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Entries from January 2016

Billionaire Singapore owner of Plaza of Nations property promises housing for locals, art museum, a green development

June 27th, 2017 · No Comments

There’s going to be a lot of conversation in the next year (and more) about Northeast False Creek, the last big piece of False Creek waterfront that’s going to be developed. Every piece of the creek’s development has generated debate, starting in the 1970s when the TEAM council of the day decided to convert former […]

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Owners of second homes, empty condos consider renting, lying, selling, and more as vacancy tax looms

June 27th, 2017 · 1 Comment

Vancouver’s impending empty-homes tax — the first in the country — is prompting a lot of angst as owners facing bills of $4,000 to $100,000 a year decide what to do. You urban-life keeners will remember that most of the units identified as empty are condos. The city’s electrical study identified 10,800 homes in the […]

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Who is really buying Chinatown condos? You’d be surprised (or not)

June 19th, 2017 · 11 Comments

The story of the battle over development in Chinatown is an endlessly mesmerizing one. There are so many political forces, so many internal battles, so many different groups, so many issues. There’s also an incredible amount of misinformation, “facts” that have taken on a life of their own in the social-media world. A curious person […]

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The battle over short-term vacation rentals (aka Airbnb) is heating up in both cities and resort towns

June 19th, 2017 · 1 Comment

Victoria council’s recent move to start clamping down on short-term vacation rentals prompted me to do a quick canvas to see what is happening in various cities around B.C. with this issue. Whoa, was that an eye-opener, to hear about the struggles various towns are going through as they try to strike a balance — […]

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How B.C. has transformed the thrifty into millionaires and made millennials feel poor

June 19th, 2017 · 8 Comments

I got asked earlier this year by Nick Rockel, the editor of BCBusiness, to write a story based a cascade of financial data about Canadians that Environics Analytics had gathered. Since I’m obsessed with this general topic — how we spend money in ways that we don’t acknowledge, the impact that money and possessions (or […]

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The last big downtown waterfront area about to be developed — and it will be the most complicated of all

June 2nd, 2017 · 3 Comments

If you think the current Chinatown debates are heated, wait until things really get going with Northeast False Creek. The city is going to present the proposed ideas so far in a big fair/demo on June 10, with material from all of the many participants involved (park board, stewardship community work on the Hogan’s Alley […]

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