Comment by otoburb | Hacker News Reader

Comment by otoburb | Hacker News Reader

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>>It's one of the most expensive cities to live in in the world, [...]

Toronto was ranked as the 98th most expensive city in the world; not even in the top 50, even though it's the 4th largest city in North America.

Perhaps it's more accurate to say that Toronto and Vancouver are unaffordable and expensive cities for domestic Canadians to live in.

>>Our debt to GDP is out of control. Our federal government keeps borrowing and spending on things that are completely inneffective (and bragging they spent the most than any other country). My gloom and doom prediction is our currency is going to be absolutely worthless in two years time.

Canada's debt-to-GDP is 88%[2], but the USA's debt-to-GDP is 127%[3] and climbing. You remember the ol' saying: when America sneezes, Canada catches a cold. The largest destabilizing factor to Canada's economy is likely to be problems with their largest trading partner.

[1] https://www.mercer.com/newsroom/2020-cost-of-living.html

[2] https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/countries-by-nat...

[3] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GFDEGDQ188S

Toronto is expensive given the amount jobs are paying in the area.

SF a condo might be 1M, but getting paid 250k+ for a job is fairly common.

In Toronto the condo might be 1M (CAD), but getting paid 250k+ CAD is not common.

By all accounts Toronto is more expensive than SF

My understanding is that there's a lot of foreign capital getting parked in real estate in Toronto. I believe they were going to implement a vacancy tax similar to Vancouver next year to try to curb that

There’s not a lot of evidence that it’s not the locals creating a bubble because of speculation and lax lending. If you don’t believe me look up how nicely private mortgage debt in Canada correlates with the growth in housing prices in Canadian cities. Canadians hold one of the highest rates of personal debt in the OECD.

That's actually a really good point to ponder about. I've seen a number of news articles about predatory practices among real estate agents (I believe many hog anywhere from 3 properties or more to ride the bubble, there's unethical abuse of dual representation, there's bid secrecy, etc)

No doubt, there's also a great deal of greed and wealth signaling from the general population (especially among upper middle class) as well. Competition around high ranking school areas comes to mind. Not to mention rental properties are pretty much the go-to choice of passive income building that most people go for.

I would bet that if multiple property ownership was penalized by high taxes, real estate prices would come down real fast.

A cursory look at condo prices on any website* shows that most condos are well below $1M CAD. A 1 bedroom can be had in the downtown core for 600-700k, and significantly lower if you don’t mind commuting from Scarborough or Etobicoke.

Also, interest rates are 1% lower in Canada (albeit on shorter terms), and property taxes are roughly half.

This isn’t to say that homes are “cheap”, but there’s more to the story.

(Aside, I have lived in both cities for a considerable number of years.)

https://www.zolo.ca/toronto-real-estate/sold

Which city did you enjoy more and why? As someone who has entertained moving to either one day from Vancouver/Bc, am very curious!

Toronto is a failed city. Stay west.

Would be good to elaborate.

> SF a condo might be 1M, but getting paid 250k+ for a job is fairly common.

If you're in tech of course. SF and Toronto have many other professionals living in. How's the median salaries comparing?

Our of curiosity, is $250+k genuinely a fairly common salary in SF, or are you exaggerating to make a point? Surely that must only account for a very small number of the total residents who work in particular industries.

The US situation is bad but also unique because of guaranteed demand for the dollar for at least the short to medium term. So you can’t really compare the numbers. Other countries don’t control the printing press for the world reserve currency.

>Perhaps it's more accurate to say that Toronto and Vancouver are unaffordable and expensive cities for domestic Canadians to live in.

Yes, the numbers in that first link are in the context of expats. But even with remote work likely becoming more common, it's more meaningful in general to think about cost of living with respect to local salaries because that's what people living in a city are earning.

>> Toronto was ranked as the 98th most expensive city in the world; not even in the top 50.

So, I'm not going to look into different methodologies that are used, but Toronto is often ranked near the top of least affordable cities.

For example: http://demographia.com/dhi.pdf

>>Toronto is often ranked near the top of least affordable cities.

When the only factor is home ownership, which is the focus of URI's study, this is absolutely correct. But then I think back to how absolutely unaffordable housing was across the GTA in the late 80s, after which point people were able to buy back in again when the housing market corrected 40% in most of the GTA, with certain areas of Toronto (not the GTA) dropping by over 50%.

Homeowners generally want housing prices to rise indefinitely, but this is in direct opposition to younger cohorts wanting affordable entry points to home ownership.

The URI study also doesn't mention anything about renting. There are rumbles that Toronto developers have built too many properties (condos primarily), so perhaps an oversupply will benefit both renters and potential homebuyers if/when property prices correct.

Condos built in Toronto are mostly terrible for anyone that’s not single. They’re basically Airbnb speculation boxes in the sky. The city suffers badly from “the missing middle“ problem because of bad zoning. It’s a big part of why I moved away after living there 8 years.

Speculation up in the sky isn't really a problem since a) it's a tax base b) it's not hurting you since it doesn't take up land c) a condo is strictly cheaper than a house on the same land.

If housing is expensive it's because there aren't enough houses or the land is too expensive, and it's true that much of this is due to zoning and similar restrictions like parking minimums.

It is hurting families because mostly only small 1 bedroom apartments get built which are more attractive to Airbnb investors. However zoning is probably the biggest problem, yes. Far too much of the city is zoned for single family housing.

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