Foreign purchases of Metro Vancouver homes plunge

Tsur Somerville, a professor at UBC’s Sauder School of Business, spoke to CBC after Finance Ministry data showed a drop in homes purchased by foreign buyers in Metro Vancouver.

“[The foreign buyers tax] is having an effect. At the same time, anyone who thinks things are going to be more affordable on the Lower Mainland, they’re going to be in for a surprise. That’s not going to happen,” he said.

The story also appeared on Yahoo.

Tom Davidoff, also a Sauder professor, spoke with News 1130 on the same topic.

“It could be that foreign buyers ability to move out of B.C. actually gets larger over time, so we could see the response to the tax grow, and the foreign buyers shrink as time goes by,” Davidoff said. “It could go the other way. We really don’t know.”