Expectations of perpetual price appreciation are more faith-based and less experience-informed

Michael Sasges
Sun

Katherine Tung, 35, of Richmond is pursuing her first home purchase, a transaction that is particularly consequential, and not for her alone, a recent comment from the B.C. Real Estate Association suggests. The relative disappearance of the first-time buyer locally and recently was an absolute brake on transaction numbers and values, the ‘voice’ of the province’s real estate agents reported. ‘First-time buyers were largely absent in the late fall and winter, making it more difficult for move-up buyers to sell their current homes. The chain of ownership is now being oiled.’ The Canadian Real Estate Association recently circulated another measure of the social and economic consequences of buying and selling real estate: every Multiple Listing Service transaction in the three years before this one generated another $46,400 in Canadian economic activity, with the B.C. sum, $60,200, the top sum province by province. Photograph by: Steve Bosch, Vancouver Sun

Right now the topic of real estate is right up there with religion and politics: just don’t go there with extended family and co-workers.

— A comment on the Greater Fool website

The elevation of real estate to another faith-based topic best not discussed in good company was probably inevitable, if an American scholar of investor behaviour is right.

The scholar’s name is Robert Shiller. A couple of years ago he circulated a paper that says property buyers and sellers in the first years of this decade shared a certainty about the inevitability of price-appreciation supported by neither evidence nor experience and, further, they shared that certainty in unprecedented numbers.

“While home-price booms have been known for centuries, the recent boom is unique in its pervasiveness,” the Yale University professor of economics and finance wrote.

“Dramatic home-price booms have been in evidence since the late 1990s in Australia, Canada, China, France, India, Ireland, Italy, Korea, Russia, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States, among other countries.

“There appears to be no prior example of such dramatic booms occurring in so many places at the same time.”

Shiller is the developer, with Karl Case, of a widely circulated index of American real estate values. (See page G6)

The “Case Shiller” index’s inaugural value was 100, established for January 2000. Its highest value was 206.5, reached in July, 2006. Its lowest value, 140, is also its current value.

The index, among many, many matters, records 78 months of increasing American prices followed by 32 months of decreasing prices. On the way up the average monthly change in the index was almost 1.4 per cent; on the way down, almost 1.9 per cent.

No “fundamentals” — monetary policy, for example — drove international real estate prices up, Shiller says.

Instead, “extravagant expectations for future price increases” lifted them, an extravagance he attributes to an apprehension that “a new era of capitalism . . . is producing phenomenal economic growth, and . . . both extreme winners and unfortunate losers.”

Further, “fundamentals” will not reverse, by themselves, “large real-price declines extending over many years in major cities that have seen large increases.”

Robert Shiller doesn’t say a change in certainties is required, but it clearly is, from faith-based to experience-informed.

A germane Canadian experience might be our immigrant experience: we are a nation of immigrants, arriving and settling in the millions over the 400 years since the founding of Canada‘s first permanent settlement, Quebec City.

A document on the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation website, Pro-Home: A Progressive, Planned Approach to Affordable Home Ownership, is the inspiration for the possibility that in our immigrant past is a home-ownership experience of valuable currency.

“In the first half of the 1900s lower-income, immigrant families developed large portions of older Canadian cities using their own, and in some cases their neighbours‘, labour and capital.

“Subdivided park and farm lots were developed unevenly, without any overall plan, but this approach provided affordable homes for many working-class families.

“According to some estimates, as much as 25 per cent of housing built in Toronto between 1900 and 1913 was self-built.”

Not the particulars, the owner-built house, attract in this immigrant achievement.

The ethic attracts, the identification by ordinary people of a need and of a means of acquiring it. These homes were “incremental . . . affordable . . . and flexible,” to appropriate the language the study uses in championing “incremental housing” as a possible solution to the affordability challenges endured today by low-income families.

The homes were incremental because their owners expanded or altered them as household circumstances changed. They were flexible because they could be built by property owner or contractor and could be built to include “an accessory unit . . . as a source of income.” And they were affordable, to start and expand and alter.

The last quality is their most important today. They were affordable because their owners considered them “as a process rather than a product” or as a means rather than end, a means of mastering household circumstances over the years and the decades, good and bad, additions and subtractions.

This mastery was, and is, an achievement of profound value, with dividends that will speak to us today if we would only listen, and learn.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Kim Pemberton
Sun

Record low interest rates, falling house prices and buyer incentives are adding up to the perfect time for British Columbians wanting the Canadian dream — owning their own home.

In a buyers’ market, first-time buyers, in particular, are discovering they can not only finally get their foot in the door but a very inviting welcome mat has been laid out allowing their dollars to stretch further. Where they once would have considered themselves lucky to afford a small studio apartment, these same buyers have climbed further on the property ladder and are looking at two-bedroom condos and townhomes in some areas of the Lower Mainland.

Katherine Tung, 35, of Richmond is one such first-time buyer. She initially thought all she could afford would be a one- bedroom condo. Instead, Tung is happily searching the MLS listings for a two-bedroom condo in the $300,000 to $350,000 range.

“It would have been more difficult, and there would be a limit on what I could have afforded last year,” says the software developer, who wants to remain in Richmond close to her work, family and friends.

“Before, I could have only afforded a one-bedroom but with prices coming down and low interest rates that’s the main reason I can afford a two-bedroom condo.”

And while it is tempting to stretch further and go for a townhome, Tung says she plans to play it safe and factor in what would happen if today’s interest rates climbed higher.

The best rate she has found is a 3.3-per-cent variable but her budget could handle six per cent, she says.

“I’m going for a variable [rate] and when it looks like it’s going up I’m locking in for five years. A friend of mine purchased a condo five years ago with a closed rate close to four per cent. Five years later there’s another down cycle. He lucked out.”

The B.C. Real Estate Association’s Spring 2009 Housing Forecast reported recently that housing market conditions have started improving more quickly than expected thanks to the increase in home affordability for many first-time buyers.

“The majority of the decline in home prices has already occurred,” Cameron Muir, BCREA chief economist said in press release. “Balanced markets are emerging in Victoria, Vancouver and the Fraser Valley. There’s now little downward pressure on home prices in these area.”

He noted affordability reached a three-year high in April with the lower home prices and low interest rates reducing the carrying costs of the average priced home 24 per cent over last year.

“A significant increase in affordability has brought many first-time buyers into the market. First-time buyers were largely absent in the late fall and winter, making it more difficult for move-up buyers to sell their current homes. The chain of ownership is now being oiled.”

A recent report by Royal LePage Real Estate Services concurred, stating when first-time buyers stepped out of the market in the fourth quarter of 2008, at the height of the global recession, their “absence was profoundly felt.”

“Without significant volumes of entry-level homes trading hands, the entire market limped through the winter months. First-time buyers are back in force this spring, and with them the beginnings of a market recovery,” said Phil Soper, president and chief executive officer of Royal LePage Real Estate Services in a press release.

“While these consumers appreciate government incentives such as tax credits, greater RSP deduction limits and rebates on home renovations, it is markedly improved affordability that is proving to be the powerful drawing card.”

Burnaby resident Ashley Ostenal, 25, has been saving since the age of 20 and managed to stash away a $60,000 deposit. thanks to living rent-free with her parents all that time. And now that prices have dropped along with interest rates, Ostenal says she’s ready to take the plunge.

“It’s a really good time to buy. The market is at a great place for first-time buyers. It’s incredible,” she says.

She’s looking for a two-bedroom townhome in the $250,000 range in the Tri-Cities, Surrey or New Westminster. Just completing her teaching degree, Ostenal says she doesn’t know where she’ll end up working so she wants a central location.

She’s been to a few open houses since starting to look seriously but it wasn’t until she took a Greater Vancouver Home Builders’ Association first-time-buyer seminar that she says she realized she needed to expand her knowledge base.

Helping her through the maze is her sister, who recently bought a house in Burnaby with her boyfriend for around $500,000 — a price that Ostenal says wouldn’t have been possible last year for a detached home in the same neighbourhood. And like Tung, Ostenal says she plans to play it safe when it comes to interest rates. When she finds the right place she plans to opt for a mortgage she knows she can afford should the interest rate climb.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Mike Sasges
Sun

For 60 years, mortgage-loan insurance from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation has been helping Canadians, especially younger Canadians, with home-affordability challenges.

There’s not too much the national housing agency doesn’t know, or hasn’t investigated, about the rights and wrongs of home ownership, in other words.

And, thanks to the Internet, what it knows is readily available when you’re ready to know it.

One of its publications, Home Buying Step By Step, actually reduces the life-changing first-purchase to a “couldn’t be easier” process of 10 steps. (It’s not, of course.) The first step is the biggest: deciding if home ownership is right for you. (It isn’t for everyone.)

Another CMHC publication, Condominium Buyers’ Guide, is especially germane to metropolitan Vancouver home-ownership.

If buying a new-build apartment or townhouse, before or after construction-completion, a provincial government website is an indispensible supplement to the national guide.

The B.C. Financial Institutions Commission administers 10 statutes, four of them governing real estate and strata-property transactions and relationships, before and after a sale. (“Condominium living . . . can be a relatively carefree housing option,” CMHC says. Depends on who all is involved, the provincial website suggests.)

CMHC also maintains an “Affordable Housing Centre” on its website. (That’s where I found Pro-Home: a progressive, planned approach to affordable home ownership and its immigrant-experience observations.) Intended for “professionals,” read the right way it has much that is personally useful, inspiring even.

Prof. Robert Shiller’s paper, “Understanding Recent Trends in House Prices and Home Ownership,” has been published by Yale University‘s Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics at Yale University.

The Greater Foot website is maintained by Garth Turner, sometime journalist and author and financial adviser and federal MP and cabinet minister. Think of it as a cyberspace equivalent of those desert and mountain refuges of our collective past where New Believers have gathered to scorn — “Greater Fool” — and scold Old Believers at eschatological, “end of an age,” moments, like the passing of real estate as religion.

You will find:

Garth Turner, and his correspondents, at greaterfool.ca; Shiller’s “Recent Trends” paper through a search at cowles.econ.yale.edu; The provincial financial institutions commission website at fic.gov.bc.ca;

The CMHC website at cmhc-schl.gc.ca.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Neighbours fear the 15 buildings are too dense and would set a bad precedent in the historic area

John Mackie
Sun

A model shows the proposed townhouse development in the 1400-block McRae in Shaughnessy, which will feature 15 townhouses.

Some Shaughnessy residents are seeing red over a proposed townhouse development near 16th and Granville.

Protest signs have popped up around the wealthy enclave reading “McRae Development Sets Bad Precedent.” It’s the latest wrinkle in a four-year fight between some residents and developer Brian Bell, who wants to build 15 townhouses in an empty lot on the edge of Shaughnessy.

Bell struck a deal with the City of Vancouver to save the historic Nichol mansion and its lush gardens at 1402 McRae. In return, the city rezoned some land below the mansion to allow for townhouses.

The Nichol house sits on two lots, and was sold along with the empty lot. The rezoning split the middle lot, so that the Nichol house remains in situ on the top lot-and-a-half, the townhouses will be built on the lower lot-and-a-half.

Bell beat back a legal challenge to his development and expects to get the final approval to proceed from Vancouver council in July. But Shaughnessy resident Angela Woo is not going to let it happen without a fight.

Woo argues the townhouse development is far too dense for the neighbourhood, which is traditionally reserved for single-family homes, albeit big ones.

“This is the iconic gate to First Shaughnessy,” said Woo.

“It’s a treed lot, with over 100 trees, and they are going to [knock down] 96 mature trees. They are saying they are going to preserve the house and the garden, but they are going to build right beside the house in the back garden, which is detrimental to the heritage character of the site.”

Woo argues that the 49 parking spaces in the development will mean a big increase in traffic, that the entrance on McRae could be a problem in wintertime because it’s such a steep street, and that the rezoning sets a bad precedent for the neighbourhood.

She said she isn’t against densification per se, but this development is too big.”We are not against densification, we are for densification in a responsible way,” she said. “The [current Shaughnessy zoning] bylaw allows for densification, but by infills, and also by conversion.”

Don Luxton of Heritage Vancouver has a far different take.

Luxton likes Bell‘s plan because it retains the 1912 Nichol mansion on its site, with its gardens. The home sits at the corner of McRae and the Crescent, the heart of the historic neighbourhood. It was built by former Province owner and B.C. Lt.-Gov. Walter Nichol, and was owned by Canfor founder Poldi Bentley and his family from 1941 to 2005.

“It’s one of the most important buildings in the city from the point of view of its architecture, its history, its associations with people,” said Luxton.

“It’s a work by [the legendary architect] Samuel Maclure, it’s one of the primo buildings in Shaughnessy and the city. What is really interesting about the building is that it does have its intact garden setting at the front…which is a really important part of the building, because it’s the whole arts and crafts esthetic.”

Luxton argues that the rezoning of the empty lot below the mansion is an “exceptionally unusual circumstance” that doesn’t bear any relation to Shaughnessy’s heritage character.

“They keep saying it’s a precedent, and it’s not, it’s a one-off HRA [Heritage Revitalization Agreement],” he said. “It’s the very edge [of Shaughnessy], it doesn’t impact anything. I have never understood the opposition to this project.”

Luxton also doesn’t think the current Shaughnessy zoning protects the neighbourhood’s heritage because it has a loophole that allows developers to tear down old homes and replace them with “faux heritage” homes that are much bigger.

Heritage Vancouver named the neighbourhood First Shaughnessy one of the 10 most endangered heritage sites in Vancouver in 2009; it said 50 of the 369 “character” homes in the neighbourhood have been torn down since 1982.

“Shaughnessy is under siege right now, it’s not being well-protected at all,” said Luxton.

“Often the neighbours don’t seem to see the value of some of these really exceptional buildings. They’re more interested in preserving property value than in preserving heritage.”

Vancouver Coun. Suzanne Anton admits the previous Non-Partisan Association council took a lot of heat from Shaughnessy residents when it agreed to rezone the site for townhouses. But she said it was the best of the options that were presented.

“There were three choices,” she said. “Tear the house down and build three single-family [homes], completely unacceptable. Another was move the house and build three more single-family, which I think was going to be the reward for moving the house, you’d get three [houses] instead of two. To me that was not acceptable either.

“The third [option] was to leave the house in place and allow the townhouse development.”

She also said the location at 16th and Granville was also key.

“It’s a pretty obvious location for a slightly higher density,” she said.

“The builder always could have a house on that bottom property there. The people who say you’ve got to leave it as a park, or spare land, none of them showed up with the several million dollars it would have required to purchase the lot. If you want it as a park, you need to go out and start doing some fundraising.”

Bell wouldn’t speculate on how much the 15 townhouses will sell for, but they will range in size from 1,500 to 3,500 square feet. He paid $7 million for the three lots on the property in 2005. He has just listed the 10,000 square foot Nichol mansion for $6.2 million.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

A roof keeps the interior dry, but the choice of materials can add to the value of your home

Pedro Arrais
Sun

Gordon Carter of Gord’s Infinity Roofing Services says too many layers can lead to leaks or even a roof collapse. Photograph by: Bruce Stotesbury, Canwest News Service

The federal government’s new budget offers homeowners a tax break of as much as $1,350, if they spend up to $10,000 on renovations.

One of the projects that qualify is installing a new roof.

Re-roofing a house can be a major investment for any homeowner, but the government’s Home Renovation Tax Credit of up to 15 per cent for every $10,000 spent on home repair can soften the blow. Installing a new roof on an average home costs about $8,000. The tax credit can mean a savings of $1,050 come tax time next year (15 per cent credit on the remaining balance after deducting the first $1,000 of the bill)

Roofing contractors hope the incentive will spur some penny-pinching homeowners to open their wallets.

“We recently did a job where the homeowner was in the attic with bedpans every time it rained,” said Gordon Carter, owner of Gord’s Infinity Roof Services. “Others have so many old layers of material on the roof that there is a danger of water leaks or even roof collapse if there is any significant accumulation of snow.”

He says leaks can lead to house fires. Moisture in ceiling electrical boxes can lead to short-circuits.

Most new roofs now have up to a 35-year warranty, but Carter recommends homeowners have their roofs inspected five years after installation and every two years after that. He says the $50 cost for the check is money well spent as it will catch problems before they cause damage.

While every roofing product on the market will keep the rain off, many new materials are available that mimic more costly choices. But not everybody thinks that is necessary.

“It’s about function,” said Jenny Ferns, who had the roof of her house recovered by Carter when she moved in. “The black shingles may complement our white house nicely, but at the end of the day its primary purpose is to keep me dry at a reasonable cost.”

She thinks it is more important to find a trustworthy roofing contractor who does quality work than choosing a fancy roof.

There are strengths and weaknesses in every product. Here is a snapshot of materials available on the market:

• Fibreglass shingles are the bread and butter of the industry. Locally, up to 85 per cent of new and re-roofs are covered with this light yet strong roofing material. They have replaced the once-popular asphalt shingles, which are made from a felt base that consists of wood and other cellulose fibres. Both types of shingles are covered with asphalt and coloured granules.

Life expectancy: 25 to 35 years

• Cedar shakes and shingles are a favourite for homeowners, but the cost — usually two to three times the cost of fibreglass shingles — is beyond the budget of most middle class homeowners. Shingles are sawed, shakes are generally split. Shingles are usually smaller than shakes. These are not the best choice for homes in fire-prone areas. Cedar roofing requires a seal coat every five years or so.

Life expectancy: 15 to 30 years

• Metal roofs are found more on high-end houses because of its cost compared with traditional cedar shakes. A metal roof will likely last the lifetime of a house. It is especially popular in the country for its fire resistance and snow-shedding ability. The downside is that a metal roof can be noisy when rain or hail is beating down. Installation can be more complex but there is less waste.

Life expectancy: 20 to 50 years

• Plastic, polymer and rubber tiles are injection-moulded with colours and patterns to mimic cedar and other materials, usually made from consumer recycled materials. Composite shakes are made from plastics such as old juice and milk containers. Rubber shakes come from recycled vehicle tires. They are the quietest roofing material, but rubber tiles have been known to give off a smell on hot days.

Life expectancy: 50 years plus

Roofing companies calculate the cost of re-roofing in squares. A square in roofing terms signifies 100 square-feet of roofing materials applied. A typical roof is 1,500 square-feet and takes 15 squares — 13 squares for area materials and two squares of starter and ridge caps.

Re-roofing this house with fibreglass shingles costs between $6,000 to $8,000. That includes tearing off two layers of old roofing and applying a new board base for the shingles.

The slope of a roof also affects roofing costs. It’s more difficult and complicated to re-roof a house with a steep roof. An average slope is 5:12, which means there is a vertical rise of five inches for very 12 inches of horizontal run. A steep pitch — anything over 7:12 — is difficult to walk about on safely, which means a lot of safety equipment is required.

Roofline interest — a lot of peaks and valleys — also add to the complexity and cost of re-roofing.

Curb appeal extends to the roof — some call it “roof-scaping.” It is important to keep in mind the architecture and appearance of the street and neighbourhood.

“A roof is just like paint,” said Sandy Berry of Newport Realty, a real estate agent since 1996. “If it is in sad shape, it negatively affects the value of the house.”

A house that obviously needs a roof repair or replacement would usually appeal only to buyers who don’t mind taking on a renovation project. Sellers who are reluctant to repair their roofs risk low offers.

“Buyers seeing a roof in need of attention would usually assume that the rest of the house is also in need of repair,” says Berry.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

It’s a way for companies to cut costs in notoriously tight downtown Vancouver

Derrick Penner
Sun

Sometimes business trends converge. In this recession, there is a window of opportunity for a trend towards more self-employment to meet another one: companies downsizing and subleasing some of their office space.

Metro Vancouver’s commercial realtors saw the latter trend develop midway through 2008, with companies either bracing for the downturn by giving up some of the office space they’d leased to accommodate growth, or suffering economic storms that forced them to downsize or close up shop.

Shawna Rogowski, director of research at Colliers International in Vancouver, currently counts 244 sublease listings for a total of 1.34 million square feet of space available across Metro Vancouver.

Notorious for its tight office vacancy rate, downtown Vancouver accounts for 171 of those listings for a total of 844,600 square feet of space.

“I have to admit, people can low-ball [on sublease space],” Rogowski said in an interview. “[For direct or head-leasing], not so much, because landlords are still in a great position.”

However, for subleasing, “if it’s a question of nothing or someone in there tomorrow who will pay the rent, at a reduced rate, they’ll take [it].”

That can mean basic office space in downtown Vancouver at base rents of $12-$15 per square foot per year for a sublease, versus $18 to $22 per square foot for a head lease, Rogowski said. Costs in the suburbs, however, could be half that.

Rogowski said prospective sublease tenants do have to endure the limited terms of a sublease, but for companies starting out, the savings can be worth it.

She added that subtenants can economize further if the company leaving it behind is willing to leave it furnished, which is a strong likelihood if companies are giving up space to economize themselves.

“Just to un-furnish space costs money,” Rogowski said, and to build improvements for a new tenant might cost in the range of $40 per square foot.

“So if you’ve got improvements in place, it’s quite a bit of cost savings.”

However, such deals aren’t necessarily available if a retail store is the self-employment choice of prospective entrepreneurs, according to Doug Le Patourel, a vice-president at Colliers in the retail leasing area.

Metro Vancouver‘s retail vacancy sits in the four-per-cent-to-4.5-per-cent range, Le Patourel said, which is “pretty insignificant.”

There are pitfalls potential store owners can avoid, he said, such as determining whether the retail space they are looking at has adequate electricity or utility services for their purposes, and before they sign a lease. Upgrading to a more powerful electrical service after they’ve committed to renting can be an expensive afterthought.

Le Patourel said commercial realtors can help prospective retailers with a lot of research on demographics of neighbourhoods to make sure a tenant is finding his key target markets, on what kind of traffic they can expect, what kind of sales they should get when renting at specific rates and what improvements should cost.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Environmentalists say the $170-million project will launch a new era of commercial sprawl in the Fraser Valley

Brian Morton
Sun

An artist’s rendering (above and above right) shows the proposed $170-million, 600,000-square-foot shopping mall development by Shape Properties west of Abbotsford. It would be located just off Highway 1 at Mount Lehman Road.

A shopping mall planned for an eight-hectare site near Abbotsford’s Mount Lehman interchange will be a major retail draw for Fraser Valley residents, according to the city’s mayor.

However, environmentalists see the development as the start of a trend that will see green space paved and sprawl spreading up the Fraser Valley along the Trans-Canada Highway as a consequence of the provincial government’s expansion of the highway and doubling of the Port Mann Bridge‘s capacity.

“The potential regional draw for that centre is enormous,” Abbotsford Mayor George Peary said in an interview about the $170-million, 600,000-square-foot Shape Properties development, dubbed Abby Lane.

“It’s huge and it’s got amazing freeway access. I think this will be the largest mall in the region. It will be relatively easy for people to get there from Langley, Chilliwack and Mission. Millions travel that freeway and they’re all potential customers.”

Opponents of commercial sprawl say the new plaza is an example of the type of retail they expect will pop up all along the highway because of the provincial government’s Gateway Program to add lanes to Highway 1 and double the size of the bridge.

“They’re going to sprawl all the way out to Chilliwack,” Cathleen Vecchiato of the Fraser Valley Conservation Coalition said in an interview. “It [the expansion] is just putting more people into their cars.”

Vecchiato, a Langley resident, said the planned highway and bridge expansion is fuelling a lot of development proposals, a trend she feels is short-sighted.

She said Abby Lane won’t be the last of its type. She fears that a “big green section” along the highway in Langley and Abbotsford will see more development. “Once it [the highway and bridge expansion] goes in, it will be an excuse to build more.”

But Peary sees the shopping mall as another sign that his city is coming of age. He noted that approximately 400,000 people visit the Fraser Valley Trade and Exhibition Centre (Tradex) each year and another 500,000 people fly through Abbotsford International Airport.

The project, which has been given approval in principle by Abbotsford council, will have access off Highway 1 and draw people from as far east as Harrison Hot Springs and Hope. It is scheduled for completion in the fall of 2011 and will have a “trading area” of approximately 262,000 people.

Peary said the shopping centre will be a series of free-standing buildings accessed from the outside and that he’s been told by staff that a huge Wal-Mart Supercentre could anchor the development.

There will also be many small and medium-sized retail tenants.

Peary said the mall is the first major development on a green strip beside Highway 1 east of the Mount Lehman interchange, and that other properties there will also be developed. He said the highway access for Abby Lane will be paid for by the developer.

Darren Kwiatkowski, executive vice-president of Shape Properties, said in an interview the project has the largest dollar value the company has ever undertaken.

“Along the Trans-Canada Highway, there’s no development of that nature,” he added.

Kwiatkowski said the shopping mall will have a “main street” style, with direct access to stores off the development’s streets.

He said it will take about 18 months to construct and will have a mixture of small and large retailers and possibly a theatre.

Kwiatkowski refused to say which stores have signed on and declined to comment on whether a Wal-Mart Supercentre would be the anchor tenant in a 150,000-square-foot store.

He said the shopping mall would meet the needs of “a wide range of shoppers,” and include higher-end family restaurants and fashion stores.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun