REAL ESTATE WEEKLY BURNABY NEW WESTMINSTER info@rew.ca • 604-435-7977 Watch out for our next issue, published January 6, 2016. Happy Holidays to all our readers and customers! GO TO REW.CA /NEWS TO READ THESE STORIES AND MUCH MORE REAL ESTATE NEWS AND ADVICE Early Warnings Issued Over High-Growth Property Assessments: BC Assessment New Home Price Growth in Vancouver Continues but Slows: StatCan Ask the Expert: Should I Hire a Chinese Listing Agent to Sell my House? WEDNESDAY DEC 16, 2015 - DEC 30, 2015 A s we wrap up the final edition of REW.ca for 2015, it’s time to take a look back at the year in local real estate. Which early pre- dictions came true and which were wildly off the mark? And which real estate stories blew everyone’s mind this year? Here’s a month-by-month breakdown. In January, home prices in Van couver were predicted to see a mod- est 2.8 per cent rise in 2015, accord- ing to a Royal LePage survey (a fore- cast that turned out to be way off the mark, with prices up 18 per cent year over year in November). Later that month, and after predic- tions of rises in 2015, the Bank of Canada surprised everyone by cut- ting its overnight rate to 0.75 per cent in the wake of sliding oil prices. Premier Christy Clark made headlines in February by telling the Surrey Board of Trade that it was the BC government’s plan to scrap the Property Transfer Tax. “It is abso- lutely part of our long-term plan to get rid of it,” Clark said. February also saw some conflict- ing real estate sales forecasts for 2015, with the CMHC predicting that sales across BC would actually drop 5.8 per cent this year. Even RBC’s assertion that home sales in BC would rise 10.5 per cent in 2015 fell far short of reality. One of the hottest March stories was our Frank O’Brien’s coverage of the disparity between prices of homes in West Vancouver and those a 35-minute ferry ride away. The average house in West Vancouver was selling for just over $2 mil- lion, according to March figures, compared with the Sunshine Coast, where the average house was selling for less than $350,000. Splashing across all the local and national media headlines in April was the assertion by Laurence D. Fink, head of the world’s big- gest asset management company BlackRock Inc., that Vancouver con- dos – along with those in London and New York – were a “better invest- ment than gold.” April also saw some of the key brokerages hustling to amend their earlier sales and price forecasts on the back of scorching first-quarter results – including Re/Max, which doubled its annual price rise forecast for Vancouver from three to six per cent in 2015. And they thought that was bullish... A fun lookie-loo story from May was the listing of Mayor Gregor Robertson’s Kitsilano home for $1.8 million ahead of the open-house weekend. The lovely ocean-view duplex was marketed for $223,000 more than the mayor and his then- wife bought it for two years previ- ously. The Vancouver market heated up still further, with the statistics out in May showing sales up 37 per cent year over year in April and the sell- ers’ market firmly in place. June saw a well-read and some- what controversial story about the British Columbia Real Estate Association’s assertion that foreign buyers are having an insignificant impact on Vancouver’s housing mar- ket. Skyrocketing demand and rapid price acceleration is “largely driven by land scarcity and densification policies,” while foreign investment is “insufficient to impact such a large and diverse market.” Reflecting the hot summer weath- er, statistics released in early July revealed June 2015 as the hottest June on record in terms of real estate sales. That was the second-highest sales volume ever recorded, beaten only by May 2005. Prices continued to break records, as they have every month this year, rising in June 10 per cent year over year. Also in July, the year’s second interest rate cut by the Bank of Canada dominated the headlines. REW.ca published a popular story in which finance expert Penelope Graham of RateSupermarket.ca explained what this meant for the economy and the housing market. With many alarmed at the seeming unsustainability of Vancouver real estate price rises, the CMHC reported in August that Vancouver, Victoria and Canada all remain at “low risk” of a significant price correction. And RBC forecast that prices in BC would keep rising across the rest of 2015 and into 2016, but at a slowing rate. However, as of December, there has been no sign of price growth rates slowing... Another hot August story was REW.ca’s feature on families who have made the most of Vancouver’s high prices by selling up to move permanently to their vacation cabin. September saw the much-publi- cized results of the REW.ca reader survey, which was picked up by multiple local TV and radio news shows. One key headline figure was that the Bank of Mom and Dad was enabling 75 per cent of young home buyer respondents with their down payments. Also in September, the Canadian Real Estate Association predict- ed that, by the end of the year, BC would see by far the coun- try’s biggest rise in home sales for the whole of 2015. And a much- hyped report by a CIBC economist asserted that Vancouver was see- ing Canada’s “most asymmetrical” price rises, with detached homes rising at a much faster rate com- pared with condos. The big news of October was of course the election of the new Liberal federal government under Justin Trudeau. The most-read news story of the month was the editorial on Liberal housing poli- cies and how these could affect the Vancouver housing market. Another well-read story cov- ered the sale of the first market- listed home in BC built to passive house standards (although not certified as such). The state-of- the-art property was sold in a sin- gle day at an undisclosed record price for a detached home on a 33-foot lot in East Vancouver’s Renfrew neighbourhood, accord- ing to listing agent the Klein Group. By far November’s most read REW.ca article was a photo gal- lery story showcasing the listing of a luxury West Side home for $12.8 million. REW.ca was given a tour of this magnificent home by the developer Tavan Group, and we just had to share the stun- ning photos. Right at the end of November, local mortgage broker and finance expert Peter Kinch told REW.ca that ahead of the antici- pated US Fed interest rate rise on December 16, Canadian banks have been quietly raising new variable-rate mortgages by 0.5 per cent. As REW.ca went to press in early December, the most-read story is staggering monthly statistics com- ing out of the Fraser Valley – and mirrored in Greater Vancouver – that November saw the highest sales activity for the month in 26 years. On December 11, the new Liberal Finance Minister Bill Morneau announced plans to raise the mini- mum down payment on a sliding scale from February 2016. For all these stories and much more, go to REW.ca/News. 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