As a residential property owner in B.C., you may qualify for a Home Owner Grant.

Available to homeowners who pay property taxes to a municipality (or to the province if they live in a rural area), this grant helps to reduce the amount of property tax you pay for your principal residence.

For the purposes of this grant, you can have only one principal residence, which is considered the place you occupy, or essentially where you ‘make your home’. It’s where you carry out day-to-day life, and the location which the Government records you as living for things like income tax, your driver’s license, and so on.

Read on...

https://stilhavn.com/b-c-home-owner-grant/

Begin this process with one simple idea:"This is not my home, it is a house for sale."

This allows you to look at your home through the lense of a Buyer. When you are looking at property to purchase, what is important to you?

Recommended TO DO LIST:

Level 1: The Basics

De-clutter, De-personalize, Deep-clean

Level 2: Beyond the Basics

Paint the walls neutral colours, make minor repairs, re-arrange furniture/art

Level 3: Way Beyond the Basics

Major renovations, complete unfinished basements, consider professional staging

Helpful Tips

*Think of this process as a head start to packing

* Even though some repairs seem minor, they can be a major factor in determining whether the Buyer will actually buy.

* Pay attention to rooms that smell - this is can be very off putting to Buyers.

* Don't forget about the outside - curb appeal is very important!

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/

January’s Residential Housing Market at a Glance

As we head into the second month of 2023, we move further past the holiday season and start picking up more of our regular routines. Housing activity across Metro Vancouver* last month moved in a similar fashion with inventory remaining on the “lower side” but still surpassing the number of listings recorded back in December. Home sales remained slow (as to be seasonally expected), but both listings and sales grew as the weeks went on.

Read more...

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

Along with a fresh new year comes some fresh new policies for those looking to enter the Metro Vancouver residential property market in 2023.

Take a minute to familiarize yourself with the following three major players that have recently come into effect, because they’re not ones you want to be caught out by!

Read more...

https://stilhavn.com/big-2023-property-market-changes/

As we welcome in a new year, we also look forward to welcoming buyers and sellers to the new 2023 market.

There were certainly different playing cards held last year compared to the previous two, as the Metro Vancouver* property market found ways to adjust after the record-setting pandemic period. However, it became a balancing act for prospective buyers and sellers between the levelling out of property costs and the rise of borrowing costs.

Andrew Lis, Director of Economics and Data Analytics at the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV), commented, “The headline story in our market in 2022 was all about inflation and the Bank of Canada’s efforts to bring inflation back to target by rapidly raising the policy rate. This is a story we expect to continue to make headlines into 2023, as inflationary pressures remain persistent across Canada.”

Read more...

https://stilhavn.com/metro-vancouver-housing-update-december-2022/

Looking for a investment in a condo to run an airbnb? Most strata don't allow it so it is important to do your research.

All short-term rental operators in Vancouver must have a business licence and include their licence number in all online listings and advertising. 

Note You must have strata approval and/or your landlord must permit the use of short-term rentals in your home before you apply for a licence.

For the Do's and Dont's of airbnb in Vancouver read more...

To some, their favourite part of Christmas is being with loved ones. To others, it’s the giving and receiving of thoughtful gifts. But to many of us, well, we’re also here for the food!

Whether you’re passionate about cooking and are happy to spend full days kitchen-bound or you simply want to create an impressive, yet timely spread, we’ve listed a few of our festive food favourites, because hey, ‘tis the season to deck those… tables!

Read more...

https://stilhavn.com/top-5-festive-food-favourites/

It was beginning to look a little more festive around the region last month; colourful lights started to pop up, snow began to fall, and home sales – in typical seasonal fashion – also began to relax as we ease further toward the holiday season.

Andrew Lis, Director of Economics and Data Analysis at the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV) commented on last month’s market activity, sharing that “With the most recent core inflation metrics showing a stubborn reluctance to respond significantly to the furious pace of rate increases, the Bank of Canada may choose to act more forcefully to bring inflation back toward target levels. While it’s always difficult to predict what the bank will do with certainty, this persistent inflationary backdrop sets up the December 7 rate announcement to be yet another increase, making holiday-season home purchases something people may end up foregoing this year.”

Housing Market at a Glance

Last month, the REBGV reported that home sales in the region totalled 1,614. This figure came in at less than half (-52.9%) of the sales recorded in the same month back in 2021 (3,428). When compared to one month prior in October, sales dipped during that time by 15.2% – down from 1,903.

Read on...

https://stilhavn.com/metro-vancouver-housing-update-november-2022/