Step-by-Step Home Buying Process If you are new to B.C. or a first-time homebuyer, buying a home can feel like a daunting experience. Over the years, my mentor (John Grasty) and I have developed a step-by-step guide to help simplify this process. 1. Choose a Realtor then Analyze Your Needs/Goals with your Realtor When it … Read more
Coquitlam City Centre Area Plan On Saturday, June 9, I went to the Community Information Session put on by the City of Coquitlam about their upcoming plans for City Centre. The info session was held at Coquitlam Centre mall (there’s another one scheduled at their Canada Day booth display at the Town Centre Park celebration … Read more
Unrepresented Parties in Real Estate – Beware Consumers who choose to conduct a real estate transaction without a real estate professional are soon to be known as “unrepresented parties”. Following the Independent Advisory Group Review for the Office of the Superintendent of Real Estate (OSRE), consumer protection has been reaffirmed as the priority in real … Read more
What is Your Home and Property Really Worth? Making Sense of the BC Assessment It’s that time of year again. Every first week of January, BC Assessment, a Crown corporation, sends out its annual notifications of property assessments for owners throughout the province. And every January, homeowners scramble to make sense of the assessment. What … Read more
STV is the abbreviation for the Single Transferable Vote, an electoral system of preferential voting designed to minimize wasted votes and provide proportional representation. This is a primer for our upcoming May 12, 2009, provincial election. A variation of STV known as BC-STV is a proposed voting system recommended for use in British Columbia by the … Read more
This post is not about the slick (and mindboggling success of) marketing ploys of developers to “liquidate” their bulk over-supply of over-priced condos throughout Metro Vancouver; although just the thought makes me shudder. The condo liquidation phenomenon I am referring to here is likely to become more prevalent as more buildings realize that their short-sighted focus … Read more
The origins of the National Certification Program (NCP) for home inspectors stretch back to 1997 when a report was issued by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) that uncovered noteworthy inconsistencies in the skill and diligence of home inspectors across the country that still persist today. With the support of CMHC, Human Resources and Social … Read more
This week I returned from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. While home sales might have slowed down slightly, asset appreciation is still happening in PV, and it is clear that those with money continue to buy there including many Canadians. I suspect that as paper portfolios diminish in North America, hard assets such as homes offer an … Read more
http://www2.news.gov.bc.ca/news_releases_2005-2009/2008HSD0079-001459.pdf It is difficult to understand the motivation of our provincial government to throw so much of the housing ministry’s resources into another initiative (this time 6-storey wood frame buildings) that does nothing to improve homeowner protection in BC. How are the same people that can’t build a 4-storey building right, possibly going to achieve … Read more
As a British Columbian outsider I am utterly disgusted reading this article on the plight of the Shuman’s. I have a great deal of difficulty comprehending how a certain percentage of performance value or work disqualifies a claim for sub-standard workmanship or materials. Okay, so it is none of my business poking my BC nose … Read more