Just stumbled upon this thread and have been reading through the posts. I didn't realize the situation was as crazy as it is. My partner and I had been looking for the last few months and gave up recently - it always ended in frustration - we're in our mid 30s, renting downtown, average household income, looking to start a family. I was reading some posts in this thread out loud to her and we both laugh at how ludicrous the situation is - better laugh than cry! Thanks for the inside scoop. So... we continue to rent and are now strongly considering a move abroad - it has become the most attractive option.
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COVID and the housing market
- Thread starter mimico_polak
- Start date
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Deleted member 50930
Guest
Anybody remember the term "Starter home"? It used to be you bought a small home to start with, earned some equity and bought a bigger home. Today that's not really a thing . First off no one builds small homes (Want fries with that McMansion?) and if they did I don't think young folks today would be interested. I used to work for Habitat for Humanity removing old kitchens that were then sold in the store. I can't count the number of young people/ couples who wanted me to remove perfectly good, solid, useable kitchens as soon as they got the keys to their new home. "how can we live with laminate countertops and last years flavour for cupboards?"
Where are they getting the effing money?
Where are they getting the effing money?
I've lived outside of Canada for almost a decade. There are places in the world where medical insurance is not necessary and you can readily pay for healthcare with your credit card... or cash that you have in your wallet.
My friend broke her arm in Thailand. X-ray + cast = $50USD.
My wife had a mole removed and analyzed in Germany = 80 Euros.
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Deleted member 50930
Guest
Yup I been to Vietnam, Korea, China, Singapore etc
Not sure I want to work and life there though
Home equity.
When your house goes up 30% every year and borrowing against that increase only costs you 2.75% APR (basically peanuts). It's like free money...
...until either interest rates go up and/or house prices crash.
The Canadian economy is running almost entirely on real estate. Especially since our dirty oil is becoming locked up.
It's a house of cards that's waiting to come crashing down...
Other Low Cost of Living countries: Spain, Portugal...
Was the BOC rate drop from 1.75% to 0.25% last March one of the root causes of this mess?
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Deleted member 50930
Guest
Go to UAE!
I think so. The lower interest rates turned equity into king. Parking your money in a HISA doesn't grow anymore
Can I survive knowing only english?
Interest rates have been low since the Financial Crisis in 2008.
I remember a good buddy of mine told me that he paid off his 25k car in cash...I asked how the hell he did it because I know he wasn’t making great cash.
‘Oh I just put it on the mortgage when we refinanced....it’s only an extra 100/month for 25 years.’ WTF!
maybe I’m the idiot for not taking out equity for cars, investments or anything really and paying cash for what I can like a sucker.
Every year my wife complains we don’t go on as many vacation as our friends....we have no debts outside of the house. They’re running LoCs of about 100k/family.
‘Oh I just put it on the mortgage when we refinanced....it’s only an extra 100/month for 25 years.’ WTF!
maybe I’m the idiot for not taking out equity for cars, investments or anything really and paying cash for what I can like a sucker.
Every year my wife complains we don’t go on as many vacation as our friends....we have no debts outside of the house. They’re running LoCs of about 100k/family.
Priller
Well-known member
This is what I miss. I much prefer southern Ontario weather to Vancouver weather, but the roads there are so much better. This is especially true closer to the coast where they rarely see cold and therefore don't have frost heaves and potholes.
Sea-to-Sky is mediocre at best since the Olympic re-do. Needs license-losing speeds to get a lean on, and it's crawling with cops all summer. Great scenery, though. Past Whistler it gets fun, but you're a lot more than an hour from Vancouver by then. There's lots of great roads up the north side of the Fraser between Maple Ridge and Harrison, there's some awesome runs northeast of Abbotsford, and the Sunshine Coast is unparalleled, despite the short ferry ride (the ferry has the added benefit of being a squid repellant, though it's less effective against RV's). Whether they're an hour from home very much depends where you live...
The interior is amazing, for sure, particularly in the south towards Nelson. Eastern Oregon is almost as close to Vancouver (in normal times, anyway) and has equally good, if not better roads. The pavement down there is immaculate, and there's almost zero traffic. You'd think Washinton would have great roads, but the pavement there is mostly terrible.
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Deleted member 50930
Guest
That's dumb. Should have sent the $25k into a ETF
Same here. No plane vacations since kids. On the rare occasion that it makes sense to LOC something, it gets paid off before the LOC is used again. Every year the bank bumps up LOC limit and I keep letting them as it will lower our percentage utilization if we use it. Not going to be able to keep this up forever, wife wants to go somewhere warm, but by the time covid is over and the crazy post-covid travel rush with astronomical prices, kids will be in school and daycare money can become vacation money.
He took out 80k recently to buy some stock...,didn’t tell the wife.
he’s making enough on the dividends to make his payments on the loan though. I don’t have nuts of steel so I’d never do that.
EDIT: I don’t agree with doing that for a car, but really who am I to judge? He’s happy, enjoyed the car, and now he has a model Y that he loves. He gambled and it worked out. I’m happy for him.
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Deleted member 50930
Guest
While that makes sense financially and probably works most of the time, I'm not there yet. Once the mortgage gets below 200 (in a long time), I will become much more comfortable with drawing to invest. Sure, the compounded return will be less but I don't want the pressure of figuring out where the money is going to come from if it doesn't work.
I’ve got to figure this **** out. Gimme the TL
R version?
You borrow to invest using equity in your home to get a lower interest rate. Interest on money borrowed to invest is tax deductible. That pushes your mortgage interest to before tax dollars and hopefully your investment grows to get you even further ahead.I’ve got to figure this **** out. Gimme the TL
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