Vancouver’s housing market is the second least affordable in the world. Why? It’s due to the fact that there are so many foreign buyers interested  in a safe financial investment such as Canada. Lately, there has been a major crackdown on corruption in China; where most of the market flow has been coming from. Many wealthy foreigners who stay in China have seen their savings evaporate since this crackdown.

Since many wealthy Chinese families have become interested in the Vancouver housing market, Vancouver has seen 90% of homes valued at over 5 million dollars sold to Chinese families. The market has since had to adapt to this changing target consumer range. Prices of homes have been increasing substantially due to the competition between Canadians and foreign buyers. An increase in demand is directly correlated with an increase in price due to Vancouver’s location, there is no room to expand outwards, therefore, driving up the demand of local homes and making it so that only the extremely wealthy can buy. The real estate market has changed a significant amount to accommodate these new wealthy foreign buyers. An example being many new homes coming standard with a wok kitchen. Real estate firms, like any good marketing firm, always want to appeal to the consumer. If the targeted real estate market is 90% Central Chinese, then these firms want to adapt their product (housing) to appeal to this type of consumer. Therefore, including certain amenities may be an inexpensive way to better position the firm’s product in the mind of the consumer.

Link:http://business.financialpost.com/2014/09/11/china-buyers-vancouver-housing/#__federated=1