Blogs

As of April 2021, the changes to the First-Time Home Buyer Incentive program the federal government announced as part of the Fall Economic Statement on November 30, 2020 are in effect.  The eligibility for the program has been expanded in the higher priced housing markets of Victoria, Vancouver, and Toronto.

The Speculation and Vacancy Tax (SVT) was introduced by the B.C. government in 2018 as part of the plan to address affordable housing. Property owners must make a declaration by March 31, 2021 for their 2020 tax status.

In a continuing trend, British Columbia is still the least affordable region in Canada to live, led by Vancouver and Victoria. Vancouver is also the second least affordable city among major international housing markets, trailing only Hong Kong.

There has been a lot of speculation about the impact of foreign property ownership on real estate prices over the past couple of years. In joint research from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) and Statistics Canada, we can finally see some numbers and what they mean for our local housing market.

As we previously wrote, the B.C. government has considered changes to the additional tax on foreign home buyers in Vancouver in order to remain attractive to prospective employees. On March 17, the province confirmed the scope of their changes.

A new international survey shows that Vancouver continues to be the least affordable city to buy a home in Canada – and ranks third internationally. But would you believe that Victoria comes in at second on the list in Canada, less affordable than all of the other major markets considered in the study?

The B.C. government is planning to lift the levy on foreign home buyers in Vancouver for those who have a work permit and pay taxes in the province. Originally implemented in August 2016, the 15% foreign home buyer tax had an immediate impact of reducing the number of real estate transactions involving foreign buyers. In Metro Vancouver, there were 1,974 deals involving foreign buyers from June 10 through August 1, 2016. In the remaining month of August 2016 there were only 60 transactions; the volume has slowly recovered and there were 200 transactions during November 2016.