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Comment by medell | Hacker News Reader

The same goes for Vancouver, which the article briefly mentions.

A study in 2010 reported that of the 164 sales of $3M+ homes in Vancouver's West Side (richest area) and Richmond (largest chinese suburb of Vancouver), 74% went to buyers with Chinese last names. This number was 46% in 2008. Not the most scientific study for many reasons, including 2nd/3rd gen Chinese, but knowing Vancouver, that demographic doesn't intersect with the affluence much at all. This "study" wouldn't work as well in SF, but you get the point. There is a lot of yuan coming to the west coast.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/home-and-garden/real-est...

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The Seattle area is definitely experiencing this as well.

Sydney, Melbourne, and Auckland have had their day.

Not in my experience with Melbourne.

Glen Waverley, Box Hill, Springvale and then the spillover. I can't get a look in. One house went for $200k over the asking price. Glen Waverley has supposedly ~25% Chinese but its a lot more in practice. There are also a lot of Indians looking in the surrounds. There aren't that many anglo people at the viewings at all.

I was talking to a mortgage broker and he said that in some cases the children were advance parties with parents money.

A lot of the estate agents are Chinese as they cater to the Chinese.

I work in Melbourne's Docklands area and the situation here is similar with many of the local RE offices obviously catering to the overseas Chinese market. From my office window I can see a nearby condo where 2 bedroom units sell for $550k+ but the ground floor commercial units are almost all vacant. And another building is going up next-door. In the other direction I can see a massive new tower going up next to the Crown casino in Southbank.

A month ago my neighbour sold her old 3 bedroom house for $650k whereas the same sized house I rent with a much nicer backyard costs me only $21k/year.

Australians are in for a shock when economic reality kicks in and the consequences of a speculative real estate bubble become apparent...

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