Vancouver residential sales sector reaches new, absurd heights

While home sales volume growth in Vancouver seems to have abated somewhat in recent months, demand for the city’s residential land does not appear to be petering out any time soon, with a single-family home near Cambie Street and 35th Avenue having just been listed for an eye-popping $11 million.

According to B.C. Assessment, the property’s listed value is nearly twice the price is sold for only around 18 month ago.

The listing came in the wake of increased densification in Cambie Street recently. While many homes in the area have already been purchased for upcoming condo construction projects, 485 W 35TH Avenue remains one of the few properties to have not been slated for further development.

UBC Sauder School of Business professor Tsur Sommerville said that remarkable price surges such as this tend to arise from rapid development.

“As we’re getting rezoning and increasing densities, what that’s doing is basically providing a source of value,” Sommerville told CBC News, adding that similar increases can be observed in other transit corridors like Granville and Oak Streets.

“A piece of land when you can only build a single family house on it might be worth $2 million, but that same land, if you can build a six-storey condo building or a six-storey rental apartment building, might be worth $4 million.”

Former real estate agent John Lopes expressed bewilderment at the listing.

“I think this is totally ridiculous,” Lopes said. “At some point there's going to be a break. I don’t know when, but it will. It always has.”

MBN

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