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Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

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Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#531

Post by cortesoft »

alistairSH wrote: post #272
jejeyyy77 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. IMO, blind bidding is suppressing prices not inflating them. Here’s why, as someone who has been on the ground and lost a few offers because we didn’t want to overbid. After the sold price was released, on multiple occasions we thought “damn! we’d have our that and $25K on top to get it had we known”. In a blind bidding system, you bid what you think the house is worth. In an open bidding system you start…

You say that, but the fact you didn't bid $25k+ initially tells us otherwise, no? Here in DC metro, people are massively over-bidding (relative to list price) because they've already bid/lost 5-10 homes in the last few months. So, they go in strong, $100-$150k over on a $600k list price isn't uncommon right now.

> You say that, but the fact you didn't bid $25k+ initially tells us otherwise, no?

That doesn’t follow at all. You are going to bid the minimum amount you think can win the auction, not your max price you are willing to pay.

If you want people to bid the max amount they are willing to pay, you would want a Vickrey auction, where everyone presents a sealed bid, and winner is the top bid… but they pay the price of the second highest bid. That way you can bid your actual max price without worrying about bidding against yourself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickrey_auction

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#532

Post by weeksie »

dimitrios1 wrote: post #527
weeksie wrote: post #519

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can always build more dense housing on land that is in high demand. In fact, doing that is the most obvious and effective way to keep prices low for desirable locales. Backed up by pretty much all the economic research on the subject in the last decade.

Great, is that economic research based on thought experiments or reality? I'd love to read it. Let's go back to my example. You build denser housing on top of or next to the condos I mentioned, what happens? The workers move in closer to the city center. The price is low for a short period of time, until more people migrate. Just like when the highway opens up a new lane. The traffic is better for a short period, unt…

Those are empirical studies. The Finnish one is the most recent I'm aware of, but they all say basically the same thing[1], here are a couple more [2][3].

Housing does not suffer from induced demand like road capacity does. This is easy to disprove by reading those studies. Sure, building nicer better neighborhoods does make them more desirable but it doesn't follow that they have to be more expensive, as long as you build enough homes for people to live in. Taken to its conclusion the induced demand argument against density is an argument against improving quality of life in general, and pretty nihilistic.

[1] https://ideas.repec.org/p/fer/wpaper/146.html

[2] https://www.dropbox.com/s/oplls6utgf7z6ih/Pennington_JMP.pdf...

[3] https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/7fc2bf_ee1737c3c9d4468881bf14...

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#533

Post by RspecMAuthortah »

pards wrote: post #98

I'm a homeowner in Toronto and I don't think this will help. They've eliminated a small number of buyers from the market but have added other incentives like a first home buyers tax credit that will only fuel the fire - Australia tried this with tragic results. >> working with provinces and territories to develop and implement a Home Buyers’ Bill of Rights and bring forward a national plan to end blind bidding. Blind…

Its actually much more endemic than this. To start off, Canada's service sector dominating economy means jobs are concentrated in cities like Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal etc. So most people want to move and live those places. To make it worse, the government has plans to bring over 1.2M people over next 3-4 years time range as immigrants who again because of the fact that our economy is not diverse enough, tend to settle in those cities. Which makes the already heated housing market worse.

And everyone knows in those cities, local officials and councillors are all in builders' pockets. Large tier builders like Richcraft are routinely raising their prices by 5-10K per every release within last 2-3weeks since last 2020 and still they have all slots closing in 5 min of opening. They are keeping the supply artificially low and I imagine the inflation and supply chain issues are not going to make things any easier.

Bottom line, house prices continue to rise. The only thing that can temporarily put a halt to this is if we end up with rates as high as 10+%. Even then I suspect there are enough people with equities and large cash pool (hell our point based immigration system makes sure this is the case for all incoming immigrants)..

Middle class dream in Canada is over for most people. When you can't afford a decent place in Toronto or Vancouver with a tech salary you know its over.

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#534

Post by pesfandiar »

djrogers wrote: post #339
s1artibartfast wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bank won't offer if you can't pay, at least in the US these days. But we have 30 year fixed mortgages, I think Canada is shorter

The norm in Canada is 30 year term, with a variable rate. It's the second part that can really get you...

I think you're conflating mortgage term (which is typically 5 years fixed or variable in Canada) and amortization. The latter can go up to 25 years for CMHC-insured loans at the time.

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#535

Post by scld »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #530
weeksie wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'll be interesting in a couple years when prices are still crazy and someone has to come up with an excuse for why. It's amazing to me how resistant people are to the idea that housing is expensive because there aren't enough homes for people to live in. It's always a search for exotic explanations like foreign buyers and mysterious empty apartments.

>how resistant people are to the idea that housing is expensive because there aren't enough homes for people to live in. I imagine there are enough homes in both America and Canada (they are two of the largest countries after all). But it's all about location. Very few can even afford to move out to the middle of nowhere just to own land. And not many people that can are willing to turn their potentially short commut…

Yeah, the NIMBY argument that there are "plenty of homes" is like going into a supermarket whose shelves are completely full of only sardines and saying "there is plenty of food".

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#536

Post by skeeter2020 »

bitshiftfaced wrote: post #176
stevesimmons wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Melbourne, this is totally normal. Everyone stands in the street, prospective buyers, neighbours, and people starting their house search. The estate agent stands on the front step, acting as the auctioneer, using the rolled up "Section 32" document like a gavel. Typically the auctioneer draws out bids in $10-20k increments, then knocks it down with a "going once, going twice, going three times..." call. Just befor…

> Sales almost never fall through. If the buyer cannot get financing etc, the seller keeps their 10% deposit. The seller cannot back out. In the states, once the purchase agreement is signed, the home goes through inspection at some point before the sale. The inspector finds a hundred little problems with the house, and the buyer can back out of the sale for any little complaint.

As a buyer, you can try and write whatever contingencies you want into a purchase contract. In supplier markets like most right now they'll just refuse them. In a slower market where "simple" purchases are not so typical, offers with few or no conditions are often the difference maker, or even worth a slightly lower offer price to the seller. Even with a conditional home inspection "a hundred little things" typically won't disqualify the deal; the inspector will be looking for larger single issues that are up closer to 1% of the price. In reality sales don't often fall through unless something is extremely major or misrepresented; the inspection is used by the buyer to promote price concessions and help them deal with the stress of such a massive purchase. Inspectors miss important stuff all the time, which isn't surprising when they're spending only a few hours for an entire home.

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#537

Post by johnnyanmac »

weeksie wrote: post #519
dimitrios1 wrote: post #513

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The root cause of the supply constraint that ultimately gives real estate it's value is the land, and more specifically, the land being in a particular location . For example, a row of condos built right next to a major employer of the town, in the center of the city. That land is going to be valuable so long as that town exists, and as the population continues to grow, will only become more valuable. Adding more hou…

You can always build more dense housing on land that is in high demand. In fact, doing that is the most obvious and effective way to keep prices low for desirable locales. Backed up by pretty much all the economic research on the subject in the last decade.

>You can always build more dense housing on land that is in high demand.

you CAN. But that takes a while. There's always something under construction in Califnornia and a good portion of that is trying to build more apartments and housing. The time to make those don't keep up with the influx of people emmigrating to LA or otherwise leaving the parents' homes to seek their own lifestyle.

It's honestly a more feasible solution to try and convince certain companies to build in a city that is otherwise "vacant". Make it a place where people will work around, have the existing land and homes appreciate in value. That's why Amazon and Apple had such aggressive bid wars from cities to try and get them to make new campuses in their respective city areas.

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#539

Post by BlargMcLarg »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #530
weeksie wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'll be interesting in a couple years when prices are still crazy and someone has to come up with an excuse for why. It's amazing to me how resistant people are to the idea that housing is expensive because there aren't enough homes for people to live in. It's always a search for exotic explanations like foreign buyers and mysterious empty apartments.

>how resistant people are to the idea that housing is expensive because there aren't enough homes for people to live in. I imagine there are enough homes in both America and Canada (they are two of the largest countries after all). But it's all about location. Very few can even afford to move out to the middle of nowhere just to own land. And not many people that can are willing to turn their potentially short commut…

>If you're a recluse you can make it work, but I can understand millenial aged people not jiving with that style

Which further creates a spiraling effect where even recluses will feel obligated to move to the city just for anything that you can't / is very difficult to get from a town. Turns out it isn't that fun when the majority of your neighborhood doesn't share your generation or interests. Especially for young people still looking to find someone to settle down with.

Re: Canada bans foreign home buyers for two years

#540

Post by skeeter2020 »

TomVDB wrote: post #385
joejerryronnie wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still back out of the deal but you will typically forfeit your deposit or earnest money (sometimes in the $10’s of thousands). But I hear you with the seller’s market - we just purchased a couple homes in the Austin area, bid significantly over asking price, waived all contingencies, and offered free 2-month rent back.

I discussed this with our realtor: forfeiting your full 3% earnest deposit is apparently rare. It’s not automatic, and when somebody backs out due to a non-contingent reason, it’s usually for a fraction of the full earnest deposit. (At least, that’s for the SF Bay Area.)

in really hot markets the seller often does BETTER if someone backs out and they move on to the next set of buyers. It's not worth the trouble to try and collect, which is not a gimme. The deposit is not a formula but more convention and an amount that demonstrates good faith. You want to get back on the market and not mess around to maybe capture 5 grand gross.
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