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With home sale activity dipping below long-term historical averages, the supply of homes for sale in Metro Vancouver* reached a three-year high in June.

The Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV) reports that residential home sales in the region totalled 2,425 in June 2018, a 37.7 per cent decline from the 3,893 sales recorded in June 2017, and a 14.4 per cent decrease compared to May 2018 when 2,833 homes sold.

Last month’s sales were 28.7 per cent below the 10-year June sales average.

“Buyers are less active today. This is allowing the supply of homes for sale to accumulate to levels we haven’t seen in the last few years,” Phil Moore, REBGV president said. “Rising interest rates, high prices and more restrictive mortgage requirements are among the factors dampening home buyer activity today.”

There were 5,279 detached, attached and apartment properties newly listed for sale on the Multiple Listing Service® (MLS®) in Metro Vancouver in June 2018. This represents a 7.7 per cent decrease compared to the 5,721 homes listed in June 2017 and a 17.2 per cent decrease compared to May 2018 when 6,375 homes were listed.

The total number of homes currently listed for sale on the MLS® system in Metro Vancouver is 11,947, a 40.3 per cent increase compared to June 2017 (8,515) and a 5.8 per cent increase compared to May 2018 (11,292). This is the highest this total has been since June 2015.

“With reduced demand, detached homes are entering a buyers’ market and price growth in our townhome and apartment markets is showing signs of decelerating.”

For all property types, the sales-to-active listings ratio for June 2018 is 20.3 per cent. By property type, the ratio is 11.7 per cent for detached homes, 24.9 per cent for townhomes, and 33.4 per cent for condominiums.

Generally, analysts say that downward pressure on home prices occurs when the ratio dips below the 12 per cent mark for a sustained period, while home prices often experience upward pressure when it surpasses 20 per cent over several months.

The MLS® Home Price Index composite benchmark price for all residential properties in Metro Vancouver is currently $1,093,600. This represents a 9.5 per cent increase over June 2017 and is virtually unchanged from May 2018.

Sales of detached homes in June 2018 reached 766, a 42 per cent decrease from the 1,320 detached sales recorded in June 2017. The benchmark price for a detached home is $1,598,200. This represents a 0.7 per cent increase from June 2017 and a 0.6 per cent decrease compared to May 2018.

Sales of apartment homes reached 1,240 in June 2018, a 34.9 per cent decrease compared to the 1,905 sales in June 2017. The benchmark price for an apartment is $704,200. This represents a 17.2 per cent increase from June 2017 and a 0.4 per cent increase compared to May 2018.

Attached home sales in June 2018 totalled 419, a 37.3 per cent decrease compared to the 668 sales in June 2017. The benchmark price of an attached home is $859,800. This represents a 15.3 per cent increase from June 2017 and is virtually unchanged from May 2018.

Click here for all the stats...

Provided BY: Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver - REBGV

New real estate rules came into effect that change how REALTORS® and their clients can work together in different circumstances.

These rules state that real estate licensees across our province can now only represent one party in a transaction and must provide additional documentation about representation and compensation.

So, the next time you go to buy or sell a property, your Realtor is required by the government to go through some additional forms to explain how or whether you’re being represented and to clarify the compensation that you’ll pay. Of course, Realtors can still give factual information about the properties they list for sale without providing you with this additional documentation. This, however, would change if you wanted to ask them for advice or to reveal any personal information, e.g. your situation; what you’d like to buy or sell, why; etc. 

There may also be times under the new rules when your Realtor is unable to represent you because they’re already representing another client in the transaction. In these situations, there are some options you can consider, and a Realtor would be happy to explain them to you.

“These new rules and forms change processes and documentation that have been in place in our province for decades. Our more than 14,000 Realtor members are working hard to comply with these regulatory changes,” Phil Moore, Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver president said. “We ask for the public’s patience during this adjustment period. The new forms and disclaimers are required government changes and we’re doing our best to comply with them while serving your needs.” 

To understand how these new rules could apply to you in your next real estate transaction, talk with your Realtor or refer to the Real Estate Council of BC’s website at www.recbc.ca. 

Click here to learn more about the new real estate rules. 

Provided By: REBGV

Boy, this new Vancouver property tax increase — the charmingly named "school tax" — sure is causing a lot of commotion. It can be as little as a few hundred if your home is worth just over $3 million, but if you are lucky enough to own a $6-million house, you better find another $10,000 on top of your usual property tax, every year. Of course, you can defer the whole tax at a low interest rate and pay it when you sell, which is a pretty good deal, but some just don't want more debt on their head after working hard to be mortgage free. Poor things.

People suffering under this housing crisis have about as much sympathy for these paper millionaires as they do "student" owners of Point Grey mansions.There seems to be a number of factors at play with this, some of it verging on class war in its intensity and vitriol.

How dare these "lottery winners" complain about a few thousand dollars tax increase? We all wish we had such problems, right? Paying some more property tax on a windfall does seem entirely reasonable, but how much and who should pay? Is this a wedge issue which widens the divide, or is it entirely reasonable that those who are sitting on a fortune, pay a little more?

Some homeowners affected by the increase feel that their homes ought to be considered a holding and taxed just like your pension, stock investment or Ferrari — that is to say "never" in Canada's case, where holdings aren't taxed simply because you own them. Instead, you pay when you purchase a holding or you realize the gain by selling.

Thus, the nature of this tax increase is somewhat historic — but so are Vancouver's house prices. Perhaps unique approaches are necessary.

Are Vancouver's property taxes really lower than in other Canadian cities?

UBC professor Tom Davidoff is a leading commentator on housing-related subjects and very charming guy to boot. He claims that "our property tax rates are incredibly low." He feels that increases are not only reasonable, but absolutely due. Policy on property tax rates is another discussion. In this blog, we are looking at Professor Davidoff's claim about the relative cost of Vancouver residential property tax which Davidoff equates with the rate used to calculate, rather than the dollar amount paid. He uses it to support the notion that we are due for considerable increases at least on that basis alone.

So, are Vancouver property tax rates really so much lower than in other cities in Canada?

To answer that, you have to understand how property tax works, and it seems many don't. Property tax is not calculated like income tax, which multiplies your income by a set of ratios to determine amount owing. Instead, property tax is based on a property's assessed value relative to other homes, which is then multiplied by the "mill rate" (the percentage of a home's assessed value that is taxed).

This ensures that cities facing hyperinflation, like Vancouver, won't see absurdly high property tax increases as assessed values skyrocket (as they have over the past decade) — and that taxes collected aren't suddenly reduced to a trickle in cities where assessed values may drop. This calculation is used because cities set taxes against a projected budget, and that money needs to be collected in a reasonably predictable manner from the pool of properties that can be taxed.

(Here's a more detailed article about all this in Torontoist.)

© Provided by AOL Inc. Homes in Forest Hill, a Toronto wealthy neighbourhood. 

Making a more accurate tax comparison

The confusion happens when tax rate is conflated with tax paid which, as I say, is Professor Davidoff's position. Sure, Vancouver's tax rate is low (the "mill rate") compared to other cities, but this rate alone will not give you a proper comparison between cities' property taxes. You'd have to look at similar dwellings in similar areas in different cities in order to find a true like-for-like comparison.

I know Toronto well, so it's easy for me to compare. In terms of dividing the pool of homes by a mill rate to achieve a taxable amount, identical houses in three different cities should pay about the same. The Forest Hill area of Toronto is a tony neighbourhood much like Point Grey or Dunbar in Vancouver. However, if you look at similar homes in those areas, the tax amount — the dollar figure — is, in most cases, higher in Vancouver.

A newer, high-end, four-bedroom and six-bathroom house for sale right now on a large lot in Forest Hill has a tax of $8,467. Other examples in Forest Hill are more like $10,000, or a bit more. Similar homes in Dunbar have a tax closer to $11,000 — higher in all cases I examined, and that is before adding the new school tax addition.

Let's look at a specific example which seems pretty typical. Vancouver's Kerrisdale neighbourhood could be considered similar to Midtown Toronto. This nearly new home on Vine in Kerrisdale was built to a very high standard and has a tax of $13,530.

Here's a home in midtown Toronto which I would consider roughly similar in finish and location and size. It's on Glengarry Avenue. The tax is $13,001. It's featured in The Globe, so you can see the level of finish and the fancy wine cellar. This is a nice home.

I don't know Calgary that well, but here is a lovely, central house of a very high standard, and easily compares in quality to the Vancouver examples. Taxes on this would be $11,453 based on the asking price. Assessed value might actually be a bit lower, as it usually is. That, again, is less than Vancouver property tax for a similar property.

© Provided by AOL Inc.

Here we have very similar homes with either similar or higher taxes in Vancouver. I based this example on a number of examples I researched, so they are not unique. 

A lower tax rate in Vancouver 

So what about the rate being lower?

It is true that the rate on the dollar is lower. It's $12.68 per $1,000 in Saskatoon, but Vancouver's is a mere $3.68. Wow! That means investors will pay less tax per dollar in Vancouver than in other cities like Saskatoon — but we should not focus broad tax policy on investors and speculators. That's unfair on people who just want to live in their home. And, besides, there are other considerable factors when you look at investment cost, principally the far higher capital outlay required to buy the same house in Vancouver and the lower rent relative to capital cost compared to any other Canadian city. To the investor, that is a far greater financial consideration than the tax paid.

Provided By: David Fine with HuffPost Canada

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Their subsequent climb up the property ladder, the same one followed by so many of their generation and previous ones, is both ordinary and extraordinary: they welcomed their first child, then two more. In 2000, they sold the Mississauga house for a profit and bought a bigger redbrick home a bit further west down the Queen Elizabeth Highway in Burlington.

“We outgrew one house and moved to another,” said Carolyn Duarte, now 52. “We were just doing what everyone else did.”

Yet today, that same Burlington house — bought for $260,000 — is worth upwards of $1 million. And Grant, now 22 and finishing a degree in anthropology at McMaster University in Hamilton, cannot imagine owning anything like it, and certainly not by 25.

“Hell no,” he said and then laughed. “How’s that going to happen?”

Every generation, it seems, has a tale of woe about trying to overcome Goliath-like obstacles in making that all-important first home purchase. But Canadian millennials are shouldering a particularly heavy burden by historical standards, analysts say, one brought on by dizzying price increases, but also lagging incomes and tighter regulations.

“The fact is, there’s been a massive transformation in terms of how much more work young people have to do to get so much less,” said Paul Kershaw, a professor at University of British Columbia’s School of Population and Public Health in Vancouver and founder of Generation Squeeze, a non-profit organization that advocates for young adults.

An analysis by Kershaw found that in 1976 — around the time the baby-boom generation was coming of age — the price of an average Canadian home (figures adjusted for inflation) was $213,030 and the median full-time earnings for a 25-to-34-year old were $54,700. That’s a ratio of roughly four to one.

Compare that to 2017, when the average home price was $510,179 and income for the same age group was $49,800, pushing the ratio to 10 to one.

In Ontario, the ratio for 2017 rises to 12 to one, he adds. And in Vancouver, where home prices have taken the steepest climbs, the figure shoots to 14 to one.

“Across the country today, the typical home price is up by hundreds of thousands of dollars while young people’s earnings on an annual basis have gone down by about $5,000,” Kershaw said.

Paying for the house once you are in it, hasn’t got any easier either. Back in 1976, it took five months of full-time work to pay the annual mortgage on an average-priced Canadian home, after saving 20 per cent as a down payment,

Kershaw said. In 2017, it took six months nationally (6.5 months in Ontario and eight months in B.C.). “Even if housing prices aren’t rising as fast this year as the last, the damage has been done,” he said.

“We need to pay attention to that gap.”

In an effort to cool booming markets, governments and regulators have introduced a variety of measures, including foreign buyers’ taxes and tougher mortgage qualification rules.

In the wake of these changes, and with interest rates now rising, feverish price increases have cooled and sales volumes have slumped, with analysts predicting even further softening to come.

Yet the moves have inadvertently put even more pressure on young people trying to buy a home. For example, the new mortgage stress testing introduced in January squeezed the budgets of first-time buyers and pushed those who might have purchased more expensive detached homes into more affordable options: the condominiums, townhouses and semi-detached homes that have served as entry points to home ownership for young people, noted Gregory Klump, chief economist at the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA), earlier this year.

Indeed, while the average price for all types of residential property fell to a little bit more than $495,000 in April, down 11.3 per cent compared to the same month a year ago, apartment units posted the largest price increases, rising 14.7 per cent, followed by townhouses and row units at 6.5 per cent, according to CREA.

As more people sit on the sidelines of the market, rents are also rising, increasing nearly 11 per cent in Toronto in the first quarter of 2018 to an average of $2,206, according to data from market analysis firm Urbanation.

That makes saving for a down payment an ever more difficult task. “The traditional situation of young people working their way up, living with mom and dad or renting until they can save up and buy, in a lot of ways, has been completely altered,” said Jim Clayton, a professor at the Brookfield Centre in Real Estate and Infrastructure at York University in Toronto.

“You’ve got to be a lot more disciplined and creative and, let’s face it, there’s a lot more inter-family wealth transfer going on.”

Family assistance helped Jordan Glover, 27, cobble together a down payment of $120,000, though he also used a windfall on marijuana stocks and the savings he built up while working in sales and renting an apartment in Toronto’s High Park area.

As both financial contributors to and guarantors of his mortgage, his parents became an intricate part of the buying process, even reviewing listings for every place he considered.

Despite all that help, the buying process was still gruelling.

By January, Glover had made eight failed offers on downtown condominiums and attended 12 showings, including one that involved waiting in a line that snaked out the property and down the hall.

“At one point in February, I was ready to give up,” he said.

“I didn’t care anymore. It was constant. Off work at six and at a showing by six-thirty. Then you put in an offer and you don’t get it, so the next time you put in an offer over asking and someone comes in with a bully offer that’s way over asking and you’re out again.”

In April, Glover finally landed a one-bedroom condominium for a little less than $600,000. But he doubts he’d ever have pulled it off without his parents. “That was super helpful,” he said. “It made a huge difference.”

As Glover proves, landing a first home isn’t impossible. Mortgages can still be had with down payments as low as five per cent, prices are more moderate outside the heated markets of Toronto and Vancouver, and studies suggest young people remain optimistic about their chances.

Millennials were at the fore of an overall increase in homebuying intentions in RBC’s annual homeownership poll, with 50 per cent of those aged between 18 and 34 saying they were very or somewhat likely to purchase within the next couple of years.

Moreover, the current generation of first-time homebuyers isn’t the first to struggle for a foothold in the market.

Carolyn Duarte can remember walking into a bank with her mother in the early 1980s when rates briefly rose above above 20 per cent.

“My mom was there to refinance her mortgage and all the talk was this person lost their house, that person lost their house,” she said.

“I always tell my kids you never know what will happen in the market. I don’t think it was harder then, but it was hard.”

Yet the challenges posed by the high interest rates of the 1980s pale in comparison to the hurdles the current crop of first-time homebuyers are up against, said David Rosenberg, chief economist and strategist at Toronto-based Gluskin Sheff + Associates Inc. “I’ve heard the argument that it was tougher then and it just doesn’t hold water,” he said.

“We had higher interest rates, sure, but at the same time we had a lot more wage growth. It wasn’t rare in the 1980s to see wages going up eight or nine per cent per year. I think there’s a lot more frustrations for young people today certainly than there was when I was their age 30 years ago.”

Rosenberg estimates it takes nearly eight years of average family earnings to buy a typical home in Toronto, a figure he said is double the historical norm and “basically off the charts.”

Unless Canadians experience a “fairy tale” surge in income that would correct that ratio, prices will have to significantly decline before homes become readily more affordable, he said.

A best-case scenario would see a long softening in prices — Rosenberg expects a total decline of 30 per cent in Toronto — rather than a sharp, abrupt correction.

But the latter could occur, he cautions, particularly given record household debt levels and the high proportion of mortgages (47 per cent, according to the Bank of Canada) poised to be refinanced over the next year. “We can talk all we want about interest rates and foreign investment and housing, but you reach a point where these ratios tend to break,” Rosenberg said.

“And I think it’s absolutely necessary for prices to go down because it has created a massive social problem here for the younger generation.”

In the meantime, young people navigating Toronto and Vancouver’s heated condominium markets continue to make their first home purchases amid fierce bidding contests and rising prices.

“What I’m afraid of is that I’m purchasing at the peak,” said Margarita Duque, 25, whose search for a place began in earnest earlier this year.

“Everyone says it’s still a good idea, but it’s still scary because it’s the biggest decision of your life so far and it feels rash. You have to make a decision on the spot if you want a place because they go in three to four hours.”

With so much competition and with assistance from family an option for some but not all, the rate of home ownership among young people is on a downward slide.

Just one in three Canadians under 35 were homeowners in 2017, compared to one in two in 1976, UBC’s Kershaw said.

“Let’s not over-exaggerate the bank of mom and dad, because not everyone has it,” he said.

“Those who are getting help from their parents are enjoying rising prices too which means housing prices are not only growing inequality between generations, they are a primary driver of inequality within generations.”

Despite the stark difference in their circumstances, Grant Duarte’s goals aren’t all that different from those of his parents.

He’d like to own a home someday, especially once he has a family, though he doesn’t know when or if a home will be possible.

“My parents say you need to get your name on a piece of property. It’s important. I ask them, ‘Is that a maxim you throw out there because it’s true or is that reality?’” Grant and his two siblings, aged 19 and 25, are still at home, but his mother, Carolyn, is happy to allow them to live in her house while they build their savings.

She draws the line, however, at covering a down payment.

“No way, we have not been saving for that,” she said. “We didn’t get a house from our parents and I don’t have any plans to that. They’re all smart enough to end up in good jobs and save for themselves. That’s what I’m banking on.”

Article & Photo Provided By: The Financial Post