I believe there is a new form of market manipulation quietly emerging in Canada’s new construction condo market

A lot of condos completing today were sold years ago at peak prices, and many of them are not worth what buyers paid. 1/ Imagine buying a pre-construction unit for $650K that is only worth $550K today

Until recently, banks usually looked the other way and appraised at the original price to help buyers close. 2/

Doug Ford’s government is proposing one of the most radical changes to rent control Ontario has ever seen

It’s a disaster for tenants 1/ Right now, tenants have what’s called security of tenure

As long as they follow the lease and the law, they can stay after the first year on a month-to-month basis. 2/

We’re starting to see clear signs of financial stress emerging across the GTA housing market.

And the data on Power of Sale (POS) listings shows exactly where that stress is hitting hardest. 🧵 Mortgage arrears have been climbing, now above 0.4% at many major banks and as high as 6% at some private lenders.

These rising arrears are showing up in the resale market as more forced sales hit the MLS, adding to already high inventory levels. 2/

"Poilievre has threatened to pull federal funding from universities over their alleged ideological slant"

You can’t claim to support freedom of thought and speech while punishing ideas you don’t like by defunding universities.

These are crazy times 1/

https://twitter.com/CTVNews/status/1914670588838158367

Do I agree with every idea that comes out of universities? Of course not

But as a society, we either defend freedom of expression - including speech that challenges or discomforts us

Or we let the state decide which ideas are acceptable 2/

Pre-construction condo sales are falling off a cliff and will likely remain near historic lows for quite some time.

As housing experts scramble to explain why pre-construction condo sales have crashed and what needs to be done to drive more sales 🧵⤵️ They have zeroed in on one thing

The taxes and fees levied on new home sales and developers are now the reason nobody can afford to buy a new condo, according to this clamour.

And there is some truth to that 2/

Nine months ago, Pierre Poilievre released a YouTube video titled
Housing hell: How we got here and how we get out

In it, he unpacked his analysis of Canada’s housing crisis and proposed solutions 🧵⤵️
movesmartly.com/articles/poili… While original in format, Poilievre’s housing plan focused on the same old arguments Canadians have heard from politicians and housing economists for years

That Canada’s housing crisis is due almost exclusively to a lack of supply 2/

A thread on some of the bigger issues with 🇨🇦's obsession with real estate as an investment.

Firstly, the issues surrounding investors buying condos vs low-rise houses are quite different. 🧵⤵️ The fact that most of Canada’s rental supply has been filled by investors buying condos and converting them to rentals is a product of our government’s decision decades ago to not invest in and prioritize permanent rental housing 2/

A bungalow in East York has been redeveloped into a small condo with (what appears to be) 4 units.

This link is for the biggest unit, 3 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms, listed for $1.6M 1/
realosophy.com/listing/3-319-…
Here's the garden suite, which is listed for $1.3M 2/
realosophy.com/listing/4-319-…

Federal Liberals Take A Big Step Towards Making Homes More Affordable 🧵⤵️
movesmartly.com/articles/feder… Last week, Canada’s immigration minister, Marc Miller, announced that the Liberal federal government plans to reduce the number of non-permanent residents (NPR) in Canada from the current 6.2% share of total population to 5% over the next three years. 2/

The housing narrative in 🇨🇦 is changing

This piece argues that 🇨🇦’s 🏠 crisis cannot be solved with a singular focus on building more homes

It suggests that 🇨🇦 should reduce the number of non-permanent residents by 1M people to ease the demand for 🏠
thehub.ca/2024-02-21/mik… This is a very big change in the main narrative re: our housing crisis

For years, most experts & politicians argued that the solution to our 🏠 crisis was to "Build More Homes"

Countless op-eds and editorials were written blaming supply restrictions for our housing crisis 2/

Why did our federal government ignore the warnings of public servants if the impact of Canada’s high population growth on housing was so obvious?

If you rewind the clock by more than 2 years, you'll see that these impacts were not so obvious to some 1/
movesmartly.com/articles/the-f… Most housing economists at that time concluded that Canada’s booming population wasn’t the key driver of rising home prices.

The key driver of rapidly rising home prices, they argued, was a “lack of supply” driven mainly by municipal inefficiencies and zoning restrictions 2/

Toronto-based developer that vowed to buy up $1 billion in single-family homes plans to add 10,000 more houses to its portfolio

Why can't young families afford their own homes?

Because they now have to compete with Billion dollar companies 1/
thestar.com/real-estate/to… Homes in Canada have become financial assets for the rich

“We have a large corporation going into smaller communities, scooping up affordable units, making them inaccessible for many of the local residents, and renting them out to the corporation’s sole advantage” 2/

In my June report, I discussed the Conservative’s “Insane” Solution to Canada’s Housing Crisis

Earlier this month, Conservative housing critic Scott Aitchison was on a podcast to discuss what it will take to fix Canada’s crisis 🧵
thestar.com/podcasts/its-p… Aitchison’s solution was simple “we need more supply”

How much more?

He argued Canada needs to triple the number of homes we are building

While Aitchison did recognize that tripling housing completions is “insane” he still thinks this is the solution to our housing crisis 2/

No, every word in this speech is not in fact correct

Home prices did not double every few years under the previous Harper government

Home prices have increased more rapidly under this government 1/

https://twitter.com/maxfawcett/status/1642178610344886274

Here's a piece I wrote in 2021 showing how home prices changed under the Harper gov vs the current Trudeau government in Toronto

2/
movesmartly.com/articles/how-t…

Things aren’t looking good for housing affordability in 🇨🇦

Pierre actually believes that if he fines cities that “block homes” this will magically result in builders doubling the number of 🏡 they build

Ahmed thinks he’s doing a great job to make housing affordable Pierre’s argument is quite bad because he’s trying to argue that “big city governments” ie. Toronto and Vancouver are causing our national housing crisis

It’s of course easy (and popular with his conservative base) to blame the big cities that traditionally vote Liberal 2/

A quick thread that I think summarizes what is happening on the ground right now in Toronto's housing market

How sellers are calling the shots, are holding back inventory & why it's so frustrating for buyers ⤵️🧵 We have clients who made an offer last might on a home that got 20 offers

They made a competitive bid but the listing agent advised that there were better offers

Not a problem

But just before midnight, they emailed everyone to say they didn't accept any offer 2/

One of the problems with Toronto's housing market right now is that 90% of the agents out there have no idea what they are doing

A house in my neighbourhood was listed for $900K and sold for $1.265M - a sale price that is relatively reasonable but....they had 23 offers 1/ I suspect that out of the 23 offers

7 offered under $1.1M
10 from $1.1M-$1.2M
3 in the low $1.2M range
3 were in the mid $1.2M range

This of course is just a guess, but I've been doing this long enough to be confident that the distribution looks something like this 2/

A brief thread on what I’m seeing in Toronto’s housing market right now

I’m going to try to bridge the on the ground anecdotes & market sentiment with actual data 🧵⤵️ Firstly, sales this month will be the second lowest for the month of January in 20 years

But new listings will also be the second lowest for the month of January in 20 years

The market is not oversupplied, it’s actually undersupplied, especially for low-rise houses 2/

A great look at why our housing market and healthcare system are breaking

Because our federal government wants a massive immigration boom without ever investing the time to consider how they’ll house and care for the health of these new Canadians 1/
theglobeandmail.com/business/artic… For some Canadians the upward pressure this puts on home prices and on rents for the poorest Canadians because we can’t build enough homes to meet this demand is one of the desired outcomes

I don’t think that’s optimal, but I’m clearly in the minority 2/

A tenant not paying rent for up to a year is difficult for a landlord to manage during the best of times

But in today's market with much higher debt payments, a decline in home equity & incomes that are less secure

It could be disastrous leading to insolvency in months 1/

https://twitter.com/RE_MarketWatch/status/1585499914267774976

What’s worse is that the landlord cannot just list their investment property for sale to unload their debt obligations and rental arrears

An investment property where the tenant isn't paying rent and refuses to vacate is effectively unsellable 2/

A few thoughts on what appears to be a trend

Anonymous twitter users who have decided to make it a part time job to disparage the reputation and integrity of people in the real estate industry

Some agents might deserve it, but this below is complete nonsense 1/

https://twitter.com/saretskysego/status/1584721646111272965

Firstly, the people who I see in the press from the RE industry commenting on the housing market are always giving an honest look at what is happening on the ground

If they were in fact perma-bulls, journalists would smell that a mile away and never interview them again 2/