Barbara Gunn
Sun

There are many homes in this city with exquisite finishings and million-dollar views. There are very few with exquisite finishings, million-dollar views and Olympic boasting rights.

Those residences, of course, are on the southeast shore of False Creek, once the winter home of the Squamish First Nation, and later home to sawmills, foundries, shipbuilders and the public works yard.

But the site’s more recent history — as any Vancouverite well knows — has nothing to do with industrial activity, and everything to do with some pretty spectacular days in February and March, when our city was visited by some of the best speed skaters, snow-boarders and hockey players in the world.

The Joannie Rochettes and Scott Moirs may have long gone, as have the other 2,800 or so athletes and officials who slept and ate in the Olympic athletes’ village during the Games, but the world is back — in a manner of speaking.

Today, more than 350 homes at Millennium Water will be launched with great fanfare in an event the sales team has dubbed “Avenues of the World.” To say it won’t be your average unveiling is like saying the Olympics were just okay.

“We picked eight amazing local interior designers, plus Chil Design, which did the original (presentation) suite, to really showcase what can be done (with the homes),” says marketing mogul Bob Rennie. “And we thought: Let’s bring everybody down and show people an Olympic legacy.”

Those who take Rennie up on his invitation will have an opportunity to see where some of the Olympians lived, but certainly not how they lived.

The athletes lived in units with kitchens that were boarded off with wheatboard, and with floors that were topped, not with high-priced hardwood, but with carpet tile. The units may have provided what USA Today called “a billion-dollar view of the city’s skyline across the water,” but their interiors, notes Rennie, were utilitarian.

Not so today, when Mayor Gregor Robertson, former Vanoc CEO John Furlong and Millennium Development Corp. principals Peter and Shahram Malek will be joined on site by thousands of Olympic “blue-jacket” volunteers for the ceremonial handing-over of the village keys from Vanoc to the city, and from the city to the developer.

The wheatboard is now gone, and the nine presentation suites have been outfitted to do a little showing off.

Like the 1,108-unit Millennium Water community itself, which is comprised of a diverse selection of residential offerings, ranging from high-end market penthouses to rental and affordable housing units, those show homes will be far from uniform.

“We’ve got a very simple, sustainable design, right up to hyper-luxury on the water,” says Rennie. “And then, in between, we’re having fun with a suite that’s all done in gold by Alda Pereira.”

The hyper-luxury Rennie speaks of would include the 2,900-square-foot home outfitted by Mitchell Freedland on the second floor of the Arthur Erickson-designed Canada House and within hollering distance of the dragon boats in False Creek.

Far from utilitarian, the residence has 10-foot ceilings, three large bedrooms — all with en suites — and enormous outlooks that face east toward Science World, north toward the downtown skyline, and west beyond the Burrard Bridge. It will go to market for $4.4 million.

“You can picture the CEO of a company living here and entertaining and showing off Vancouver,” says Rennie. “It’s like being on a boat without having to leave your home. And when the new roof goes on the (BC Place) stadium, you’re looking at a half-billion-dollar toy. It’s a really special location.”

(Rennie says he doesn’t know which athletes made the unit their home during the Olympics, but he will say this: “My guess is that Canada’s gold (hockey) team had some front-row seats. They’re our darlings.”)

Millennium Water, which is probably noteworthy as much for its environmental sustainability as for its Olympic legacy, was awarded a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) platinum certification earlier this year by the U.S. Green Building Council. That distinction, which recognized the community’s sustainability in several areas — among them, its proximity to the downtown core, its green buildings, its habitat restoration and its affordable housing component — made it “the greenest neighbourhood in the world,” Mayor Gregor Robertson noted at the time.

(The distinction is officially limited to North America, but the mayor said he knew of no comparable community.)

Sustainability, of course, has been key to the city’s development plan for all of the southeast False Creek site. Those who make their homes at Millennium Water will be sharing their neighbourhood with amenities that include a community centre, a boating facility, an Urban Fare, a London Drugs, a brew pub, an elementary school and daycare facilities — as well as a park and a new seawall promenade.

Southeast False Creek, notes the city on its website, was designed as a model sustainable development based on “environmental, social and economic principles where people will live, work, play and learn.

“This complete community will ensure goods and services (are) within walking distance and housing that is linked by transit and in proximity to local jobs.”

The LEED certification was a nod to that design, and also a much-needed boost for the city after a number of issues plagued the project — including the need for the city to step in after the builder lost its financing.

Of the 737 market homes at Millennium Water, 263 have been sold, says Rennie, noting the units on offer are being placed on the market for the first time, most within the range of $600,000 to $2 million.

“The intention was always that this would be a steady rollout of inventory,” he says. “When we went into the economic standstill in the fall of ’08, we sat down as consultants to the developer and the city — the city is holding the mortgage here — and said that our belief was that if you were still standing in the fall of ’09, you’d made it through the economy. So let’s wait and sell it when the economy comes back.

“There was no sense selling the Olympic village when there was no confidence in the world in the economy . . . And we got to September ’09 and the market was back.”

And now, notes Rennie, the homes are special for a reason beyond their location, their sustainability and their Olympic connection.

“Standing inventory just means more toward homeowners, so we get to satisfy that side of the market. And our confidence then is: If you own an existing home now, you’re liquid. It’s very easy to sell.”

Throughout all the trials of the past couple of years the Malek brothers remained focused on the job at hand, Rennie adds.

“Peter and Shahram Malek, they’re unbelievable developers. Through all the controversy and the downturn in the economy, they just put their heads down and said: ‘We’re building a village.’ They didn’t get caught up in it. They just delivered. They didn’t take the limestone off. They put more on.”

Today, however, Rennie will be focused less on the economic concerns of the past and more on the hoopla of the present.

“One reporter called me and was asking about it. He said, ‘You know, my mother-in-law in Japan e-mailed me and said we should be looking at the Olympic village.’ The word is out there,” says Rennie.

“You’re not going to have to say, in our city, ‘I live at the Olympic village’ and then have to explain where it is. It’s just going to be a statement.”

The designers taking part in the “Avenues of the World” Millennium Water launch include Alda Pereira Design, BYU Design, Inform Interiors, Kodu Design, Ledingham Design Consultants/ Livingspace Interiors, Mitchell Freedland Design, The Cross Decor and Design, William Switzer and Associates and Chil Design Group.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Apartments are attached to restored mansion that has been converted to a hotel on the water

Shirley Culpin
Sun

The Villas at Crown Mansion

Project location: Qualicum Beach

Project size: 16 apartments, 1 bed, 1 bed +den

Residence size: 1,030 -1,198 sq. ft.

Prices: $359, 900 — $469,900

Sales centre: Crown Mansion, 292 Crescent Road East, Qualicum Beach

Hours: 10 a.m. -4 p.m. Monday -Friday, noon -3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday

Telephone: 250-752-5776  or 250-752-5776      

E-mail: [email protected]

Web: crownmansion.com

Developer: Silverado Land Corporation

Architect: Manley LaFoy

Interior design: Donna Coulson

Occupancy: Immediate

—

A unique project located on the east coast of Vancouver Island has brought new meaning to the adage “Everything old is new again”.

Located in the charming village of Qualicum Beach, The Villas at Crown Mansion have drawn their inspiration from the original dwelling built on the six-acre property almost a century ago.

The residence served as the home of some of Qualicum’s leading citizens during the 1900s, and hosted many a celebrity, including Bing Crosby, John Wayne and the King of Siam.

Early in the new millennium, Ron Coulson and Rick Jackson, owners of the Silverado Land Corporation and the principals behind Courtenay’s Crown Isle golf community, purchased the aging mansion with an eye to returning it to its original status in the community.

The mansion has been converted to a six-room hotel that evokes the ambiance of yesteryear.

Many of the striking original features of the structure remain, among them the spectacular zebra wood in the hotel’s card room, the imposing fireplaces with decorative mantels and an intimate dining room.

The Silverado plan also included a small real estate development, the first stage of which is The Villas at Crown Mansion.

Sixteen modern condominiums have been seamlessly added to the original structure. From the exterior, the condos appear to be part of the original building, sharing the same port cochere and architectural elegance.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Derrick Penner
Sun

Expect British Columbia’s property prices to remain flat for the balance of the year, which will be good news for buyers again being squeezed by the province’s sky-high values, according to the B.C. Real Estate Association.

Cameron Muir, the association’s chief economist, said sales have stabilized while inventories of unsold homes have risen, which is keeping pressure off prices.

Provincially, realtors processed some 8,385 units through the Multiple Listing Service in April, 21 per cent higher than the same month a year ago, but when figures are adjusted to account for seasonality, April sales were four per cent below March, according to Muir.

At the same time, provincial inventories hit 54,029 in April, some nine per cent more than in April of 2009.

“Overall there is more balance in the Lower Mainland and Victoria markets going forward and much less upward pressure on prices,” Muir said in an interview.

“I anticipate prices will remain fairly flat for the rest of the year as a result of the countervailing forces of improving economy and job growth [offset] by affordability.”

And as it had become before the recession and downturn, Muir said buyers’ constricted ability to pay for real estate will be “the single biggest constraint in the market over the next few years.”

Muir expects banks’ prime lending rate, currently resting at 2.25 per cent, to rise to the range of 4.5 per cent to five per cent by this time next year, if the economy keeps improving.

Carol Frketich, regional economist

for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp., said economic fundamentals, such as the addition in April of 13,000 new jobs to the economy, and an unemployment rate of 7.3 per cent versus 7.5 per cent in Alberta, look good for the real estate market.

“B. C.’s unemployment rate is now below Alberta’s, so that bodes well for migration,” Frketich said. “Employment opportunities are supportive of housing demand.”

Frketich noted that property prices have rebounded more strongly in the Lower Mainland and Victoria than they have in interior markets.

The provincial average home price in April hit $514,820, which was almost 15 per cent higher than the same month a year ago, but that average was driven in part by steep price increases in Metro Vancouver, which accounted for more than 40 per cent of provincial sales.

In Metro Vancouver, average prices have reached new highs with the overall average home price up some 19 per cent to $673,561 in April.

By contrast, the Kamloops region has seen year-over-year price growth of 6.3 per cent to hit an average of $316,520 in April.

Okanagan Mainline, which includes Kelowna, saw price growth of almost 10 per cent to an average of $394,516.

Paul Fabri, a CMHC market analyst in the Okanagan, said the region’s markets have been hampered by a decline in the recreational real-estate market during the recession, when “Alberta [buyers] stayed home.”

“We did see some price recovery in the latter half of 2009, but certainly not to the extent that was seen in the Lower Mainland,” Fabri said.

For the year to date, residential sales totalled 26,669 units at the end of April, up 47 per cent from the same point a year ago, and the total value of properties sold came to $13.5 billion, some 73 per cent higher than for the same months of 2009.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

The wild card in 2010 will be the introduction of the HST

Derrick Penner
Sun

With spring offering the promise of sunshine and thoughts of summer cottages, the performance of British Columbia’s recreational real estate market will depend on how well sellers appeal to a new, finely honed sense of value among buyers, according to one consultant.

Coming out of the recession, the recreational sector has left behind the headier days of 2002 to 2007 when buyers felt flush and worried more about missing out on opportunities to jump into a dream property, according to Scott Brown, the senior vice-president of Colliers Residential Services.

And with the marketing push for 2010 beginning, Brown said developers can expect to have to bargain hard to clear out existing inventories that built up during the recession.

“People’s interest is back, [but] it’s not crazy interest,” Brown said in an interview on Thursday.

Now, however, a property buyer’s biggest fear is, ” ‘Am I paying too much, and is this a bad time to buy, and am I going to look stupid?’ “

From what Brown saw in 2009, when buyers began to trickle back into the market, those developers who can price products in the $300,000 to $500,000 range will likely do the best.

Beverly Hills-based auctioneer Kennedy Wilson is touting the possibility of getting in at “the bottom of the market” with a couple of auctions on B.C. recreational projects.

For instance, the firm has set opening-bid prices of $85,000 to $115,000 on quarter-share units (priced at $209,900 to $284,900 in June 2008) in the Painted Boat time-share resort at Pender Harbour in an auction taking place for 72 shares on May 30 at the Fairmont Hotel Vancouver.

Then at Invermere, Wilson has set opening-bid prices of $85,000 to $180,000 on 40 units in the Lake Windermere project, which will be auctioned in Calgary on May 29. They had previously been priced up to $512,900.

For Sable Resorts’ Legacy on Mara Lake project near Sicamous, the developer is enticing buyers with a “stay and play” opportunity for prospects to test drive one of the 24 units still for sale in the 65-unit condominium development.

“We’ve had very positive results and had some sales,” Lara Grimm, Sable Resorts’ marketing coordinator said in an interview.

Prices at Legacy range from $299,000 to over $1 million, which Grimm said has put them “below the 2009 appraised value.”

“There have been some adjustments on some units, but for the most part, because of the quality of the project and its location, we’re not looking to fire sale and be done with it.”

Brown said it was difficult to gauge how much the recreational market went down because developers were reluctant to discount prices, then buyers disappeared.

This summer, Brown said there are failed B.C. projects in the hands of receivers, which will help determine pricing.

“This summer, people will be more aggressive with pricing, some obviously in a more distressed state than others.”

If they are able to end up with selling prices in the $300,000 to $500,000 range “they could sell 20 or 30 units,” Brown said. “But that would still be about half of what [prices] were.”

He added that the wild card in 2010 will be the HST that takes effect July 1. That will add seven-per-cent inflation to the already challenged market.

Brown said he is telling clients “you’d better be prepared to eat the HST if you want to see sales in August.”

Still, for financial advisers, it remains a difficult environment to recommend a recreational purchase, from an investment standpoint, according to David Sung, president of Vancouver-based Nicola Wealth Management.

Sung said B.C.’s real estate values have grown so sharply over such a short period it is hard to see that trend continuing.

“If real estate is going to be flat or see no growth, then clients are going to be more well off by taking the same money and putting it towards other assets,” Sung said.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Repair bills will include HST while PST rebate disappears

Doug Ward
Sun

The financial hit facing thousands of leaky-condo owners in B.C. is about to get worse because of the new harmonized sales tax and the end of the province’s rebate for PST paid on repairs.

The HST will apply to all goods and services involved in leaky condo reconstruction, including labour, which was not covered by the PST.

The PST relief grant for owners of homes with completed repairs will be terminated June 30, with the arrival of the HST.

“It’s a double whammy,” said James Balderson, of the Coalition of Leaky Condo Owners.

“The government will be taxing the misery of leaky-condo owners.”

Gary Hamilton, president of a strata council at 2368 Laurel St. in Vancouver, said the changes will force condo owners in his development to dig deeper into their pockets to pay for repairs.

Hamilton said the strata council won’t be getting a $40,000 PST rebate it had initially counted on when drawing up its budget. And the HST will add an extra $80,000 to repair costs, he added.

“So the overall impact to the owners here is $120,000,” said Hamilton. “We had no idea when we signed a contract with our contractor, what the impact of these tax changes would be.”

Hamilton said his strata council has a contingency fund for unexpected costs, but the unanticipated burden will leave his member condo owners, some of them pensioners, with less discretionary income.

It’s unclear how many condo owners will be affected by the tax changes.

Seumas Gordon, a public affairs officer with the ministry of housing and social development, said the government does not have an estimate of how many condo owners stand to lose the rebate.

Leaky-condo advocate Balderson said there could be tens of thousands of owners who are going to face increased costs.

A report from consultants McClanaghan & Associates two years ago estimated that some 45 to 55 per cent of the 160,000 strata-owned apartments built in B.C. during the leaky-condo period — considered between 1992 and 1999 — had suffered “premature building envelope failure.”

The report’s authors estimated that between 45 and 68 per cent of the leaky units had not yet been repaired, and that by 2012, up to one-third of them would still need fixing.

The Homeowner Protection Office (HPO) said that, as of the end of 2009, it had approved relief grants for 765 strata councils, with an average grant of $688 per home.

NDP housing critic Shane Simpson, extrapolating from the report’s projections and the HPO figures, said that there are about 29,000 units still to be repaired — “so there’s about $20 million being lost to condo owners in lost PST rebates. It’s a pretty big number.”

Simpson said the new condo repair costs are “just another example of how the HST will hit consumers and people who can least afford it. People are facing a whole array of extra costs simply to keep their homes.”

Among these people are owners of 50 condos in a highrise building at 7288 Acorn Ave. in Burnaby who have already contributed about $75,000 each for a 12-month, $3.8-million repair job expected to wrap up this October.

“This is a tax … that we hadn’t budgeted on. We counted on getting the PST rebate, and we’re not going to get it,” said Trudy Lancelyn, president of the strata council.

Lancelyn was expecting a total PST rebate of roughly $100,000.

“We’re not against the HST per se, but it would have been very helpful if they just waived that criteria,” Lancelyn said. “It basically disqualifies every partly complete project like this one.”

The Burnaby strata council estimates that the additional seven-per-cent HST levy on items currently PST-exempt will mean $110,000 in additional costs. In all, the HST and the cancelled rebate will add $210,000 to the project, which translates to $4,200 on average per suite.

Lancelyn said they had no idea the HST was on its way when they budgeted for the project.

But government spokesman Gordon said the PST relief is available for work completed by June 30 where PST has been paid. Applications received by June 30, 2010 will be processed.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Dungeon still intact after renovation

Mario Toneguzzi, Calgary Herald
Sun

Described as “one of the most sophisticated buying opportunities of this century,” the iconic Hart family mansion, one of the country’s most infamous historical residences, has been listed for sale in Calgary for nearly $5 million.

The three-storey mansion, formerly owned by pro wrestling’s famous Hart clan and currently owned by Dario Berloni, owner of the downtown Teatro Restaurant, is approximately 5,600 square feet on about one hectare of land with stunning views of the city from Patina Place S.W.

It has been refurbished inside, but the legendary ‘dungeon,’ a specially outfitted, custom-built basement where famous wrestlers like Superstar Billy Graham, Greg ‘The Hammer’ Valentine, Davey Boy Smith, Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Abdullah the Butcher, Roddy Piper, Edge, Fritz Von Erich, Gene Kiniski, and Jim Neidhart were trained and brutalized at the hands of Stu Hart and his sons Bret and Owen, has been preserved.

Bret Hart has previously described the room as having holes in the walls and ceilings where bodies had been driven through them at various times over the multi-decade history of the room. The Dungeon was even the scene of an MMA vs wrestling match between Ken Shamrock and Owen Hart for a 1998 WWE pay-per-view.

“Going to the Hart family for training was kind of like, if you’re a very religious person, going to the Vatican,” said Chris Benoit in the book WWE Unscripted. “It was a good experience just to be there, to imagine all the people that had been through there, and all the blood, sweat, and tears that had been paid.”

The mansion is listed on the MLS system by Rooney Cronin + Valentine of Re/ Max Real Estate (Central) for $4.95 million.

“When (Dario) bought it a few years ago, it needed to be refurbished,” said realtor Donna Rooney.

“He has spent a lot of time on this and I would say at massive expense.”

“The amount of money that has gone into this and the love that’s gone into this renovation has been spectacular. Anybody that’s seen the house is just in awe,” said Rooney.

Bret (The Hitman) Hart dropped by the house with his girlfriend Thursday afternoon to take some photos, and said he was surprised it is for sale again.

“But at the same time, I could see somebody living in this home,” said the world-famous former wrestling champion, who grew up in the home.

“It’s a beautiful house. It’s filled with memories and love. Pleasant memories.

“I like a lot of the changes, but I miss the old house.”

The mansion has been restored to keep the integrity of the way it was, but also to modernize it, said Rooney.

“It’s beautiful. There’s been a lot of imported tile and wood and the kitchen is totally divine. The house is gorgeous. It’s very much a grand property,” she said.

There is approval in place for multi-family development on the site, if potential buyers are interested in pursuing that.

A few years ago, there was a great deal of controversy over that potential development opportunity.

“I know they’ve done some renovations on it and they’ve restored it,” said Ross Hart, one of the 12 Hart children who grew up in the home.

“It all depends on the type of buyer. If it’s someone who wants to preserve the house and the landscape, I’m really happy with that.

“I’m not so keen on some developer just buying it that’s going to sell a bunch of townhouses or condos on it and change the landscape, the traditional look of the yard and the character of the home itself.”

The Hart mansion was built in 1905 by Edward Henry Crandell, a successful businessman whose family owned the mansion until 1935, when it was bought by Judge Henry Stuart Patterson.

The home was sold to wrestling icon Stu Hart and his wife Helen in 1951 for $25,000.

The Hart family sold the mansion in 2004 for $1.5 million.

Stu Hart, the patriarch of the wrestling dynasty, died in 2003. His wife Helen died in 2001.

“This house would be similar to some of the great Mount Royal mansions that you would see, and it’s perched up on the hill on the west end of the city. That’s really unusual,” said Rooney.

“It’s got absolutely stunning views of the city and it feels like a grand old dame that you would see in Europe. It’s got very much a European-type flavour. You could see somebody having a family of 12 in this house. There’s a multitude of bedrooms (six) and they’re all equipped with beautiful ensuites. There isn’t an inch of this home that hasn’t been touched.

“The old dungeon has been preserved. There’s pictures of the Hart family up. It’s turned into an exercise room. The punching bag is there. Some of the old equipment is still there.

“Anything they could keep that the Harts had in place, they kept. And they complemented it with imported fixtures.”

© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service

Stephanie Armour
USA Today

Foreclosure filings dropped 2% in April from a year ago, the first annual decrease in more than five years, according to a report out Thursday.

The RealtyTrac report could signal that foreclosures have begun to plateau, economists say.

Foreclosure filings were reported on 33,837 properties in April, a 9% decrease from March, according to the report. One in every 387 housing units received a foreclosure filing during the month.

Nevada posted the highest state foreclosure rate for the 40th-consecutive month. One in every 69 housing units there received a foreclosure filing in April — more than five times the national average. Arizona and Florida ranked second and third.

Foreclosure filings include default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions.

The decline in foreclosures is “telling us that the problem may be peaking. A lot of people had been saying it would be getting worse,” says Patrick Newport at IHS Global Insight, adding that the pace of foreclosures still will remain high. “It will still be a big problem through next year.”

Reasons for less foreclosure activity are:

• Job creation. A better job outlook means fewer homeowners will fall behind on their mortgages; unemployment has been a major cause of delinquencies. Non-farm payroll jobs rose by 290,000 in April and are up 573,000 since December, the government said last week.

• A stabilizing housing market. One sign is there were about 100,000 fewer residential properties with mortgages in negative equity in the first quarter than in the fourth quarter, according to CoreLogic. That means fewer borrowers owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth. The improvement was slight — the more than 11.2 million properties underwater still equaled 24%, the same as in the fourth period.

• Tighter lending. Stricter credit standards for loans written since the housing bubble burst in 2006 mean mortgages taken out since then are less likely to become delinquent, says Mark Zandi at Moody’s Economy.com.

“The loans that have been originated are better quality; the people who got them are good credit risks,” Zandi says. “It is clear the foreclosure crisis is peaking. It looks like the crisis is past the worst.”

Still, bank repossessions hit a record monthly high in April even as default notices dropped substantially on a monthly and annual basis. That pattern is expected to hold as lenders systematically work through a backlog of distressed properties.

Copyright 2010 USA TODAY