Real estate in Calgary - another bubble?

[RichieRich]

Super FOMO happening for sure.
Super risky too from a financial perspective - especially if you’re starting out it’s easy to get into a negative equity situation. If you have lots of money and investments and a home already then less of a risk. But still one.
For those looking to buy please run the numbers comparing rent vs buy, including risk factors and opportunity costs.

Anyways here’s yet another entertaining article from Garth on how cra-crazy it is out east:
https://www.greaterfool.ca/2022/02/03/stay-away-2/

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Gundo

As someone listing later this month, this excites me. As a rational human being this is absolutely absurd.

A 1 year old Duplex in Wolf Willow just sold for $90,000 over asking. The folks only lived there 13 months and made $165,000 over what they had paid for the place.

Well the thing is unless you own multiple properties for investment purposes, you don't "make" any money when you sell, as I'm assuming those people are looking to buy something else to live in. That's why I'm just glad we bought last year and I really don't care how much our house is worth now. No plans to sell it for at least the next 20 years so whatever equity we have right now doesn't mean anything to me. My wife is determined to buy some kind of investment property in Vietnam this year though, they're seeing the same kind of rapid price increases but it's still far cheaper to buy there than anywhere in Canada right now. Hopefully that will be our retirement investment

[Locke]

Originally Posted by keenan87

Is Edmonton seeing the same ridiculous market?

Good question.

The historically low cost of borrowing certainly isnt helping matters any. I do wonder what might happen if and when interest rates start going up.

[Sylvanfan]

Originally Posted by Locke

Good question.

The historically low cost of borrowing certainly isnt helping matters any. I do wonder what might happen if and when interest rates start going up.

I live in St.Albert, no absurd price increases or anything like that. Recently you would see sold for 98% of list price in 6 days. Inventory is low and places are moving pretty quick. My dreams of selling my two houses here and moving somewhere good have pretty much been crushed.

Even when it comes to inflating house prices indirectly thru money laundering...E=NG.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Sylvanfan

I live in St.Albert, no absurd price increases or anything like that. Recently you would see sold for 98% of list price in 6 days. Inventory is low and places are moving pretty quick. My dreams of selling my two houses here and moving somewhere good have pretty much been crushed.

Even when it comes to inflating house prices indirectly thru money laundering...E=NG.

Well ooh lah di dah there Mr. Fancy multiple homeowner!

[Deegee]

Originally Posted by keenan87

Is Edmonton seeing the same ridiculous market?

We moved to Edmonton for work reasons last summer from closer to Calgary (yeah, I really miss being further South).

For homes in the lower end of price range in Edmonton, we looked at several places, and many sold before we had a chance to put an offer on them. Inventory seemed to be moving extraordinarily fast in the sub $400,000 mark. In some cases we noticed places were being pulled and relisted 10% higher.

https://www.iheartradio.ca/am800/new...022-1.16928905

An increase of 11.6% for prices in the single family market, which is pretty significant.

[calgarygringo]

We recently sold ours and much the same. Lower cost home in old area, needs stuff replaced too and went for 55k over what the ask was and had 6 offers. No conditions either straight away. Almost couldn't believe it but we are older and are done with all the fixing, shovelling etc. and got way more than we thought.

[red sky]

Congrats. Must be a nice feeling.

[DoubleF]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

Exactly what I and many others predicted last year when Vancouver/Toronto real estate prices kept climbing higher while Calgary stayed stagnant. People are moving here to finally be able to buy a house they can raise a family in, this is no bubble. If you're at all interested in owning a house and have the means you'd better get in now while the market is still somewhat affordable

My wife and I are being contacted by a few friends of friends or alumni asking about Calgary. Many mention that million dollar town houses is kinda daunting and having a full detached home in Calgary with change left over for a million bucks when they can work remotely seems pretty awesome to them.

Some people are treating it almost like a bizarre lifestyle/tourism work from anywhere sort of thing. Why not? The prices here are less than half over there.

[_Q_]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

Exactly what I and many others predicted last year when Vancouver/Toronto real estate prices kept climbing higher while Calgary stayed stagnant. People are moving here to finally be able to buy a house they can raise a family in, this is no bubble. If you're at all interested in owning a house and have the means you'd better get in now while the market is still somewhat affordable

What happens when the inevitable interest rate increase happens and the Toronto/Vancouver bubbles burst? Most experts predict as much as a 30% drop in property values in those cities happening in the coming year.

Will those same people looking at moving to Calgary be around?

[Sylvanfan]

Originally Posted by DoubleF

My wife and I are being contacted by a few friends of friends or alumni asking about Calgary. Many mention that million dollar town houses is kinda daunting and having a full detached home in Calgary with change left over for a million bucks when they can work remotely seems pretty awesome to them.

Some people are treating it almost like a bizarre lifestyle/tourism work from anywhere sort of thing. Why not? The prices here are less than half over there.

This sounds a bit like what I hear from my inlaw's who live in Osoyoos. People in Vancouver sell a moderate place for 1.5 million there...they can build a massive place in Osoyoos for like 800 and they pocket the other 700k. They don't think anything of the fact that they're spending 800k on a house because it's like found money to them. The fact that the local economy is made up of retirees and a bunch of people earning less than 60k a year means nothing.

I would think this recent run in Calgary is also influenced by low rates, and a bit of market panic to buy now before the rates go up. That said, is getting a Mortgage for a quarter point lower for 5 years worth paying 60 grand over list on a house that was listed for less than 600k? Than add in people throwing in the towel for living in Vancouver or Toronto where it's just too damn expensive and also coming in with some found money to the market. It's likley making the prices move more than they would in more normal conditions.

[Leondros]

Originally Posted by _Q_

What happens when the inevitable interest rate increase happens and the Toronto/Vancouver bubbles burst? Most experts predict as much as a 30% drop in property values in those cities happening in the coming year.

Will those same people looking at moving to Calgary be around?

People have literally been saying this for over a decade now... It is certainly not 'most' experts either.

[_Q_]

Originally Posted by Leondros

People have literally been saying this for over a decade now... It is certainly not 'most' experts either.

The last decade has seen historically low interest rates. The 2.1% fixed rate mortgage of the last 18 months is certainly not the norm. A family may be able to barely pay $4200/ month for their $1million home, how about when interest rates go up to 5 or 6 percent, or even higher?

[REDVAN]

Our neighborhood had no inventory the past few weeks, and I've heard anecdotally that the 2-3 houses that did sell went for 100k+ over asking, maybe even sight-unseen... I live in Airdrie so this is nucking futs. But good for our equity since we bought in 2014 and have been losing value ever since.

Anyway, I suppose word has gotten out, as I see about 20 new properties available for sale this weekend.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by REDVAN

Our neighborhood had no inventory the past few weeks, and I've heard anecdotally that the 2-3 houses that did sell went for 100k+ over asking, maybe even sight-unseen... I live in Airdrie so this is nucking futs. But good for our equity since we bought in 2014 and have been losing value ever since.

Anyway, I suppose word has gotten out, as I see about 20 new properties available for sale this weekend.

Thats just the smart people trying to GTFO of Airdrie.

[The Yen Man]

Originally Posted by _Q_

The last decade has seen historically low interest rates. The 2.1% fixed rate mortgage of the last 18 months is certainly not the norm. A family may be able to barely pay $4200/ month for their $1million home, how about when interest rates go up to 5 or 6 percent, or even higher?

Again, it's up to you if you want to wait for this potential bubble that may never happen. Just my opinion, but you'll most likely wait a long time, or potentially get screwed 10 years down the road when no bubble occurs, you wasted 10 years of waiting, and you end up paying more for a house.

[Leondros]

Originally Posted by _Q_

The last decade has seen historically low interest rates. The 2.1% fixed rate mortgage of the last 18 months is certainly not the norm. A family may be able to barely pay $4200/ month for their $1million home, how about when interest rates go up to 5 or 6 percent, or even higher?

The BoC is going to be in a very interesting spot - never have Canadians had more debt. They are going to need to raise these interest rates significantly to combat inflation, but they are going to find themselves between a rock and a hard place. Interest rates won't be able to come up too quickly or they risk imploding the financial system. They will have to be comfortable with a moderate increase to interest rates and higher inflation rates. My two cents at least.

The stress tests have been doing their jobs and should cushion real estate enough not to see massive corrections. Foreign investment is agnostic to the interest rate increase in Canada as well.

I think you will be sitting in the corner waiting for this so called correction to happen for a while yet if ever...

[_Q_]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

Again, it's up to you if you want to wait for this potential bubble that may never happen. Just my opinion, but you'll most likely wait a long time, or potentially get screwed 10 years down the road when no bubble occurs, you wasted 10 years of waiting, and you end up paying more for a house.

So here's another question.

What does a balanced market look like in Calgary? Is a $1million 800sqft condo a possibility in the near future? Considering the availability of land, does a 20% year over year increase become the norm for the next few decades?

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by _Q_

What does a balanced market look like in Calgary? Is a $1million 800sqft condo a possibility in the near future? Considering the availability of land, does a 20% year over year increase become the norm for the next few decades?

I think we would look like Texas, maybe Austin at the high-end. Texas added 4M people in the last 10 year, a considerably higher rate than Ontario but its housing prices have grown at relatively modest rates due heavily in part to sprawl.

And even at current selling prices once you account for inflation we are probably only back to 2014 levels in Calgary for the mainstream SFH. The high end market is still heavily down.

[Old Yeller]

Originally Posted by _Q_

The last decade has seen historically low interest rates. The 2.1% fixed rate mortgage of the last 18 months is certainly not the norm. A family may be able to barely pay $4200/ month for their $1million home, how about when interest rates go up to 5 or 6 percent, or even higher?

I think if interest rates go up 5 to 6 percent in the next couple of years, it'll be more than just home owners in Toronto and Vancouver that are in trouble.

I just can't see increases that sizable in a short period of time... I'm no expert but I would guess we see an increase of .5 to 1% this year.