From soaring values, to shadow flipping, to foreign buyer tax and much more – it has been an incredible year. Here are the real estate news highlights of 2016
Phew! What a year it’s been for Vancouver and BC real estate stories. From soaring values, to shadow flipping, to foreign buyers tax, to tough new mortgage policies and then Donald Trump’s US presidential election win… 2016 has seen it all. Here are the highlights of our local year in real estate.
January
January real estate news is always dominated by the New Year’s BC Assessment figures, which shocked everyone in January 2016. The value of residential real estate in Vancouver compared with the previous year went up by 16.96 per cent – far greater than the already-high 9.5 per cent of the previous year but only the fourth steepest increase in BC, according to BC Assessment figures released January 4. Lions Bay in West Vancouver saw the province’s highest rise, at 17.96 per cent year over year, followed by Squamish at 17.33 per cent and Burnaby at 17.07 per cent. However, the most expensive properties in the province were to be found on Vancouver’s West Side – check out this separate story here about the 2016 roll’s top-valued homes (but first, take a guess whose house made the list again…).
In other January news, Royal LePage came out with its annual outlook, predicting that home prices in Vancouver would rise another nine per cent across 2016. The ensuing super-hot spring market, combined with the summer and fall’s drop in sales and detached-home prices, means that this prediction could turn out to be fairly accurate – albeit not necessarily for the expected reasons.
