Friday, July 29, 2011

Bit of a shocker....


Canadian GDP dips in May.

Hopefully it was weather related and not a sign of a new trend.

Just imagine what happens to GDP when housing starts to take a turn downwards.





Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Don't be shy...

Do the poll>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

I know exactly how many of you waste some time on this blog, so get voting. Lets see of our collective wisdom is right or not




Meanwhile this was front page on Yahoo.ca. We are getting some traction.

Monday, July 25, 2011

What are we going to get this month?

Well she is heading for a MOA of between 9 and 10 this month.

What about Vancouver?

Anyone want to guess at the Average price change with the dropping sales?

We know the HAMs are super active in the West Van and Van West area still, so prices could still go up. Also anecdotally those selling to the HAMs have been down-sizing. An interesting new dynamic in the housing market! It used to be entry buyers pushed everything else along like a train with the locomotive at the rear.

Now we have top priced properties being picked up the way the gull swoops down to pick up a fish form the waves, and then those sellers are moving down into the middle of the pack.

Such are the dynamics of Vancouver RE.

Anyone want to guess - heck why don't we put up a poll.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Whistler


Based on the sales from July 10-17.

List/Sales = 15% (33/ 5)

Total inventory = 783

One of the 5 sales 100K (12%) under list price.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Government pulling in it's horns

It had to happen. The cookie jar is slowly being closed. The spend-and-pay later that Governments embarked on when the speculators bust the system in 2008 (and got their 100 cents on the dollar back) is slowly being withdrawn.


The US of course is the big kahuna of spend and don't tax , which has brought them near the abyss.

Well it looks like they may have a deal, but a nasty one, which ends up hitting the middle class while CUTTING, yes cutting taxes for the wealthy and the corporations.

Crazy I know, and under a Democratic President who has been called 'socialist' by his right-wing opponents (of course anyone who suggests free school milk for poor kids is a socialist to those Atilla-the-huns).

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Slippery Carney

My picture could have many connections to the Bank of Canada announcement today.

Of course, as everyone knows, they stood 'pat' on rates. No increase, even though we know inflation is running at over 3%, we just cannot bring ourselves to even increase rates from 1 to 1.25%.

Would 0.25% make any difference? probably not. But it would at least send a very mild message that the B of C was not just all talk like that idiot Bernanke, but could actually inconvenience speculators a tiny little bit.

These low rates, are indeed like butter. Butter makes everything more tasty, even broccoli, but too much of it is bad for you.

These below-inflation rates are good for a pump, but long-term they completely distort the economy, as money flows away from prudent behaviour into risky speculative behaviour. Didn't they teach you that at Goldman Sachs Mr Carney?? That is the temple of speculation after all.

Think about it. He wants us to save. OK so we save $1000. So now you want to buy a GIC to at least keep up with inflation of 3% with a 30% tax rate.

No point even looking under 5 years! Because they are all under the amount needed to keep up!!

So what do you do? Buy a seven year bond? I wouldn't advise it, because well before then we will be dealing with rampant inflation of maybe 7-8% a year, and 3% will look mild . However (Chad this one is for you) I think we have a year or two before we even start seeing that start to happen.

So you can spend it, buy property, throw it at the stock-market or...but why save it. The Bank of Canada is telling you that as a saver YOU have to bail out all the excess speculation. Meanwhile it will ask all the speculators, pretty please, pull your horns in..or we will..damn it we might just...stand pat!



Thursday, July 7, 2011

Pigs do fly...




Anything is possible after this


BTW- Congratulations to Abbotsford's buyers. Abbotsford is the first area in the REBGV or FVREB which is negative YOY for SFH detached - average, median and benchmark.

There are several areas which are close but I am trying to keep up journalistic integrity here.

Friday, July 1, 2011

Saved by the Bell!

I said in this post that if May was NOT the high point I would shut this blog down. The graph was too parabolic, the fundamentals were too out of line, there is nothing to comment on when one has crossed into the world of fantasy.

Inventory has been rising steadily and while we all know that prices can still rise with higher inventory as the wealthy buyers (eg HAM money) skew the market...I had decided that if the lunacy didn't at least take a break in June I would call it quits and another bear blog would have admitted defeat and closed.

Well by a hair all three averages are down this month, so unfortunately for you guys the blog keeps rolling. Condos especially have taken a big dump from April's high.

Thanks Larry for being the first one out with the data again.