Quote:
Originally Posted by Sylvanfan
The Okanangan is a weird market. The fundamentals are brutal as pretty much no working person here can afford their house. But due to the high number of retiree's it drives prices up. I know I've been looking for a place in the South and I balk at the piece of crap that you have to pay 350 grand for. Pretty much any place under 400 needs 100 grand worth of building materials to bring it up to date. It's sad.
The HST is really only going to affect new houses as on an existing house you'll only pay it on the realtor commissions from what I understand. But BC is expensive with that land transfer tax.
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I'll agree that it's weird in Kelowna.
- There's a disproportianate number of higher-end and million dollar homes given the population size.
- There are very few (if any) areas where you can build a home for less than $500,000. Thus, the only option in the $300-350,000 range are older homes.
- This results in the price of these homes being inflated as there's a gap in houses that actually deserve to be priced between $300-400,000.
- A lot of money is spent here, but not earned here, thus Kelowna being named one of the least affordable cities to live in.
I think for higher-end homes your dollar goes about as far in Calgary as it does in Kelowna. But you get much less for your money on less expensive homes here than in Calgary.
But I do think it has bottomed out in Kelowna. A lot of the people who have their homes for sale have the financial ability to wait out the market until prices improve, so don't feel pressured to move their homes quickly.
Plus, you're likely not going to get interest rates like we currently have a few years from now. Even if we haven't quite hit the bottom and prices fall a bit further, you're going to end up paying more in interest costs on your mortgage (assuming you will have a mortgage). You'll need prices to fall a lot further to make up the difference.