Richmond Condo News

Buyer beware

When buying a Condo or town home, home buyers are advised to carefully review the strata minutes, property disclosure statement and Form B. In spite of home buyers' careful review of all relevant documents and inspection by professional home inspectors, many still ended up buying condos that are leakers.

There are many instances of condos that are suspects, but water-damaged problems in the buildings not being confirmed by engineering report. Meanwhile, patch-work repairs may have temporarily minimized the water ingress problems. Without a comprehensive investigation by a building envelope engineer, no one can be sure whether a building is "leaking".

One way to avoid the uncertainty is for home buyer to buy a newer condo unit. The newer condo buildings have been competently designed and built with rain-screen technology to solve the water-ingressed problems. A home buyer should be cautious on those buildings that are built following the "air tight" building code from 1980s to 1990s.

Difficulty in getting financing

Canadian banks will only lend on leaky buildings that have been "fixed", or the strata council already obtained approval from 3/4 homeowners to proceed with the building envelope remediation. When buying a condo, make sure to ask your realtor not to show units that have water-damaged problems.

General description:

This townhouse complex is around 20 years old. This is a 3-level townhouse complex ranging in size from just over 1,600 to 1,715 square feet of living area with 3 bedrooms and 2.5 baths. The parking arrangement is one or 2 covered garage(s). The property tax for 2007 is around $1,800 and the monthly maintenance is around $165.

The strata management and general up-keep by the owners of 8431 and 8531 above average.

Location:

The townhouse complex is located in Richmond’s “Riverdale” area. Access to the townhouse complex from the city is via Granville Road and No. 2 Road. Both elementary and secondary schools are within a short walk from the townhouses. The very popular Thompson Community Center is just a short walk from the townhouse complex. Proximity to the Richmond City center makes this townhouse complex a popular homes for many home owners.

Price history: 2005 - $320,000/$335,000, 2006 - $370,000/$380,000, 2007 - $410,000

If you are interested to look for a townhouse unit in any of the above addresses, you can contact James Wong 604-721-4817.

General description:

This townhouse complex is around 20 years old. This is a 2-level townhouse complex with average built-up area around 1,450 to 1,500 square feet of living area with 3 bedrooms and 2.5 baths. The parking arrangement is one covered car-porch and one open parking spot. The property tax for 2007 is around $1,860 and the monthly maintenance is around $120 (self-managed).

Location:

The townhouse complex is located in Richmond’s “Brighouse South” area. Access to the townhouse complex from the city is via Granville Road and No. 3 Road. Both elementary and secondary schools are within a short walk from the townhouses. The very popular Minoru Park, Richmond main library, swimming pool, ice-skating ring and Richmond Center Mall are all withing a short walk from the townhouse complex. Proximity to the Richmond City center makes this townhouse complex a popular homes for many home owners.

Price history:

2005 - $320,000/$335,000
2006 - $380,000
2007 - None for sale
2008 - $453,000

If you are interested to look for a townhouse unit in any of the above addresses, you can contact James Wong at 604-721-4817.

General description:

This townhouse complex is around 34 years old. These townhouses are seldom available for sale. Each unit is consisted of around 1,550 square feet of living area with 3 bedrooms and 2.5 baths. The parking arrangement is 2 covered car porches. The property tax for 2007 is around $1,800 and the monthly maintenance is around $220.

The strata management and general up-keep of this townhome complex are above average. This is a children friendly environment whereby your young children will have many young friends to pay with in this complex.

Location:

The townhouse complex is located in Richmond’s “Westwind” area. Access to the townhouse complex from the city is via Steveston Highway and No. 2 Road. An elementary school is within a short walk from the townhouses.

Price history: 2005 - $330,000, 2006 - $380,000, 2007 - $395,000/$420,000

If you are interested to look for a townhouse unit in any of the above addresses, you can contact James Wong at 604-721-4817.

Condo living is the most likely choice for most young first time home buyers. The main reason if because of affordability and for some people it is a lifestyle choice. Most people are realistic that buying a condo is a stepping stone for them to own their first homes. They know that a condo will be good enough for them to live and have a small young family for the first few years. They are hoping that by the time they need to move to a larger home, they will have enough equity to do so.

Condo Location

This is one of the most important considerations when buying a condo. In areas like Vancouver, Burnaby, Richmond, New Westminster and Surrey, many home buyers and investors prefer buying condos within a short walk from the Rapid Transit or Sky Train system. Condos around the Sky Train stations are found to have better price appreciation, higher rent and easier to rent out. The ease of transportation enables the tenants or owners of such condo units to forgo owning their cars. 

The monthly saving in forgoing car ownership is as much as $500 to $900 a month if the car is leased or a car loan is required to be repaid ($200 - $500 a month) . Car insurance, gas and repairs and maintenance will cost another $300 to $400 a month. This monthly saving can be translated into money that a home buyer can use to afford a larger and higher price condo. Based on the prevailing interest rate around 6.0% and 25 year amortization, the saving on $500 to $900 can support an extra  mortgage loan of $78,000 to $140,000.       

Floor Plan, Furnishing and Amenities

Most new condo units are built and installed with the most contemporary kitchen equipment, modern bath/shower fixtures and trendy wood/carpet flooring. Most condos do differ in their floor plans and the functionality of the condo layouts. A good or not so good floor plan is one critical area that affect how easy or difficult your condo unit can be sold when you are selling your unit some years later.  

If you are looking for a local Realtor to help you with your search for a Richmond condos, your can contact James Wong 604-721-4817.

It's very common that a home owner is selling his present home and buying another home in the process. Buying or selling first becomes a tricky problem to solve. The most practical way to solve the problem is to sell and buy at the same time. "Pricing your house fairly" is important if you are expecting to sell your home within 30 - 60 days of listing.

There are some basic house keeping and home preparation works that are needed to be done to present your home for sale. Click here to follow the link on preparing your home for sale.

Pricing your home

The real estate market is relatively transparent when comes to pricing. Under prevailing market conditions a property is considered fairly priced when comparable most recent sales data are used to determine the listing price. Setting the listing price at 4% to 5% higher than comparable sales could be excessive, and may result in little interest from buyers and agents. Overpricing means fewer showings and poor responses from home buyers and agents.

Getting the help of a local Realtor

There are compelling reasons to use an experienced Realtor to help you with this important process of buying and selling your home at the same time. An experienced and knowledgeable Realtor can help make your move less stressful and fulfill your plan with minimum disruption.

If you a resident of Richmond, Vancouver or Burnaby, BC you are welcome to contact James Wong at 604-721-4817 to discuss your situation.

General description:

This townhouse complex is around 10 years old, and the townhouse units are consisted of 3 level homes ranging in built-up area between 1,540 to 1,620 square feet of living area. The townhouse complex has a good range of 3 and 4 bedroom units with 3 and 2.5 baths. The parking arrangement is two covered attached garages. The property tax for 2007 is from around $2,200 and the monthly maintenance is from $190 a month.

Location:

This townhouse complex is located in the very desirable and newer Terra Nova sub-division in North West corner of Richmond. Home owners are attracted to the neighbourhood for it’s proximity to the Terra Nova shopping plaza and the Richmond Nature Park and the West Richmond Trail along the dyke.

Access to the townhouse complex from the city is via Westminster Highway and No.1 Road. Both elementary and secondary schools are within a short walk from the townhouses. A very popular outdoor destination for residents of Terra Nova is The West Dyke Trail which connects Terra Nova with Garry Point Park. Richmond residents are taking on to walking, jogging and cycling along this trail.

Price history: 2005 - $390,000, 2006 - $440,000, 2007 - $480,000/$500,000

If you are interested to look for a townhouse at the above addresses, you can contact James Wong at 604-721-4817.

There are 2 time periods of the year that are good for listing and selling your homes. Historically, early spring and mid-summer are the most active period and best time for sellers listing their properties for sale. These time periods co-incide with better weather conditions and homebuyers planning to make a move before the new school term starts in September.

Conversely, Autumn being perceived as slower months with less buying and selling activities may prove to be the best time for homebuyers to buy their homes. At this time with relatively less activities, sellers are more likely to reduce their listing prices or more willing to negotiate on their prices. Autumn is also the time period when there are more listings and a wider selection of properties to choose from.

So, if you are planning to make a move as a homebuyer, you should seriously consider contacting your local Realtor and check out what you can get within your price budget. You will be pleasantly surprised that buying a home in Autumn is less stressful as you will have more time to carefully consider your selections. You may find your perfect ideal home that you have been looking for.

If you need a local Richmond or South Vancouver Realtor to check out the active listings for you, kindly contact James Wong 604-721-4817.

Taking a pause?

Is Vancouver's detached house price in October taking a pause before heading up higher as in December 2006 and January 2007? Or, is this the top of the Vancouver housing market? The Calgary and Edmonton housing markets had already stalled for the past 3 months with declining sales volumes. The Canadian 6 cities pricing trends as presented by Brian Ripley can be viewed here.

Brian's scorecard statistics for Calgary and Edmonton are showing deterioration in the housing market in these 2 cities. Could October be the month that Vancouver too follows Calgary and Edmonton reversing its pricing trend?

Other than the highly unaffordability problem faced by Vancouver homebuyers, high level of housing constructions and housing inventory coming on-stream near term will put pressure on the market. Market sentiment and buyer confidence will dictate what will happen to the Vancouver real estate market the next few months.

There are signs that Western Canadian cities have already reached or past the housing market top. The next few months will confirm whether Vancouver's housing market still has the strength to move higher. Or, it will stay flat before heading for a decline.

If you like to find out more information on the recent Richmond housing market, you can contact James Wong 604-721-4817.