[casper]

Went through all of this 20-25 years ago.

Grew up in Vancouver, SFU grad, went to Ottawa, then Saskatoon, then came back but to Victoria.

Vancouver needs more high rises. If there is a market for buying condos, paying taxes and maintenance on them and leaving them empty then we should just build more of them. The strata buildings have engineering studies driving the maintenance plans and usually a property management company managing it. They may be vacant but the buildings are being maintained and paid for by someone overseas. Same for property taxes.

As for living in the city, when I left I wanted to get out of the big city and not spend all that time in grid lock. Today I still feel the same way. When it was time to come back I could have done Vancouver (even with the higher property costs) but transit and the road network makes it tough to get around. The same reason I turned down options of being in Toronto. You just spend a lot of time commuting. For me, I have customers and family in Vancouver, visit regularly but I live on the Island.

So we ended up in a situation when first generation immigrants end up in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal. Second generation families look more closely at other communities in Canada. I don't think that is a particularly bad thing.