
Vancouver slaps 15% tax on foreign home buyers - gregman
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/vancouver-slaps-15-tax-on-foreign-home-buyers-2016-07-25
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thenewwazoo
I wonder what the cost is to acquire a company incorporated in Canada and if
the new tax takes those kinds of shenanigans into account. Here in California,
buying a company that owns property is much cheaper in Prop 13 terms than
buying property.

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vivekd
Canadian corporations have to have a certain % of the board as Canadian
residents so I don't think we'll be seeing too much of that sort of fraud. At
the same time this tax seems like a band aid solution taking the politically
easy solution of blaming foreigners rather than looking at the structural
problems of low interest rates combined with government regulations and groups
preventing the construction of new housing.

I haven't been to Vancouver too often but I know here in Toronto you can get
into the downtown core and still see rows of single family homes . . . which
doesn't make much sense for a city this size. The city core has gone towards
building expensive million dollar homes rather than high rises that could
support many many families.

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lstamour
Actually, I think the rules are more flexible than requiring Canadian
residency. You've a different tax requirement if you're not Canadian-
controlled, though. And they do, I think, tax heavily on investment income in
businesses, but not so much land if it's required for the business.

It's certainly an interesting idea. Might depend on which jurisdiction you've
incorporated under, whether provincial or federal....

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rezashirazian
I grew up in West Vancouver and there are countless neighborhoods and streets
with empty million dollar houses. I remember they would go on sale and within
a few days they'd be off the market, sold $30,000 - $100,000 above asking
price. This has driven up prices to ridiculous heights. The average salary in
Vancouver for a Software Engineer is around 75K, yet the price for a detached
single family home is around $1,500,000. I don't think there is anyway for a
single working family to afford a single detached house anywhere in Metro
Vancouver area. This was long overdue

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robotresearcher
And how does this get local people into those empty homes?

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sintaxi
It won't. This tax is ultimately unenforceable since it would be trivial to
put down a family member as living at your vacant house. All they would have
to do is collect mail there and it would be virtually impossible to prove
otherwise.

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rezashirazian
Not true. It's fairly trivial to see if someone is living in a specific
location. A simple bank statement shows where you've been spending money and
tends to be good indicator of whether you're in Vancouver or not.

Canadian government already has a program like this in place for recent
immigrants to ensure that they actually reside in Canada during their
permanent residency period. Over the past fews years many people immigrated to
Canada and left after landing to become 'convenient Canadians' five years
later. Canada already knows how to do this.

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chillacy
> The province will also allow the City of Vancouver to impose an annual
> vacancy tax on some residential properties that are left uninhabited.

That seems like a great idea. Just throwing out an idea that could be
terrible, why not tax all people who don't personally live in their home? That
would effectively be a discount for people who want to buy and live in their
own home, while discouraging people from buying multiple properties they don't
need for their survival and collecting rent.

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charlesdm
Collecting rent isn't necessarily always bad since not everyone can buy a
house, regardless of the price of the property.

