Leith van Onselen presents an analysis of total housing value relative to GDP for current and prior bubbles in Japan, HK, USA, Australia, NZ and UK [seekingalpha.com 3 Nov 2010]. He expresses hope to be able to include Canadian figures. I can’t recall if I’ve ever seen an estimation of the total value of residential RE here. What are the figures for Canada? Help him out if you can, anybody. (And share with us here).
UPDATE: I have just discovered that Leith has already discovered the Canadian numbers: Total Value of Residential RE/GDP = 1.8 (National number). He hypothesizes that this relatively low number is the result of the concentration of housing overvaluation to four centres (Vancouver, Victoria, Montreal and Toronto) with “relatively affordable housing elsewhere”. He has analysed the Canadian market at his blog ‘The Unconventional Economist’ earlier this year [6 Sep 2010].
So, now, anybody know the ‘Total Value of Residential RE/GDP’ for BC?
What is the total value of mortgage debt in Canada?
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/canadian-mortgage-debt-tops-1-trillion-for-first-time/article1789172/?cmpid=rss1
Let’s take a stab in the dark:
Average price according to BCREA $480,000
# private dwellings: 1,800,000 (est)
= $864BB total asset at market value
BC GDP in 2008: $165BB
House asset to GDP ratio: 5.23
Wow.
Thanks for the stab in the dark, jesse, we’ll take that 5.23 as a ballpark figure.
Only goes to show that these prices can’t possibly rely on local economic activity to stay at these levels.
Only two explanations: Bubble, or ‘New Monaco’.
My bet is with the Bubble, natch.