His house there looks out on some of the world's best salmon-fishing waters, but this may be one of his last trips to a place he calls paradise. Mr. Williamson recently put his house on the market for a cool $1.95-million -- making him one more U. S. owner of B. C. recreational property who is selling out as the U. S. economy breeds uncertainty and the strong loonie brings extra profits to those sellers who conduct their affairs in greenbacks.
Or so it may appear.
Mr. Williamson scoffs at the idea that his economy has him retreating. The owner of a successful corporate-seminar company, he owns four houses and, with his new yacht, simply decided the waterfront B. C. property was redundant.
"It's not really a currency play for me," he says. "Most of the guys that I know -- I'm trying to say this in the right way -- they've got pretty deep pockets. They know that as you head into a bear market in the States that this, too, shall pass."
What, then, has brought such a screeching halt to B. C.'s recreational-property market? Over the past half-decade, prices for B. C.'s waterfront property increased by 150%. Other recreational property doubled in value. This year, those same properties are flat-lining.
Realtors on the West Coast say there is no denying that more Americans are selling their Canadian recreational properties and that the number of U. S. buyers is down, in some areas by as much as 50%. But U. S. residents have historically formed at most 20% of buyers at some mainland ski resorts. On Vancouver Island, Sotheby's International Realty Canada estimates it is no higher than 5%.
In other words, even a significant drop in U. S. buyers can't account for the drop in sales.
But that doesn't mean that the U. S. economy isn't to blame, says Elton Ash, the executive vice-president of Western Canada for Re/Max.
"Canadians are taking advantage of the southern U. S. Sun Belt price depreciation and buying properties," he says. "I know personally of two friends that have purchased in Arizona on golf resorts."
Combine a subprime mortgage-fuelled tumble in the value of U. S. resort real estate -- those Arizona golf resorts have seen 15% declines -- with the massive appreciation of the Canadian dollar, and it is no longer U. S. buyers looking north for a deal. It's now Canadians looking south, spurred on by marketers at U. S. destinations.
"I've seen TV advertisements, seminars, this type of thing, pointing out opportunities in the U. S., given the state of the housing market," says Paul Fabri, a Kelowna-based analyst for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.
All of which has meant that the developers of some of B. C.'s most desirable recreational properties are looking to neither Canadians nor Americans as they draft their marketing plans.
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=633183
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