ExKiwilass

The other negative to renting, if you have a family - I have a lot of renter friends - is the lack of stability. IF you are lucky enough to hit on a good landlord who wants a long term tenant, it's all good. But I've seen quite a few friends have to move over the past 5 years due to a. landlord issues and b. house is getting sold and c. <insert issue here>. The bottom line is, as a renter you do have less control over your home.

The4BellsLondon

We sold v quickly in N Burnaby - which schools are yours at??

dboy

tough choice these days. I feel that owning your home is much more than financial, but the harsh reality of Vancouver is that it is often a way better deal renting. As out of wack the real estate is, renting is relatively reasonable in comparision. As already noted, stability etc are factors on the plus side.

Assuming that houses prices stay more or less static, if one were to compare renting vs owning i suspect renting would be a far, far cheaper alternative, especailly when costs related to upkeep, utilities, and taxes are factored in. Not to mention property transfer taxes on purchase. I think the argument "paying someone else's" mortgage doesn't really hold true in Lotus Land.

On the other front, interest rates are set to rise in the not to distant future. As for house prices.....i have given up waiting for them to come down and capitulated and bought in North Van.

At the end of the day, if you are certain this is where you want to be for the forseable future and you are not taking on too much debt and not looking at an home as a way to get rich, I would suggest there is nothing wrong with buying....but, dont, dont take on too much. The mortgage rate you get now, will most certainly be higher when it is time to renew.

dboy

apples to oranges...we are talking Vancouver not the US where real estate values have all but colllapsed. 800,000 here gets a very, very average home. Over a million for something decent.

And what's is the point of talking about tax dedection here? Besides, if the US actually faced reality and admitted that tax breaks need to stop and income taxes raised, they may actully put a dent in the national debt, albeit a small one...but that's a whole different thread.

dboy

Actually very true. There is a huge influence of both traditional organised crime (yes the Mafia) and the HA in north Burnaby. Having said that though, it's very safe and the guys who police around there call it sleepy hollows. I would not have an issue living there. When I policed in north Burnaby, we would go as many as 2 or 3 nights in a row with not a single call for service and would often be re-directed to south Burnaby, mind you that was close to 10 years ago with no Skytrain.

Burnaby has never been plauged with the protracted gang violence as in other areas and is a very, very safe city.

Burnaby has a very progressive police force. Here is teh 2009 annual report if anyone is interested:

http://burnaby.rcmp.ca/burnaby/pdf/B...l%20Report.pdf

ExKiwilass

Yeah, we love living here. It's a true neighbourhood. Great people

Didn't know you bought in north van. Congrats!

True story: coworker lives close by me, and she was telling me when they started looking in the heights their realtor was using the HA as a selling feature i.e. that nothing would happen in their neighbourhood. ha ha.

Anyways.

Not that I think anyone shoudl be complacent.

MarylandNed

That depends on where you are in the US - there are regional differences and that means some places have been hit harder than others. In places like Nevada and Arizona, there are many people who are in homes worth much less than their mortgages. I live near Washington DC and it's a bit more recession proof here simply because of the federal government and all the related jobs (including government contractors). My house has dropped a bit in value over the last 3-4 years but is still worth much more than my mortgage (I know because I had it appraised recently as part of a refi to take advantage of lower interest rates).

Also, I wouldn't even be able to rent my house for the mortgage I'm paying now - so it turned out well that I bought when I did.

dboy

yes perhaps so but the OP is here in BC not DC. There are other areas of Canada that your position hold true but not here. It is cheaper to rent here by as much as 50 percent I would suspect

MarylandNed

Agreed - and I'm not saying that the OP should buy. There are too many factors to take into account and I don't know enough to advise one way or the other. However, it's useful to present the pros and cons of renting and buying so that the OP can make a more informed decision.

Also I think the Vancouver market is an anomoly. I know some people in real estate in Canada and even they don't understand the Vancouver market. So it's probably the hardest market to predict.

Mike Gas

Year on Year looks like fairly big drops in some areas around Washington, and when the US government finally decides to take action with that deficit you watch them cut government jobs big time.

Washington $352,100 -5.1%
Mount Rainier $201,000 -18.4%
Brentwood $167,700 -27.0%
Chillum $155,800 -33.9%
Colmar Manor $141,300 -28.4%
Takoma Park $403,500 -1.5%

Back to the thread question I would stay and rent and wait for the housing market in Burnaby/ Vancouver to drop 20/30% or more before buying.
Big bubble if ever there was one.

DESERTFOX

Thanks for the link dboy. That's very reassuring that we knew we are living in one of the safest neighbourhood in Burnaby and perhaps in BC. There's no wonder there's only limited lists of properties in these areas and they are still selling.

We are definitely in no rush to buy a property. We have save enough for our down deposit and no other debts. If the right property comes along then we're going to buy one. Other reasons that might force us to buy sooner is if our landlady will need her basement suite or neighbours become a nuisance. We don't want to move and rent another place again as it would be another stressful exercise.

MarylandNed

DC area is pretty robust:

http://www.bizjournals.com/washingto...nation-in.html

As for waiting for price drops in BC, that's only one factor. Any savings might be wiped out by higher interest rates. It's generally accepted now that interest rates are on the rise after recent historic lows.

Mike Gas

In 2006, the median sales price for a DC area home peaked at around $450,000. By 2009, that had dropped to $300,000, a 33% drop.

Perhaps homes in desirable central DC neighborhoods didn't change much, but the DC area as a whole got significantly cheaper.

Housing Bubble Graph: Washington, DC inflation-adjusted housing prices
http://mysite.verizon.net/vzeqrguz/h...ashington.html

Mike Gas

President Obama approved a salary freeze for all federal government employees for 2011 and 2012. This is not good news for the DC region economy. In a sense, this decision leads to a pay cut for federal workers because the cost of living in this area continues to grow faster than the average wage increases.

With a Republican-majority House and a more politically split Senate, the next step would be to eliminate federal government positions across several agencies.

Alan2005

as far as the US is concerned I'd say all bets are off. Not only is there a lot of government debt (14Tr or so), unfunded liabilities (that's government worker pensions, welfare and medicare) amount to $70 trillion. This will never be paid, therefore any reliance on federal jobs or incomes to prop up house prices in the medium to long term is misguided in real terms. Nominally, prices could easily rise significantly, but only an idiot would see this as wealth creation.