Vancouver's Real Estate Market

[GLOW]

kind of depends on the culture at the firm IMO

i was a sub (in the office though) for a while and we believed in safety...were COR certified if that means anything to anyone

[quasi]

Originally Posted by GLOW

kind of depends on the culture at the firm IMO

i was a sub (in the office though) for a while and we believed in safety...were COR certified if that means anything to anyone

Yeah, our company is a sub and also COR certified. We have a full time Safety Officer that we move around sites in our lower mainland office as well who can certify for fall protection, lifts ect.

Originally Posted by MarkyMark

What line of work is that?

We do steel stud, drywall, acoustic ceilings, acoustic specialty items.


Also most of the work we do is for the bigger GC's, the PCL's, Graham's, Bird, SBW, Ledcors ect... so those companies don't fuck around with Safety.

[MarkyMark]

I'm on the maintenance side of things where downtime costs them a lot money and shitty companies are willing to turn a blind eye to guys doing something unsafe to get things up and running again. I've heard a lot of stories from coworkers who used to do contractor work out to places and if you questioned anything safety wise you were asked not to come back the next day.

It's usually the smaller companies that do this, the big public companies with lots of money care a lot more about safety.

[donk.]

Originally Posted by MarkyMark

It's usually the smaller companies that do this, the big public companies with lots of money care a lot more about safety.

What they don't tell you, is that the big companies care more about safety, because they have had enough lawsuits, WCB claims, jobs go over budget, because they did not do things properly, for years, errrrr decades

Spoiler!

[Hondaracer]

1-2 major WCB claims and it would sink most small companies

[hud 91gt]

COR is a certification to get a discount on your worksafe insurance. Likely to be cut out in a few years anyhow. The discount is based on your payroll, so the percentage saved is obviously exponential for large companies. Not worth small companies to get it (expensive yearly audits of your program etc). My wife use to do these audits all the time.

[hud 91gt]

Originally Posted by Tapioca

The first rule of dating is to be attractive.

But yes, lots of older successful woman do stay single and become cat/dog owners because there aren't enough high achieving and high status men to go around. This explains why we need more housing - we will continue to see people not forming households with others and instead, opt to remain single for the long term.

That’s the successful woman’s excuse for being single. More like that can’t find someone successful that they can actually get along with for extended periods of time. Fact of the matter is, the boss lady is a boss lady. Type A personality, that like to control. They think they want a successful man, but in reality they should be finding a house husband.

[donk.]

I got inspiration from badhobz+Tofus post in good buys thread

https://www.rew.ca/properties/506616...hy&sort=latest

Solid C- realtor, or stay at home mom kind of posting with garbage photos. The value probably dropped by 10k at minimum, just from the shitty photos

Also, who puts a chandelier above their bed in a low rise ceiling condo.....


I was going to give the listing benefit of the doubt, for it being a FSBO listing, but even that does not come up

[Presto]

Originally Posted by donk.

Also, who puts a chandelier above their bed in a low rise ceiling condo.....

My wife's cousin somehow installed 4 chandeliers into a langeway suite. We are all wondering what stupid shit he's going to do next.

[Presto]

https://vancouversun.com/news/local-...ike-after-sale

TLDR: Lease of land expired in 2022. Residents vote no to buy the land even though it would only increase their rent by 7%. Now, they are screwed because somebody else bought the land and are going to increase rent by 200%.

Residents at a Surrey housing co-op that has been around for 40 years face a difficult decision after the land was recently sold to a new owner — agree to steep and sudden rent increases or move out by July 1.

Many of the low income seniors and young families who have been living at Totem Housing Co-operative are scrambling to understand if they have any other options.

Their situation comes as other renters find themselves in a similar bind as landlords are raising rents or seeking new tenants who will pay more in order to keep up with maintenance and other costs.

Judy Patka, 79, has lived at Totem for 15 years and has been paying $600 a month to the co-op for a one-bedroom apartment. She makes $2,100 a month and the new owner is demanding $1,600.

In 2017, Patka sat on the co-op’s board, which was in favour of buying the land even though some residents were opposed.

“We checked the rents in the area to see if we could increase our rents for a one-bedroom from $600 to $750 so we could try to save a little more and get a better mortgage, but (it was), Nope, nope, nope.’ ”

Since then, she has been worried that the land could be sold out from under the residents for redevelopment.

“So, I’m really frustrated and (ticked). Sure, go complaining now, but you know what? You have done this to yourselves,” said Patka.

Thom Armstrong, CEO of the Co-operative Housing Federation of B.C. (CHF B.C.), agreed that while the residents at Totem now face a disturbing outcome, it could have been different.

He said that the previous pension fund owners offered the co-op the chance to buy the land in 2017. At the time, it would have cost less than $10 million. The co-op was given some discounts, but there would still have been rental increases of between three and seven per cent.

“It was pretty reasonable at that point and they said, ‘No,’ ” said Armstrong, lamenting the missed opportunity.

In Burnaby last July, the CHF B.C. worked with the City of Burnaby and B.C. Housing to keep 425 units of co-op housing for seniors and low-income residents by helping the co-op to buy its three buildings when the owner was selling them.

Currently, it’s working on several deals with co-ops on leased land that are at risk of being sold to the private sector in Coquitlam.

“We’re trying to recreate what we were able to do in Burnaby,” said Armstrong.

The “tragedy” goes beyond the plight of the current families in Totem’s 58 units, but includes the loss of having those more affordable rental units in the future, said Armstrong.

The co-op had already in 2017 paid off its mortgage for the units in the buildings, but its lease for the land expired in December 2022.

The lease, dating to 1982, included the right of first refusal, which gave the co-op a chance to make an offer on the land if the pension fund owners were to sell. However, when the lease expired, a six-month extension offered to the co-op didn’t include a right of first refusal.

Richard Coulter’s daughter and son-in-law and three grandchildren have been living at Totem. He’s a commercial real estate developer and had reached out to the pension fund owners of the land in the late fall of 2022 with a plan for the co-op to assign its first right of refusal to a company that would buy the land and offer residents 24 months of not having to pay rent and then ultimately $50,000 to find somewhere else to live. He said he got a reply from a consultant working for the pension fund that said the land wasn’t for sale.

“Then the property suddenly was sold (in 2023) and there was an announcement that the rents were going up over 200 per cent,” said Coulter, who is meeting with residents to gauge interest in seeking legal advice.

The new owner is a numbered company whose director is Munish Katyal, who is the co-owner of Indo-Canadian Voice newspaper, who didn’t return Postmedia News’s phone calls.

“It would have given people a way to plan,” said Coulter, adding that the co-op buildings are in need of significant investment. “They are falling apart and not built to code with materials that are hazardous. They need replacing.”

[Great68]

Shitty, no protection under the RTA at all either.

[JDMDreams]

So they were dumb and short sighted then they try to play victim? What did they think? everything is a charity and rent to you for $600 a month? That probably doesn't even cover the expenses or maintenance upkeep.

[Hondaracer]

A guy who is a commercial real estate developer has a son and daughter in law with 3 children living in a low-income coop?.. :/

[JDMDreams]

^^ I've seen a guy making over $100k own a detached that was spilt to two duplex and sold making $$$$ live in a coop

[yray]

wait... coop lands are not owned by the gov't or the coop

thats fucked

[Great68]

Cooperative housing =/= government housing.

Most probably own their land, but as we've seen in this article some do not.

[yray]

Originally Posted by Great68

Cooperative housing =/= government housing.

was thinking of something like a lease to own deal

[Mikoyan]

Originally Posted by JDMDreams

So they were dumb and short sighted then they try to play victim? What did they think? everything is a charity and rent to you for $600 a month? That probably doesn't even cover the expenses or maintenance upkeep.

Don't think they did cover upkeep..

“It would have given people a way to plan,” said Coulter, adding that the co-op buildings are in need of significant investment. “They are falling apart and not built to code with materials that are hazardous. They need replacing.”

[JDMDreams]

O look mortgage rates are going up again, I guess we better subsidize and eat the cost for the poor renters

[carsncars]

Yikes. It sounds like the board made efforts to educate residents and the vote was still "no" - I wish they'd interviewed some of the co-op residents that voted no?? I'm curious as to the rationale.

I understand that some people have fixed income etc. but when the choice is to come up with 3-7% in rent increase vs. the alternative of 100% increases or losing your home, what purpose does voting "no" achieve? Like, do you expect your cost to never increase? Are you just crossing your fingers that government will swoop in and bail you out?

Overall as I get older I have less and less faith that large groups of people will act/vote rationally...

[Hondaracer]

Here’s the thought process of the people who voted no:

My rent is going to go up AT ALL? - No.

[ilovebacon]

YouTube

Whats the problem?

[unit]

what is the CPCs plan for housing specifically? genuinely curious, because all they seem to be good at is blaming the libs. even their website literally does nothing more than blame JT.
who are the gatekeepers they are referring to and how would the CPC circumvent those gatekeepers?

https://www.conservative.ca/cpc/buil...le-can-afford/

[Traum]

From my experience with living at a strata property, the mentality described by Hondaracer is unfortunately common enough that it ruins the situation for the everyone. Some people are literally incapable of seeing the bigger picture even if it could potentially pan out for the worse in a matter of months. There is no logic to it because, for the lack of a better description -- they are just stupid.

It is very frustrating, and when faced with situations like that, my preferred option is to just withdraw myself from having anything to do with this sort of idiocy.

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

Here’s the thought process of the people who voted no:

My rent is going to go up AT ALL? - No.

Originally Posted by carsncars

Yikes. It sounds like the board made efforts to educate residents and the vote was still "no" - I wish they'd interviewed some of the co-op residents that voted no?? I'm curious as to the rationale.

I understand that some people have fixed income etc. but when the choice is to come up with 3-7% in rent increase vs. the alternative of 100% increases or losing your home, what purpose does voting "no" achieve? Like, do you expect your cost to never increase? Are you just crossing your fingers that government will swoop in and bail you out?

Overall as I get older I have less and less faith that large groups of people will act/vote rationally...

[donk.]

I wonder what the new value of the property is after the rent went from 600$ to 1800$.

Gross rent multiplier only goes so high in in the GVRD area

I bet you they could flip it for a cool few million once "rents" are at market and not 2005 rent prices.