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NYT: In Vancouver, Indigenous Communities Get Prime Land and Power


From The New York Times, read article:  https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/23/world/americas/canada-vancouver-indigenous.html

 

After acquiring some of the biggest and most coveted parcels of land in Vancouver, the city’s three First Nations are becoming players in the biggest game in town — real estate Lelem, a development led by the Musqueam Nation, in Vancouver.



Cost of Construction Hit By Inflation


From: Western Investor:

Glass price increase adds to construction cost pressures

Contractors pushed to the brink as insolvencies loom

vancouver-condosGlass is a defining feature of highrise towers, and prices are poised to reach new heights in BC with a 40 per cent increase this month.

Glass suppliers hit the B.C. construction sector with a 40 per cent increase in the price of glass this week, adding to what many builders say are unsustainable cost increases that could lead to a wave of insolvencies.

Guardian Glass gave notice to customers on June 14 that it was raising the price of clear glass 40 per cent effective June 20. Tinted glass will increase 25 per cent.

Other suppliers quickly followed suit.

Guardian declined comment on the increase, which contractors say is impossible to absorb. Combined with cost increases for other materials, it puts the entire production chain at risk, said Craig Enns, vice-president and area manager with EllisDon Corp. in Vancouver.

“The scale of the increases now is such that no matter how good or honourable a trade you are, you can’t absorb a 20 per cent glass increase overnight and still honour your price. Those margins just don’t exist,” Enns said during a June 16 panel discussion regarding construction costs hosted by commercial real estate association NAIOP.

 

Glass isn’t the only cost that’s increasing. Statistics Canada’s Industrial Product Price Index reports that lumber costs remain 87 per cent higher than in January 2020, while the prices for fabricated metal products and other construction materials have increased 43 per cent.

Drywall is up 55 per cent versus pre-pandemic levels, NAIOP was told.

Delivery timelines for almost all materials have doubled since the start of the pandemic, adding to cost pressures – if they even arrive.



Urban Analytics Report on Highrise Condo Projects Put on Hold


In my opinion there is sure to be a supply deficit come 2022 which will only drive prices UP!

 

 

Developers hit pause on riskier, highrise condo projects: Urban Analytics

Highrise condo projects, which carry significant risk for developers and construction lenders, comprised the largest proportion of postponed developments

Highrise condo projects, which carry significant risk for developers and construction lenders, comprised the largest proportion of postponed developments, according to Urban Analytics, which tracks presale condo data. DARRYL DYCK / THE CANADIAN PRESS

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Vancouver-based developer Townline gave official notice that it’s postponing its Meridian project, a 39-storey tower with one-, two- and three-bedroom units near the Evergreen Line in Coquitlam.

Other developers, who had been scheduled to launch sales in recent months, have been more discreetly letting key dates go by without proceeding as planned. And there is market chatter about others who will join them.

It’s no wonder some developers are hitting pause, according to Michael Ferreira, managing principal at Urban Analytics, which keeps track of presale condo data.

The number of new or presale condo and townhome sales recorded across Metro Vancouver during the first quarter of 2019 represented a 56-per-cent drop from the last quarter and a 61-per-cent drop from the same quarter last year. At 1,783, it was the third-lowest quarterly sales total since 2010, after the global financial and credit crisis.

The postponing of several condo-project launches in the first quarter of 2019 meant 75-per-cent fewer units were released for sale, compared with the previous quarter.

“Highrise condo projects, which carry significant risk for developers and construction lenders, comprised the largest proportion of postponed developments,” said Ferreira in a news release.

Consultant Michael Ferreira of Vancouver-based Urban Analytics says highrise projects that carry significant financial risk for developers have hit a major slowdown. GERRY KAHRMANN / PNG FILES

Projects that are more dependent on buyers who are investors have also been hit hard, as investors are “more apt to stay on the sidelines and wait for what they perceive as a bottom of the market.”

This impacted some findings for the quarter. For example, there was a more significant drop in sales in the area north of the Fraser River because of the greater concentration of highrise developments there.

To compare, while highrise condo sales fell by 61 per cent year-on-year, there was only a 28-per-cent drop for lowrise condo sales.

The Real Estate Development Marketing Act requires developers to secure construction financing nine months after they file a disclosure statement, which allows them to legally sell their units. When presales were selling like hotcakes, this timeline was easy to meet.

Now, “with such a short window in which to meet presale targets required to obtain financing, developers are reluctant to launch a new project without some certainty they’ll meet those targets,” said Ferreira.

He added that the “overwhelming majority of unsold units are in the pre-construction phase, with completed and unsold units accounting for just six per cent of all unsold inventory.”

Across Metro, 93 per cent of all highrise-condo units scheduled to be completed by the end of 2020 are sold. The number goes down to 80 per cent of units being sold when looking at units that will be completed later in the third quarter of 2022.

Only in a few markets such as South Surrey/White Rock, Langley/Cloverdale and Richmond/South Delta were there more than 50 completed, move-in ready units that were unsold.

Overall, the total number of completed, move-in-ready-but-unsold units at the end of the first quarter of 2019 was 453. This figure has been increasing “moderately” and is an 18-per-cent increase over the last quarter, but still well below the high of just over 2,200 that was recorded in the last quarter of 2013, according to Urban Analytics.

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