Sun

A record number of would-be buyers have signed up for a condo at the site of the former Woodward’s store in the Downtown Eastside.

Since the sales website was launched three weeks ago, 1,200 people have registered for a chance to buy one of the 500 market units.

Bob Rennie of Rennie Marketing says it’s his most successful website campaign but admits many people are just sightseeing.

Woodward’s is an “intellectual property” aimed at buyers who want a different urban lifestyle, he said.

“If you’ve lived in Vancouver all your life, Woodward’s is forgotten and questionable,” said Rennie. “Yet if you’ve moved to Vancouver in the last 10 years, or you’ve ever lived in another major city, you really look at Woodward’s as an emerging area.”

Rennie said he’s getting interest from young architects and designers who “don’t want to buy and own the same as everybody else.”

About 100 of the website registrants live in the eastside, Rennie said. He’s arran-ging priority access for them to one-bedroom suites. He’s looking at preferred mortgages, capped mortgage rates and extended terms to help them buy in.

The high level of interest “bodes very, very well, for the project and the sale of the units,” said Michael Flanigan, the City of Vancouver’s project manager for Woodward’s. Flanigan said registered buyers will get the chance to come in on a certain day to make an offer at the list price, instead of lining up on the sidewalk.

The apartments average about 550 square feet for a one bedroom and 900 for a two bedroom, and range from $200,000 to $600,000.

Architect Gregory Henriquez said two-thirds of the condos are one-bedroom, “all very modern, open-plan concepts.”

The 40-storey building will house 330 condos, with the rest in the Abbott Building. The units go on sale in April and move-in date should be 2009. The project includes 200 units of social housing.

Mark Townsend of the Portland Hotel Society said 125 tenants will go into studio suites of between 341 and 558 square feet, each with a bathroom, kitchenette and folding bed. First dibs will go to eastside residents, he said. The other 75 non-market apartments are set aside for local families.

© The Vancouver Province 2005

Sun

The local real-estate and development fraternity has started a campaign to help children at BC Children’s Hospital. Organizers call the undertaking Building For Kids and want you to know that if you see the logo above on a new-home project’s signage or promotional material, someone, company or individual, involved in the development is a participant in the campaign.

The Salient Group’s Terminus project in Gastown will be the first in Vancouver to display the Building for Kids logo.

“The BC real estate and development sector is very busy right now, but we recognize that being extremely busy is just business as usual at BC Children’s Hospital,” said David Podmore, who is chair of Concert Properties and BC Children’s Hospital Foundation. “We also know how important it is to have the right tools for the job.”

For more information about the program contact Leah Nyrose ([email protected]) or visit bcchf.ca/buildingforkids

BUILDERS COLLECT COATS

The 10th annual “Coats for Kids” campaign by local home builders collected more than 3,000 coats, blankets and sweaters from the public, Peter Simpson of the Greater Vancouver Home Builders’ Association reports.

GOOD NEWS FOR LANDLORDS IS BAD NEWS FOR RENTERS

Good news for landlords in Victoria and Vancouver is bad news for renters. According to information released this week by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. the average rental-apartment vacancy-rate in Canada’s 28 major cities was unchanged at 2.7 per cent in October, 2005 compared with last year.

Of the cities surveyed Victoria had the lowest vacancy rate at 0.5 per cent. Vancouver was not not far behind at 1.4 per cent.

Separately CMHC is calling for submissions to an affordable-housing competition it sponsors. Among the 16 categories are buildings; housing finance; neighbourhoods; housing with resident services; and, new for 2006, aboriginal housing.

www.cmhc.ca

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

Divine inspiration from UBC theological school

Michael Sasges
Sun

CHANCELLOR ROW

Location: Chancellor Place new-home neighbourhood, University of B.C.

Presentation centre: 1716 Theology Mall, at Chancellor Boulevard

Hours: Noon – 5 p.m. Sat. – Thu.

Telephone: 604-228-8100

Web: chancellorhall.ca

Project size: 8 duplex homes

Residence size: 3,695 sq. ft. – 4,115 sq. ft

Prices: $1.46 million – $1.59 million

Developer: Intracorp

Architect: Ramsay Worden

Interior design: BBA Design

Warranty: St.Paul Guarantee

Tentative occupancy: First half, 2007

westcoast homes editor

As God is my witness, and not because the seller says so, the latest additions to the University of B.C.’s Theological Neighbourhood are a deal.

Here’s my reckoning (Is there a patron saint of the innumerate?):

First, I created the average square-foot list price for the homes, from two big numbers that figured in my interview with Intracorp’s Don Forsgren. Those numbers are average home size (about 3,900 square feet) and average list price (about $1.5 million). The latter divided by the former generates an average list price of about $385/square foot (God is in the details!).

Fifteen new-construction residences are currently for sale in my west-side Vancouver, which is short 10 of the neighbourhoods in the Multiple Listing Service’s west-side Vancouver. (Of the Seven Deadly Sins, the worst is pride.)

Of those 15 I only included 10 in my reckoning. I eliminated three (low) three-digit addresses that life-time westside residents (like me) might consider cheeky declarations of west-side ambition. (There’s that Queen of the Deadlies again!)

I also eliminated the most expensive and the least expensive residences of the 12 whose prices I wrote down.

So, what was revealed to me?

The average per-square-foot list price of those 10 new-construction homes is almost $503, almost $120 more than the average per-square-foot list price of the eight Chancellor Row homes.

Did I compare water and wine, by comparing duplex (Chancellor Row) and single family detached?

I hope not.

I did so at the implicit invitation of the Don Forsgren, and with his numbers.

“We wanted to create a home that would be typical of a new westside residence . . . [and further] a [new] home comparable in size, and features, to a home you would find on a 50-foot

[-wide] lot,” Don Forsgren said in an interview in the Chancellor Row show home. “This [the show home] is about the size of a home you would find on a brand-new 50-foot lot, but at a price you would find on a 33-foot lot.”

The Chancellor Place neighbourhood is anchored on the south by the Iona Building and on the north by Chancellor Boulevard.

Its creation is a joint effort by the university and the four theological colleges in the neighbourhood to create enduring endowments for the colleges.

One immediate consequence of the development of the properties has been the renovation and refurbishment of the Iona Building, in which the Vancouver School of Theology is located.

The earlier Intracorp projects in the neighbourhood are Chancellor House, Argyll West and East, Folio and Chancellor Hall. Two other developers have built or are building new-home projects in the neighbourhood.

Intracorp expects to start on an seventh neighbourhood building in the spring, Forsgren says.

“It’s a very special site,” he comments.

“This has been a fantastic opportunity, but it has also been a big responsibility because the property . . . is probably one of the best pieces of property in the country . . . beautiful views and the amazing [endowment lands] neighbourhood [below] and the campus.

“Everyone’s forever going to say if we did a bad job or a good job. So, we’ve been very committed to making sure what we did was the best we could do.”

If, ultimately, the enduring consensus of opinion is that Chancellor Place is a worthy addition to campus, continuity of design, by developer and university, will be one reason.

Ramsay Worden designed the six Intracorp buildings. “If you’re designing a building, or buildings, before the other ones are completed it’s critical that the architect have, in his own mind, how a building, or buildings, will work with the next one, so they don’t look the same, but don’t look uncomfortable with one another either,” Forsgren says.

The university, in Forsgren’s opinion, has assembled the financial and human resources appropriate to “a quality community.”

“They spend a lot of time and money on design, on urban-planning- type things and they spend money on infrastructure, and not just to put it in the ground. They don’t just roll out roads at the lowest cost; they build granite entry-monuments and buy expensive light standards and think about the landscaping.

” . . . you don’t get that in other municipalities.”

Let us end now our visit to the latest addition to UBC’s Theological Neighbourhood with a well-known exhortation (not, I suppose, primarily to buy real estate):

God helps those who help themselves.

The Vancouver School of Theology’s Iona Building (above) is a keystone influence on the architecture of the six Intracorp buildings in Chancellor Place, University of B.C. The Chancellor Row show home (above right) is clad below in granite (like the divinity school) and above in stucco. ‘There’s lots of common elements like the split-face granite which is on all the buildings,’ the developer’s Don Forsgren says. ‘The window patterns in some areas of our buildings are very regimented, punched openings, as they are on the Iona Building. At the same time we introduce housing and contemporary elements, to create something respectable of the historic building, but didn’t try to mimic them. So, where there’s expansive views, there’s lots of glazing and where there isn’t there’s those regimented, punched windows.’

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

Sun

In a continuing series on consumer decisions, Michael Kane looks at what’s involved in being the executor of a will

An executor is the person named in a will to carry out the will’s directions. You may be honoured to be invited to serve as an executor, but ask a lot of questions before you agree. The task can be time-consuming and thankless. It all depends the adequacy of records, the number and location of beneficiaries, and the complexity of the “estate” — which comprises any land, house, money, investments, personal effects and other assets left by the deceased.

WHAT DOES AN EXECUTOR DO?

Your first challenge is to locate the will and read it as soon as possible. It will confirm if you were named as executor and may have instructions about the deceased’s wishes for organ donation, burial or cremation, funeral or memorial services.

Ordinarily, the family will take care of the funeral and ordering death certificates.

The executor’s next job is to locate all assets, ensure that they are safe and that sufficient insurance is in place, and arrange for probate — the process of getting a court to rule that the will is legally valid — if necessary.

You don’t need to stage a Hollywood-style “reading of the will,” but you must send a copy of the will and a copy of your Notice of Intent to Apply for Probate to all beneficiaries named in the will and anyone else who may have a legal claim to the estate, such as a common-law spouse, children, or a separated spouse.

Before distributing money and property according to the will’s instructions, you must cancel the deceased’s credit cards, accounts and subscriptions, and pay funeral costs, debts and taxes.

HOW HARD CAN IT BE?

Your job will be fairly simple if you are an executor of an estate in which there is only a house, a car, some personal belongings and a bank account, according to a free guide, Choosing An Executor, Being An Executor, from the People’s Law School at www.publiclegaled.bc.ca or 604-331-5400.

The job is more complicated if:

– There are many beneficiaries and they are difficult to locate.

– The deceased owned a business.

– The deceased had a lot of investments and debts.

– The will includes a trust.

– The will is challenged by someone who feels unfairly left out of the will.

BYPASSING THE ESTATE

Assets owned with another person, such as joint bank accounts, bypass the will. If the deceased owned land or a house in joint tenancy with another person, the survivor only has to file an application in the Land Titles Office along with the death certificate. This will register the land in the name of the surviving joint tenant.

Nor does the estate include insurance policies, registered retirement savings plans, registered retirement income funds — anything that specifically names a beneficiary.

However, the executor may be asked to provide a copy of the death certificate to insurance companies and RRSP administrators before they will pay out to the beneficiary. Sometimes they also ask for a copy of the will to make sure the deceased didn’t name a new beneficiary.

DEALING WITH PENSIONS

If the deceased paid into the Canada Pension Plan, apply to your local CPP office to tell them of the death and obtain any death, survivor or orphan benefits. You should also check with the deceased person’s employer about benefits available there.

If the deceased was receiving Old Age Security or other pensions, you need to inform those pension offices of the death.

DEATH AND TAXES

You need to file tax returns for any years for which the deceased did not file a return, and then you need to file a return for the year of death, covering the period from Jan. 1 to the date of death.

The executor must obtain a tax clearance certificate from Canada Revenue Agency before distributing the estate to the beneficiaries. It takes at least six months from filing a tax return to getting a clearance certificate, and longer if the estate is complicated, says Hugh McLellan of Vancouver lawyers McLellan Herbert.

KEEP CAREFUL RECORDS

Before distributing the assets, you should submit a full accounting of the estate’s financial activities and obtain a release from each beneficiary.

DO I GET PAID?

Any expenses incurred in settling the estate are paid by the estate. Sometimes the will states the executor’s fee, and this is the maximum the executor can receive. If the will does not list any fee, the executor may take up to five per cent of the gross value of the estate and five per cent of the income.

There is also a care and management fee up to 0.4 per cent of the average annual value of the assets if there is an ongoing trust. If the beneficiaries do not agree to the executor’s fee, the court can set it.

Sometimes the will leaves the executor a special gift for doing the job. The executor may prefer to take a gift rather than a fee because a fee is taxable but a gift (jewelry, cash, real estate, etc.) given under the will is not.

CAN I BACK OUT?

As long as you haven’t meddled in the estate, nobody can force you to be an executor. Even after probate has been granted, it may be possible to resign, according to the B.C. branch of the Canadian Bar Association. A good will always names an alternate or back-up executor.

If you decide to act as executor, you should decide whether to hire a lawyer to do the paperwork and advise you of your obligations. If you do, the estate pays the lawyer’s fees. In large or complicated estates, it’s a good idea to hire a lawyer and an accountant.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

Eric Beauchesne
Sun

Fasten your seatbelts: the Canadian and U.S. economies are in for some ups and downs, but aren’t about to crash, according to a new forecast Thursday.

The two economies, which have enjoyed surprisingly strong growth through most of 2005, have weakened this quarter but thanks to a surge in consumer spending will rebound early next year before being dragged back down again later in 2006 by higher interest rates, the TD bank forecast.

However, both economies will avoid a hard landing, and will rebound in 2007, it predicted.

TD’s warning that Canadian growth will slow to an annual pace of 2.6 per cent this quarter from the robust 3.6 per cent posted in the third quarter came amid a retreat in the value of the dollar to below 86.5 cents US from a 14-year intraday high of 87.5 cents US earlier this week. The Canadian dollar closed North American trading Thursday at 86.22 cents US, down 0.60 of a cent from Wednesday’s close.

The TD forecast was also made on the same day some banks raised mortgage rates and more evidence was revealed of continued strength in housing markets.

Home sales in Canada’s major urban markets rose 1.2 per cent last month to 28,980, the sixth-highest level on record, leaving the resale housing market on track to post its best year ever, the Canadian Real Estate Association said.

TD sees overall economic growth rebounding to a 3.3 per cent annual pace in the first quarter of 2006, well above the 2.8 per cent the Bank of Canada considers its non-inflationary speed limit. As a result there will be further rate increases that will gradually slow growth to 2.3 per cent by year-end. The bank will reduce rates and the expansion will steadily pick up steam to reach three per cent by the end of 2007.

“Sluggishness on the consumer front in September and October sets the stage for a weaker performance by both economies in the fourth quarter of this year, but growth should rebound in early 2006,” it said, predicting the Bank of Canada and U.S. Federal Reserve will respond by raising rates further.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

Vigorous economy, migration and hot job picture credited

Derrick Penner
Sun

Greater Vancouver’s apartment vacancy rate edged up to 1.4 per cent in October, compared with 1.3 per cent a year ago, as the region’s rental market stayed in a delicate balance between renters giving up apartments to buy property and new residents coming in to fill the void, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. said Thursday.

“On the side of pushing vacancy rates up would be the first-time buyers moving into condominiums,” CMHC housing market analyst Cameron Muir said in an interview.

“The downward pressure is coming from a reinvigorated economy and good job growth that is drawing migrants, both internationally and from other provinces, to the city. And many of them choose to rent before they buy.”

The result, Muir added, is a slightly higher turnover of apartment properties, but the turnover isn’t pushing up vacancy rates.

CMHC released its annual rental market report showing that vacancy rates were variable across the region with West Vancouver posting the lowest at 0.1 per cent, and Surrey posting the highest at 4.7 per cent.

The city of Vancouver showed an overall vacancy rate of 0.7 per cent, up slightly from the 0.6-per-cent vacancy recorded in 2004, but rates varied considerably from region to region.

The East Hastings area, which includes the Downtown Eastside, had the highest vacancy rate in Vancouver at 2.1 per cent, the West End/Stanley Park and Kerrisdale had the lowest at 0.2 per cent.

Some specific apartment types, such as two-bedroom units in the West End and three bedroom units on English Bay, showing zero vacancy.

Across downtown, including the West End, the CMHC report showed only 63 vacancies among 20,609 units. Across all Vancouver, it was 394 vacancies out of 56,338 units.

Average rents also showed some variability although on average, Muir said rents did rise between 1.5 per cent and 2.7 per cent.

Across Greater Vancouver, the average rent for a two-bedroom unit was $1,004 in October, compared with $984 in the CMHC’s survey a year ago. The highest rents, however, were in West Vancouver where a two-bedroom suite let for $1,548 a month. The lowest rents were found in Surrey where a two-bedroom unit let for an average $777.

The average one-bedroom suite rented for $788 a month in October, up from $774 a year ago. The highest rents were in UBC’s University Endowment Lands where the average rent was $1,030. The lowest were in Surrey where a one-bedroom unit, on average, let for $617.

Scott Ullrich, president of Gateway Property Management Corp., which manages some 10,000 units in Greater Vancouver, noted that while the rent increases that landlords are charging look like they are keeping up with inflation, their utility costs, a big component of their expense side, are rising faster than inflation.

“Business is good,” Ullrich added. “Average rents are moving up … [but] the one to three-per-cent increases in rents are below what is allowed under the [provincial] Residential Tenancy Act, which tells you it is an efficient market.”

Ullrich, however, noted that the CMHC survey does not measure the “hidden” portion of the rental market consisting of investor-bought condominium apartments, which are a significant part of certain markets.

Ullrich estimated that if investor-owned units in downtown condo towers were factored into the equation, downtown’s vacancy rate could be as high as 1.5 per cent.

However, the further you move away from downtown, especially in suburbs such as Burnaby and Surrey, more condos are owner-occupied and “the hidden vacancy is a little bit less.”

He added that strong net migration to B.C. is keeping demand for rental accommodation strong, and the region’s labour shortage is helping to push up wages and increase people’s disposable income. That allows them to spend more on higher-quality accommodation.

“As such, we’re seeing landlords spend money on improving their buildings,” Ullrich said.

In its report, CMHC said Greater Vancouver’s purpose-built rental stock has remained stagnant at about 107,000 units for about 10 years. Individual investors putting money into condos have become the key suppliers of new rental units.

However, Ullrich said the improving rental market is making it more viable to build new apartments with about 1,200 new units built or being built downtown.

Sun

307-2256 West 7th Ave., Vancouver
Two-bedroom and den, one-bath top corner suite in Kitsilano. Bought: Nov. 1998, $202,500 Listed: Nov. 7, $379,900 Sold: Nov. 20, $395,000 Listing agent:
   Frank Zomar,
   Sherree L. Mitchell,
   Park Georgia Realty Ltd. 102-1575 West 10th Ave., Vancouver
Two-bedroom and den, two-bath southwest garden suite in Fairview Slopes. Bought: March 2003, $300,000 Listed: Nov. 4, $418,900 Sold: Nov. 13, $429,100 Listing agent:
   Jennifer K. Chu
   Century 21 In Town Realty 406-1888 York Street, Vancouver
One-bedroom and den, two-bath corner suite near beach in Kitsilano. Bought: March 2004, $375,000 Listed: Oct. 23, $438,000 Sold: Oct. 28, $422,000 Listing agent:
   Bryan K. Velve
   Re/Max Crest Realty
   (Westside)

But the practice of announcing rankings has been stopped

Derrick Penner
Sun

Two of Vancouver’s top real estate marketers have racked up a combined total of close to $1 billion in condominium sales so far this year, but whether those results make one of them the city’s new condo king is up for debate.

Jason Craik, leader of MAC Marketing Solutions, claims the top spot with 2,640 unit sales worth $434 million, figures backed up by the Multiple Listing Service. Given the normal commission rate of between 2.5 and five per cent, that would translate into $10 million to $20 million in fees for Craik’s sales team.

However, George Wong of Platinum Marketing Services, Macdonald Realty, says his team has posted 640 unit sales worth $530 million, but only some of those are reflected in MLS statistics.

And the city’s dominant condominium project marketer, Bob Rennie of Rennie Marketing Systems, who was last year’s top seller with $405 million in sales, could not be reached Tuesday.

There won’t be an official condo king, or queen, for 2005 anyway, because the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver is discontinuing its Medallion Club ranking of top-selling agents.

Carmen Patrao, who is in member services at the board, said the public ranking is being stopped for privacy reasons as it adopts new rules under B.C.’s freedom of information and protection of privacy legislation.

Amanda Malone, external communications coordinator for the board, said that each real estate agent’s sales figures are considered part of his or her personal file, and the board can’t release the information to anyone else.

Malone said those in the industry can access their own information, including their own ranking, on the MLS system, but can’t access anyone else’s record.

However, the figures released to The Vancouver Sun by Craik and Wong confirmed that the market for condominiums in 2005 remained brisk. Craik’s sales team, which includes partner and marketing guru Cameron McNeill, sold 1,000 units in three towers of the five-tower Infinity project being built in Surrey, and 230 units in the Park 360 tower in Burnaby.

MAC Marketing Solutions also sold out the 145 units of the luxury, lakeside Barona Beach resort development in Kelowna, the 230-unit Elan tower in Yaletown and the unique Flatiron building being constructed at Coal Harbour.

“The demand doesn’t really surprise me,” Craik said in an interview. “It’s an incredible city that we live in, and it is really looked upon as a safe haven.”

In the past year, Craik said he has noticed a significant influx of buyers from “all the new world powers,” such as China, India and South Korea.

Wong’s 2005 highlights included the record-setting $7.75-million penthouse sale at the Two Harbour Green development at Coal Harbour, which Platinum Marketing also sold at an average of $2.5 million a suite.

Wong’s group also sold out a 250-unit, entry-level development called The Ocean Walk in Richmond within three months. As well, it launched a development called Dcor in Whalley.

“Two Harbour Green is the exclusive upper end, but a big part of what we’ve seen in 2005 is the starter market, the entry market,” Wong said. “That will continue to be our bread and butter.”

© The Vancouver Sun 2005