More international coverage for our bubble: ‘Where The Housing Bubble Lives On’, National Public Radio blog, at npr.org 22 Apr 2011, featuring this recent Vancouver westside sale from the G&M -
2466 WEST 14TH AVE., VANCOUVER
ASKING PRICE $1,895,000
SELLING PRICE $2.55-million
PREVIOUS SELLING PRICE $531,000 (1996)
DAYS ON THE MARKET eleven
[npr's comment]: “Sure, the pool slide is awesome. But would you pay $2.55 million to live here?”
From the reader/listener comments that followed:
“I’m Canadian, and I have lived in several parts of Canada. I currently reside in Burnaby, a suburb of Vancouver. To characterize the Canadian housing market by the prices in West Vancouver is like estimating national home fire rates based on Malibu. You can get a really nice townhouse in Toronto for money that wouldn’t buy you a vacant lot in Van., so yes, the prices on W. coast are ridiculous. Since the housing market in the USA still is toxic, if you are in Asia and have money to invest in N. America real estate, Canada is the only choice. The Vancouver area is attractive due to publicity from Olympics, a large asian pop’n, mild climate, min. from USA/Canada border, easy to get back to Asia.” – Chris Parker
“I live in New Westminster, a suburb of Vancouver. Vancouver has the most expensive (read: insane) housing prices in Canada; my wife and I bought a house here in 2006 because it was relatively affordable. My guess was that the bubble would burst after the Olympics were over in 2010…I was wrong.
The case of the house flipping in 11 days is an extreme one, but the rise in prices overall has been pretty steady. We’ve watched prices rise in our neighbourhood, and I don’t think we could afford to buy a house now…we did well to buy when we did.
I do worry about the bubble bursting. As you say, there is always an explanation of why this time is different, and I don’t find those stories convincing. I hope we’ll come out of it okay: our plans are to be here for a long time, and we’re in a nice neighbourhood close to schools and other amenities. I hope that will cushion the blow for us.” – Hugh Brown
This is impressive. This is irrefutable evidence that Vancouver is a world class city, to have NPR dedicate a blog post to it. All you high rolling motherfuckers dropping 800k mortgages pay some respect to NPR and support your local US public radio station, which in our case would be KUOW and KEXP (my personal favorite).
What are you smoking ? !!!
Vancouverites are amazing… We’re so far behind the curve of worldwide real estate prices reverting back to the mean, that we don’t even believe “the curve” exists anymore…
Everything is starting at us in the face… higher interest rates baked in the cake, severe overvaluation and our largest trading partner still down for the count… and yet we persist in this mad delusion that “we’re different” here…
Don’t be fooled by the blue sky and pristine reflections in the water. Anyone who owns a pool in Vancouver knows the following: it’s only useful for 3 months of the year, and then only useful if you have kids between the ages of 4 and 18. The rest of the time you might as well infill it with sand for all the good it does. In that neighbourhood, in that city, that’s a massive waste of space; imagine the heirlooms you could grow there instead!
Looks like we have a replay of Hong Kong 1997, perhaps on steroids this time. Interesting to see if the story will have a different ending.
Other than fueling a RE bubble and its spin-offs, are there any long term benefits to Canada derived from HAM? Perhaps the government should set explicit requirements (not just through taxation) for any hot-whatever-money (i.e. passport buying money) ‘invested’ to be channeled specifically towards upgrading our hospitals, schools and other infrastructure so everyone, including immigrants, will benefit.
http://china.globaltimes.cn/society/2011-04/647415.html
“The 2011 Private Wealth Report, published by China Merchants Bank and business consulting firm Bain & Company, showed that the number of high net worth individuals (HNWIs) in China exceeded 500,000 in 2010, 19 percent more than in 2009.
According to the study, those who have at least 10 million yuan ($1.53 million) worth of individual assets (financial assets, not including their primary residence) available for investment are defined as HNWIs.
Among that group, nearly 60 percent are either considering emigration through investment overseas or are already finalizing the process.
Among those with at least 100 million yuan in individual investment assets, 27 percent have already emigrated, and 47 percent are considering leaving China.” …
“A report by the China Youth Daily pointed out that, taking into account education and pensions, feelings of insecurity are the major factor prodding rich people to emigrate.
Despite their huge wealth, many of them rely heavily on connections with authorities, but an administrative monopoly in China often puts them in a disadvantageous position in the market. Meanwhile, their connections with authorities make them easy victims of corruption charges and become targets of the public, the newspaper said.”
“are there any long term benefits to Canada derived from HAM”
Other than the money, which by all accounts is substantial, it can be successfully argued that the answer is maybe.
I hate ham the same as the next guy but dude’s gotta eat.
For a bit I was very confused. Planet Money (the NPR econ program) and VREAA are two of my top blogs on Google Reader. I thought I had opened Planet Money, the post looked like it came from VREAA…
About time. Vancouver is an interesting case study, and Planet Money lives on interesting case studies.
The program is excellent, btw. Most economics reporting turns into business boosterism or apocalyptic fearmongering. Planet Money sounds like a bunch of students who are simply fascinated by this whole economy thing, they manage to explain it in a fascinating and informative way.