In July, BC's most prominent developers publicly called upon the Federal government to remove the ban on foreign buyers to help spur condo presales. While the request might have been legitimate since without local and foreign investors, condominium presales have effectively dried up, as one of my colleagues put it, how could they be so tone deaf to make their request so very public?
After all, whether rightly or wrongly, the general public blames foreign buyers for our current affordability crisis.
While this is a federal ban, the province was quick to respond. The premier and housing minister Christine Boyle loudly announced "We're not returning to the wild west when foreign buyers inflated prices and left so many homes empty!"
In fact, this is not what anyone called for or expected. For one thing, the developers were arguing that we copy Australia which only allows purchases of new units, not existing homes. Furthermore, there now is a municipal Empty Home Tax, a provincial Speculation and Vacancy Tax, and a Federal Underutilized Home Tax to discourage housing from being left vacant.
As noted elsewhere, as long as banks are requiring presales before construction can proceed, I reluctantly support foreign investment. But I would prefer to see the banks relax their presale requirements so that developers can build what is truly needed...larger two and three bedroom suites for those ready to move up or downsize.
No comments:
Post a Comment