It’s no secret the Vancouver real estate market has been known for its consistently increasing prices.

In recent years, we’ve also been seeing huge year-over-year increases in sales of larger homes further from the downtown core, especially homes with great outdoor spaces. This has continued throughout the pandemic and doesn’t seem to be changing. Increased interest rates may impact the market but it won’t be sudden.

Why is this the case?

Of course, we are seeing people move to the suburbs to help put themselves in a better financial position but also increasingly so, we are seeing people purchase homes outside of the city to put their children in a better financial position.

There is a huge percentage of new buyers that are being gifted funds from their families to buy their first homes and we are seeing parents feel the need to help their kids enter the market. With the market at an all-time high, first-time home-buyers are often unable to come up with these funds on their own.

Since location plays such a big role in the market value of a property, parents are able to move to a lower-priced housing market and take out equity in order to help invest in a second property for their children.

We are also seeing others choose to capitalize on the current market conditions and many realizing it’s a great time to move out of the downtown core due to increasing development in neighbouring cities/towns/neighbourhoods. The fact that more people are opting to work from home is likely also a driving factor for this change.

Is moving out of the city the right decision for me?

It depends. The answer will be different for everyone. Aside from putting your children in a better financial decision, there are many reasons why one might choose to move out of the city or downsize in general. The decision and the right time will really depend on your flexibility with where you’re open to/able to live. The current market is a strong seller’s market making it favourable for those that have built up strong equity in their homes.

This could also be an attractive strategy for the equity rich who are approaching retirement or looking to retire early and don’t want to sacrifice property size and no longer need to be close to their place of work.

Feel free to reach out if you have any questions or are looking for more information on this topic or other market trends.