What goes up, must come down. 'Cept in larger centres.

Supply and demand dictate the market. As more people move to this area for work, the demand for housing increases. Homes in certain price ranges will attract more attention depending on their annual salary.

First time home buyers can pull out up to $20,000 each tax-free from their RRSP's to purchase a home. A purchaser can keep CMHC out of their lives by putting at least 20% down at purchase time. These are typically the folks who can afford a home. (and not everyone can afford to own their own home)

Don't let the banks tell you what you can afford. They would be the last ones I would consult. Chester

funny how the citizen reports that the market may be increasing by 21% by the end of this year...who do you believe!

According to the above table, the average sale price for single detached housing sold in PG in 2007 is projected to be up by 21% and that is projected to drop to a 7% increase in 2008.

So, the price paid will have increased by the end of the year and increase much less next year, but still increase. The number of sales, however, dropped in 2006, is expected to drop even further this year, and drop very slightly in 2008.

So, it looks like when the Citizen refers to the "market" it refers to the price component of the market, not the unit turnover rate of the market.

BTW, the total detached home sales in dollars for 2006 was $238.0 million.

For 2007 it is projected to be $267.7 million for a 12.5% increase.

For 2008 it is projected to be $280.5 million for a 4.8% increase.

I think its a big mistake that multi residential housing is not being developed in Prince George like it is in other parts of the province. With single family homes becoming more and more unattainable for the average person in the market, smaller, less expensive condos are the rage.

dgdiggler...generally speaking the mistake is a private one, not public. the developer takes the risks, except where seniors housing comes in.


with our dirth of land available it is still cheaper for developers to build individual detached or semi detached....

the only way we will get affordable strata housing is when land becomes very expensive or when a third party steps in....check out the development on the corner of Davis and Ospika...It is unique in that it is a co-op where the properties are sold back to the co-op and not to the market, thus "controlling" the cost of housing.

That's low income housing that is administerd by the church. I'm talking about nice condos like the kind you'll find in the okanagan, whistler, new west, coquitlam, etc.

"with our dirth of land available it is still cheaper for developers to build individual detached or semi detached...."

The city is very much in control over how much land costs. By opening up all these new subdivisions and having most of the properties zoned for detached single family, they are flooding the market. Thus, property costs will stay low and condos will not be in large demand.

The key reason why places like Boston and San Francisco have high housing costs is not due to construction costs or due to a large influx of people, it is because they control the amount of land on the market through "planned" development objectives set by the cities. Costs in Texas, an equaly and even more quickly growing area are considerably less for the same type and size of house. They put more on the market.

So, developers are shooting themselves in the foot by what is going on here. The City is spending more money to build the water, sewer and road network capacity when they could be using those dolalrs for maitenance of existing infrastructure and building up the infrastructure such as better community facilities.

As I keep saying, there is nothing smart about the growth planning this city is doing. Anything but that.

Kelown condo examples

http://flickr.com/photos/jumpyjodes/420831855

http://flickr.com/photos/11455667@N03/sets/72157601912967834/

http://flickr.com/photos/10770290@N06/961228192/in/set-72157601117786653/

That first picture above. There is prime land available in the Hudson Bay slough area. It is in the 200 year flood plane which can be accommodated quite easily with a project of this magnitude. In addition, that size of development would change the dynamics in the South Fort area considerably. The Kelowna development was built in a run down warehouse area as well. The third image above is a loft conod development in the same "cultural district" built in the old warehouse/industrial district between the lake and "downtown".

People here talk about infill development but instead are "infilling" in suburbia, not close to the heart of the city. They pan for housing in the same way as they plan for downtown - let the centre of the city die and build up the outer ring .....

The problems of building with wood .... there are high quality developments; then there are developments built with wood instead of concrete.

[/url]http://flickr.com/photos/75122043@N00/91669307[/url]