Housing has been an ongoing topic in the news for sometime now and Randy Mann Homes sheds light on the recent changes coming to the housing market in Darpan’s May/June issue.
1. Tell us about yourself.
I was born in India but grew up in Vancouver, BC. I don’t have a post-secondary education and
had always been a blue-collar worker in the labour force. In 2010 the union job I had was eliminated and so I decided to jump into real estate at the advice of my father. There was no looking back. I’ve been a real estate professional for 11 years, and have consistently ranked in the top 1 per cent of all agents in the Fraser Valley.
2. Where do you foresee the real estate market in the summer time?
The market has really been quite a change from what we’ve seen in the last two years. The market has slightly dipped in many areas but yet in small pockets. Especially in the greater Vancouver area, some places are still exceeding the previous sale. For the summer, I see the market levelling off. We won’t have as many sales and transactions as last year but I believe it will start to progress by the end of the year.
3. The Bank of Canada will be bringing in more interest rate hikes, what does that mean for the buyer?
Yes, we’ve already seen some spikes in the interest rates in the last six months. We are due for another rate hike according to the Bank of Canada. These interest rates are still consecutively lower overall than the average over the last 30 years. This is the time for any buyer to lock in the rate and go and purchase before the market interest rates rise even more.
4. Is it a good time to sell?
I believe it’s a great time to sell based on the fact that the market has dipped but it has not crashed to the pricing that we saw when it first started in 2020. Since then the market has climbed substantially and as we see a decline in the pricing you would be smart to sell now than later so that you can sell at the highest possible price.
5. The “cooling off” period legislation brought in by the BC NDP has passed, so what does that mean for the homebuyer?
The “cooling off” has been around for multifamily homes for a while now. It makes sense when there’s a product that you’re buying when looking at brochures or attending a presentation at a sales centre. However, when you’re investing in a home that you can feel, touch, and view, I don’t believe this cooling down will benefit the buyer or the seller.
6. Realtors and the government have been at odds with the “cooling off” legislation, why do you feel that this will not address the cause of the problem?
It will only cost sellers in a downward market to have to wait to see if their home is sold and that in return could cause them to lose more money on their sale. Even the government does not know what they’re doing with this one; so we need to wait and see and then move forward once we get a clearer picture on how it’s going to play out.
7. Lots of changes are being brought in, such as the pre-sale tax for homes and the anti-flipping measure proposed by the Federal Government. Do you feel the market is strong enough to handle all the changes at once?
I believe that any time an election is around the corner, the government starts throwing out rules, regulations and taxes in order to make it look like it’s providing a solution. In any market, especially ours, the supply and demand factor are key. You can bring any kind of regulation along with any type of tax but if the demand is high and supplies are low, the market will still continue to grow.
8. Will we see a price adjustment or will the prices level off?
We have already seen a price correction in the last three months. I believe that the inventory will start declining as sellers are not receiving prices that they would have at the beginning of this year or closer to the end of last year. So based on that I think the adjustments will happen and overall the prices will level off.
9. With the bidding wars that have taken place will we see buyers getting a chance to review documents, get appraisals, or schedule inspections ever again?
The bidding wars that have taken place before are not taking place as much, neither are they making headlines in the news. There are some more pockets that still have been worse based on the location but overall in the market that has now stopped. Buyers are now able to get their subjects and do their due diligence. They have a period of about one to two weeks to do so.
10. What’s a message would you would like to share with the South Asian community?
I think the South Asian community needs to know that we are a very big part of how this housing market grows. It is important that we stand together and let the government know when some of the rules and regulations that they implement are not changing anything. Investing in real estate is always smart. The game is to buy and hold for your best overall return.
