According to a UBC associate professor and economics analyst, the housing market in Vancouver is growing more slowly than markets in most of Canada and the U.S.
In an interview with Business In Vancouver, Tom Davidoff says housing prices in the Lower Mainland are increasing because of “enhanced affordability” whereas that driver in the past was foreign ownership, not local.
Davidoff points out that while Greater Vancouver house prices rose 6.7 per cent from February 2020 to February 2021, when Canadian home prices jumped by 17.3 per cent, and by 10.8 per cent in the U.S., according to statistics from December to December.
His analysis comes at a time when “the B.C. housing market continues its record-setting pace”, in the words of the B.C. Real Estate Association, also analyzing February-to-February sales statistics for the entire province.
In the three years prior to the pandemic, house prices went up 48.5 per cent (that’s over three years, remember), according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver.