dbd33

Yes, excellent. I would have karma'd that if my karma button still worked.

dbd33

That's without changing employers, just taking two job transfers. If there are jobs that pay more in Vancouver I don't know what they are; ferryman maybe or positions related to feng shui.

BristolUK

You can have a piece of mine.

getoutofbritainquick

Interesting how you make out someone to be a racist for mentioning the obvious in Vancouver. In Victoria I recently spoke to Realtor and asked what was driving the massive property increases in Victoria area (around 30-40% last year). Apparently he said it was being driven by the Americans driving up the price of property because of the exchange rate and maybe the Trump effect. Guess he must also be racist or does racism only apply to certain cultures?

dbd33

This,

"The property has always been expensive in Vancouver since the Chinese from Hong Kong started buying and leaving there kids in Vancouver."

is a plainly racist comment. It may be true that property purchases by the Hong Kong Chinese are solely responsible for the increase in property prices in Vancouver since the Hong Kong Chinese started buying. I suppose that might have been in the 1930s. Even if it is true (as likely as a Trump tweet being true imo) the "leaving there kids in Vancouver" is an unnecessary, insulting, irrelevant and illiterate adjunct.

By contrast, saying that Americans drive up the price of property in Victoria (or Yarmouth NS) may or may not be true but it's not racist because Americans are not an identifiable ethnic group; they come in all shapes and sizes. Some of them even started life being Hong Kong Chinese.

Take out the insult and the gist of the assertion, that Hong Kong Chinese money has driven up prices, isn't racist, just an inadequate explanation.

hth

FishAndChips00

Alleged racism aside, the fact remains that this property boom is changing society in a fundamental way - in many aspects to the detriment of the existing population. First this was a problem mainly in Vancouver, now the GTA is becoming affected too.

The historical "don't ask, don't tell" approach by the government won't do any longer. Canadians deserve an explanation as to why this is happening, whether government policies are involved, and if so who exactly is responsible for these policies.

My $0.02.

biggayowl

OP - almost identical position to yourselves, albeit without the threat of eviction. I've given up looking here. Hoping to get the heck out of the city for a short term rental either in Squamish (crazy rental prices though) or Gibsons for the summer. As another poster said - have you considered Vancouver Island? We have been looking at both Sooke and Cumberland. However most likely we'll return to Europe - primarily because of missing family and friends, which has become worst since we've had kids. We're lucky in that we can move to Sweden (my OH is Swedish) - I don't really fancy the UK right now (especially England) with all the Brexit nonsense.

geoff52

I have lived in various parts of UK.
Living in Cambridge UK was the best time of my life I enjoyed the university life.
I grew up in Coventry UK, and I visit the city on regular basis and this city has declined significantly.
I have lived in London UK where I enjoyed living and had a great lifestyle.

In the UK there is a North South divide economically. The North is in decline in my opinion but the south is a great place to live. Brexit vote resulted because of the North South economic divide.
So depending where you live in the UK you can have both views of decline and prosperity.

The point I was trying to make is that immigration from the UK is a big decision and depends on getting a good job in the host country and the finances to fund the lifestyle, and not every body gets this balance right. Sometimes the heart rules the head.

As far as the Hong Kong Chinese comment is concerned, in the 1990 before Hong Kong got its independence from the UK, the Canadian government was encouraging high net worth people from Hong Kong to come to Canada as was Australian Government.
Newspapers in Vancouver were reporting that Hong Kong people were buying property and leaving their children in Vancouver while the parents went back to Hong Kong to work.

I know you want to label me as some kind of racist. I dont have the time or the inclination of arguing with people on forums.

scilly

I know some people don't like it when I go back in history, but this is one time when a little knowledge of the history of Vancouver does help.

First, yes, the Canadian government did encourage Hong Kong investment here, and yes, many did take up the encouragement, moved their families here, and sent their children to school. So did Australia (as you said), and so I believe did the "mother country", Britain.

They all jumped on the band wagon.

Yes, their kids were sometimes (?often?) left alone here, leading to the coining of the term "astronaut kids". I believe that also happened in other countries, as parents discovered that they could still continue to make large incomes in Hong Kong after the Chinese had taken over.

BUT that all happened in the 1990s, before Britain handed the territory over to the Chinese in 1997.

It did not lead to the extreme astronomical increase in house prices that is the current concern.

That increase has happened over the last 3-5 years ............ my house assessment has increased almost 150% in 5 years, including 28% this year over last year alone. That degree of increase was unheard of in the 90s.

Correct ........... these latest increases have been due to the influx of people moving to an investing in houses and condos here ................ including from mainland China.

BUT various studies seem to show that that investment was not the major driver ............. seemingly there were more people from eastern Canada buying houses.

I have seen at least 3 studies showing that ............. but obviously cannot comment on the truth of them.


One has also to realise that Vancouver is, I believe, alone in Canadian cities (plus towns or villages) in literally being unable to change its borders and take in more land to allow expansion and the building of new "developments".

Vancouver's boundaries are fixed ...... water on 3 sides, and another city Burnaby on the 4th, where the boundary runs down the middle of the street. Both communities are built up right to that street .... so the houses on the west side are in Vancouver, and those on the east side are in Burnaby.

The only land available for development is the land that is already here .......... and most of it has already been built on. If it costs $1 million to buy an old house, it costs around $500,000 - 600,000 to demolish and build a new larger house which the developer now sells for around $2 million. He has to make his profit, doesn't he?

The only real solution is to develop multi-housing ............ high rise condos, low rise apartments, town (aka row) houses, etc. But there again, you see the developer getting his cut.

There are several town house developments in various stages of construction in the area where I live ................ 5 or 6 "old" houses (some as recently built as the late 1990s!), on lots about 33' by 122', bought for around $2-3 million each. The buyer was usually a realtor, who sold on to a developer, for a profit, of course. The property is then subdivided to provide 2 rows of town houses with a central lane dividing them, longitudinally. Each row is thus approximately 122 minus 6-8' (laneway) divided by 2. I make that about 57' deep for each house and a small "garden". Each row consists of 10 or 12 houses (depending on the development.


Plans of one of the proposed developments showed that a private garage under each house is deep enough to take ONE car plus a small amount of storage space. The developer claims these will be 3 or 4 bedroom houses.

Price ............. around $1 million each.

10 houses cost the realtor approximately $10 million, which s/he of course did not pay out to the house owners until he had sold on to a developer.

Developer paid .......... unknown

20 houses at $1 million each = $20 million in sales

Profit ........ unknown, but considerable


I suppose one could "reclaim" (ie re-zone") park land and turn it over to housing. How about re-zoning all school playgrounds? Take on the Federal Port Authority and re-zone all the dock lands round Burrard Inlet? Persuade the provincial government to hand over the University Endowment Lands at Point Grey?

JamesM

I'm actually having a similar dilemma in Toronto.

I'd like to try a new neighbourhood (been in my current for 6 years) but rental prices have soared in the last 18 months meaning I'd take a pretty big hit on Monthly outgoings to move to a new place with the same square foot and amenities that I have now.

Edinburgh is a great place so why not move back?

The work situation in Canada is not great in most circumstances unless you work for the government or have a unionised job. The private sector worker puts in more hours for less money and benefits so our civil servants across 3 tiers of government can live the dream for next to nothing. Successive governments have thanked us with hydro bill increases, endless line items of pay slip deductions on our wages and poor investment in the fundamentals pillars of a first world economy such as public transit and healthcare.

The UK in many circumstances is a better place to live- even if you are making the choice purely for your children.

Novocastrian

Really? I think the divide is between London and the actual UK beyond.

I would sooner live in Regina than in the South-East of England.

I'm not going to get into the reasons for the referendum result, but to claim it was a north/south divide is completely spurious.

Edo

You clearly know too much.