Does Vancouver’s hot investment market make building a better option?.

Consistent demand and high lease values in Vancouver’s downtown office and retail property markets combined with low interest rates continue to fuel a sizzling investment market.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen the investment market this robust, vibrant and strong. We get multiple bids on everything and anything,” says Ross Moore, director of research for CBRE Canada.

Developer floats Lower Cap revamp.

DEVELOPERS are looking to completely revamp a large section of the Lower Capilano neighbourhood, converting what is largely empty space to a “village centre” complete with multifamily homes, a community centre and public plaza.

Larco Investments presented the plan to neighbours at two meetings last week. The proposal, still in its preliminary stages, would see a cluster of multi-storey residential buildings and a limited amount of commercial space appear on what is now a vacant lot – once the home of the Capilano Winter Club. The 4.35-acre site sits between Curling Road and Fullerton Avenue to the west of Capilano Road.

Vancouver planner wants to end ad hoc approach to developer fees.

Vancouver’s new director of planning wants to get rid of the city’s contentious method of negotiating with developers over fees they are required to pay for public services.

Brian Jackson, who starts his job as the general manager of planning and development Aug. 27, said the current “one-by-one” method of negotiating so-called community amenity contributions with individual developers is both unproductive and divisive. Instead, he wants the city to institute a system that allows developers to know up front what they’ll have to pay for parks, daycares and other needed community services.

A review of resales data for newer condos in Downtown Vancouver (2 years old or less) shows that sales activity has slowed since the beginning of 2012 but pricing has maintained an average around $800 per sq ft.

The vast majority of sales are between $600 and $1,000 per sq ft depending on the building/unit quality and location, with some sales such as units in The Erickson and Fairmon Pacific Rim showing sales values above $2,000 per SF. One can speculate that given a slowdown in sales activity, pricing will be affected eventually, particularly at the lower end of the spectrum where there are competing new developments in presales and/or under construction.

Source: MLS

“The owner of Vancouver’s Oakridge Mall is proposing a major expansion of the 56-year-old shopping centre that would transform the 11.5-hectare site into more of a community.

Ivanhoe Cambridge Inc. wants to build a broad range housing ranging from luxury to affordable, as well as more office and retail space, parks, bikeways, walking paths and a library, Senior Development Director Gordon Wylie said Monday.

Wylie said most of the development would occur on what are currently the mall’s massive parking lots.

“We’ll be building new parking underground and then on the surface area will become retail and residential areas.”

The city approved a similar plan in 2007, but since then, policies have opened up and Oakridge wants to take advantage with a new concept that goes beyond a modest expansion.”

Courtesy of the CBC: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/07/23/bc-oakridge-mall-expansion.html