• mobile: 604-250-8845

Blog by MJ Ankenman

< Previous Next >

Americans Flood into Canada

July 30th, 2007
Continuing on in the discussion as to why Vancouver's real estate market will continue to be a healthy viable market is this article published in The Province, originating from the Ottawa Citizen. Thanks to Loud Murmurs for blogging about it and drawing it to my attention. The article illustrates the attraction of Vancouver as a city to live in. Not only is BC experiencing migration fr ...

Read More

Posted in General

Live Earth & Vancouver Condos

July 8th, 2007
After watching Live Earth and thoroughly enjoying it, I started thinking about the changes I have been seeing in the condo market in Vancouver in the past year. While condo dwelling in itself is green living, as we take less of a footprint on the land, it has been hard to participate as far as function and design. That has been changing as we are seeing condo developments being built with 'gr ...
Read More

Posted in General

Property Taxes Due

June 26th, 2007
Just a reminder that Property Taxes are due next week. Make sure you complete the Home Owners Grant application on the reverse side of your tax statement. For ways to pay and other questions check out The City of Vancouver's site.
Read More

Posted in General

April housing sales pick up, listing activity swells

May 17th, 2007
Vancouver, B.C. May 2, 2007 –The Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV) reports that total residential sales for detached, attached and apartment properties reached 3,387 units in April 2007, an increase of 1.3 percent when compared to the 3,345 units sold in April 2006 and a decrease of 16.2 per cent when compared to the 4,043 sales in April 2005. New listings for detached, attac ...

Read More

Posted in General

Money Coach

May 4th, 2007
I belong to the Vancouver Bloggers Meetup Group, a group that never has a problem with what to talk about. Topics of conversation range from the best place to buy olive oil to religion and its place in society. I have met some great people through this group including Nancy Zimmerman. Nancy runs a company called Your Money by Design which helps people get "savvy" with money. Yesterday, Nanc ...

Read More

Posted in General

New Lower Minimum Down Payment Required

April 26th, 2007
 New legislation that lowers the required down payment for mortgages was passed, yesterday. The federal government has lowered the minimum down payment requirement for mortgage default insurance from 25% to 20%. Under the previous existing Bank Act regulations, which have been in place for 40 years, a bank could not provide a mortgage loan for more than 75% of the value of the property ...

Read More

Posted in General

Bank of Canada Holds Steady on Key Interest Rate

April 25th, 2007
  This morning, The Bank of Canada decided to leave its rate unchanged at 4.25%. The Bank said the current rate of inflation is higher than previously expected. However, the bank expects the core inflation will cool to 2% target but expects that to happen by the end of the year. As far as economic growth is concerned, the bank expects the GDP growth to be around 2.2% in 2007 and 2 ...

Read More

Posted in General

Ecodensity Fair

February 27th, 2007

The city of Vancouver is holding a two day information fair on the concept of Ecodensity, this weekend.  More info here. They are showing the films An Inconvenient Truth, and Who Killed The Electric Car. It was great to see Al Gore's movie win for Best Documentary at the Academy Awards as well as Melissa Ethebridge for her song "I Need to Wake Up"

Read More

Posted in General

Property Transfer Tax

February 22nd, 2007
It was announced in the provincial budget yesterday that the First Time Home Buyers' Program Thresholds for Property Tax Exemptions have changed  .  Effective for registrations starting today, the fair market value threshold for eligible residential property under the First Time Home Buyers' Program is increased and will apply throughout the province.  The new threshold will be $375,000 which ...

Read More

Posted in General

Ecodensity- Vancouver

February 12th, 2007
I had lunch with a friend Lianna Sipelis this past weekend.  Lianna was telling me that the architect firm she works for, Peter Cardew Architects won a Canadian Architect Award of Excellence for their Garden Wall House. This house follows Mayor Sam Sullivan's "eco-density" policy aimed at increasing the density of existing residential neighbourhoods. The policy's intent is to reduce the e ...

Read More

Posted in General

< Previous Next >

Sitemap Privacy Policy Real Estate websites for Agents