Years ago I bought a very charming mid-century modern rancher with post and beam ceilings. Off the living room was a large space with tall windows on three sides and a plastic corrugated roof - so it was full of light which was great, but unheated so freezing in the winter. 

The house was built in the 1960's and it appeared that some owner had enclosed a covered porch in order to have more interior space. I had dreams of redoing the badly done reno by installing a proper roof, updating windows and putting in a new heating system - all to be done by a professional contractor. Now some contractors may do a great job without obtaining permits (permits can take months to obtain from your local municipality).

However there are risks to not obtaining the appropriate paperwork. Firstly, when you go to sell your property, you must disclose that alterations were made without permits because that is considered a material latent defect. Often unpermitted work will affect the sale of your home in some way. Secondly, if you are not selling but are planning to do further renos that require permits and you apply for the permits, the city will come to inspect the work and may notice the non-permitted work, which MAY have to be undone or redone at a considerable cost.

For more details on permits, visit:

https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/housing-tenancy/building-or-renovating#:~:text=Permits%20help%20ensure%20that%20construction,of%20a%20project%20can%20start.

There are many great reasons to buy a condo in an older building - larger rooms, no GST, lots of inventory. It is now 2023. Any condo built in the 1990's is now 23-33 years old and with age comes the end of the life span for many elements like roofs, windows and balconies, parking membranes, exterior cladding and more.

When you write an offer for a unit in a building from this decade, you have access to the strata documents which you absolutely should read. What should you be looking for? A newish Depreciation Report which is a 30 Year maintenance plan/guide to assist the strata owners in maintaining their building. In the minutes, specifically Annual General Meeting minutes, you want to see that maintenance projects are being voted on and not postponed continually. You may fall in love with a particular suite but you are also buying the building! 

As you may have heard, many of the Vancouver apartments built in the nineties were improperly built which resulted in leaky condos - water infiltrating into the exterior building envelope (walls and roofs). Many of the buildings have been repaired, at great cost to the owners, by way of a rainscreening process. When shopping for a home built in the nineties as well as the eighties, I would recommend looking for buildings already rainscreened. They are a better investment!

Change is inevitable.

We change things almost daily, from our wardrobe to our meal choices to the activities we to enjoy on the weekend. But how about where we live and spend most of our time?

Your home was the perfect space when you bought it. But how about now?

We’ve listed our five key areas that are worth considering to check if your home is still right for you…

Read more...

https://stilhavn.com/top-5-checklist-does-your-home-still-match-your-lifestyle/

February’s Residential Housing Market 

Buying a home can take time. 

For current buyers, there’s even more inventory to consider, a housing pool that is continuing to inch upwards across Metro Vancouver*. Although residential options have risen, February’s home sales were down 33% on the 10-year February sales average.

Andrew Lis, Director of Economics and Data Analytics at the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV) commented on recent activity by saying, “It’s hard to sell what you don’t have, and with new listing activity remaining among the lowest in recent history, sales are struggling to hit typical levels for this point in the year. On the plus side for prospective buyers, the below-average sales activity is allowing inventory to accumulate, which is keeping market conditions from straying too deeply into sellers’ market territory, particularly in the more affordably priced segments.”

Read more...

https://stilhavn.com/metro-vancouver-housing-update-february-2023/