DATE

Detached Housing Market
Steve Saretsky -

Detached Housing Market Takes Huge Plunge in August The much anticipated August 31, 5pm cutoff for market stats has come and gone. Before we dive in let me just touch on all the counter arguments quickly. Yes, one month after the tax it is still too early to tell how much of this slow down is a direct result from the tax. As i’ve mentioned in a previous post FOMO Drives Vancouver Real Estate Market, much of this slow down appears to be from a change in local buyers psychology. Also to the online troll who wants to call this post “Chicken Little” please don’t forget my job as a Realtor is to sell you a house. Therefor it’s probably in my best interest to pretend like things are all good and rosey in the market ala Cameron Muir. (Economist of the Real Estate Board). But this isn’t about me, this is about you, the public. So without further ado here are my findings for the month of August 2016. Detached houses took a hit. In fact they didn’t just take a hit, they took a Muhammed Ali straight right knock out punch. I studied arguably the 4 biggest markets,

Steve Saretsky -

Preliminary Analysis Shows Sales Price Decline in Metro Vancouver Real Estate Today I’m happy to release the very first set of data from myself and Tom Davidoff. Tom is a very well respected UBC housing economist and one of the go to guys on the Vancouver housing crisis. We’ve teamed up before, like this interview here on CBC.  Tom is very smart with numbers so I let him take the reigns. I worked together with him to help pull the MLS data that is available to me and provided some insights with how sales are reported, etc. As per Jason Billingsley than man behind the infamous Zolo stats, he discovered that 50% of sales take longer than 10 days to report to the Real Estate Board. So although a sale may have been signed and accepted on August 15, numbers show that 50% of those sales won’t be reported until upwards of August 25. Most likely due to lazy Realtors, understaffed offices, or Realtors leaving listings active to attract more buyer leads for their own business. So using some algorithms and coding we pulled all the MLS sales from all of 2014 to 2016. We aimed to ask: for an

Steve Saretsky -

Why Your Neighbours Price Reduction Has a Ripple Effect The Vancouver real estate market has changed drastically over the last couple months. We used to see multiple offers on basically every property, now you’re lucky if it sells (for detached houses anyways). Despite the dramatic slow down in sales which I’ve talked about previously in articles such as Demystifying the latest Vancouver Market Stats and Staggering Numbers Show Impact of Foreign Buyer Tax sales prices remain relatively the same. At least to the untrained eye… The price drops have already begun. In fact they started in areas like Tsawwassen & Ladner months ago. Now they are becoming more and more evident in other areas. Including much of Metro Vancouver. I tweeted the staggering price increases of areas like Tsawwassen and North Delta which saw the biggest price gains year over year. When I tweeted these numbers back in June it showed Tsawwassen detached homes had a price gain of 48% year over year compared to June of 2015. North Delta had a 47% price increase vs June of 2015. These numbers were pulled using Median sales price from REBGV (Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver). Now let’s look at July stats

Steve Saretsky -

Who’s Market Stats Can We Trust? What in the world is going on with the latest Vancouver Market stats? REBGV is saying one thing and Zolo (a real estate brokerage) is saying another. A recent blog post from the infamous Garth Turner says the REBGV is misleading the public and Zolo should be relied upon. Alright so let’s break this down. First off, everyone interprets the stats differently based on their world views and opinions. All the guys hoping for the bubble to burst view the stats how they want. Twisting and turning words and data any way possible so they can prove to everyone they’re right. The same can be said for the REBGV. Of course they’re not going to predict doomsday on a public release. They have homes to sell! So who do we really turn to for reliable stats? Don’t get me wrong I like Garth Turner, he offers some valuable financial suggestions but he’s also a huge advocate of the bubble and has been predicting it forever. Alright now that we have that out of the way, here’s what I’m seeing. First for REBGV stats which covers the included areas, Whistler, Sunshine Coast, Squamish, West Vancouver, North

Steve Saretsky -

One Pacific Resales Flood Market- Struggling to Sell One Pacific, located at 68 Smithe Street next to the Cambie Bridge recently approved final occupancy. The condo development by Concord Pacific has finally completed and with that came a flood of new listings to the market as seen when most buildings complete. You would think this would be your classic blueprint to riches in today’s Vancouver real estate market. Invest in a pre sale condo and in as little as a couple months later you assign it for profit. Or in this case, wait until closing and make an even bigger killing as seen with Telus Garden Resales Explode.  However, this has not been the case for investors at One Pacific. There are currently 33 active/sold listings since the first one surfaced on July 16, 2016. Of those 33 only 3 have actually sold. There are some which are awaiting subject removal however many are sitting stagnant. Many have now been on the market for 3 weeks. It is a beautiful building and the condo market downtown remains hot despite Staggering Number Show Impact of Foreign Buyer Tax. The average asking price for One Pacific resales hovers around $1100/square foot. A hefty

Steve Saretsky -

How Much of the Vancouver Market is Driven by Fomo? I know right off the hop this title is going to ruffle some feathers. Especially those who point the finger at foreign buyers and better yet, foreign capital. Now don’t get me wrong I’ve mentioned before that I’m all for taxing foreign capital I even think taxing foreign buyers is better than nothing. As I mentioned in my post What To Make of the Vancouver Foreign Buyer Tax.  However, foreign buyer aside this market has gone bananas with or without them (especially with them) I’ve witnessed it first hand, it’s crazy! I have friends that are making under $20/hour and they’re talking about buying a place. They have no money, heck they can barely afford their beer league hockey fees. “I’ll just put 10% down, or whatever.” I have to pull them aside and bring them back to reality. Much like Tulipmania. The story back in the 1600’s where the price of a Tulip was driven by human psychology, the fear of missing out. Prices went up and up on a Tulip flower and everyone wanted to cash in. The price of a tulip exceeded the annual income of a

Steve Saretsky -

Impact of Foreign Buyer Tax Evident after First Week The shocking announcement of the Foreign buyer tax last week dominated headlines last week. Although it had it’s many flaws as I pointed out in my post What to Make of the Vancouver Foreign Buyer Tax, the impact of foreign buyer tax remains to be seen. What I witnessed last week was absolute mayhem. The tax caught everyone off guard and left buyers, sellers, lawyers, Realtors, developers scrambling to close deals before the August 02 deadline. While I held my breath for previous deals I had under contract thankfully none got derailed. However, I had many fellow Realtors tell me they had to change dates on several deals. I received a call from a developer in which one of my clients bought into asking me if they were going to back out. There were posts on Craigslist welcoming foreign buyers and offering them a discount. Much of this adding up to a situation where the Foreign buyer tax could cripple local sellers. A week later, with the dust settling, the numbers are finally out. I pulled up the sales from July 25-July 31. One full week of sales since the announcement

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The Canadian Economy

Steve Saretsky -

Detached Housing Market Takes Huge Plunge in August The much anticipated August 31, 5pm cutoff for market stats has come and gone. Before we dive in let me just touch on all the counter arguments quickly. Yes, one month after the tax it is still too early to tell how...

Steve Saretsky -

Preliminary Analysis Shows Sales Price Decline in Metro Vancouver Real Estate Today I’m happy to release the very first set of data from myself and Tom Davidoff. Tom is a very well respected UBC housing economist and one of the go to guys on the Vancouver housing crisis. We’ve teamed...

Steve Saretsky -

Why Your Neighbours Price Reduction Has a Ripple Effect The Vancouver real estate market has changed drastically over the last couple months. We used to see multiple offers on basically every property, now you’re lucky if it sells (for detached houses anyways). Despite the dramatic slow down in sales which...

Steve Saretsky -

Who’s Market Stats Can We Trust? What in the world is going on with the latest Vancouver Market stats? REBGV is saying one thing and Zolo (a real estate brokerage) is saying another. A recent blog post from the infamous Garth Turner says the REBGV is misleading the public and...

Steve Saretsky -

One Pacific Resales Flood Market- Struggling to Sell One Pacific, located at 68 Smithe Street next to the Cambie Bridge recently approved final occupancy. The condo development by Concord Pacific has finally completed and with that came a flood of new listings to the market as seen when most buildings...

Steve Saretsky -

How Much of the Vancouver Market is Driven by Fomo? I know right off the hop this title is going to ruffle some feathers. Especially those who point the finger at foreign buyers and better yet, foreign capital. Now don’t get me wrong I’ve mentioned before that I’m all for...

Steve Saretsky -

Impact of Foreign Buyer Tax Evident after First Week The shocking announcement of the Foreign buyer tax last week dominated headlines last week. Although it had it’s many flaws as I pointed out in my post What to Make of the Vancouver Foreign Buyer Tax, the impact of foreign buyer...

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The Saretsky Report. December 2022