“How about an unemployed chef with his unemployed wife and carrying 850k of debt over 2 un-sold properties. They are making payments with a line of credit. He sat down with my wife over coffee and she said he looked really depressed. He is wondering why the media still says the market is balanced when clearly it has collapsed”
- Pat at VREAA 4 Jun 2012 8:35am
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- “My folks find themselves at 65 still owing half the value of their home and recreation property to the bank. After almost 30 years of ownership in the BPOE and a number of boom markets, they have very little to show for it.”
- “Rent for $2,200 a month or buy and have a mortgage of $4,310 per month. Why would anyone buy?”
- “They were talking about two couples they knew who had recently bought a lot and planned to each build a house on it and live as neighbours.”
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- “He’s sold all his properties except his current one, which is now for sale. He explained that the market’s currently in crash mode, worst that he’s ever seen.”
- “One of my old high school buddies finally got her mother to sell the family home in Kitsilano – sold for over $1M, monies realized after debt paid off $185K.”
- “I know someone who just declared bankruptcy because her condo was assessed at $150k and she bought it presale north of $250k in 2005 or 2006.”
- Sturdy, With Views – “Calling Froogle Scott!… Is Dr. Scott ‘In The House’?” [Not In This One, Certainly]
- “She said the market was dead in Victoria and that it would remain so for a very long time. I asked how she knew. Her answer was fascinating and should scare the pants off the real estate crowd.”
- Kits Notes – “I’m pretty sure that this is the first 3+ bedroom property of any type that I’ve seen in the 5 years I’ve lived here that is priced below $700K.”
- “A beautiful Belfast home, in the equivalent of 1st Shaughnessy, bought at their RE peak in 2007 for £3.5 million, has now sold for £800K, almost 80%-off. The market didn’t suffer any significant economic shocks. Rates & unemployment didn’t skyrocket. They didn’t build more land. Sentiment just changed and the prices fell and fell.”
- “Two family members of hers are trapped, underwater, in condos on the East Side.”
- “Interprovincial migration is not saying good things about BC’s economy.”
- Vancouver RE: Not As Expensive Provided You Don’t Think – “It’s clear that our perception of affordability has been coloured by living on a continent where housing is unusually inexpensive.”
- More Undisclosed RE Industry Insiders Publicized As Clients – “In 1995, Allan and Karin Hoegg were mortgage-free. But no more. Today their Vancouver home is a valuable source of income as they plan for full retirement.”
- Rumor that some OV units will be reduced by 20%.
- Downside Weights On The Vancouver RE Market – “One of the older guys (over 60) mention to the guy beside him that he and his wife were thinking about selling their family home, and renting, in order to get some of the money that was locked up in the house.”
- “My buddy was looking to upgrade to a house in the Coquitlam area. With 200k extra for a home, that’s half of lifetime saving between him and his wife.”
- “I was walking in the Fraser neighborhood yesterday, I noticed that the population, on average, seem to be composed of workers. I belong to the top 5 percent in terms of income. Nevertheless, I cannot afford any of the houses for sale in that neighbourhood.”
- “Vancouver is an urban resort whose value mostly resides in its real estate and not much else.”
- “Rogers Communications is expanding into RE; aiming to relaunch website; providing critical data that can help potential buyers assess the value of a property from the comfort of their home computer.”
- I’m only 50 and I can just about retire if I want to, all because of a single simple decision – “When prices rebounded to their former highs, then rocketed another 30% higher to what I considered to be totally unsustainable levels, I decided that only a fool would pass up a second opportunity to harvest such a massive non-taxable capital gain, and in 2011 I sold my place.”
- The Vacant Lot of Versailles, Richmond.
- “I don’t think that most people think things are going to crash, just that there is going to be a slight correction, but it was amazing to me how sentiment has changed, and the fact Vancouver RE is too high was just understood.”
- “The ‘investor’ who purchased our house put it up for sale two months later, in January 1981, but the bubble had burst.”
- For A City To Have That Kind Of Vacancy, It’s Like Cancer – “Downtown, the vacant unit rate is so high that it’s as though there were 35 towers at 20 storeys apiece – all empty.”
- “What’s the worst that can happen? You can’t pay your mortgage, so sell your house! No fear.”
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I see sold signs everywhere here in Coquitlam. As long as they are willing to drop the price, their houses will sell.
On the way up each sale at an inflated price sets a new floor, on the way down it sets the ceiling.
I’m seeing sold signs too, but the data seem to be somewhat incongruent.
Try to feel some sympathy. Every sold sign now is just a marker in time of someone elses future financial loss. They don’t know it yet but it is already too late. They bought at the top and many of those new, fresh, young (and old) buyers will not survive this experience. Losers all. That is guaranteed.
Farmer, you are so right. So many people just have no idea.
In *my* neighbourhood, they keep each “SOLD” sign up for what seems like months.
In my neighbourhood there are two houses side by side with real estate signs. One has a sold sticker on it, the other doesn’t. It’s been that way for almost 4 months.
Totally true! When we bought our place (not in Vancouver, mind you) almost a decade ago, the “SOLD” sign was up for, at most, a couple of days.
Now when I walk around the neighborhood the signs stay up for weeks on end.
It would be interesting to collect data on number of days for SOLD signs to see if it correlates at all to market conditions. In terms of basic psychology, I’d bet that there’d be a negative correlation.
A few of those “Canadian Action Plan” signs were put up around a few buildings in the past few years. They were required to be kept up 90 days from installation of the renovation work.
Are they blaming the media and the market for their own stupidity?
And, yeah, sub-prime does not exist in Canada.
The market isn’t bad yet for sfh in Coquitlam. Very balanced market condition at 4 months of inventory. It’s the westerly part of the lower mainland where we are seeing MOI rising and sales slowing. Some areas like east Van is actually hot. It will be an interesting summer and fall. I am certain the answers will be there for us by then.
yes my area is still hot
In the building we’re in in Fairview (~5 years old) almost 5% of the building is now listed, although as near as I can figure, the last possible sale was probably back in February.
There are 4 houses for sale that I can see from my front yard have been for sale for a few months now. And much more on my usual commute route.
Seems like SFH over 1.2 in East Van are not moving that quickly.
At least with two properties he can list them both and hopefully sell one. He DOES have twice the chance of selling if he prices realistically.
Over at the mortgage broker blogs they keep saying that most HELOC folk use ‘em responsibly. I wonder if this is responsible use or not? If he didn’t have a HELOC but he had cash reserves, would he be throwing his cash at the property, or would that somehow be different in his mind?
They seem to feel pretty comfortable if 80% of mortgage holders are behaving themselves, as if 20% of distressed households won’t bring the market down.
@RC
“If he didn’t have a HELOC but he had cash reserves, would he be throwing his cash at the property, or would that somehow be different in his mind?”
That is the question. In my experience, people tend to be much, much more cautious with money they’ve actually earned, rather than have fall into their lapsfrom the HELOC gods, so to speak.
I know people in my own neighborhood that funded a 3 week trip to Europe for four people through a HELOC this spring. Can you imagine how long it would have taken to *save* for that trip with all the other expenses they have going with a family of four? It would have taken them YEARS. In this instance, though, the HELOC money was akin to winning the lottery, and yes, they were far less prudent with the spending. I doubt that it occurs to them that they are just amortizing that trip to Europe over the next couple of decades or so.
Ya but who wants to hit Ibiza in their 60′s?