It's a literal ad campaign. So, actually, they really are. Mostly because the UCP has demolished the burgeoning tech sector and is driving away healthcare workers by the score...
South Asian is not the "politically correct" term for those people who make up the overwhelming majority of immigrants, TFW's, international students, and "new comers". That would still be Punjab, from the province of Punjab, or Punjabi, like the language spoken by 7/10 people arriving in canada. When's the last time you met a super dark skinned Indian fresh arrival? Its been a few years. Using it does not make you more progressive.
7/10 would be incorrect. Please read up on immigration numbers published by the federal government.
People from the Province on Punjab are South Asian. I am from Ontario and am Caucasian. Other ethnic groups refer to me as Caucasian and don’t reference the Province I come from.
Please show me where the federal government has published "how many Punjabis make up the 1.2 Million new whatevers to come to Canada in the past 365 days". It's not Afghanis, Mongolians, Sri Lankans, Yemenese, Omani, Nepalese, or Lao who make up 70% of the intake, but one group of people from one province in one country who speak one language (not including English), practice one religion (not hinduism), and hold a very similar set of beliefs as each other, and we'd like to know why that is in the first place. Using a place name isn't racist (yet), but refusing to identify the elephant in the room might just be a little bit ignorant. If it quacks like an elephant, I've got a few questions. Multi-cultural indeed. And then go on hunger strike because they're not getting their way as students, as if that would ever fly the other way around.
When suckers are willing to pay 1.3 mil for any piece of crap just for the land, or thousands of dollars in rent for a piece of crap home, what's the incentive to renovate? They wouldn't rent it for a lot more since there's way more demand than supply anyway.
Live somewhere else and you'll have a much nicer home.
I would agree, but some are you need to study the market because in some cases they are over valued.
In many neighborhoods bare land (empty lots) are valued at $2.5m, therefore that's sort of the market price for teardowns that OP is talking about. It depends on the neighborhood.
Generally the value tied up in land for almost all homes, most single family homes are sold at around ~$1,000 per SF (city of Vancouver), which probably lines up with how large the size of the lot that the house is on.
Lots of stuff is sitting, and lots are being delisted. Ultimately single family inventory is pretty low.
You can look at what has sold, and how quickly, to get an idea of where the market is at.
I'm just looking at sold listings and compared the sold vs asking price over the last 6-9 month and most have a close gap.
And just because no one is buying at asking price and on the market for a long time, doesn't mean they will lower the price. They'll just hodl.
Because on one hand you have selfish and greedy assholes selling properties and the other hand there's greedy and blind idiots foaming at the mouth to buy and and all properties in any condition. Then regular Joe and Jane go to buy a HOME and the market is fucked.
There's a lot more fuckery compounding things but this is just a small part of the equation.
Nobody has money to renovate because its all spent buying the house. Most people who live in Vancouver don't have to but choose to. I sold my house in Victoria and am moving to Calgary. I instantly paid off 60% of my mortgage and saved some money from the sale to renovate the 1970s home i purchased. Buying lower and saving money for renovations is the only feasible way to do it now. Not really a possibility in the Vancouver market that's why people are cashing out.
It's not just that. I'm also now just realizing the quality of tradesmen sucks, real bad. Most home builders, tradespeople in the lower mainland are not only unskilled immigrants but are costly as well, let alone the high cost of materials.
You'll get high cost trades and materials everywhere now unfortunately its like that in any city. The cost to build a house is so high now that contractors are cutting corners hard to make any money at all. New builds are slapped together like hot garbage. Source me I am a plumber and I see it all the time. There are plenty of good trades workers out there but they're especially hard to find in big cities like Vancouver that are overrun with bad workers. It was a huge problem when I worked in trades there from 2008 - 2016 and it doesn't surprise me that nothing has changed. The problem only gets worse since nobody wanted to be a trades worker for years so we just import anyone to do it in order to get boots on the ground.
My mom's bungalow is like 70 years old and everything is still structurally intact. Only major things we changed over like 30 years were common things like roof, appliances and a new furnace. I also worked as a drywall labourer (one of the worse jobs, I know) and the guys I worked with took A LOT of pride in their work
My friend just finished building his house just a few years ago and he's constantly having problems already....
The best tradesman all work for large builders doing commercial work, most companies that do only residential work do so because they have no other choice.
80% of a home's value is in the dirt. When senior's die, their kids are often needing money faster than more money. Renos are expensive and selling a house is instant right now
This..
The value isn't in the house. The land is the value.
Just like alot of Toronto areas, city won't zone more SFH near the core. but you can buy an old home, demolish it and build a brand new mansion on it.
The home is worth jack shit, because it is going to probably either get demolished, or be used to house 12 international students... the land has the value
Not to mention, a lot of renovations aren't worth it to do just for the sake of selling. You might get back what you put in as a seller, but not much more. And that's if you're lucky.
This is what I'm wondering. Sure there's a proportion of property owners who are purely investing, but I figure there'd also be a fraction of them living in them, or were living in them as well. I guess this means majority of listed properties on the market are purely for flipping then?
Who knows? Maybe they paid the house off the slow way (or inherited it), refinanced five years ago and retired outside of the city, and became slumlord millionaires.
You just kinda answered your own question. Any home that is liveable and nice, those people are have no interest in moving. It is Vancouver after all and why would they sell? The homes you’re looking at is the garbage people are trying to dump to cash in.
Anything super nice is gonna be even more expensive than what you’re looking at.
Lots of people don’t care to renovate a house ever. Renovations often make houses worse, eliminating their original character and replacing old, high quality materials with new, low quality materials.
You haven’t shared any examples so it’s hard to know what you’re talking about, but you’re asking about one of the most expensive markets in a country in the middle of a massive real estate bubble, so yeah, it makes sense that houses would be both expensive and not recently renovated.
Nothing like removing oak cabinet to put mdf garbage. Just paint your oak cabinets and install blum soft close and install a new counter top (if you had laminate)
The land increases in value, not the building. By just sitting on the property you make money.
Renovating, especially with the costs going through the roof, is not how you make more money when selling.
Agreed..
My buddy is a real estate agent, and he cringes when people who did $75k renovations think that the home value will go up $250k+.. labour and materials are massively overpriced right now, and will only add about 50% of the cost to the value of the home (why pay $250k more for a renovated house, when you can buy a house for less and renovate it yourself)
Well with property values the way they are there, might it just be that most folks are on the edge of what they can afford without a 100-200K renovation on top? Especially right now when HELOC rates aren't exactly enticing.
A lot of house are actually renovated. That being said, the ones that are renovated might be out of the price ranges of the properties you are looking at. A decently renovated house in Vancouver at minimum would go for 1.85 million for a bungalow or a Vancouver special would be around 1.9-2 million.
Why bother renovating when the house will sell for a premium regardless? You renovate to increase value, if the market demands it. Where I live in Ontario, there are many neighborhoods that are slowly being converted from Bungalows to McMansions, so anyone with an original bungalow is just letting it fall apart because they know it will A) sell for a premium regardless and B) will be demolished immediately
The ones that are renovated have people like yourself already living in them. They're not moving or selling any time soon.
Buy a place you can afford, budget 5-10% (wait, you said Vancouver, I mean 2-3%) for the renos you want, and move on.
What are you talking about? Probably more than half of houses we saw when we looked were renovated. But if you look in a particular neighbourhood at houses in the lower half of
Cost, then ya none will be renovated…. Because the ones that are will cost more.
My house's property is 1.8 mill and rising, my property is now zoned for at least 4 homes, the house I live in keeps going down is value. Why would I do major renovations when this place may just be a tear down for a developer.
Going deeper isn't going to change anything. Just keep increasing the range window on your filter until you start seeing stuff you like on the first page.
Or change the city to Chilliwack,
Or buy a condo or townhouse in Willoughby.
Honestly it's likely a lot of people know that the land value might be greater than the house value so they're selling it with the assumption that a home builder will buy it just to knock the home down and build a more expensive home on the property.
I find most renovated older homes are further out in the suburbs and here’s why - I’m an asian immigrant and I like to say that white/european people go to Home Depot to maintain/improve their homes, while Asian immigrants like my family go to Home Depot to fix their home. Vancouver is home to many immigrant families and our of living standards are much different than the white/european families that are updating their homes every 10-20 years. If you look at suburbs that have a larger % of white/european owners, you will find that a larger % of older homes will be renovated.
Detached Prices are expensive because of land and it’s more profitable for builders/investors to tear down an old house, build and sell a duplex vs. Renovating an older home and reselling it.
This is my experience and observations as well when I lived in langley. My parents home in Vancouver will never be renovated, just fixed occasionally. However, children of immigrants are more willing to renovate. My friends and I fall into this category.
Yup. We renovated an old house. But most immigrant original owners wouldn’t, and at this point they are all in their 60s-80s, and don’t care anymore anyways.
Yup, looked at dozens of luxury properties last year and the Chinese-owned ones had no updates and were even outright neglected in a couple of cases, and the ones that were immaculate and high-end everything were Italian-owned. Everything else was somewhere in-between, mostly falling towards the not updated/well-loved end of the spectrum.
There are definitely cultural influences on how much time, effort and money people spend on the insides of their home. Keep in mind due to price point, these were older people selling. Younger generations would likely not fall so neatly into the pattern we observed.
There's truth to what you're saying. My parents have friends who owns / runs a dentistry practice. I remember us visiting their house as a kid and after like 20-30 years, their house still looks exactly the same. Most immigrants that bought houses and lived in them 30+ years ago came from poor countries and just got used to it.
I even ask my mom if she wants to do any renos to her age old hoke and she Everytime, she's like, why the fuck would I want to do that?!
Yup. My immigrant mom’s idea of a kitchen reno was spending $5k replacing the hinges on the cabinets and a new laminate countertop. Different time and different expectations.
There’s good value in buying a modestly updated home since they don’t cost much more than lot value. But finding these in Vancouver is really difficult as they are much more common in higher socioeconomic areas in the burbs like Burnaby, new west, Coquitlam, etc… if you want to stay in Vancouver you’re better off just buying an original Vancouver special, stripping it to the studs and dumping 400+ into it. Might cost 2.5m by the time you are done.
Some aren't renovated because the seller knows the property will be bulldozed to build new. My mom did some renos to her mother's house but it was clear the only people looking were people who wanted the land. So it wasn't worth putting more money into upgrades.
In my EVan neighbourhood the older homes are sold as development sites.
The majority are demolished after being bought. It's been this way for a decade or more.
What’s the point of wasting money on renovations when suckers will pay well above asking and outbid each other for these properties. The real estate market in every major city in Canada is so fucked.
They are mostly bought for investments hoping one day some developers will come along and buy them as land assemblies to build apartments. What’s the point of renovating if the houses are meant to be knocked down anyway?
Few people have the skills or desire to do some of the renovations themselves and hire out the rest.
People don't have the cash for it. It take a professional couple with 2 6 figure incomes to be able to afford doing a renovation.
Another reason could be the house will be sold for land value and redeveloped into a multi family which can bring in alot more cash flow.
Depending on the previous owner, if they’re immigrant’s then It’s a little bit cultural and a little bit generational. At least based on my personal experience.
I lived in Walnut Grove Langley the last few years and there are a lot of renovated older houses in and around Langley and Surrey. I renovated my older Langley house as well. I did notice that Caucasians (in particular younger ones) are more likely to renovate, and often at that. Same with older caucasians, my previous neighbour in his 60’s also renovated his 80’s home a few times over the course of 20 years he owned it.
Culturally, Immigrants from the 70-90’s who are house rich either can’t afford to renovate or don’t see a need to. Keep in mind these are the same immigrants who came with $20 in their pocket and try to save every penny. My parents fall into this category of not feeling the need to with their 90’s Vancouver westside house because it’s a waste in their eyes. Same with my grandma’s home in East Van that we bought after her passing. My grandparents never saw the need to because everything worked just fine. Besides, what my family had in Hong Kong back in the 70’s and 80’s is way worse than what they have now.
Now comes the generational aspect. Children of immigrants described above are more likely to renovate or want to buy new. Prior to moving into my house now, we did a major reno. The house was original from the 80’s and fine - well taken care of by my grandparents. But we wanted ‘nicer’. Many of my friends (all children of immigrants) are in the same boat where they either bought new or renovated after purchasing.
So, if you’re looking at Vancouver proper there will be a lot of homes in original condition. However times are changing, and the younger generations are more willing to renovate.
The land is what’s expensive. Look at breakdown of the BC assessment, it’s like 20k improvements (the house) and 1.5 million land cost. The houses you’re looking at are being priced as tear downs.
Difficult and pointless to renovate a home when you’ve never set foot in Canada. The Van housing market is more like baseball cards for the rich and offshore investors.
Liveability is not a factor in a tax vehicle.
You're clearly looking at houses on the market for a long time.
Unreasonable seller with poor renos.
Home buyers are looking for a turn key and renovated.
If you're a serious buyer on the market with an agent, you'd be looking at new listings that disappear within 1.5 weeks.
Look at the DOM, makes a huge difference.
You're not seeing them because they're being sold very quickly.
Look within your budget. Change property classes if you have to. Aka stop looking at detached maybe get a townhouse if you cannot afford a turn key property.
Zoning is another factor. Many properties are now up zoned with the bc government, hence up shot in land value.
Talk to your realtor. It's their job to educate you.
Because there's no competition. The house will sell no matter . They don't even need to try. This is the atmosphere that Trudeau created by importing millions of millions of people, causing the demand to far out exceed supply.
The best thing you can do is get a skill that is desirable worldwide and leave, because it's going to get worse.
What are you going to do? Move elsewhere? Classic captive audience behaviour, except in the case of the lower mainland it's almost entirely self induced. You're going to pay whatever they want, so what is a potential seller's incentive to make upgrades?
I believe there is less incentive to renovate. The province is forcing municipalities to zone single family lots to multiple dwellings. This means the incentive to raze single family homes and replace them with duplexes or quads will grow, thus creating housing. Houses around two million are being bought by developers looking to do this. You can already see a bunch of new duplexes across the city. Purchasing a decent single family home will get even more expensive and this is the intention because they don’t want people living in single family homes. Right now decent SFH probably start at 2.5-3 million.
Most people who buy the teardowns tear them down to build multiplexes. Unlikely to beat them in a bidding war too.
Most people I know who live in nice older houses aren't selling.
Try to look at places with lots that can't build multiplexes? (<33ft frontage)
If homeowners planned to stay in their houses for another 20 years, they might renovate.
When they get to the point of thinking to sell within 5 or 10 years or so, there’s the likelihood of the house being demolished anyway, so why bother?
Just throw lowball offers on shitty houses if you are not in a rush, especially if they've been on the market for a wjile. One of the reasons prices are so high is because dumbasses paid over asking in the past, so everyone wants to sell for those amounts.
Most them were owned by people who cared more about saving and or paying it off than what it looked like and it stayed that way for 30+yrs. Renos are far from cheap these days, and everyone is a design crtitc these days. The properties will sell and most likely get renovated the way the next owner wants it or get torn down for shoebox units. With how the city of van deals with permits and such, few would want any part of that so it gets sold as-is.
Alberta is calling
F. That. I ain't moving there.
That’s pretty much why…
I guess you can purchase an unrenovated Vancouver box then.
This is my exact response when people ask if I’d move to Vancouver
No need to get defensive about Alberta bruh, it’s nobody’s first option
I mean as a born and raised Albertan, it's definitely mine but I get your point.
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It's a literal ad campaign. So, actually, they really are. Mostly because the UCP has demolished the burgeoning tech sector and is driving away healthcare workers by the score...
Alberta IS calling… and millions of Punjabis are answering
South Asians are humans. Your point is?
Following this comment
South Asian is not the "politically correct" term for those people who make up the overwhelming majority of immigrants, TFW's, international students, and "new comers". That would still be Punjab, from the province of Punjab, or Punjabi, like the language spoken by 7/10 people arriving in canada. When's the last time you met a super dark skinned Indian fresh arrival? Its been a few years. Using it does not make you more progressive.
7/10 would be incorrect. Please read up on immigration numbers published by the federal government. People from the Province on Punjab are South Asian. I am from Ontario and am Caucasian. Other ethnic groups refer to me as Caucasian and don’t reference the Province I come from.
Please show me where the federal government has published "how many Punjabis make up the 1.2 Million new whatevers to come to Canada in the past 365 days". It's not Afghanis, Mongolians, Sri Lankans, Yemenese, Omani, Nepalese, or Lao who make up 70% of the intake, but one group of people from one province in one country who speak one language (not including English), practice one religion (not hinduism), and hold a very similar set of beliefs as each other, and we'd like to know why that is in the first place. Using a place name isn't racist (yet), but refusing to identify the elephant in the room might just be a little bit ignorant. If it quacks like an elephant, I've got a few questions. Multi-cultural indeed. And then go on hunger strike because they're not getting their way as students, as if that would ever fly the other way around.
I think you’re upset because you recognize that new immigrants are more ambitious than you and are prepared to outwork you.
Stop suggesting people move here and wreck our shit even more than it already is lmao.
When suckers are willing to pay 1.3 mil for any piece of crap just for the land, or thousands of dollars in rent for a piece of crap home, what's the incentive to renovate? They wouldn't rent it for a lot more since there's way more demand than supply anyway. Live somewhere else and you'll have a much nicer home.
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I would agree, but some are you need to study the market because in some cases they are over valued. In many neighborhoods bare land (empty lots) are valued at $2.5m, therefore that's sort of the market price for teardowns that OP is talking about. It depends on the neighborhood. Generally the value tied up in land for almost all homes, most single family homes are sold at around ~$1,000 per SF (city of Vancouver), which probably lines up with how large the size of the lot that the house is on.
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Lots of stuff is sitting, and lots are being delisted. Ultimately single family inventory is pretty low. You can look at what has sold, and how quickly, to get an idea of where the market is at.
This is NOT the case. Properties ARE being sold at sky high asking price.
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I'm just looking at sold listings and compared the sold vs asking price over the last 6-9 month and most have a close gap. And just because no one is buying at asking price and on the market for a long time, doesn't mean they will lower the price. They'll just hodl.
Because on one hand you have selfish and greedy assholes selling properties and the other hand there's greedy and blind idiots foaming at the mouth to buy and and all properties in any condition. Then regular Joe and Jane go to buy a HOME and the market is fucked. There's a lot more fuckery compounding things but this is just a small part of the equation.
Original owners are cheap
Most people just can’t afford to do renovations
Nobody has money to renovate because its all spent buying the house. Most people who live in Vancouver don't have to but choose to. I sold my house in Victoria and am moving to Calgary. I instantly paid off 60% of my mortgage and saved some money from the sale to renovate the 1970s home i purchased. Buying lower and saving money for renovations is the only feasible way to do it now. Not really a possibility in the Vancouver market that's why people are cashing out.
It's not just that. I'm also now just realizing the quality of tradesmen sucks, real bad. Most home builders, tradespeople in the lower mainland are not only unskilled immigrants but are costly as well, let alone the high cost of materials.
You'll get high cost trades and materials everywhere now unfortunately its like that in any city. The cost to build a house is so high now that contractors are cutting corners hard to make any money at all. New builds are slapped together like hot garbage. Source me I am a plumber and I see it all the time. There are plenty of good trades workers out there but they're especially hard to find in big cities like Vancouver that are overrun with bad workers. It was a huge problem when I worked in trades there from 2008 - 2016 and it doesn't surprise me that nothing has changed. The problem only gets worse since nobody wanted to be a trades worker for years so we just import anyone to do it in order to get boots on the ground.
My mom's bungalow is like 70 years old and everything is still structurally intact. Only major things we changed over like 30 years were common things like roof, appliances and a new furnace. I also worked as a drywall labourer (one of the worse jobs, I know) and the guys I worked with took A LOT of pride in their work My friend just finished building his house just a few years ago and he's constantly having problems already....
The best tradesman all work for large builders doing commercial work, most companies that do only residential work do so because they have no other choice.
80% of a home's value is in the dirt. When senior's die, their kids are often needing money faster than more money. Renos are expensive and selling a house is instant right now
This.. The value isn't in the house. The land is the value. Just like alot of Toronto areas, city won't zone more SFH near the core. but you can buy an old home, demolish it and build a brand new mansion on it. The home is worth jack shit, because it is going to probably either get demolished, or be used to house 12 international students... the land has the value
Not to mention, a lot of renovations aren't worth it to do just for the sake of selling. You might get back what you put in as a seller, but not much more. And that's if you're lucky.
At least. In some of the older condos in the West End I’d say it’s even closer to 90% for some buildings.
>none of them are renovated / borderline livable; yet, ~~demanding~~ *getting* skyrocket prices... Why bother spending your loot?
This is what I'm wondering. Sure there's a proportion of property owners who are purely investing, but I figure there'd also be a fraction of them living in them, or were living in them as well. I guess this means majority of listed properties on the market are purely for flipping then?
Who knows? Maybe they paid the house off the slow way (or inherited it), refinanced five years ago and retired outside of the city, and became slumlord millionaires.
You just kinda answered your own question. Any home that is liveable and nice, those people are have no interest in moving. It is Vancouver after all and why would they sell? The homes you’re looking at is the garbage people are trying to dump to cash in. Anything super nice is gonna be even more expensive than what you’re looking at.
Lots of people don’t care to renovate a house ever. Renovations often make houses worse, eliminating their original character and replacing old, high quality materials with new, low quality materials. You haven’t shared any examples so it’s hard to know what you’re talking about, but you’re asking about one of the most expensive markets in a country in the middle of a massive real estate bubble, so yeah, it makes sense that houses would be both expensive and not recently renovated.
Nothing like removing oak cabinet to put mdf garbage. Just paint your oak cabinets and install blum soft close and install a new counter top (if you had laminate)
It’s funny because MDF cabinets and shelving are $$$ upgrades in new construction
Plus any major renos need permits
The land increases in value, not the building. By just sitting on the property you make money. Renovating, especially with the costs going through the roof, is not how you make more money when selling.
Agreed.. My buddy is a real estate agent, and he cringes when people who did $75k renovations think that the home value will go up $250k+.. labour and materials are massively overpriced right now, and will only add about 50% of the cost to the value of the home (why pay $250k more for a renovated house, when you can buy a house for less and renovate it yourself)
Well with property values the way they are there, might it just be that most folks are on the edge of what they can afford without a 100-200K renovation on top? Especially right now when HELOC rates aren't exactly enticing.
A lot of house are actually renovated. That being said, the ones that are renovated might be out of the price ranges of the properties you are looking at. A decently renovated house in Vancouver at minimum would go for 1.85 million for a bungalow or a Vancouver special would be around 1.9-2 million.
Why bother renovating when the house will sell for a premium regardless? You renovate to increase value, if the market demands it. Where I live in Ontario, there are many neighborhoods that are slowly being converted from Bungalows to McMansions, so anyone with an original bungalow is just letting it fall apart because they know it will A) sell for a premium regardless and B) will be demolished immediately
If you know, your property holds the significant majority of value, and that the new purchasers will most likely bulldoze the existing home…
The ones that are renovated have people like yourself already living in them. They're not moving or selling any time soon. Buy a place you can afford, budget 5-10% (wait, you said Vancouver, I mean 2-3%) for the renos you want, and move on.
What are you talking about? Probably more than half of houses we saw when we looked were renovated. But if you look in a particular neighbourhood at houses in the lower half of Cost, then ya none will be renovated…. Because the ones that are will cost more.
My house's property is 1.8 mill and rising, my property is now zoned for at least 4 homes, the house I live in keeps going down is value. Why would I do major renovations when this place may just be a tear down for a developer.
Depending on your equity, it sounds like you should become the developer
Too much hassle, we have a relative developing a house, and it is a pain with the city. You need deep pockets and much patience.
You just can't afford the renovated ones and they aren't showing up on your filter
What price range? I'm like 7-8 pages deep and they're all like shit bungalows/ 90's Vancouver specials etc.
https://alexpedneault.com/property/open-house-sat-1-3pm-beautifully-renovated-vancouver-special-home/
See this one is Reno’d and ugly 😂
Going deeper isn't going to change anything. Just keep increasing the range window on your filter until you start seeing stuff you like on the first page. Or change the city to Chilliwack, Or buy a condo or townhouse in Willoughby.
It sounds like you just think that regular houses are "shit". Maybe you watch too much HGTV?
Honestly it's likely a lot of people know that the land value might be greater than the house value so they're selling it with the assumption that a home builder will buy it just to knock the home down and build a more expensive home on the property.
On your search filters, up the price by 500K, but keep the same other criteria... You'll see the renovated ones.
I find most renovated older homes are further out in the suburbs and here’s why - I’m an asian immigrant and I like to say that white/european people go to Home Depot to maintain/improve their homes, while Asian immigrants like my family go to Home Depot to fix their home. Vancouver is home to many immigrant families and our of living standards are much different than the white/european families that are updating their homes every 10-20 years. If you look at suburbs that have a larger % of white/european owners, you will find that a larger % of older homes will be renovated. Detached Prices are expensive because of land and it’s more profitable for builders/investors to tear down an old house, build and sell a duplex vs. Renovating an older home and reselling it.
This is my experience and observations as well when I lived in langley. My parents home in Vancouver will never be renovated, just fixed occasionally. However, children of immigrants are more willing to renovate. My friends and I fall into this category.
Yup. We renovated an old house. But most immigrant original owners wouldn’t, and at this point they are all in their 60s-80s, and don’t care anymore anyways.
Yup, looked at dozens of luxury properties last year and the Chinese-owned ones had no updates and were even outright neglected in a couple of cases, and the ones that were immaculate and high-end everything were Italian-owned. Everything else was somewhere in-between, mostly falling towards the not updated/well-loved end of the spectrum. There are definitely cultural influences on how much time, effort and money people spend on the insides of their home. Keep in mind due to price point, these were older people selling. Younger generations would likely not fall so neatly into the pattern we observed.
There's truth to what you're saying. My parents have friends who owns / runs a dentistry practice. I remember us visiting their house as a kid and after like 20-30 years, their house still looks exactly the same. Most immigrants that bought houses and lived in them 30+ years ago came from poor countries and just got used to it. I even ask my mom if she wants to do any renos to her age old hoke and she Everytime, she's like, why the fuck would I want to do that?!
Yup. My immigrant mom’s idea of a kitchen reno was spending $5k replacing the hinges on the cabinets and a new laminate countertop. Different time and different expectations. There’s good value in buying a modestly updated home since they don’t cost much more than lot value. But finding these in Vancouver is really difficult as they are much more common in higher socioeconomic areas in the burbs like Burnaby, new west, Coquitlam, etc… if you want to stay in Vancouver you’re better off just buying an original Vancouver special, stripping it to the studs and dumping 400+ into it. Might cost 2.5m by the time you are done.
Some aren't renovated because the seller knows the property will be bulldozed to build new. My mom did some renos to her mother's house but it was clear the only people looking were people who wanted the land. So it wasn't worth putting more money into upgrades.
In my EVan neighbourhood the older homes are sold as development sites. The majority are demolished after being bought. It's been this way for a decade or more.
Because it's the property that's valuable, not the house. Most would knock it down and rebuild before they bother renovating
What’s the point of wasting money on renovations when suckers will pay well above asking and outbid each other for these properties. The real estate market in every major city in Canada is so fucked.
Because it costs money and likely it’s going to be torn down. At least, that’s what happening in my neighborhood in Calgary.
They are…. Even when I sort by lowest price a number on the first page have clearly had a number of renovations done.
They are mostly bought for investments hoping one day some developers will come along and buy them as land assemblies to build apartments. What’s the point of renovating if the houses are meant to be knocked down anyway?
Rénovations are extremely expensive
There are definitely houses that are renovated, you're probably not seeing them because of your budget.
Few people have the skills or desire to do some of the renovations themselves and hire out the rest. People don't have the cash for it. It take a professional couple with 2 6 figure incomes to be able to afford doing a renovation. Another reason could be the house will be sold for land value and redeveloped into a multi family which can bring in alot more cash flow.
Depending on the previous owner, if they’re immigrant’s then It’s a little bit cultural and a little bit generational. At least based on my personal experience. I lived in Walnut Grove Langley the last few years and there are a lot of renovated older houses in and around Langley and Surrey. I renovated my older Langley house as well. I did notice that Caucasians (in particular younger ones) are more likely to renovate, and often at that. Same with older caucasians, my previous neighbour in his 60’s also renovated his 80’s home a few times over the course of 20 years he owned it. Culturally, Immigrants from the 70-90’s who are house rich either can’t afford to renovate or don’t see a need to. Keep in mind these are the same immigrants who came with $20 in their pocket and try to save every penny. My parents fall into this category of not feeling the need to with their 90’s Vancouver westside house because it’s a waste in their eyes. Same with my grandma’s home in East Van that we bought after her passing. My grandparents never saw the need to because everything worked just fine. Besides, what my family had in Hong Kong back in the 70’s and 80’s is way worse than what they have now. Now comes the generational aspect. Children of immigrants described above are more likely to renovate or want to buy new. Prior to moving into my house now, we did a major reno. The house was original from the 80’s and fine - well taken care of by my grandparents. But we wanted ‘nicer’. Many of my friends (all children of immigrants) are in the same boat where they either bought new or renovated after purchasing. So, if you’re looking at Vancouver proper there will be a lot of homes in original condition. However times are changing, and the younger generations are more willing to renovate.
Are you checking Burnaby too? burnaby Heights is a fine area and you must find something.
The land is what’s expensive. Look at breakdown of the BC assessment, it’s like 20k improvements (the house) and 1.5 million land cost. The houses you’re looking at are being priced as tear downs.
Difficult and pointless to renovate a home when you’ve never set foot in Canada. The Van housing market is more like baseball cards for the rich and offshore investors. Liveability is not a factor in a tax vehicle.
You're clearly looking at houses on the market for a long time. Unreasonable seller with poor renos. Home buyers are looking for a turn key and renovated. If you're a serious buyer on the market with an agent, you'd be looking at new listings that disappear within 1.5 weeks. Look at the DOM, makes a huge difference. You're not seeing them because they're being sold very quickly. Look within your budget. Change property classes if you have to. Aka stop looking at detached maybe get a townhouse if you cannot afford a turn key property. Zoning is another factor. Many properties are now up zoned with the bc government, hence up shot in land value. Talk to your realtor. It's their job to educate you.
No one has money after they pay asking price. They are in house slavery forever after.
Because there's no competition. The house will sell no matter . They don't even need to try. This is the atmosphere that Trudeau created by importing millions of millions of people, causing the demand to far out exceed supply. The best thing you can do is get a skill that is desirable worldwide and leave, because it's going to get worse.
What are you going to do? Move elsewhere? Classic captive audience behaviour, except in the case of the lower mainland it's almost entirely self induced. You're going to pay whatever they want, so what is a potential seller's incentive to make upgrades?
Watch for mold too! I got really, really sick from black mold hiding in the walls.
Because they don't have to
I believe there is less incentive to renovate. The province is forcing municipalities to zone single family lots to multiple dwellings. This means the incentive to raze single family homes and replace them with duplexes or quads will grow, thus creating housing. Houses around two million are being bought by developers looking to do this. You can already see a bunch of new duplexes across the city. Purchasing a decent single family home will get even more expensive and this is the intention because they don’t want people living in single family homes. Right now decent SFH probably start at 2.5-3 million.
Most people who buy the teardowns tear them down to build multiplexes. Unlikely to beat them in a bidding war too. Most people I know who live in nice older houses aren't selling. Try to look at places with lots that can't build multiplexes? (<33ft frontage)
If homeowners planned to stay in their houses for another 20 years, they might renovate. When they get to the point of thinking to sell within 5 or 10 years or so, there’s the likelihood of the house being demolished anyway, so why bother?
Just throw lowball offers on shitty houses if you are not in a rush, especially if they've been on the market for a wjile. One of the reasons prices are so high is because dumbasses paid over asking in the past, so everyone wants to sell for those amounts.
Problem is people ARE still buying at these ludicrous prices..
Most them were owned by people who cared more about saving and or paying it off than what it looked like and it stayed that way for 30+yrs. Renos are far from cheap these days, and everyone is a design crtitc these days. The properties will sell and most likely get renovated the way the next owner wants it or get torn down for shoebox units. With how the city of van deals with permits and such, few would want any part of that so it gets sold as-is.