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What can you get for 4.1M in Vancouver? A pretty awesome house, I am sure, but in 2022 April it was enough to buy the AT&T Centre in downtown St. Louis. It is a 44-story skyscraper valued at 207M in 2007. The building owner was in trouble when the sole tenant, AT&T, left in 2017.The landlord stopped making mortgage payments and it was eventually foreclosed. SomeraRoad, a New York developer, came in and bought it for 4.1M which was just enough to pay all the fees and expenses. In 2017, the mortgage balance outstanding was $107M. That was a complete loss for the lender. Interested in getting in on more deals? The discount might not be as steep but there will be more to come.

In Metro Vancouver, the real estate sales are picking up, but the inventory remains low, so prices continue to climb. The sales volume in May are back to normal. It is only 1.4% lower than the 10-year May average while inventory is 20.6% below the 10-year May average. As you can see from the table below, the very high sales-to-active listings ratios are indicative of the high demand relative to supply. And as a result, you see the month-over-month price increase in all categories. Anytime the sales-to-active listings ratio is above 20%, it is indicating upward pressure on prices. At over 40, it is evidence that the fear of missing out (FOMO) is back again. This is why there are multiple offers and listings selling

There are two main reasons why someone would want to buy real estate inside a corporation. One is for personal liability protection and the other is to make more money. A corporation is a separate legal entity from the owner(s). This means if something occurs within the corporation that generates a liability, the damage is contained in the corporation.For example, if someone sustains a serious injury at one of your rental properties due to your potential negligence, you may be held liable for damages. If you hold all your properties in your personal name, then everything is up for grabs. This includes all your real estate, your stock portfolio and even future earnings. If that property was held inside a corporation, then only the assets

In Metro Vancouver, the real estate prices are moving up for a third straight month and it is picking up steam. The media is keying on multiple offers and units selling above listing price. Though the inventory remains low, the sales volume is picking up.It is only 15.6% below the 10-year April average. Note the year started with sales 42.9% below the 10-year January average. If prices continue to increase, there will be more people willing to put their property up for sale. Sales-to-active listings ratio is a measure of supply and demand. As it is increasing, pricing pressure is increasing and when it is above 20% for a sustained period, it is expected that the price will move up. As you can see from

The First Home Savings Account (FHSA) is a new account the Federal Government created to help people save money to buy a home. It is better than the RRSP and the TFSA, because that money is NEVER taxed. And the growth is never taxed. With the RRSP, every dollar withdrawn is taxed as income. And the money inside your TFSA has already been taxed. Because money not used for the purpose of buying a home can be rolled over to the RRSP tax-free, people who don’t plan on buying a home can use this as an extension to the RRSP. Even though the FHSA is better than the RRSP, if you have the money you can contribute to both. And you can withdraw money from

In Metro Vancouver, the real estate prices are moving up for a second straight month while sales volume remains low. The sales number for March is 42.5% below last March but only 28.4% below the 10-year average.Remember the sales were down 42.9% and 33% below the 10-year average for January and February respectively. So it is doing better on a 10-year average basis, but sales volume is still really low. The prices have gone up as you can see by the table below. The sales-to-active listings ratio used to gauge price trends have also moved up. All of them are above 20% which indicates pricing pressure upwards. It is actually surprising how much prices jumped month over month. What seems to be playing out is

Canadian seniors now owe 6.7 billion in reverse mortgage debt. And it is rising quickly. A reverse mortgage is a loan you take out against your home where you don’t need to make monthly payments. The accrued interest is added to your principal amount. This along with the fact that the interest rate is higher than your typical mortgage or home equity line of credit (HELOC) makes this type of loan more of a last resort as it will eat away at the equity in your home faster. Though you do have the option of paying the interest and preventing the loan from increasing in size. These loans are geared towards the elderly as it does not require proof of income and generally you need

Title fraud and mortgage fraud has been in the news the past month. There were several articles that highlighted the increasing number of title fraud and mortgage fraud in Canada. Title fraud is when the fraudster sells your house and the title of the house is transferred to a third party. Mortgage fraud is when the fraudster uses your house as collateral for a mortgage loan. The easiest targets are homes that are paid off and the owners are out of the country.  The two cases that were successful in BC involved owners who were out of the country. The fraudsters were able to manipulate property management company to help them fool the realtors and lawyers.   In BC, the record at the land titles

The Metro Vancouver real estate sales in February were 33% below the 10-year February average. Remember January’s sales were 42.9% below the 10-year average. So while the sales remain low, the activity is picking up relatively speaking. This is reflected in the stronger sales-to-active listings ratios and the corresponding month-over-month price increases in all three categories. Sales-to-active listings ratios are 16.8% for detached homes, 30.1% for townhomes and 25.8% for apartments. From the chart below you can see that it is a significant reversal from the recent trend. Townhomes had the biggest reversal in the sales-to-active listings ratio and translated into the biggest month-over-month price increase: 1.8%. This is followed by apartments at 1.6% and 0.7% for detached. New listings are 36.6% below last February’s, but the total