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  #1601  
Old Posted Jun 3, 2020, 7:59 PM
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csbvan csbvan is offline
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Given the economic reopening halfway through May, I am surprised by these numbers. Last year, May sales were 44% higher than April, in 2018 it was about 10%, and in 2017 it was 23%. In other words, this month-over-month change looks a lot like what you would expect without a pandemic.
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  #1602  
Old Posted Jun 3, 2020, 8:15 PM
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Originally Posted by CanSpice View Post
Right, so the May market highlights are out. misher said that halfway through May sales of condos were increasing from 22/day for the first week to 37/day for the second week. This means that in the first two weeks of May there were 413 sales (22/day * 7 + 37/day * 7).

REBGV said there were 653 sales in May, so that means that if misher was right then the last two weeks of May there were 240 sales or roughly 17 a day (assuming May is made up of 4 weeks, which it isn't). (note that I flippantly said that "you could just as easily say sales have dropped to 17/day" and it turns out I wasn't far from the truth)

May averaged 21 sales per day, lower than both the 22/day and 37/day misher stated.

And rofina, I'd like to see your take on this given you said your observations matched with what misher was saying. It looks like your observations didn't really match with what the actual numbers are, unless there was a sudden and sustained 50% drop in sales for the last half of May.
I think I was told last week was up to 50-a-day
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  #1603  
Old Posted Jun 4, 2020, 6:24 AM
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Originally Posted by whatnext View Post
So is it better to be only down 44% from a dismal previous year or up 36% from the previous plague month?
Unless you're a real estate agent, those numbers don't mean a whole lot for the average Vancouverite.

The Straight and the Sun agree on one thing, housing prices have not gone down and in fact continue to increase 1.4% over 3 months and 2.9% YOY. Seems like COVID is another failed bubble popping prophecy that is failing to come true.

People still want to buy houses here (though perhaps fewer) but now there's even fewer on the market so prices are just going to keep on increasing. Isn't this what people on this forum have been complaining about for a while? Housing in Vancouver is supply constrained, not demand constrained.
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  #1604  
Old Posted Jun 4, 2020, 2:37 PM
WarrenC12 WarrenC12 is offline
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Way too premature to call anything. Millions of people are out of jobs, the impact of that on housing has hardly started.

Foreclosures will happen, downsizing will happen, kids will move back in with parents, etc. We've already seen the impact start here in the rental market, which adapts a lot faster.
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  #1605  
Old Posted Jun 4, 2020, 4:19 PM
VarBreStr18 VarBreStr18 is offline
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Originally Posted by chowhou View Post
Unless you're a real estate agent, those numbers don't mean a whole lot for the average Vancouverite.

The Straight and the Sun agree on one thing, housing prices have not gone down and in fact continue to increase 1.4% over 3 months and 2.9% YOY. Seems like COVID is another failed bubble popping prophecy that is failing to come true.

People still want to buy houses here (though perhaps fewer) but now there's even fewer on the market so prices are just going to keep on increasing. Isn't this what people on this forum have been complaining about for a while? Housing in Vancouver is supply constrained, not demand constrained.
Think this is a case between the "haves" and the "have not s".The "haves" have been sitting on the side line watching the market, and this is the time to act... hence explains the slight uptakes. As to the have nots, they cannot afford it to begin with, now can even less afford it. Some of those "have nots" who barely hang on their mortgage payments may indeed forced to off load in the coming months. Though I do not have statistics, there are more assignment sales at a loss from presales bought a few years ago.
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  #1606  
Old Posted Jun 4, 2020, 4:38 PM
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Prices follow sales, usually by months. If prices are to be impacted by COVID and the economic crisis we are now in, then it will show up later in the summer. That prices are a lagging indicator is fairly basic.
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  #1607  
Old Posted Jun 4, 2020, 5:34 PM
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Originally Posted by CanSpice View Post
Right, so the May market highlights are out. misher said that halfway through May sales of condos were increasing from 22/day for the first week to 37/day for the second week. This means that in the first two weeks of May there were 413 sales (22/day * 7 + 37/day * 7).

REBGV said there were 653 sales in May, so that means that if misher was right then the last two weeks of May there were 240 sales or roughly 17 a day (assuming May is made up of 4 weeks, which it isn't). (note that I flippantly said that "you could just as easily say sales have dropped to 17/day" and it turns out I wasn't far from the truth)

May averaged 21 sales per day, lower than both the 22/day and 37/day misher stated.

And rofina, I'd like to see your take on this given you said your observations matched with what misher was saying. It looks like your observations didn't really match with what the actual numbers are, unless there was a sudden and sustained 50% drop in sales for the last half of May.
I casually follow a few realtors that post daily stats for my own interest in seeing what direction the market is taking.

My take on it? I didn't look closely enough. I did see an increase in sales, and not much for listings, which is really as far as I got.

Big picture - this year is a wash. I'm more interested in spring 2021, I think that will give a much better perspective, as the dust would have settled on some of the larger questions we have surround health of the economy and job market.

I think 2020 was on track to be very surprisingly bullish, the increases in sales and prices YoY was starting to look like a banner year for Van RE, coming out of a multi year correction.

Factors were obviously leading the market in that direction, if those factors remain or not in a post Covid world remains to be seen.

Its a really interesting time - despite the pandemic its not too difficult to make a very bullish case and a very bearish case;

Bear - Economy, job loss, pandemic. Need I say more?
Bull - Unprecedented liquidity. Zero rates. Flight to safety. Low CAD.

Put it this way - its about as likely that Van RE turn bullish right now as it is for the DOW to be trading at over 26,000, and yet here we are.
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  #1608  
Old Posted Jun 4, 2020, 5:51 PM
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It's impossible to predict what the long term impact will be. Data on sales of houses are different from sales of condos. There are few houses being put on the market at the moment, so prices haven't dropped much recently, but if you bought a house in the fall of 2017, it's worth about 10% less today than you paid. That's still better than a year ago - when you would have been 13% underwater. Sales in April were still the lowest for that month in the past 20 years.

Condo prices are down less, but more condos have been coming to market in recent weeks - not least because of former short-term rentals. Prices have dropped from the peak (if you look at average dollars per square foot), but not by much yet.

The big unknowns are what will happen in the fall. If immigration doesn't pick up again for a while, while all the current construction gets completed, there will be a lot more units completing with no obvious occupants wanting them.

On the finance side, it looks as if CMHC are going to make it harder (or more expensive) to get a mortgage, and with 15% of mortgages deferred, there are clearly a bunch of owners who are going to struggle if their jobs don't reappear.

Those all suggest downward pressure on prices for a while - but those sorts of prediction have been made before, and been wrong.
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  #1609  
Old Posted Jun 4, 2020, 9:08 PM
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A bit more tightening by CMHC in order to reduce risky mortgages:

Quote:
CMHC tightens mortgage rules amid downturn

Canada’s housing agency is tightening rules to make it more difficult for higher-risk borrowers to qualify for mortgage insurance.

As of July 1, homebuyers will need to have a higher credit score to qualify for default insurance, Canada Mortgage & Housing Corp. said Thursday in Ottawa. In addition, a borrower’s maximum gross debt service ratio -- the share of income that goes toward paying all housing costs, including mortgage, taxes and heat -- can’t exceed 35 per cent, down from 39 per cent previously.

The agency also said it would work to curb the practice of borrowing money for down payments. In addition, it suspended refinancing for multi-unit mortgage insurance except when the funds are used for repairs or reinvestment in housing.

...
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  #1610  
Old Posted Jul 2, 2020, 11:54 PM
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Vancouver pre-sales fall 50% and new condo launches are down 75% over last year:

New condo sales, starts plummet in Metro Vancouver
Only two new condominium projects with 200 units launched in the six weeks ending May 15, down 75 per cent from the same period in 2019
By Frank O'Brien, Western Investor | July 2, 2020

A pandemic panic may be settling into Metro Vancouver’s once robust condominium market, at least for the short-term. Presales of new condo units are down 50 per cent and new product launches had plunged 75 per cent as of mid-May, industry reports say.

Some buyers of pre-sale condos are now trying to unload their investment on Craigslist before the building opens.

According to the latest results from Altus Group’s Condominium Apartment Monitor, between the beginning of April and the middle of May, only two new condominium apartment projects launched in Metro Vancouver, with a total of just over 200 new units, down by almost 75 per cent from the same period in 2019....


https://biv.com/article/2020/07/new-...etro-vancouver
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  #1611  
Old Posted Jul 3, 2020, 4:02 PM
rofina rofina is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by whatnext View Post
Vancouver pre-sales fall 50% and new condo launches are down 75% over last year:

New condo sales, starts plummet in Metro Vancouver
Only two new condominium projects with 200 units launched in the six weeks ending May 15, down 75 per cent from the same period in 2019
By Frank O'Brien, Western Investor | July 2, 2020

A pandemic panic may be settling into Metro Vancouver’s once robust condominium market, at least for the short-term. Presales of new condo units are down 50 per cent and new product launches had plunged 75 per cent as of mid-May, industry reports say.

Some buyers of pre-sale condos are now trying to unload their investment on Craigslist before the building opens.

According to the latest results from Altus Group’s Condominium Apartment Monitor, between the beginning of April and the middle of May, only two new condominium apartment projects launched in Metro Vancouver, with a total of just over 200 new units, down by almost 75 per cent from the same period in 2019....


https://biv.com/article/2020/07/new-...etro-vancouver

Both those figures, wow.

75% reduction in new units is pretty impressive. That's going to have an impact on supply, no doubt.
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  #1612  
Old Posted Jul 3, 2020, 5:17 PM
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Mixed messages on the housing resale market in June. 15% more sales than last year, and 64% more than last month sounds good, until you realize that June 2019 had the worst sales numbers for that month in 20 years. Overall sales were still 21% below the ten year average. According to Steve Saretsky, some houses were getting multiple offers, and selling over asking, while condos are sticking on the market.

So in the REBGV area the 'pent up demand' and 'the lowest mortgage rate in years' doesn't seem to be translating into a boom in housing resales, just a very slightly better first six months than last year.
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  #1613  
Old Posted Jul 3, 2020, 6:28 PM
VarBreStr18 VarBreStr18 is offline
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Situation about to change after July 1st due to implementation of China security law in Hong Kong. 300,000 Hong Kong'ers with Canadian passport are coming back to Canada.
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  #1614  
Old Posted Jul 6, 2020, 12:04 AM
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Homebuyers pulling the trigger in the Fraser Valley and beyond

I kind of figured the Fraser Valley will see a pump due to covid19 as people want to stay away from urban centres. But this is decent news for the GVRD as quoted from the article.

Quote:
Home sales rebounded by more than 64 per cent in June compared to May in Greater Vancouver, though sales volume was about 20 per cent below the ten-year average.

Steep price declines predicted by some pundits failed to materialize despite the disruption caused by COVID-19.

“Last summer home prices bottomed out after a three-year decline and since then they have levelled out,” said Colette Gerber, president of the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver. “As inventory has come in, we’ve been in a balanced market, so prices are not going to go down.”
I honestly don't see the real estate crash that some here are wishing for. I do think there needs to be tempered expectations and reaching a balance. Here is hoping we have reached this balance and continue to strengthen our local economies.
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  #1615  
Old Posted Jul 6, 2020, 12:45 AM
dreambrother808 dreambrother808 is offline
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Originally Posted by NetMapel View Post
I kind of figured the Fraser Valley will see a pump due to covid19 as people want to stay away from urban centres. But this is decent news for the GVRD as quoted from the article.
I’ve heard some anecdotal evidence that some food service locations are actually seeing sales growth in the suburbs, due to people working from home and not commuting into downtown where sales are being the most negatively affected. Downtown was obviously more dependent on tourism as well.

PC is pretty empty white Metrotown is full of people when I’ve been there.
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  #1616  
Old Posted Jul 6, 2020, 4:17 PM
rofina rofina is offline
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Originally Posted by dreambrother808 View Post
I’ve heard some anecdotal evidence that some food service locations are actually seeing sales growth in the suburbs, due to people working from home and not commuting into downtown where sales are being the most negatively affected. Downtown was obviously more dependent on tourism as well.

PC is pretty empty white Metrotown is full of people when I’ve been there.
Downtown is still emptiest I have seen it in years.

I don't think anyone had a clue at the amount of impact tourism had one the DT peninsula.

I became a bit more aware of this when I was biking the seawall maybe 3-4 years ago and realized the amount of tourists outnumbered the amount of locals.
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  #1617  
Old Posted Jul 6, 2020, 7:45 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dreambrother808 View Post
I’ve heard some anecdotal evidence that some food service locations are actually seeing sales growth in the suburbs, due to people working from home and not commuting into downtown where sales are being the most negatively affected. Downtown was obviously more dependent on tourism as well.

PC is pretty empty white Metrotown is full of people when I’ve been there.
First guess: the suburbs are more centralized and less walkable.
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  #1618  
Old Posted Jul 8, 2020, 10:15 AM
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Originally Posted by rofina View Post
Downtown is still emptiest I have seen it in years.

I don't think anyone had a clue at the amount of impact tourism had one the DT peninsula.

I became a bit more aware of this when I was biking the seawall maybe 3-4 years ago and realized the amount of tourists outnumbered the amount of locals.
So true. In many areas the homeless outnumber other residents on the streets these days. Disorderliness and the smell of urine aren't going to attract locals to come hang out downtown. Stripping away the tourists, we are now seeing what the real downtown is like, and it's not pleasant.
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  #1619  
Old Posted Jul 8, 2020, 11:57 PM
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Originally Posted by dreambrother808 View Post
PC is pretty empty white Metrotown is full of people when I’ve been there.
I've been into the office (TD Tower) quite a bit, but haven't gone into the mall (but then again, I didn't much before, either).

The sidewalks are getting busier though.
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  #1620  
Old Posted Jul 9, 2020, 3:20 PM
WarrenC12 WarrenC12 is offline
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Originally Posted by officedweller View Post
I've been into the office (TD Tower) quite a bit, but haven't gone into the mall (but then again, I didn't much before, either).

The sidewalks are getting busier though.
West Broadway feels back to normal.
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