggested Citation
US stores expand to Canada anticipated of predicted spending boom http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/US-stores-expand-Canada-capress-3271404405.html
I doubt they expect a spending boom, just an escape from the spending desert in the US. Man, do we ever blow a lot of sunshine up our own butts. — Garth
I would say what I know now if I could go back to 2005 I would not have bought my house I would have continued to rent and invest my money. However back then until last year (before I even heard of Garth) I was illiterate about housing. I have a good job and income, but I am single, back in 2005 after talking to many people and listening to the realestate cartel, buying a house or condo was the way to go. So like my friends I went out bought a place about 220k, put 10% down and took a 25 year mortgage at 5% through my bank. Completely lucky on my part I also put my two extra bedrooms up for rent and got two people that continue to live here 5 years later helping with extra $ on my mortgage. Off course I now have a lower mortage and have accelerate my payments to get it down. But still in hindsight I knowing what I do now, I still would have been better to rent and bank the rest of my money. But i guess people just have to learn the hard way, I believe now I am on the right track with things investing etc. But I still have a house that on my own is too much and big for what I need to live. If I were to sell now, I would have a tough time I think to unload this place, as just in my area there is over 100 newer home listings and the area is all zoned for new homes. Many listings have been sitting for many months. On top of that there is a huge condo building that has gone up, again more competition if I try to sell. Just as Garth says I have a large illiquid asset that has tied up alot of my money. True I have a place to live but still it is illiquid until or if I can sell it.
A comment on rents:
I just negotiated an 8% reduction on my rent, which had not increased in four years, since I sold my house in the Okanagan at near-peak price.
My sister who just sold her condo in Vancouver was able to negotiate a 22% reduction from the advertised rent, by showing comparables in the area. This must be some kind of record.
So much for rents going up!
#24 Get Real “philosophical” grounds.
Those are not ‘financial managers.’ They’re mutual fund salesguys. — Garth
as sales guys their philosophy is to get paid for selling you the mutual funds, which if you keep there for a number of years they will continue to get paid for you holding the money there. (why do you think a fund will be the most popular fund out there, they basically pay the most upfront and most retainer over the years). they say there are no commissions… haha nothing is free…
ETF’s- you can purchase via your discount brokerage account (sadly you still have to pay plenty to the discount broker, for dong all the work)
therefore ETFs equal no money to the sales guy which is against their “philosophical” grounds ;) making tons of money for funneling your hard earn money …
ps if they were true financial guys they would be putting you into efts and a balanced income portfolio as the Garth man suggests…but maybe Real you must be living somewhere different…
In Calgary, a doctor …“I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this.”…
7 years of schooling and the Dr. are no smarter than the general population (when it comes to real estate).
A central bankers job is to never tell the truth
http://www.prisonplanet.com/is-ben-bernanke-a-liar-a-lunatic-or-is-he-just-completely-and-totally-incompetent.html
Mr. Turner
I admire your insight and fully agree with your conclusions. A few postings ago you went through the numbers as to renting vs buying and the financial implications. In other words, you go by the numbers and bravo to you.
I have to ask myself the question, that in a world where peopled can figure out accrude interest charges on the online calculators provided by the banks, how can people be so niave?
Answer I believe is in psychology. In the absence of fundamentals, psychology drives markets up just as easily as it drives them down. And boy, have we had a bull run in housing for too many years.
Thanks
I doubt they expect a spending boom, just an escape from the spending desert in the US. Man, do we ever blow a lot of sunshine up our own butts. — Garth
I prefer the sunshine than the dark clouds that loom around in here, why else would I live in the Okanagan :). Besides this site has way too many Charlie Brown characters that need some sunshine.
Duddy Kravitz – “a man without land is nobody,”
#49 Hoof Hearted
Greed’s like that.
Well Garth,
It looks like Victorians are getting the message, maybe not heeding it but at least it’s making the news…
http://tinyurl.com/4osp5s6
#98 Mike on 02.12.11 at 11:16 am
Ryerson, York and U of T students going home for the summer. March 1 is the last day they can give 60 days notice from the 1st of the month. Many negotiate mid-April departures, so their landlords are putting the places on the market right now.
You need at least a year of data to do a comparative analysis.
Good point. I will follow this and report back.
I presume enrollment is really climbing with all the additional buildings and units coming on the market.
Do the investors know that the units are only occupied for 9 months and compensate in there cash flow?
I bet the people that buy units as their primary residence appreciate the transient nature of student rental housing.
Yes I think I will follow this trend.
# 40 Nostradamus …bla bla
Globoctopus tightens its tentacles so in reality, Egypt has gone sideways. No change at the top.
Not so fast there bro. That’s not exactly what your (interesting) link says nor is it the totality of what’s happening on the ground. Agreed there are still way too many bad guys in control but the multi–faceted leadership of the ‘revolution’ has so far played it smart. If the next step is to demand repeal the 30 year old emergency powers Mubarak instituted it will show they’re on the right track. If they pack up and go home all happy then they’re doomed, or “sideways” as you said.
Let’s hope they get it right and that a few others, like the Kingdom, follow.
Some monster, monster numbers from the lower mainland periphery. Implosions happen from the outside, no?
Victoria MOI, averaged, is over 10 months. Townhouses are well into double digits. Outside the core, nearly everything is in multi-year MOI. Outside Victoria, on the island and islands, disaster.
Whistler, the Olympic ground zero, is at 16 months.
Central OK, 20 months, northern OK 25, Shuswap/Revelstoke: 4 years. That’s gonna leave a mark. Or maybe all the wealthy Asians and Albertans are just tending to their gardens or having too much fun skiing to go vacation property shopping.
http://fishyre.blogspot.com/2011/02/sorry-folks.html
In Greater Vancouver itself, inventory has cleared/delisted, while demand picked up somewhat. Although it is still shaping up to be a weak February with well on-pace for record listings, MOI is sitting fairly low at 3-4 months. But even here, if you just peak outside E/W Van, into the burbs, things are looking thin, with areas into or approaching double digit MOI.
If high MOI (>6 months) persists, sellers will have to start dropping prices to move their properties (those who HAVE TO sell), and news will start getting out. Sentiment will turn. For now, we still have helicopter touring wealthy Asians to pin our hopes on.
End of February I have the annual get-together at my realtor’s (customer appreciation/etc), I wonder what the chatter will be like this year. Unfortunately, I will not be staying there long.
I think treating RE as an investment is OK as long as one understands it is a long term investment. Therefore comparing it to liquid stocks of whatever kind is false in its logic. People live in the houses they buy not to sell them tomorrow or a few months from now. If you rent or own you still tend to live in one place for at least several years going to the same place of work, kids preferably go to the same school for many years and people tend to live close to their extended families. So buying with a 20% or more downpayment makes logical sense. Owning rentals also makes sense as renters pay for the mortgages. All of the costs including the mortgage is tax deductible and the landlord gets richer while the renter stays poorer.
New here, aren’t you? — Garth
I”m having a lot of trouble finding a new rental in Toronto. Damn! I wouldn’t want to spend more than $1400 a month
What is the historical norm for interest rates? And where do you think we could be by 2015?
Anyone have any thoughts…
Canadian government doesn’t give a rats ass about women, womens wage parity or women seniors. They prefer that this group stay behind closed doors and starve in silence.
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Many+women+Canada+pension+retirement+system+falling+through+cracks/4266128/story.html
And spare me the “multi-culturalism” b.s. argument. Canada is white or Asian. Canada isn’t nearly as diversified as the U.S. Most comments I read here from Canadians are complaining how the Chinese do not integrate into Canadian society/culture.
#86 Moneta
True enough. The weak are the first to go, even in that ‘liberal’ state.
Don’t get sick.
Don’t be poor.
That is why, I take care of my own (first). Only then, will we be able to ‘dispense charity from a distance’, if it comes to that.
Kinda like in the airplane… when the flight attendant announces, “Put your oxygen mask on first. Only then provide aid to others”
Ain’t no one gonna do for you.
On that happy note, I need a sco-cone.
Greetings: My wife is in the process of selling a quarter section of inherited farmland in NE Alberta. She holds clear title to the property and a local farmer who has rented the land for years wants to buy it. The land is pasture, no buildings or improvements other than fencing. A question has risen as to if she should contemplate carrying the mortage for the farmer. Even though she probably could only charge a bit below the going bank rate, this would provide a steady monthly income as she wants to pull the plug on her job. If things didn’t work out, she would get the land back, interesting thoughts.. Curious as to what the blog dogs out there think.
#61 GTAInsider
You’re just buying into the stupid (not to mention dangerous) myth that wealthy Asians have prevented a crash in Canadian housing, and, presumably, will do so again in the future.
As a matter of fact, they did not. Remember 2008 people, wasn’t that long ago! What saved real estate weren’t wealthy foreigners, it was low interest rates and lending rules relaxed to the point of non-existence.
Real estate is always a liquid investment – this is why many think it is not:
#83
I have a home….thats been for sale now for over a year. Not one offer. I have reduced to $900k but cant go any futher because we would lose money….I know at 750-800 we would sale but I would lose over 100K…
Your home is worth $700k…. sell it tomorrow. Very liquid indeed.
Unfortunately for you and the Calgary doctor…so is your financial/real estate acumen.
Surely there must be someone you can sue.
What an ugly squirrel !
Good luck to us all.
http://money.ca.msn.com/investing/insight/article.aspx?cp-documentid=27627516
>#33 Debtisforever on 02.12.11 at 12:43 am
>Yep, this is all reminiscent of the high-tech boom.
>Suddenly no one cares that they’re buying an old,
>ugly house for a million bucks and taking on a whole
>whack of debt. Why? Because prices are going to the
>moon! Every time I hear a news story about real
>estate, I just don’t listen. Just like I didn’t listen when
>those so-called “experts” on the news used to tell us
>about a “New Economy” and promote Nortel as a
>great investment. It’s all a bunch of garbage. At least
>back then people weren’t up to their ears in debt over
>high-tech stocks. This time it will be much, much
>worse.
I always listen with a big smile on my face. This is good for the economy, for rental prices and (biggest smiles of all) for the future of real estate supplies. :-)
#94Big-You couldn’t be more wrong about fees-the lower your long term return, the higher the % eaten up by fees. If you aren’t getting monster returns, fees can be a killer.
#95 Herb on 02.12.11 at 11:10 am
Can anyone recommend a news aggregator that is not a partisan/ideological/commercial propaganda venue?
———————————————————
Herb, I would add the Christian Science Monitor to this list. Despite the name which casts doubt on their objectivity, I find them to be well balanced. I particularly like that they don’t simply repost the latest AP stories.
And as a nod to this crowd, they currently have an article with a nice graphic of US and Canadian real estate indices for you chart watchers.
http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Paper-Economy/2011/0210/Even-in-Canada-rise-in-home-prices-is-slowing
>#37 Jan Etter on 02.12.11 at 12:48 am
>The crash in 1990 in Toronto hammered the condo market much harder than SFD and history is poised to repeat itself. Condos are always the first choice of investors/speculators because the maintenance and
>upkeep is easier and prices are lower so it’s cheaper to get in the game. It’s only logical that when the highly-leveraged speculators/non-resident owners start to bail it happens very quickly since most don’t
>have to personally move. Plus, the lower proportion of owner-occupied dwellings in condos vs SFD neighbourhoods mean proportionately more properties get dumped, driving condo values down much more
>rapidly and severely. It also seems that condo units get overbuilt much faster in a rising/hot market than SFD. I’m in a business associated with the
>development industry and I can’t believe the number of units in the pipeline right now, it could be even worse
>than the early 90′s for the condo market this time
>around.
Lucky this time around, we will get lots and lots of immigrant families coming over from China. They will take up all the excess condos no problem. I know they like investing in real estate.
#87 Toronto Girl
Haha, “tube condo”, so funny, so true.
I saw lots of those when I was looking for a rental last year. How do people live in those things? Seriously? They even command a premium, I guess they’re the trendy thing these days.
Even when the space is reasonable, the floor plan seems like it was designed by a monkey on speed. It’s completely non-functional for everyday living. Like someone just threw up a bunch of sticks, and put walls wherever they landed.
When I look for a rental, I do these things:
1. Interview the landlord, more thoroughly than they interview me. Usually they’re too busy telling me they’ll drop rent by $100 for a 1 year lease.
2. Check out the floor plan, how it flows, will I be able to live in it.
Access to and quality of things like parking and storage are also important.
I don’t know who’s been designing condos the last 10 years. I’d say they were more concerned with how they looked on brochures and those dreamy, softly lit pictures, rather than with how people actually live. Unfortunately, I don’t host daily martini parties for my hipster friends, but I do watch TV, work on the computer, cook, work-out, do laundry, and have things that need to be stored. It’s not asking a lot!
Some people never get it, no matter how much they see things changing all around them.
We have a friend who found out the Olympics condos in Van. are now offered at 30% less than their original price. Some people think some of them will end up going for half price. He told us we should buy one, because we are sitting on a bunch or easily liquifiable assets.
I think there are going to be some great deals coming up in the coming years. I’m not interested in buying anything that I don’t want to live in myself. Actually, I want to buy three properties, one for me and spouse, and one for each kid (with a small mortgage).
The Olympic village is something rich Asians will invest in, not me.
Warning interest rate change! For the past 4-5 years my credit card sent me Low Interest Balance Transfer cheques at rates ranging from 0.9% to 3% (effective for 5-6 months).
In fact I have an 0.9% cheque offer in front of me now, from mid-2010.
The same cheques arrived by mail last week, but bearing a 11.99% rate offer!!! :o
#61 GTAInsider on 02.12.11 at 2:08 am
The Chinese newspaper just reported that RCMP has analyzed incoming WIRES of funds ($$$) from CHINA has increased 10 times more than it usually do from 2009 and previous…Hmmm…I remembered that GLOBAL TV news pumping headlines about Offshore Chinese loading up real estate in vancouver soon and I figured no wonder Canada housing bubble didnt burst and it was propping up that well until now !!!
============================
When laundering, it doesn’t matter if you pay TWICE or THREE times what it’s worth….you want to make sure your money isn’t confiscated by the Gov’t.
In other words paying $ 1 Million for RE worth $400,000 and losing $600,000, is better than losing $1 Million to a Gov’t you can’t trust.
The numerous first time landlords, that arose from the enormous level of spec buying in past two years, are an interesting bunch. They have no clue what they are doing. The four I have negotiated a lease with recently, all believed they were going to buy in and flip the property for a quick profit of $20,000 to $50,000.
None of them knows how to be a landlord. One gave back the damage deposit, not mine, the previous tenant’s, (minus $200), then tallied up the costs to repair the damage (which totalled $600). He was informed by his realtor (who did a market evaluation for him), that he rented us the condo far below market value. I thought it was a good deal. And apparently it was a good deal. Good for us.
Another newbie landlord didn’t know how to fill out the rental agreement forms. I had to do it for them. Another landlord thought they could store whatever they wanted in our back yard, after we moved in. We actually got into arguments over it. They didn’t understand that the house and yard was now ours, not theirs.
Another landlord increased the rent by the allowable amount in BC, then threatened to kick us out if we didn’t sign another one year lease–totally illegal. When he realized he couldn’t kick us out for not signing another lease, he offered to reduce the rent to its original amount if we signed another lease.
Another landlord thought he would store dump trucks on the unused/unoccupied portion of the property on our current acreage rental. I already shut down the dump truck storage (30 trucks) that was beside us on the neighbours property by complaining to city hall. So our landlord thought he could move in 50 dump trucks and store them on the other side of us to make some money. Never going to happen.
Another landlord deposited our rent cheque into the wrong bank account, apparently he has several bank accounts, and then demanded another rent cheque to cover the “missing” rent from August. It took five hours to make him understand he wasn’t missing any rent.
This is what it’s like dealing with newbie landlords.
It’s so much better to rent through a management company. On high end properties they are very, very willing to fix things quickly. And we are currently renting three high end properties.
But these are all minor worries really. My two big worries are if they are going to sell at lease renewal time and whether they might end up in foreclosure.
In reality, my worst case scenario is having to move before I want to, and even that is not the end of the world.
#115 dd on 02.12.11 at 1:44 pm
In Calgary, a doctor …“I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this.”…
7 years of schooling and the Dr. are no smarter than the general population (when it comes to real estate).
==================================
No ,actually , there is a dual problem re professionals.
They often think they know everything…talk to a tradesmen doing renos etc. for a LLB or MD…etc..
On the other side….smart con men see professionals as easy marks…..too busy and trusting….also a bit greedy…and then go crying to their LLB’s
Caveat Emptor…… baby
#118
You don’t say, huh?
Here read this:
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/143187
Your comment reminds of the schtick most chamber of commerce members hold dear to their hearts. Next thing we’ll see posted is a passionate defense of ‘The Secret’ and how reading it may help out the underwater homeowners in Canada!
Ay yes…..another sign of the times…
Another restaurant ie Kelsey’s in Richmond BC had a meeting today with its employees and said they are closing.
A family member used to work there, it was quite nice work atmosphere , but many students worked there and are now SOL.
IMHO, that’s the canary in the mine….discretionary income….is toast.
#58 Tim on 02.12.11 at 1:46 am
To the folks who prefer Ottawa over Montreal: I saw a postcard that epitomizes Ottawa. It was titled “Ottawa by Night” It was pitch black! lol. The town lacks soul. At least Montreal has character, awesome architecture and the best public transit system in Canada. I rarely had to use my car when I lived there.
……………
I lived in Ottawa for 3+ yrs late 60’s/early 70’s on and off. Night life was almost non-existent. Everyone went to hull. Ratio of women to men was over the top. Didn’t own a car. Live on MacLaren, few blocks from PH and later a 10 minute bus ride. Got around on a bike otherwise. Joined a tennis club, took skiing lessons, hiking, had tickets to the Arts. Centre, etc. but it was difficult to meet men that one wanted to date. And I was slim and attractive. Thankfully, I had lots of great girlfriends. Luckily too a roommate’s BF had a cottage on a lake in the Gatineaus. Great memories.
I moved back to Mtl. Agree, I’d take Mtl over Ottawa any day. I lived there during Expo 67 and it has the best transit system in Canada. Read somewhere that they are going to upgrade the cars. I go back 1/2 a yr.
#78 betamax on 02.12.11 at 7:24 am#10 Bottoms_Up: “What I think we’re going to see over the next 5 years in Canada, overall, is a flat market…”
“If by “flat” you mean “falling”, then sure.
Unfortunately, the housing bubble has become a driver of the economy, rather than the other way round. A flat housing market would mean significant lay-offs, precipitating price drops, further lay-offs, etc. The virtuous cycle becomes vicious.” – betamax
Quite right, Beta. Construction, last I looked, was the #2 driver of the economy in Ontario (manufacturing was #1, is it still with the dollar where its at?). In most provinces its in the top three and with interest rates on their way up due to the feds/provinces/municipalities running up 8% intergovernmental debt to GDP annually… (sadly, maybe a third of us only know what that means, with intergovernmental debt to GDP at 80% in April as it is, so I’ll enlighten.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2186rank.html
The CIA adds intergovernmental debt to come up with their numbers. Take a good long look at where we stack up. Seeing is believing. We are now the 16th most indebted nation in the world according to the CIA (and why would their opinion count right?)
It means major pressure in the bond markets for international capital to meet debt requirements of new government borrowed money. The sad truth is that as any government gets more and more into hock, which, as is the case intergovernmentally speaking with international lenders seeking to buy debt, the risk goes up and as risk elevates due to higher and higher debtloads (as does the interest on this debt, old and new depending on the type of bond), so does interest rates.
If our feds truly cared about keeping RE valuations high in Canada, they wouldn’t run record deficits. What Harper instead cares for, is to have our economic sovereignty vanish before our eyes. As intergovernmental debt to GDP ratios approach 100%, a currency crisis unfolds, perhaps even before then. As our dollar crashes, central bankers get desperate to meet new debt obligations as the red ink piles and interest rates (variable, never mind terms) soar into double digit territory.
Only those who think nothing will change in housing valuations ove the next 5 years are those who believe federal/provincial/municiple deficits will automatically disappear and surplus’s will reappear while construction craters (and it will, because its credit driven), that interest rates will not climb and that CMHC regs will remain at 35+ year terms. Clearly, and I sadly assure you all, that will not be the case.
Credit, the main driver of RE values, is about to become highly expensive and why? One only needs ask just how sovereign our PM is to know the answers to that one. (just as sadly, less than a third of us will get the reason why that is as well, and no, I won’t expand on it, at least, not today but I will. How can one not ignore the true reason why RE values, enticed by bank greed, will now crash because of “foreign interests”?
@ 128 The American …. stfu you retard. There are millions of mixed race couples in canada of which my wife and I are but one with kids a grandkids . We don’t go to the states because of the bigotry that we have to endure there at the hands of your so called melting pot .
You can’t even handle the french . So go dip your freedom fries in your tomato sauce . I’m glad you have to have a passport to get in . also glad you can’t afford to as tourist come here and bitch at us at volume 10 .
#125 The Original Dave
Try these :
http://toronto.kijiji.ca/c-housing-apartments-for-rent-1-bedroom-NEW-1-Bedroom-Condo-Near-DOWNSVIEW-SUBWAY-Stn-York-University-W0QQAdIdZ260285967
http://toronto.kijiji.ca/c-housing-apartments-for-rent-1-bedroom-LUXURY-Tridel-Condo-at-KIPLING-SUBWAY-Station-NEW-CONDO-W0QQAdIdZ258598895
#78 no betamax, If I can paraphrase the quite sensible Bottoms up, he/she thought the market would be flat. Flat doesnt mean falling. I know you all sit around gleefully hoping for a US style housing crash but it is not going to happen. Flat, or minimal growth is more like it esp in hot markets where people actually want to live…
As Bottoms Up says everybody has an ancedotal story to tell that will reflect both sides of the coin…
for instance, I can counter act all of Garths blog claims this week with my own ancedotal evidence
First of all, who would ever live/buy in Edmonton?
Secondly, prices are up in Calgary
Third, Garths flogging of the only property actually struggling in Vancouver, Millienium Water/Olympic village is his biggest deception yet. These properties are not selling for very sound reasons, nothing remotely to do with cold feet in a steaming vancouver market…In a city filled with crap condos – The units were well publicized to be shoddily built during their construction, that scares people who have lived through leaky condo hell, many of the properties are geothermic/green and have staggering monthly maintenance fees of $600-700 per month that people just will not pay ( poor planning, despite the very good intentions) AND the city keeps threatening to put welfare housing in the center of the project so that you and your family have to step over crack babies toys and losers asking for cash on your way to your very expensive property….
Olympic Village has a score of problems….
Garth says there are more sellers then buyers – bollocks – real estate markets are local, and mr turner cannot paint all with the same brush despite his love to do so – The west side of Vancouver has WAY more buyers then sellers for single family homes, bidding wars and insanity are in full effect .
You West Van girls are all the same. — Garth
Here’s a link to what I believe is this weekend’s Vancouver Sun article that’s been one of the big subjects around here the past two days. Unless another article exists that I didn’t see, this is the one. And it’s not a pump job. In fact, it seems quite balanced – and arguably more bearish than not. Yes, it disucsses bidding wars (which ARE happening), but it also broaches the reality of the situation and the dangers we dawgs all know about.
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Tight+market+sparks+bidding+wars+neighbourhoods/4271421/story.html
Obviously the “American” has never been to Canada most likely due to traffic backed up on the I-5. Backwater Seattle thinks diversified is Seattles Best and Starbucks. Meanwhile
Vancouver is the most diversified city in the world. Just one more reason the droves of wealth are helicoptering in. On a side note anyone notice Uranium is getting huge coverage now in the media. Vancouver, Gold, Uranium and Rare Earths solid picks for 2011
######################
And spare me the “multi-culturalism” b.s. argument. Canada is white or Asian. Canada isn’t nearly as diversified as the U.S. Most comments I read here from Canadians are complaining how the Chinese do not integrate into Canadian society/culture.
Anyone with an IQ over 7 knew the Millennium Waters development in Vancouver was heading for disaster. But OH NO … this is Vancouver and the Olympics will bring in the big spenders. Bull sh++ … rename that boondoggle MILLENNIUM UNDER WATER.
The Vancouver Sun article is now online:
“Realtor Selina Jansen, who also had a client bidding on the house, says artificially low list prices are fuelling the bidding “frenzy.”
“Some people are notorious for it, and I think other people are now copying them because they’re having so much success with it,” she said.
Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Bidding+wars+break+tight+housing+market/4268800/story.html#ixzz1DmZnqeqB
Yup – getting very interesting – oh, pass the popcorn will ya?
HOLD THE PRESS – BILL JOHNSTON AND HIS TREB BUMBOYS ANNOUNCE PRICE INCREASES IN TORONTO!
Mirth fills the National Post on a daily basis, but somedays are more fun-filled than others. Today’s National Post TREB advertisement-masquerading-as-journalism pooh-poohs the affordability ratios used by most on this blog, in favour of the conclusion that 2011 will be another year of rising GTA prices based on the following two assumptions: (A) “accelerating incomes” and (B) “relatively low mortgage rates”. Johnston won’t worry until the average jackass has a GDS ratio (housing costs to gross income) of 50% or more. TREB is beyond lying and is now creating an alternative universe where everyone is Chance the Butler, without his native intelligence…
AND ON ANOTHER NOTE, HATS OFF TO ANDREW ALLENTUCK and his distinguished personal finance column/assessment in the same newspaper today:
The specimens are two dolts from British Columbia who have two properties (home and rental condo) that constitute 90% of their assets, each of which is mortgaged about 90% and the budget discloses a further ‘rental shortfall’ expense of about $212 each month. Andrew’s words: “Through decades of hard work [these nobs are in their mid-40s] they have built up $668,900 is assets”. Bravo. Allen, meet Bill Johnston – you guys should get along great.
Another Squamish disaster: ,many units at the Executive Suites hotel are for sale. Last year they were offered at 170-180k+. This year there is a glut at 140-150k (likely, last year’s listings). 10 in total, all of these MLS dots are at the same property:
http://tinyurl.com/4zbvhcr
With tourism numbers down, and this hotel not being expensive ($120-150/night), investment income must be low.
Beware of the Squamish Bigfoot! He will savage your real estate.
#125 The Original Dave try these: both areas are 15 min. streetcar ride into downtown Toronto.
http://toronto.kijiji.ca/f-king-west-housing-apartments-for-rent-W0QQCatIdZ37QQKeywordZkingQ20westQQisSearchFormZtrue
http://toronto.kijiji.ca/f-leslieville-housing-house-rental-W0QQCatIdZ43QQKeywordZleslievilleQQisSearchFormZtrue
Iv’e an idea for a story for Global TV as a follow up to the rich Asians scouting RE from a helicopter. This lnfomercial would be cheap to produce and be believable.
…. There is steady stream of 747’s landing at YVR from mainland China. These Jumbo Jets are full of rich Chinese investors eager to snap up amazing RE deals in the Vancouver area. Before landing at YVR Air China has been given special permission by TSB to do low level flyby’s to showcase prime neighbourhoods carefully avoiding views of gridlocked hwy’s and streets. Special camera’s are mounted on the belly’s of the 747’s to feed live video to those unfortunate not to have a window seat. Upon landing the rich Investors are rushed through an Express Customs and led directly to branch Offices of REmax and Coldwell Banker at the terminal. From the RE offices at the terminal they are quickly whisked away by limo’s to Heliport where freshly fueled choppers are awaiting for a more closeup viewing. In the waiting choppers are the likes of Lu Wei of Coldwell Banker and RE lawyers to close deals as quickly as possible. No bidding wars here.
After snapping up incredible deals the new bargain hunters are still flush with extra cash to spend. To help our overseas friends the Bank of Nova Scotia has installed vending machines in the departure lounge at YVR to dispense Canadian Maple Leaf Gold coins and gold bars to take back home as gifts to their loved ones to help celebrate their extremely good fortune they had just stumbled upon.
Could a show like this keep the enthusiasm and hysteria going for a while longer? Its worth a try.
#128
Truth be told. Multiculturalism is an over emphasized and overrated concept indulged in by most people to feel better about themselves.
I am an Asian immigrant who has done well here and am thank ful for the opportunities, but please do not tell me that all Canadians are an all-embracing bunch.
Also, we are not “different” or better. It is more like a fat girl trying to reaffirm herself.
#151 Brynn
Right, that’s why there is 4 months inventory, because there are WAY more buyers than sellers.
/rolleyes
Garth says: liquidity rules because it offers “the ability to jump into the comforting arms of cash the moment danger is sniffed.”
#29 BDG-YYC – says: 90% of people’s sniffers are either dead or hyperactive.
But Mish Shedlock yesterday reminded us that “everyone thinks they can or will get out in time. Mathematically it’s impossible.” Mr Shedlock’s point is, even if you have a perfect sniffer you can still get creamed when an overvalued market heads south.
And those of us do get creamed will have insult added to injury by the lucky few who manage to get out in time.
#151 Brynn
There you go, bidding wars, nothing more than a simple marketing ploy, with an under-priced listing, as suspected. That recent much publicized Van tear down, that went for $500k or something over asking in a fierce bidding war, was listed well under assessed, and nearly that much below comparables.
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Bidding+wars+break+tight+housing+market/4268800/story.html
For now it’s working, until everyone starts doing it. What happens when there’s no multiple offers, and the only bid is for below asking?
At #153: BPOE, please identify why Vancouver is “the most diversified city in the world,” please. If you can direct me to a qualified publication that would demonstrate your claim is true, instead of it being yet another false claim of your’s, then I will promise never to return to the blog. As I said it is all basically white or Asian. Now, prove me wrong.
” You miss the point, Financial assets are instantly liquid in any market. Real estate is famously illiquid unless in a rising one. — Garth ”
I bought 20K work of Worldcom. it went to ZERO pretty damn fast.
I bought and hold Pfizer and Thompson Reuters. These are slowly working their way up and have steadily averaged bought. but i am still below the original prices.
BUT had I to cash them in at the wrong time for whatever reason time I could sell at a loss. Same for RE… if you are desperate for the case you sell lower than what you bought.
If i had to sell any of these two assts classes…. i could at a loss. Would you grant me this point?
You are wasting our time, and know it. Financial assets can be converted to cash with a phone call, while houses need to be listed, shown, negotiated, financed and closed. If you were too dumb to dump Worldcom, don’t take it out on us. — Garth
At #149: Debtfree, wow you sure sound angry. Not very like a Canadian to be so hostile. Lol. Your tone makes it seem as though you assume I am not a minority class. For your information, I too am a minority class and I feel people aren’t getting the point. My earlier point was to state that Canada prides itself on being a melting pot if cultures, yet much of the commentary I read typically demonstrates distane for minority classes that have moved there. That us why I say spare me the argument, because it simply is not true in Canada. The US has been the most accepting country to all nationalities, hence more immigration here every year than all other countries in yhe world combined. This is a real melting pot. Sorry if you fear coming here with your wife as I understand you are a mixed-race couple. Perhaps you all have forgotten that we elected a Black President. Yes, we sure did. I think a lot if what I hear from Canadians is fear mongering and ignorance with respect to acceptance in the US. It seems as though you’re still livin in the 60s and you belies we are too. I assure you we are not perfect, but we are indeed the most accepting when it comes to race. Even my Canadian friends say the RUDEST things about Chinese immigrants when I visit them in Vancouver. Very, very, VERY IGNORANT and hateful comments are constantly made. I point out to them they ate being racist, and they act as if they couldn’t POSSIBLY be as they are “Canadian.”. Unbelievable. Delusional.
Alex,
I beg to differ, the article is using two bidding wars in a couple of neighborhoods as if it is the norm in the market. To me that’s a pump which fuels those other 20 bidders in a February market that always has lower supply in some areas. It’s a temporary seasonal condition.
Those people have been looking since last May and can’t find anything ? They must be super picky or expecting far more than for what the market offered them. Why does this family look so happy in the pic if they think they’ve been screwed out of a house since last May ? C’mon.
It does contain some caveats that it is a dangerous thing to get involved in but it still promotes that if you want to save $200 a month you’re going to have to bid $150K over.
It’s not a balanced view of the overall market and incites those with more money than brains to get sucked into this agents game. Most stop reading after the headline anyhow, and that is a pump.
“If I wanted to sell it, which I don’t,” he says, “I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this.”
How did the realtor get him into this, don’t doctors think they’re so smart?
Garth, I sure hope you called this guy out on his “blame everyone else but me” mentality.
Incredible! Blame the realtor because I was stupid and bought a house that I shouldn’t have.
#134 Jeff Smith – said “Good luck to us all.”
Thanks Jeff. Of course, those who have an acre or two of arable land and some buckshot will need a little less of it. (luck that is)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cal12_N%C2%B08.jpg
Utopia and ExExpat,
thanks for your recommendations. Added to my list.
–
#48 604genX — Sure. Here, here and here (the last one contains a conspiracy theory starring Jesse Ventura about The Water Conspiracy. Greg W. in Oakville was right all along!
#56 Heloguy — Great joke! / #106 Abitibidoug — Well said and ditto!
#111 AACI-Okanagan — “US stores expand to Canada . . .” — See the following links. We’re one country now, but with two names.
#122 Patz — Hi Patz. Good follow-up. Remember the CIA – Mossad generally disrupt and like to cause trouble wherever they go, if it is to their advantage (e.g., let the US come in and ‘regulate’ them, or take assets for themselves.
Anyway, here’s the latest — Here and on the other side of the coin here. Choose wisely!
*
#111 AACI-Okanagan — “US stores expand to Canada . . .” — See the following links. We’re one country now, but with two names.
Big biz wanted the barriers taken down, first between Canada and the US, then Mexico and the US. Big biz will then have a huge pool of cheap labor to choose from while having outsourced good jobs to low paying countries (Bangladesh, Chindia, Brazil, etc.).
Once these are accomplished, the NAU / SPP will be implemented but the one thing that many do not know of is that cycles are changing, not caring what humans do. There’s a lot more stuff to take place in the next two decades or so.
Obama and Harper recently abolished the border between us. Apparently, we’ve been merged into the 21st century’s super state. Harper was right — this is no longer Canada as we knew it, except by name only.
Hidden in the politico-dipshit wording of this agreement is the complete overturning of the sovereignty of all sets of citizens, their laws and regulations they have lived under for centuries, but which will now be “melded” together with no votes allowed by either of them ever again. So we’re not allowed to have a say in how our country is run. Dr. Jekyll and Herr Harper
Where are these “bidding wars” that Vancouver Sun is talking about? This is nothing but complete garbage.
I have a friend who’s trying to sell her Downtown condo because she can’t afford it anymore (surprise, surprise) and she hasn’t seen a single offer that’s remotely close to what she paid for it in 2008.
Another friend is trying to sell a condo in Port Coquitlam. NOBODY is coming to see it. She lowered the price to 10% lower than its assessed value (which is about $30K less than what she paid for it) and still NOBODY.
Olympic Village is a ghost town.
WHERE ARE THESE BIDDING WARS!???!!!!!This is complete bull$hit. The condos are selling…sure…but way below the asking price.
#93 Utopia on 02.12.11 at 10:53 am
#71 BC is even better than ten best place on earth
“I do have a property, it is in Rome, Italy, where I will retire, I bought it second hand, only about 400 years old…”
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That’s kind of funny to me. My family has a place in Italy too, near Naples, closer to the volcano actually and it is still standing strong and in great shape after more than 400 years.
One day I really have to go see it.
…………..
And I ate in a couple of 400+ yr old restaurants when I visited my aunt & uncle in Esbjerg, Denmark for 10 days. Their tiny heritage home, where my father grew up, was pictured on milk cartons. My grandfather was lost at sea and his wife sewed to support her 2 children. I spent a few days in Copenhagen, but the rest of the time they took me out on daily trips. My aunt knew more than most travel guides. But I preferred her husband.
I have 73k in my TFSA. So choke on that!
If you want to see where the price of housing is going …. look at the mls for …Windsor Ontario.
Average family income in Windsor is about $79,000.00 avg SFH price is about $160,555.00. So that puts an average house for an average family at about 2x income. This is the historic reality …. and folks ..we are headed for reality!!
#167 The American on 02.12.11 at 7:06 pm
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Here’s a wiki link to Aga Khan, a muslim museum that is being established in Toronto, largely because the financiers consider Canada one of the most multicultural nations on the planet (which it is).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aga_Khan_Museum
And, FYI, I distinctly remember New Yorkers protesting a mosque being built near ground zero.
And, FYI, driving through Alabama I had a radio station on, and it said something along the lines of “this is the station that hates Canadians”.
Yes, there are respectful/accepting and disrespectful/unaccepting people in both countries. Yes, both countries have a substantial number of immigrants (essentially everyone–even the aboriginals–immigrated to North America once upon a time).
What I have found in Canada is that the multiculturalism is the greatest in the largest cities, and that tolerance decreases with smaller, more homogenous towns. I’m sure it’s the same in the good old U.S. of A.
Re:Garth Lambasting OttawaMike
It didn’t feel like lambasting to me, just a playful retort.
Trust me I know lambasting. Outside of here I’ve been lambasted so badly that I smelled of garlic and rosemarie and spring lamb.
Sometimes I wonder if Garth is the alter ego to the new home buyers leveraging up and jumping in convinced prices can only go up.
Or if you listen to Mr. Turner, we are in for a meeting with four Housemen of the Housepocalypse.
Both sides have dogmatic convictions. Reality will likely be somewhere in between.
Garth even thinks Harley Davidson builds excellent motorcycles and I use motorcycles and Harley together very loosely in that sentence.
Still a Hell of a good blog and some half decent books have been scribed by the man. Everybody has their strengths and weaknesses.
Incredible! Blame the realtor because I was stupid and bought a house that I shouldn’t have.
A statement by the president of the Edmonton real estate board..
“We’re predicting that prices will continue to rise until August, at four to five per cent per month, then at two per cent per month,”
Carolyn Pratt, Former President REALTORS Association of Edmonton, April 4 2007
Houses have fallen every month since her pumper statement.
Oh yeah, do you remember the Calgary real estate boards May 2007 statement that said this..
better buy now, or you might get priced out forever
Realtors have done a lot of damage to Canadian families, instead of shamelessly attempting to abscond themselves of any blame, they should hang their heads in shame.
I have just finished reading the GREATER FOOL…as relevant now as when it was released in ’08. This is my fourth book. You are one very intelligent man. So why aren’t YOU running the country and/or in charge of the economy? LOL Sadly, our loss…..
I lived with a doctor for 4 years and let me tell you, it’s blame everyone else because he’s the almighty doctor. It gets old…fast.
Here is a comment from a forum at urbantoronto.ca commenting about a new condo in downtown Toronto.
“And that’s not counting the number of people that bought just to flip on completion. The number of lockboxes outside the building is astounding.”
The Squamish Sasquatch was last spotted lumbering up the 99 in the direction of Whistler. Guard your property values closely, it leaves a swath of lower prices in its wake! Your only hope is throwing an official Realtor(r) into its clutch, hopefully appeasing the beast.
#165 The American on 02.12.11 at 6:53 pm
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By ‘Asian’ do you also mean ‘Russian’, ‘Mongolian’ etc.?
Here’s a chart (from Statistics Canada) that proves you wrong (there are significant populations in Vancouver of Chinese, South Asian, Filipino, Korean, SE Asian, Black, Latin American etc.):
http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2006/dp-pd/prof/92-591/details/page_Figure.cfm?Lang=E&Geo1=CMA&Code1=933&Geo2=PR&Code2=59&Data=Count&SearchText=vancouver&SearchType=Begins&SearchPR=59&B1=All&Custom=&Profile=28000&Sex=Total
On this Irish blog they seem to be having the same conversation regarding mortgages and those hidden statistics…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/ireland-business-blog-with-lisa-ocarroll/2011/feb/10/ireland-struggling-buy-to-let-investors#start-of-comments
===========
US payday loan firms plan rapid expansion in cash-strapped Britain• Credit at 30% a month can take minutes to secure
• One group sees opportunity for 800 new branches in UK
I am starting to these in every strip mall
I bought and hold Pfizer and Thompson Reuters. These are slowly working their way up and have steadily averaged bought. but i am still below the original prices.
BUT had I to cash them in at the wrong time for whatever reason time I could sell at a loss. Same for RE… if you are desperate for the case you sell lower than what you bought.
If i had to sell any of these two assts classes…. i could at a loss. Would you grant me this point?
Never invest money that you can’t afford to lose. Stock markets are very risky at the best of times.
I sold all my stocks two weeks ago (except SIRI) and could care less that the markets have gone up since, my profits are banked.
#146 Hoof Hearted on 02.12.11 at 4:59 pm
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No canary in the coal mine there. Have you ever been to Kelsey’s? The food is terrible!!!
Garth….We have been reading you for almost 2 years now since we luckly sold our house (which my wife was totally in love with) in the peg….which had a clear title (THANK GOD)…& moved to THE ISLAND!!!!! You know…Vancourver Island…We have been looking to buy or build ever since we moved here but LUCKLY AGAIN!!!! We rented a place before we got here for a year & we are so lucky to have been put in that position that we were forced to rent as we had no time to find a place to buy….After over 2 years of renting we have decided to enjoy our nest egg & have fun instead of getting locked in with yet another mortage….we are semi retired & we really don’t have any worries….HOW NICE IS THAT!!!!!!!! Thank you for all your advice.
#130 – farmland RE may be the only RE that will rise over the next ten years, but sure take back the mortgage.
#153 your side note on uranium makes me think its time to sell.
Garth – a tad touchy.
Worldcom losses – i am not taking out on anybody. It was a scam and i was the scamee ;-) So it goes.
But i still hold stocks/equities/bonds.
But i am trying to understand what this big aversion to property is. So far no one has convinced me that it is bad or that it’s a mug’s game to hold property.
Was looking at Condos today. We saw a few. One of the places we looked at was 360K. Seven yrs ago it went for 220K.
Another person there from North Carolina was also looking. had seen lots. thought the place was a good deal/ I asked why he wanted to buy as he is here for maybe 3-4yrs tops. His answer: my wife and I are tired of paying 2K a month for rent.
Herb on 02.12.11 at 10:51 am
#35 Bottoms_Up
———-
Here is my list of neighborhoods across canada where 1 million will get you a decent house; where yuppies, dinks and nouveau riche will feel comfortable.
– Westmount
– TMR
– Outremont
– Beaconsfield South
– Rockliffe
– the Glebe
– Rosedale
– Mount Royal
– Richmond
There is no great arbitrage to be done between these areas. If you move out of those areas, unfortunately, you’ll have to buy and live with the little people if you want to bank some money.
This list is not exhaustive. Feel free to add.
Kind of gives me a twinge that I sold my house in Calgary… to a doctor…. two years ago….
Could it be??? Nahhhh…..
from the Vancouver Sun article ( see link above). another experts opinion:
“Somerville, however, doesn’t believe Vancouver is at risk of a U.S.-style housing meltdown. Two characteristics that were prevalent south of the border are missing here, he said: fast and loose credit, and a lot of speculative product.”
Vancouver epitomizes speculation and has the worst real estate casino attitude on the continent. Mr. Somerville has it wrong again. — Garth
#173 VanCity Girl
“WHERE ARE THESE BIDDING WARS!???!!!!!This is complete bull$hit. The condos are selling…sure…but way below the asking price.”
Right on the Money! This what i have noticed as well. Lots of Condo inventory on the market these days. Lots to choose from. It’s a buyers market. There will be NO bidding war on Condos… bet on it.
In fact one my colleague’s son just got a condo, he bid 60K under asking. Was just accepted today. The seller was “motivated” to sell. Interest rates are set to rise again on Monday. There is a correction in condo prices underway from all the indications that i have seen. But only for those that have to sell….
Live Within Your Means on 02.12.11 at 5:04 pm
I moved back to Mtl. Agree, I’d take Mtl over Ottawa any day. I lived there during Expo 67 and it has the best transit system in Canada. Read somewhere that they are going to upgrade the cars. I go back 1/2 a yr.
————–
I think the most important word in your paragraph was thin. When I moved to Ottawa, I was amazed by the sheer number of overweight people here. Quebeckers are thin by North American standards that’s for sure, so that was a shock.
IMO, the weight problem in this city is such that if you are thin, I’m convinced you’ll have no problem whatsoever finding a partner ;)
A colleague with a couple million in net worth who bought a whack of condos a few years ago when they were 75K (now 150-200K) told me, jokingly, that the only thing holding up the market these days in Ottawa was splits and divorces. Last year, on my daughter’s team, half the couples split up in 1 single season! This year all these new singles, instead of having 300-400K in housing as a couple now have 275-300K townhouses. Unreal!
In Montreal, the transit system is good and bad. When I lived in the West Island, I took the train. I would drop off the kids at daycare or school and had to make sure I was in the train parking lot by 7:39am. One minute later and I could not park my car and would have to get back on the 20 and drive to the Pointe-Claire Station. The problem is that the traffic jams up at St-Jean, the exit for the train station, so I would miss 2 trains to get to that parking. 3 trains in total, 1 hour late.
IMO, when you compare one city to another, you’ve got to compare the irritants, those little things that make your day-to-day life miserable and stress you out. And those can be different from one person to the next.
I’m with “The American” on this one
I’m an Indian immigrant in Canada, but I barely have an accent, pretty fair skinned, well kept and don’t pass as an Indian, so life is good, but it does suck for a lot of Indians here.
I really wonder why Trudeau opened up the country to multiculturalism, it’s lose/lose situation, the indigenous people don’t want the immigrants, and the immigrants are delusional when it comes to their expectations of Canada.
You can’t blame them, immigration lawyers are as bad as RE agents and need to be taken out of the immigration equation. Heck, immigration needs to stop, I think the major cities are full and are starting to resemble the countries we want to leave behind!
Look at the websites of any newspaper in the far east or middle east, immigration lawyers guaranteeing n easy life in Canada….
But then again, to have an opinion like mine, would be called ‘racist’ in politically correct Canada. I think people need to grow a set and say enough is enough, this country is changing so much every year, it’s scary. Multicult has failed in Europe, but like RE in Canada… “It’s different here”.
Wetcoaster (fitting name, BTW): I totally hear what you’re saying. But given some of the blatant real estate marketing posing as news lately in many of our regional and national publications, I expected much worse. You could pull perhaps two-thirds of that article, right out of the middle, and have a rather effective argument AGAINST buying now.
“So buying with a 20% or more downpayment makes logical sense. Owning rentals also makes sense as renters pay for the mortgages. All of the costs including the mortgage is tax deductible and the landlord gets richer while the renter stays poorer.”
New here, aren’t you? — Garth
—————————————
Is there something wrong with that scenario for the home owner?
Greetings: There is another category of person in the same pea pod as the doctor Garth talks about ie: airline captains, converse directly with God!!!
The subprime chain:
http://bp3.blogger.com/_pMscxxELHEg/Rfd-oNpqM3I/AAAAAAAAAMI/_gmTXq52klI/s1600-h/subprimechain.jpg
At #184: Bottoms Up… Did you even read that chart? Using your chart, you only prove to me what I said is correct. Let me break it down for you…
Chinese, S. Asian, Filipino, SE Asian, W Asian, Korean, Japanese, are all ASIAN. This leaves the following categories for consideration outside of white and Asian… Black, Latin American, Arab, Visible Minority (whatever that means), and Multiple Visible Minority (whatever that means). In total, they account for 65,000 according to the chart. That is NOTHING in the grand scheme of a metro area that is a little over 2.1MM people. That is 3% of the total population outside of Whites and Asians. Like I said, white and Asian. Get real.
#180
“You are one very intelligent man. So why aren’t YOU running the country and/or in charge of the economy? LOL Sadly, our loss…..”
Perhaps because Mr Turner suffers from unbridled courage, honesty and outspokenness. He even went so far as to cross Emperor Harper. That kind of thing is frowned upon in Canadian politics. It certainly got him nowhere (politically) in the long run.
I think the bidding wars are for the olympic village
Can’t you tell there’s been so many bids on it, that they probably have to reduce the prices by 1/2.
Note this is prime WATERFRONT property.
If all hell breaks loose, I would like to see a Bernie Maddolf style of investigation and prison or Public Hanging on the people involved with this ponzi scheme.
#193 Morry
Somerville is a real estate shill and pumper.
100% wrong on both counts.
Spot The Speculators #27 –
Innocent RE Gamblers: Mid-Forties Couple; Income $163K; Two Properties $650K; Debt Load $603K; Net-Worth $66K
http://wp.me/pcq1o-1Q4
For those that may have been asking (WTF do people in Vancouver actually do) I found this interesting comparison with Seattle, Portland and SF
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/planning/stats/infosheets/pdf/WestCoastCities.pdf
Maybe this Cat shouldn’t come back!
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/entertainment/Maybe+this+shouldn+come+back/4255037/story.html
Cats at the NAC was great! Great vocals, great band and great dance routines. Patrick Langston is not my favourite critic.
I guess the point is that at the theatre they don’t have a section for renters and another for owners.
Two hundred and eighth!!!!!
#201 The American on 02.12.11 at 11:10 pm
———————————————-
So you’re trying to say that if a city’s residents consisted of Mexicans, Americans and Canadians, you would not consider that city multicultural?
I’m very real, dude.
Interesting notes about bidding wars in Vanc. All those stories center on SFH, usually between downtown and the airport. Given the large relative inventory of condo product there you could see how there may be many trying to leap from the sinking condo market into the SFH market before too late.
Having lived in Vanc, I was never interested in living in a condo, always looked for apartments in houses in the nice leafy neighborhoods west of main and North of King Ed. I could see the condo market crashing much harder than the SFH market, though losing the base of the pyramid is never good I guess.
DSMB, great link. Interesting.
Cocoa futures should be ticking up and chocolate bars …
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/valentines-day/savour-that-chocolate-while-you-can-still-afford-it/article1904608/
#196 Hot chololate [sic],
no need to wonder why Trudeau invented multiculturalism in the ’70s. Every vote counted at the time, and the ethnic vote was there to be discovered. So the Liberals – followed by the Conservatives and everyone else – stroked ethnic communities to get the votes of their members.
Since “ethnics” are concentrated in some ridings, their vote became ever more important, forcing political parties to bend over backwards to get or keep their support. Of course, the leaders of ethnic communities have not been reluctant to use their bargaining power, so muticulturalism went beyond lip service and the celebrate-your-heritage stage, and grew from political expedient to political requirement.
It’s nothing new in Canada. If we were honest with ourselves, we’d admit that bilingualism and biculturalism resulted not from any noblesse on the part of anglophone Canada, but from the hard fact that Quebec had 75 seats in Parliament that could be mobilized en masse to make or break a government.
I chuckle when I hear of realtors talking about bidding wars. Kind of reminds me of buying my first car. The salesman said that he had someone coming an hour after I was there who would pay full price. My response, ” sell it to him”.
Oh yes, I bought the car the next day after the salesman called me back. For 15% less.
Who ever believes a commissioned salesperson. I certainly don’t!
#173 VanCityGirl—where are the bidding wars??
totally agree–lots of condos selling for less than owners paid 2 to 3 years ago
check out todays Van Sun (sec H2)–the condo that sold for 407k–was listed for 415k–i wouldn’t doubt that the owner sold for less than he paid–there’s 7 others selling in the same highrise–all in trouble or soon will be
–
Three Per Cent of zero is not much.
Osama bin DeadALot comes to mind. He is buried in north west Pakistan.
Emergency Food Convoys Where? UK.
The Revolt Is Growing Algeria, Bolivia and many others. May we live in interesting times!
Doncha jes’ luv when all this stuff goes viral!
How Very Convenient and just in time. Lead-in is good, along with the rest.
Creqting A Welfare nation in the shortest time possible is what’s happening.
Another view on Mubarak’s replacement.
Chinese Food Shortages “Commodity prices around the world are set to spike. To those of you with any kind of a “big box” store membership: it might not be a bad idea to stock up on canned fruits and vegetables right now, because the cost of fresh produce may well be going through the roof, making it nearly inaccessible financially.” wrh.com. 5:46 clip GS benefits from the food shortages.
m$m from an ex-employee Quite funny, just like Tom & Jerry. “Editor’s Note: And of course this “employee” went straight to Media Matters, the left propaganda outlet funded by Globalist George Soros, further proving the illusion of choice in the mainstream media is set up only to keep the left-right debate fully raging.”
3:36 clip Celente on the real numbers (according to him).
Mish poses an interesting question: Is this 1998 or 2007?
14:47 clip Collapse of complex societies.
The case for withering US imperialism.
NAFTA Hear that sucking sound? It’s all the jobs here being siphoned off to Chindia. Plus gas and diesel are at their highest level for this time of year.
Screw Work, Play Golf Six Q&A. But the moral of this tiny tale is correct!
#165 The American
Have you been to Weyburn?
#178 OttawaMike – said “Garth even thinks Harley Davidson builds excellent motorcycles and I use motorcycles and Harley together very loosely in that sentence.”
Well, as they say…’Ride ’em for an hour, fix ’em for an hour.”
Sir/Madam Moderator…Garth’s asleep, please sneak this passed….Thanks.
I heard that. — Garth
Hey Moneta, I enjoy your posts but you’re wa..a..a..y off the mark here. Do you really think you can get a decent house in Rosedale for a million bucks? Maybe 15 years ago.
The range for detached houses in Rosedale is from $2.25M to $6.99M according to the mls search I just did.
just sayin’
******************************
#191 Moneta on 02.12.11 at 9:49 pm
Herb on 02.12.11 at 10:51 am
#35 Bottoms_Up
———-
Here is my list of neighborhoods across canada where 1 million will get you a decent house; where yuppies, dinks and nouveau riche will feel comfortable.
– Westmount
– TMR
– Outremont
– Beaconsfield South
– Rockliffe
– the Glebe
– Rosedale
– Mount Royal
– Richmond
#204 Devore
“”Somerville is a real estate shill and pumper.
“Somerville, however, doesn’t believe Vancouver is at risk of a U.S.-style housing meltdown. Two characteristics that were prevalent south of the border are missing here, he said: fast and loose credit, and a lot of speculative product.”
100% wrong on both counts.””
It would help you position if you backed it up with facts.
I am willing to listen. Bu t dismiss his arguments with an inane comment such as yours is either asinine or childish .. or both
I agree with the American. @149 DebtFree dude, your rejoinder is lame. “STFU you retard?” What is this, grade 5? I’m one of thousands of Vancouverites who go to Seattle (and Bellingham/Portland, etc.) when the dollar is high. Seattle is a great city. Way more industry, better infrastructure; true, the grunge factor is more evident in and around the shopping district, but that’s because they don’t have the downtown Eastside ghetto to concentrate all their problems. Apologies to the rest of Canada on this blog for the Vancouver fixation, but Vancouver prices are mind-blowingly insane. Absolute dumps for close to a mil. That is a lot of after tax money. Of course, if you bought 10 yrs. back or inherited, good for you, but for new buyers? No way I’m paying a mil to someone just b/c they inherited their parents 1960’s dingy bungalow.
Speaking of Edmonton; The Edmonton Journal used to just have a RE section every Saturday, then they got a “Homes” section as well as the RE section. Now they not only have an RE section and a “Homes” section, they also have a “Condo” section.
It must be tought trying to cram all those RE ads in!
Remember the good old days; when News was News and Ads were Ads.
It’s hard to believe people pay money to have a ‘Newspaper’ thats 80% advertising delivered to their door!
The Apocalypse is Nigh
#181 Sue
Smart people do stupid things all the time.
That is the way with ‘experts’. They are not usually well diversified in their talents.
“Jack of all trades, master of none, though oftentimes better than master of one”
It’s a survival skill(s)
I thought you and Doc got back together?
people have lost perspective on what it means to be profitable in the rental game. Every time I hear some naive Vancouver kid talk about how his 700K shack with a prime minus .3 variable and a basment suite pays off the mortgage, I want to punch some sense into him. Property expenses include insurance, tax, utilities, repairs, and what if your tenant trashes the place or refuses to pay rent, or leaves with all your appliances. Treat your rental home like a business, include all expenses, plan for scenarios in the future (is it still profitable at 7% interest) and soon you will find that most cities in Canada are not suitable investments.
I just spoke to someone who saw that ridiculous helicopter White Rock story and believed it. Had the nerve to use this as evidence as to why I was wrong with my crazy Vancouver crash theories.
incontrovertible proof our media can be bought with a box lunch and a thumpa-thumpa ride.
Made my day you have a great sense of humour keep up the good fight Garth.
AT #209: Bottoms Up, I would call any city with more than one race or countrymen “multicultural.” After all, if there is more than one cultre, that would define “multi.” I’m speaking of diversification. There is a big difference between the two. And I am saying it is NOT very diverse there, being it is essentially White or Asian. That’s it.
AT #196: Hot Chocolate, I’m not saying I’m not in support for multiculturalism and diversification. I am certainly pro immigration, pro multiculturalism, and pro diversification. I am saying I do not believe Canada, in all of its politically correctness, in that supportive when I constantly read and hear comments that suggest otherwise. Sure, people SAY they embrace it, but behind closed doors it is a different story. That is why I say I don’t want to hear the “multiculturalism argument.” I don’t want to hear it because I do not believe it for one second after witnessing first hand how immigrants are “embraced” (or not) in Canada. Canada takes ANYONE who can anti up $500M. That is not sound or sustainable policy for legal immigration into one’s country.
None of you morons are 1st!!
Only 1st to show all of you have nothing better to do with your time.. then waste all of ours!!
Canada is crazy I’m glad I left. I now rent a room in a million euro house with an amazing view of Piazza Michelangelo in Florence Italy, for the same price with currency changes as I did when I lived in Toronto and my bedroom window looked at a brick wall and I had a bus stopping in front of my house every ten minutes. Dufferin is a busy street.
Now I wake up to the most amazing view I have ever seen and I’m from Newfoundland so I know great landscapes and watch the sun rise over the Tuscan hills. I’ve never been happier. Canada is in for a rude awakening. We’ve become a bunch of snot nosed Americans wannabes who feel life owes them everything.
Wake up, you can’t remember where it was had this dream stopped. Little Jim Morrison quote for all you old fart boomers ;) Slue
I’m going with The American on the multiculturism issue too.
I think what has him tweaked is the passive agressive nature of the arguement, when Canadians say “we are multicurtural” it often really means “we think the United States is racist and we aren’t” without having to actually say it. I have lived a lot of years on both sides of the border, Canada is on some swampy ground claiming high ground on this one.
Maybe we can do some housecleaning and give up this national superiority myth at the same time we give up the “it’s different here” real estate valuation myth.
#151 Brynn
You must believe that Vancouver is for some reason, a city that is not built on credit, that Asian immigrants/investors are not borrowing to buy (seriously, why would one buy into a casino with one’s own money? We may as well believe that the Chinese aren’t smart as well, its suits our paradigm apparently), that interest rates in the 16th most indebted nation (public debt I speak of and household debt would be in the same ballpark) in the world won’t rise as we ascend the climb toward the top ten and if interest rates do rise, it won’t crash RE values when 29% of all mortgages are variable and that 35 year terms set to 30 year terms won’t erode mortgage affordability because lets not forget the belief that Vancouver is built on cash and not credit and hence, the worlds most expensive city in terms of real estate will continue to soar because of the belief every millionaire wants to live there.
Uhuh…
Good luck with your beliefs.
#232 Daystar,
What Brynn actually believes herself is irrelevant. What she wants (or needs) others to believe is what is important to her. She is a real estate pumper through and through. Devoid of argument and full of self serving anecdotes whether real or made up.
Hey 206, Dark Sad Monster Bunny, I read that chart. What stands out are several things. It was developed by a partisan interest, being City of Vancouver Planning Department back in 2009. I checked some of the stats, and some were tweaked, including city populations. Seattle and San Francisco both had larger populations in 2009 than what the chart reflects. So, what else was tweaked? Additionally it is two years old for starters. The States, including Portland, San Francisco, and Seattle were already well into their economic downturn. Vancouver is just beginning its downturn. That really is not a fair comparison when looking at it and understanding vacancy rates. I’ve lived in Vancouver for nearly 14 years, originally from Calgary, and I can tell you vacancy rates here for commercial space are definitely on the rise. I can also say I do not see any bidding wars taking place at least in our neighborhood. We live in Kits and inventory is definitely rising and staying on the market longer. We’ve also seen prices coming down down down. So, we’re getting out. We sold our place after it sitting on the market for 22 weeks. I am moving to Seattle in two weeks for a new job. I find this debate interesting.
What does stand out to me in that chart is how remarkably educated Seattle and San Francisco are compared to Vancouver. I mean that is a huge disparity of educated people when comparing them to Vancouver. I prefer to surround myself with educated people, so we’ll fit in nicely in Seattle. I don’t think they can hardly be called “backwater” as it was put earlier in the blog. By the looks of it, this would make us “backwater.” Seattle and San Francisco have larger city populations and larger metro populations, regardless what the chart indicates. This information is inaccurate. This tells me they have a value system with an emphasis on being smart, again severing a preconceived notion we had. That’s probably why they have such amazing research centers, medical centers, and tech development there.
I’d be curious to see this chart a couple years from now and look where Vancouver stands then when it comes to the real estate vacancies. The chart fails to list actual businesses in Vancouver, or any of the other cities. So, I am skeptical of the statistical data’s correctness. I also noticed the City of Vancouver Planning Department used a nearly five year old picture of Seattle at the time they created this publication, and it was a picture taken from the skinny side of their downtown. Why not show the city from across the water like we do in Vancouver? Why is our city planning department obsessed with always comparing itself to Seattle, Portland, or San Francisco if those dumb yanks don’t have a clue what they’re doing? The answer is simple; it is because they do know what they are doing. The Seattle skyline looks a lot different since that photo was taken. And I have to admit Seattle’s skyline is amazing, especially at night. It is one of our absolute favorites, next to Hong Kong, Chicago, and Manhattan. I think it has far more impact than our’s. But, who cares I guess. Here’s pictures taken from Seattle.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/capnsurly/337496724/lightbox/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/capnsurly/337030220/lightbox/
That is more fair.
I’m leaving Vancouver for a new job I landed in Seattle working in cancer research. My fiance and I were skeptical about the transition. We’ve found many of our preconceived notions about Seattle and the States are complete rubbish. We’re excited about the move and very nervous too. We have bought in the Queen Anne neighbourhood, and it is stunning. We were able to buy a very cute bungalow for $707,000 US and nearly 2,300 square feet with a great walkable neighbourhood. Say what you want, but Seattle’s neighbourhoods beat the hell out of anything we have in Vancouver. I do prefer Vancouver’s downtown only marginally to that of Seattle, but the neighbourhoods in Seattle cannot be beat. I will also say I find Seattle to have better food and shopping and nicer people than what we encounter in Kits and downtown Vancouver on a daily basis. Vancouver feels newer but lacks historic buildings and charm that Seattle has. Seattle seems to have a younger population, more vibrant city life, and more edgy or cutting edge. We did notice street kids a lot in Seattle, but they claim not to be boxed into a confined geographical area like we do to them in Vancouver. None of them bothered us, though. Our conclusions is Seattle is every bit, if not more, as beautiful and interesting as Vancouver. So why do we continue to keep this highbrow attitude about our lovely town, as if there is no other place on Earth that could suffice to replace it. Well, there is, and Seattle is easily already one of them.
another canary in the coalmine in Vancity- Fresh Slice Pizza
the discount pizza place ($1.50 a slice, $9.50 for an extra large take away) is busy, and not with the usual low-end clientele. I have noticed that “real” people are now buying take n bakes from Fresh Slice.
I saw this phenomenon in Ireland when I lived through their crash. Restaurants were suddenly empty but Domino’s took 1 hour to deliver….could not keep up with demand.
http://www.realtor.ca/propertyDetails.aspx?propertyId=10164153&PidKey=2131190048
Take a gander at what crime safe Burnaby has for millionaires. The ones flowing with liquidity, never a need to borrow, can’t you all just picture someone with that kind of dough living in a neighborhood safe mansion such as this? Its every 7 figure sucessful adults dream to sprawl out in such a majestic spread such as this, don’t cha’ all think?
And if you all had a million worth of cash layin’ around, not sure what to do with it, wouldn’t you see a house like that in crime safe Burnaby and ask yourself, “geez, that would make a real swell investment, look at the money I could make off that, there’s so little else to choose from in terms of generating revenue…”.
And… lets think about this one more time. If you were using other peoples money, would you buy in then? Y’know, if you somehow convinced yourself to believe that another entity had the risk, either CMHC, a bank, anyone but you if equity turned negative and you missed two payments?
Who’s buying these houses, millionaires with cash in their pockets (who, having the money to travel and invest, apparently have no clue as to what their buying power is worth for real estate for in say, the U.S., Spain, Portugal, Rome, France, South/central america and elsewhere? Or folks with $50 grand of scratch (maybe), $100 grand of gross income (perhaps) and some weird belief that this same house will be worth 1.2 million and thus, its worth the risk to lose their stake (if banks didn’t give it back to them with their downpayment cash back), a belief shared by a greeder bank with CMHC assuming all the risk… a belief shared by many a foolish voter/taxpayer.
Smart money is on the speculator if this house was to sell. Hey ah… I heard tell the Chinese are notoriously known for being gamblers. Any truth to that one y’all think?
Multiculturalism will finally be realized when we stop talking about it.
– Asian Person
Sadly, many people will be unable to sell at any price. The young couple in Mississauga, for example, who bought a $400,000 home on 5/35 terms. A market correction of 15% means if they sell at $340,000, they have to show up on closing day with a personal cheque for $75,000 – just to get out of the deed. But they can’t. They have nothing. This is what happens when people without money buy houses. And in Ontario, they can’t even walk. Only bankrupt.
–Why? If they put 5% down they owe 380,000. If they sell at 340,000, they owe 40,000. Where is the extra 35,000 coming from?
You forgot the $20,000 in 5% commission plus 13% HST, $5,000 in mortgage termination penalty and the higher mortgage amount which would reflect required CMHC insurance of $10,400) = $35,400. — Garth
232 – you dont read like the original daystar
230 – Mike. If your statement is accurate, your million
euro house is overpriced (ie the rent is too cheap). Or
you way overpaid for rent in TO.
221 – In Van – you might be interested in my link at 206.
Looks to cover only the cities proper, but you’ll see there is a surprising uniformity between the economies of Van,
Seattle, Portland and SF.
Bottoms up/The American, good morning. You both may enjoy the link too as it contains demographic info. Seattle
and Portland are both 80%+ white. Van only about 50% but almost entirely split with asian. Soon though everyone in Van will be a minority.
how could a flat or down market affect real estate agents?
if you only had a small amount of equity built up in your home, would you be more reluctant to give the $20,000+ commission to the agent?
when someone has doubled their profit in a house, I’m sure that paying a real estate agent isn’t a big deal – but when the commission could be 50% or more of the profit…..yikes
How can this be, when real estate only goes UP?? :roll:
“An investment property, estimated to be worth slightly less than the mortgage, is owned by Jeff. The rental income covers most of the carrying costs.”
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-investor/personal-finance/financial-facelift/separated-serviceman-scopes-out-long-term-options/article1904542/
#218 Timing is Everything on 02.13.11 at 2:32 am
Well, as they say…’Ride ‘em for an hour, fix ‘em for an hour.”
The correct term is Hardley Ableson.
If Garth had spent his youth rebuilding motorcycles in his living room and had used his papers for rolling doobies instead of writing on, he’d know his motorcycles better now!
(Disclaimer: I have only ever rebuilt 2 bikes in my living room)
#230 Mike Turner:
What do you pay in rent there? approx: 2000 € ?? more or less? How much for a cappuccino and a brioche? What is the cost of meal with wine?
PS “Wake up! You can’t remember where it was Had this dream stopped?” Good Question! Does anyone have the answer?
At comment 228… I really think diversity is divisive, like I would not venture into Scarborough because of the fruits of diversity… and I love pacific mall but I do feel out of place, same goes for my own ppl in Brampton. Ethnic ghettos, I cringe to think of what it will be like 20 years from now.
oh well, that’s for a debate on a different type of blog.
# 213 Herb
Exactly! Multiculturalism is a contemporary matrix used to poltically divide and conquer not too mention harvest votes for the political parties.
Here:
http://clarespark.com/
I have been reading her work for awhile now and find it to be one of the clearest elucidations of our ideas and rhetoric of multiculturalism.
Enjoy!
Mike Turner,
I know the city, you lucky SOB, and I envy you your field of study – if you can get a living out of it. Say hello to Fra Angelico in San Marco for me.
By the way, how are you doing with the problem with the girlfriend you mentioned a few weeks ago? None of the blog dogs bit, so let me pass on my humble opinion. Level with her. If it’s real, she will accept you as you are. If it isn’t, you’re better off finding out early. In any case, good luck.
I’m in a class with people from 28 different countries I live with a guy from India, Spain and the guy above me is from Argentina. The world needs to get over itself and learn to love evolution, we’re all the same. Stop thinking you own this planet. The birds in the sky have just as much a right to life as your sorry ass.
8 showings and 3 offers in one week? That’s a SLOW week. Only $2K over asking? That’s chump change.
Come to Vancouver where anything less than 8 showings in 1 hour and 3 offers in a day is a failure. As for selling above asking, try adding 1 or 2 more zeros to that 2K figure to even get the locals here interested….
234 Getting out – you are absolutely free to challenge any stats or studies. You are correct on the university education – Vancouver looks to be no smarter than Portland. But why would the Van city planning dept brag about that? Also you will note the smaller percentage of Van workers employed health care. Perhaps there is some crossover in the two factors?
The vacancy rates didnt surprise me for the reasons you have stated. The floor areas of the CBD did. The low
densities of Seattle and Portland also did, along with
their high ratios for drive to work (crossover again?).
And Seattles lower than expected ratio for manfacturing.
I saw nothing in the study for incomes or housing prices and conclude nothing from it. The study cites its sources which of course will be out of date on some factors at any
given time.
Good luck in the emerald city!
I’ve noticed a few people commenting on how inventory seems a little low in their neighbourhood & houses are still selling: WE still have some of the lowest interest rates in 55 years! Also, many fools will try to rush into home ownership to get the 35 year 5% down before it expires. Wait until late summer early fall. A few people who want to own may wait until next winter but overall most desperate wanna be home owners, who really shouldn’t own will get in by early summer, late spring. Then see how the market “quickly turns” over the next year.
Many in Edmonton still think that the market may surge and unemployment plunge when oil goes up closer to $100 a barrel. What they forget is many of the chain store type restuarant have seen sales go down by as much as 50% over the last two years. The average household debt in this city & Alberta is second only to B.C. $0 savings over the last few years (use to be almost 30% savings during the boom AND BUST cycles of the 80s & early 90s). Even smaller affluent industrial cities that were well to do like Sherwood Park & Fort Saskatchewan had almost ZERO unemployment do to the refineries in the area, see homelessnes and drug usage go crazy.
The housing bubble really takes out a large % of the middle class. Open your eyes. Remember who was the Government in power when this happened.
#151 Brynn: “bidding wars and insanity are in full effect”
Precisely. And ‘insane’ markets don’t correct by going flat.
I agree with most of what The American wrote. I live in the FS bay area and enjoy enormously the cultural and ethnic diversity here; don’t think that any place in Canada comes close in comparison. I see many Canadians too full of themselves feeling morally superior.
Really? Rosedale for $1,000,000? on 02.13.11 at 2:48 am
Hey Moneta, I enjoy your posts but you’re wa..a..a..y off the mark here.
———
I wouldn’t be surprised. I was talking to a friend yesterday from NDG who told me her house would now fetch 600-800K (she bought for 215K in 1995) and that I was way off since Westmount was even higher than I thought. I guess the sky’s the limit now!
I still don’t think there’s much arbitrage to be done. Most people in those areas would not be able to get into that area if they were getting in today, so I doubt they could sell there and move into another area on that list if their goal is to crystallize the gain. Like I said they’d have to sell and move in with the little people. Of course there are a couple of people living in 2 million + houses who could sell and move into another one of these areas but something tells me that those ones do not care about the potential arbitrage.
And another one of Seattle at night. See, it really is a cool city. Not that I don’t love Vancouver. It is great when you zoom in on it.
http://rohit.mordani.com/panoramas/washington/seattle/seattle1/seattle1.htm
thanks Nosty. Curious Sunday morning reading. I”ll stock up on garlic and cilantro.
#228-Sound or sustainable policy? You must be joking-you have states like Arizona sounding the fire alarm because of your “sound and sustainable policy”.
Herb: Quebec had 75 seats in Parliament that could be mobilized en masse to make or break a government.
Herb I want to tell you a story of my brother-in-law. He is driving across the Trans Canada and goes into a Tim Hortons dans la belle province. La serveuse wouldn’t serve him because he didn’t speak French. I told him I could have handled the situation better not because I’m better in jujitsu but because I’m better in French.
Moneta: When I lived in the West Island, I took the train.
My cousins grew up in Roxboro. My sons and I did a bunch of hockey tournaments at Quatre Glaces. There’s a new St Hubs on St Jean near Pierrefonds.
Mike Turner: talking about Canadians: We’ve become a bunch of snot nosed Americans wannabes who feel life owes them everything.
you’re so cruel
Getting Out: I’m leaving Vancouver for a new job I landed in Seattle
great post Getting Out, a lot of insight. The man who posts as “The Greatest Place on Earth” doesn’t have your options. He drools.
#115 dd on 02.12.11 at 1:44 pm
7 years of schooling and the Dr. are no smarter than the general population (when it comes to real estate).
Actually Doctors are stereotypically less smart than the general population when it comes to finances. They are frequently the target of what is know as “Dumb Dr Deals” where a fool and his (substantial) money is invariably parted!
Hot Chocolate,
I am born and brought up in Canada and of the same indian ethnicity as you. I’ve been lucky to recognize your types. Your probably from some crappy indian city like Mumbai or Delhi. Your parents probably had alot of money and you never really did an honest days work before you came to Canada, had servants to do all your Laundry and cleaning. Had parents get you in some exclusive private schools. Then you came to Canada because you thought you would thrive here.
Sorry to burst your BUBBLE , but when somebody like you says that they are fair and have a slight accent, then that means their accent is pretty funny and your as dark as most of the other indians here. You lack common sense and think you should have the privledge to immigrate to canada but others should not. (typical delusional egotistical personality displayed)
You won’t score any “brownie” points because regular Canadians laugh at you and have no respect for you. They see you as an asskisser and most people just treat your types as they would toilet paper.
Too bad you didn’t come in the 1980s during the height of paki bashing, you could have tried to make similar comments to the post #196 while you were getting a beating. IF it weren’t for those “ghetto dwellers” in brampton you would have gotten the attitude adjustment from those you want to asskiss.
Also most of your types contribute alot less diversification of the Canadian economy. Tradespeople like welders, carpenters, and other skilled tradesmen contribute more to the Canadian economy then your generic skills. You probably work in some call centre and call your phone and chair an office to your friends.
Change your name to White Chocolate, the name would reflect you more. (white chocolate isn’t even really chocolate).
“Hot chololate on 02.12.11 at 10:27 pm
I’m with “The American” on this one
I’m an Indian immigrant in Canada, but I barely have an accent, pretty fair skinned, well kept and don’t pass as an Indian, so life is good, but it does suck for a lot of Indians here.
Hi #172 Nostradamus, re: You mentioned me.
I just wrote you a bunch more good info. on “it”, but …
The Calgary vote might be worth noting…
Good for them!
Maybe some how, home prices and sales numbers their will be affected in a positive light after “it” stops.
But after a few edits and reflection, that’s all.
At #256: You are using a State’s policy vs. that of of a NATIONAL policy of Canada. Yes, it is deplorable to think you will allow legal citizenship if one can BUY his/her way into your country to gain legal citizenship. Our policies are, of course, not perfect. However, we do have DUE PROCESS to permit legal aliens into our country. Illegal aliens get past, yes, but we do not condone it. Canada condones most anyone who can anti up the cash. Sad sad sad.
At #256: BrianT, if the U.S. had such a lackadaisical policy to allow anyone to buy his/her way into our country, most of those Chinese buyers in Canada would be here now. They’re constantly knocking on our doors. Instead, we prefer quality of an individual and their WANTING to be part of the U.S. as opposed to seeking a quick and easy buck. Pathetic.
#252Pat-I have yet to meet one person who has lived in Toronto and has the complaint that the place does not have enough cultural and ethnic diversity. I have only spent a few weeks in SF but the city certainly did not appear to be nearly as culturally diverse as Toronto.
Timing is Everything: No, the dumb doc was years ago. Funny, he would overpay for everything. His first mistake was driving up in the friggen Lexus..lol He looked rich but was deep in debt. Every luxury vehicle he owned was on lease with little or no money down. Poor guy, feel bad for him.
I got back with my bf and he is selling his house..it was excruciating but I finally convinced him. I’m praying for an offer…take the money and run!
#220 Morry
Have you read any of this blog in the last year? I’m certainly not going to rehash all the tired old facts and arguments, just for your benefit. You have fingers, and Google is free. Sorry if that is inane or asinine. Yes, there is a lot of easy and cheap credit in Canada. Yes, lots of properties were bought purely for speculative reasons, because it’s not like they pay for themselves, do they? These are facts. You don’t have to take my word for it. You can find out for yourself.
Somerville’s paycheck comes from the real estate industry. He talks his book. It may be hard for you to believe, but this is not the first time I read a quote from him.
Garth, you forgot the $1000 for a lawyer to do the paperwork, because for some reason the well paid “full service” real estate professionals are not qualified to do it.
–
Afternoon all. A delightful FrozeChokenagan day here in K-Car town!
Trouble in Thailand and Ivory Coast interference.
Mubarak Two “As a man soweth, that shall he also reap.”
The Love of Power and money has taken us to where we are now, which is why things will change, whether anyone likes or not. 29:55 clip.
Mubarak An interesting, and very obvious reason for his convenient departure.
Common Perimeter “We intend to work together in cooperation and partnership to develop, implement, manage, and monitor security initiatives, standards, and practices to fulfill our vision,” the document notes, without a reference to the legislatures of either nation.” We’re caged animals under the NWO. Almost time for a revolution here.
Swiss cantons (states) have rejected a law tightening gun regulations. Seems to be working, as there is not much crime there.
Egypt “I commented on my radio show that Suleiman did not look happy when he announced Mubarak was gone. He did not look like a man who just got the top job. He looked like a man who had just realized he was an impotent figurehead.” wrh.com.
Chile ‘quakes “This is the same area that generated last year’s 8.8 quake and tsunami (or) ripple.” wrh.com.
Dominoes “The uprising did not start in Tunisia. It started in Iceland when people tired of being looted fired their government and threw the bankers in prison! Since then the protests have spread across Europe and only now are hitting the Middle East, nor will they stop there!” wrh.com. Add to uprisings a change in cycles and the world is akin to Yellowstone, ready to vent its fury .
The Fiat Kilogram? “The Founders, many of whom promptly went into the Congress, turned around and regulated the value of the dollar at 371 ¼ grains of pure silver.”
Upper Case as opposed to lower case. For passwords and the like.
Another reason why this continent is becoming a welfare country.
There’s a new St Hubs on St Jean near Pierrefonds.
———-
I was talking about the Vaudreuil line. The last time I took the Roxboro train was in high school just to bump into the Brébeuf guys!
There’s been a St-Hub there since I was in high school. I guess you mean new as in refurbished?
Seattle, give me a break … try driving to Florida.
Lots of talk about Seattle. Next week I’ll be flying out to the Emerald city.
Maybe I’ll be able to join the conversation.
A stacking washer-dryer can be installed in the upstairs master bedroom walk-in closet if desired. from the link by #236 daystar on 02.13.11 at 1:03 pm
why would anyone want a washer/dryer in the walk in closet? Are people too lazy to walk a laundry hamper down a flight of stairs?
Multiculturalism has never worked, ever, because cultures (not races, *cultures*) always wish to hang around their own. Here in Toronto we have:
Little Italy, Chinatown, Greektown, Little Portugal, Little India, and so on. Maybe our nanny state government should force them into dismantling their blatent displays of xenophobia and just shop at Wal-mart like everyone else?
Tear down those Chinese signs in Chinatown, and replace them with Federally compliant French/English versions! As if.
Just think, we cannot live without the government instructing us how.
#218 Timing is Everything on 02.13.11 at 2:32 am
#178 OttawaMike – said “Garth even thinks Harley Davidson builds excellent motorcycles and I use motorcycles and Harley together very loosely in that sentence.”
Well, as they say…’Ride ‘em for an hour, fix ‘em for an hour.”
Sir/Madam Moderator…Garth’s asleep, please sneak this passed….Thanks.
I heard that. — Garth
……………
A recent survey shows that 95% of the Harleys that have been manufactured since ’95 are still on the road………..
The other 5% made it home :-) Comment from my DH who has 2 old BMW bikes. :-)
First!……..doh!
#222 Jimmy on 02.13.11 at 5:01 am
Remember the good old days; when News was News and Ads were Ads.
It’s hard to believe people pay money to have a ‘Newspaper’ thats 80% advertising delivered to their door!
…………….
I stopped subscribing to our local paper years ago. I read MSM and non-MSM online daily.
#222 Jimmy on 02.13.11 at 5:01 am
Remember the good old days; when News was News and Ads were Ads.
It’s hard to believe people pay money to have a ‘Newspaper’ thats 80% advertising delivered to their door!
………….
Forgot to add that we receive all the adverts in a plastic bag – a bundle – the day after they appear with the the local paper.
So, this is a new danger for many homeowners. As the market declines further, and especially as the realization hits the media and the citizenry, many housing markets across the country will become astonishingly illiquid. As sellers outnumber buyers by a wide margin, there’ll be only one overriding factor when it comes to bailing out – price.-Garth
Mass media are media forms designed to reach the largest audience possible. They include television, movies, radio, newspapers, magazines, books, records, video games and the internet. Many studies have been conducted in the past century to measure the effects of mass media on the population in order to discover the best techniques to influence it. From those studies emerged the science of Communications, which is used in marketing, public relations and politics. Mass communication is a necessary tool the insure the functionality of a large democracy; it is also a necessary tool for a dictatorship. It all depends on its usage. Is it any wonder why the majority have faith in what is not necessarily good for them but what they are led to believe. People will be informed that buying real estate now is a bad move when the establishment is ready to fill them in
“The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.
We are governed, our minds are moulded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society.
Our invisible governors are, in many cases, unaware of the identity of their fellow members in the inner cabinet.”
– Edward Bernays, Propaganda.. Nephew of Sigmund Freud
It is no accident beginning in our grade school years we are taught nothing of value when it comes to finance, economics, where money comes from and who controls it. We are not taught business and economic cycles as they relate to real estate. We are only fed information that keeps us in the dark to become good little produces and consumers. Why else would the average college graduate think it is a good idea to put 5% down on a $500,000 40 year mortgage at this point in time ?
MLA Sultan investigates child “poverty” in West Van:
http://www.nsnews.com/business/Sultan+finds+childhood+poverty+exists/4273451/story.html
Sounds more like tax evasion. Daddy manages the factory in China, vastly under-declares his income, and leaves his family in the McMansion here. Investor-class immigration is a big mistake.
#264 sue
Good luck…You should get in (or out in this case) just under the wire. Hopefully BF’ name is ‘Jack’
Moneta: I guess you mean new as in refurbished?
yeah refurbished
“If I wanted to sell it, which I don’t,” he says, “I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this.”
Glad you’re not my doctor.
…and when you say doctor, I hope you are a vet or a shrink where you can cause very little harm.
BTW:
You may want to try using the grape sometimes….especially if you are going to go around calling yourself a doctor.
Holy Flipper batman…
http://www.bclocalnews.com/richmond_southdelta
Imagine Jim Davis’ surprise when he learned his home was again being offered for sale even before the deal he’d signed in December had passed its completion date.
After Davis’ mother passed away last year, he and his brother inherited her Jesmond Avenue split-level house in desirable West Richmond.
They sold the property to a man who claimed he was going to build his dream home for his wife and child.
But last Friday, a phone call from a realtor alerted Davis to the fact that the buyer was actually trying to flip his property for a $100,000 profit, one of many such transactions currently underway in Richmond’s white-hot real estate market.
The Review was recently contacted by two realtors who were concerned about the unusual practice, the likes of which hasn’t been seen in Richmond since the late 1980s.
New Land, and owner Ze Yu Wu, has spammed a list of the properties to local realtors: 9711 Stilmond Rd., 3460 Raymond Ave., 3531 Jesmond Ave., 8720 Kelmore Rd., 10740 Reynold Dr., 10100 Bamberton Dr., 9860 Berry Rd., 8360 Lunen Rd., 6391 Mara Cres. The Review was unable to reach Wu for comment.
A random thought (ok, maybe not so random), but where is DSP to show us all his St Louis Fed charts pointing to rampant deflation? The only deflation in sight continues to be one of purchasing power, as is now becoming amply evident.
#273 Live Within Your Means
Too funny! Haaaa!
—————————————————-
The cheapest ‘house’ in Victoria…
http://tinyurl.com/4fedslp
And don’t forget to check out Shaunna…Er, Umm Shauna’s website for all the details.
http://www.shaunnajones.com/
Don’t ask why I know this, but the Valentine’s Day Property Virgins marathon is brought to you by KY Jelly. The jokes make themselves.
#272-The absurd thing is that the only way you can hear the French language spoken in Toronto is to contact the government-you can hear every other language walking down the sidewalk.
218 Timing is Everything [especially on a harley..]
ha I know a couple of harley insults myself..
however i disagree with the one you got off.
harley HAS advanced. they are quite reliable these days.
overweight ,and kinda slow compared to other bikes but
the clutch no longer needs a gorilla grip to engage and they dont leak oil.
hell bells lad the sportster has a five speed.
and smooth in comparison to say a stroked shovelhead.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ua8srbD464
and you can use ’em as leafblowers too…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9rOODFJuUE&feature=related
@ #286 Timing is Everything
Shaunna’s shy today…She is ‘blocking’ her web site…
But here is a random image from her site…
http://www.shaunnajones.com/images/shaunna_home.png
262 American
What I consider pathetic is another means of a foreigner becoming an American you overlooked. All you have to do is agree to join up in the killing of Muslim terrorists (mostly women and children) overseas for a few years. This promotes a high quality citizenship class, not like the ones who come here seeking to make a quick and easy buck.
Further to the link @206 I’ve found both stascan national figures and Bureau of Labour Stats figures. On the BLS site it is easy to pick a state (on the left) then a city (at the bottom). I’ve gone thru a few cities comparing the jobs attributed to manfacturing. It doesnt seem to
exceed about 10% – about the same as the national figure for Canada.
http://www.statcan.gc.ca/subjects-sujets/labour-travail/lfs-epa/lfs-epa-eng.pdf
http://www.bls.gov/eag/eag.or_portland_msa.htm
In Calgary, a doctor making $400,000 a year bought a $750,000 house two years ago and pumped $150,000 into renos. He put down 10%, mortgaged the rest and stuck the home improvements on his line. Total house debt, he told me, is now north of $800,000 – and the place has just been assessed at $639,000. “If I wanted to sell it, which I don’t,” he says, “I’d be suing the realtor who got me into this.”
Wouldn’t this be a case of ‘Buyer Beware’? The purchase of this house was his choice….
Come on….300!!!
Jarry Street,
your attack at #259 was not relevant to anything Chocolate said at #196, but it sure was malicious.
My bank keeps offering me 2.5% for a 5 year term deposit – at the exact same time the TD has come out and said interest rates will increase by 1-3 % by 2012 – and that is their stated amount! Bunch of scum [email protected]>k$
I still recall the headline “Canada avoids recession”. Reading the news in this country is never a passive pastime.
#278 TheBigLebowski on 02.13.11 at 5:59 pm
What school did you go to? Now I know why GT calls you The Big Lobotomy.
Has anyone tried out Phillips Hager and North?
not 1st
@#273 Live Between…….
“….A recent survey shows that 95% of the Harleys that have been manufactured since ’95 are still on the road………..”
Yeah, their still on the road, BROKEN DOWN.
bwahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
–
#260 GregW, Oakville — Hi Greg — good to see you’re still around; keep on truckin’!
#278 TheBigLebowski — “. . . constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.”
Similar to a shadow cabinet, e.g. those behind the CPC (big biz — see link further on) who orchestrated selling out Canada to the US, so the NAU / SPP can be bought in for our ‘protection’ (from what, I don’t know — the only terrorists I know of run govts. and thus, countries).
In this case, non-violent resistance (a la Gandhi), failure to comply with the rules and regs. and / or an overall revolution will happen, as in Europe and the ME.
#285 Devore — “. . . where is DSP to show us all his St Louis Fed charts pointing to rampant deflation?”
As far as I know, DSP is on a time-out of his / her own choice, but for how long no one knows.
There is a reason for deflation (withdrawal of money — find out who is withdrawing the money), but reasons for in- and stagflation are unclear.
*
Thundersnow Climate is changing. How mahhvellouss! It can be called Climate Change from this point hencefifth!
Nuke One and Nuke Two. New Madrid Fault line acting up?
Stop The Presses! Egypt’s troubles may just have started.
Losing Bees — lose food, thus prices rise and quantities are smaller.
Obama Total does not include unfunded liabilities; suggest passing the buck to Sarah Clinton.
Wal Mart and others like them are responsible for the Harper – Obama write-off of Canada. Another point is Engineered Collapse. Economy Variation of what is taking place now.
Stagnate Or Die Evidently, we don’t have any choice with either option.
Nichols Kristoff Anyone heard of him? Seems to know how to overthrow govts. May be connected with Obama’s Shock Doctrine. Plus History rhymes and repeats, a double-edged sword. After the Pentagon mentioned this to dubya, HAARP appears to have gone into overdrive.
!!! LAST !!!
USA, Iceland, Ireland,
well Canada, you can’t say you weren’t warned…
THE AMERICAN
A few years ago at my gym I was speaking to a Romanian Engineer who came to Canada because apparently Canada needed Engineer’s. I am not sure if he bought himself in or there wa a job waiting for him. Anyway, he said most Romanians when they come prefer the U.S. More money – less taxes etc. etc. Canada is just a stop gap. They look for jobs in the US.
I was just surfing tonight and I came across this interesting article on Yahoo news about the most expensive home sold in Toronto. Yikes, looks like even the rich are getting the message: get out of illiquid assets.
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/dailybrew/most-expensive-homes-sale-canada-20110211-085201-837.html
Hey Moneta, at #270: When you get to Seattle, watch out for flash mobs. They’re crazy around there. Haha, just kidding. It is a lot of fun if/when you get caught in one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5PyIVVKoWU&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iITUxFo9hB4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLVVFxAdta4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjhNvAZKgfw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8c7DhwsMQCs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4CqTV9eEkI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7TI-AJi2O8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPTd8MgAeqI
Won’t it be interesting to see what Canada looks like in 3 years?
and, with the legalization of pot come to different states, I predict, very soon (save on prisons, court costs, probation costs, welfare for mothers), what will that do to the price of pot in Vancouver? I’d say you’ll see it legalized in Canada, and that will see the pot business bottom out.
Let’s see, a city that is on top of the world because it is the drug capital of Canada, has the most Chinese immigrants, has the highest priced houses, rains the most, has the most theft, the most addicts, doesn’t have industry. Wow, sounds like a recipe for long term success to me…
At #291: Bridgepigeon, if you choose to simplify the matter to a level that low, then there is no reasoning with you. Joining U.S. armed forces does NOT ensure citizenship, nor is it used as a way to coax those into citizenship. Any qualified individual, even non-citizens, may join U.S. armed forces. However, it does not permit citizenship. Your information is inaccurate and misleading. I am not an advocate of the military and its recent actions.