A Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation poll last year revealed 68% of Vancouverites believe foreign buyers are inflating housing prices, and a new report from the government agency suggests they could be right
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A Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation poll last year revealed 68% of Vancouverites believe foreign buyers are inflating housing prices, and a new report from the government agency suggests they could be right.
Nearly a fifth (19.2%) of Vancouver condominiums constructed in 2016-17 have at least one non-resident owner. Of total properties constructed in the city during the same period, 15.3% are owned by at least one non-resident. Juxtaposed with condos built in Vancouver between 2011 and 2015, only 11.2% had at least one non-resident owner. The CMHC study also revealed that 10.4% of condos in British Columbia have non-resident ownership.
Aggregated, however, the number drops considerably: Only 4.9% of Metro Vancouver homes are owned by non-residents, according to a CMHC study of 2016 Census data. Properties with at least one non-resident owner increase to 7.6% in the City of Vancouver and 6.2% across British Columbia.
"The data allows us to better understand the role of non-residents as a component of demand in Canadian housing markets, a topic that is of public interest in terms of the source of funds and the investment behaviour associated with such properties,” said Aled ab Iorwerth, deputy chief economist at CMHC.
In Ontario, 3.3% of homes have at least one non-resident owner, and in Toronto specifically that number slightly rises to 3.8%. In the provincial condo market, 6.1% of homes are owned by at least one non-resident, and in Toronto 7.6% of condos are owned by non-residents.
Nova Scotia is also getting attention from non-resident owners, albeit much less than the two most expensive real estate markets in Canada are. Only 7.1% of properties in the province have at least one non-resident owner, a number that actually drops down to 4.3% in Halifax. According to CMHC, the belief is that the non-residents are buying vacation properties in Nova Scotia.
The media assessed value of condos owned by non-residents is highest in British Columbia (29.1%), followed by Ontario (20.2%), and finally Nova Scotia (10.8%).
