Originally Posted by stewie (Post 7457380)

i say change it then.


make a law like some other places have(i think thailand does this? not sure though) and apply them here: if your not a canadian citizen or married to one, you cannot buy property here.

Originally Posted by parm104 (Post 7457467)

This thread is SO off-topic, it's not even funny. People come in here and read the last post made by someone and the elaborate or argue on that issue to the point where it becomes irrelevant to the original issue at hand...

Why is this about people's manners or behaviors? Why is this thread becoming about changing people's mannerisms? We went from having a group of people upset about the fact that housing in our fine city is unfordable and blaming it on the fact that rich buyers, not locally but from overseas are coming in and creating an inflation in these prices because of their demand...The original thread topic wasn't about whether rich people in general caused inflation, it was DIRECTLY in relation to "Mainlanders" coming in and creating this inflation and how it is unfair for non-Canadians to create a burden on Canadians in their own country...

As I mentioned before, I understand people's concerns and their frustrations are reasonable. But also as I said before, blaming "non-Canadians" is simply a scapegoat for the turmoil faced by our current middle-class economy. If not wealthy Asian's purchasing this property, there will be wealthy Canadians who will do so, and in fact are doing so. Also, if the tables were turned, and you were instead an owner of one of these properties and had a prospective buyer who wanted to give you above market-value for it, would you turn them down? Of course not!

As far taxation, even though it is off-topic as well, I don't see the debate over who should be taxed and who should be given refunds. The larger your income, the more you are taxed. The greater amount of property you own, the more you are text. The more extravagant goods you buy, the more money you give to the government. It is all proportional. There are luxury taxes for vehicles, there are premium taxes for large residential properties and their are commercial taxes for business properties...Everything is proportionately paid out by the wealthy to the government. That being said, these people are just as entitled to refunds as anyone else. People on this thread think that wealthy people are putting in the same amount of money as everyone else into the government...That simply isn't true and is absurd to even think so. So how does it logically make sense that wealthy people pay more taxes for their more expensive goods AND get penalized by not receiving the same tax breaks at the end of the year as everyone else?? So long as they are paying their PROPORTIONAL, EQUAL SHARE of taxes, which they generally are, they are entitled legally and morally to the same $80 (example) that everyone else gets as a refund. Any other discussion about corporate expenditures/tax-breaks is simply off-topic from the original issue at hand...

Originally Posted by Apparition (Post 7457505)

.
Whenever you have two fields of grass, the cows or lambs or whatever, will want to move to the greener one and the local ones who are already on the green pasture will want to keep the others out. It's animal nature. I don't think there can be any policy towards it, just better education for new comers and each one of us try to influence the new comers in our daily lives in a positive way.

Originally Posted by parm104 (Post 7457511)

Although your analogy makes perfect sense, it is simply not the case in this thread. People here have been complaining about the fact that they cannot afford a decent house in this market...That means they are not yet on the green field! If they were on the green field, they would be benefiting from it either by enjoying a nice home or by making money by selling their home in an seller's market...

Anyone who has the ability to invest money into expensive housing is on the green side of the field...Regardless of whether they live in Canada or not. They always will be, so long as they have that financial stability. If they do not invest here in property, they will simply invest somewhere else, maybe even in a different type of market. After all, they didn't make their money just by sitting around and waiting for the opportunity to knock at their door...

That's my entire point. Whether these people invest here or not, the same people who are not able to afford decent housing/housing they prefer, will STILL be in the same boat after the Asians are banned from buying property here. Their wealth will not increase magically and the prices of housing will not go down as there are still plenty of other rich people in Canada who are looking to invest into property...

Side note: LOL Nightwalker, I just realized you managed to respond to my post earlier before I had a chance to finish it. Although the Border Services argument is a weak one, my point was that enforcing (that particular law) would not fix any problems that are currently existing in our system. It does however have the potential to create more problems.

Originally Posted by Great68 (Post 7457541)

This thread is pretty much why I moved out of Vancouver.

Originally Posted by Apparition (Post 7457480)

Actually, depends. A few well off mainlanders I know are now telling others to first get Hong Kong residency first before applying for overseas passport. Right now, they gave up their Chinese passport and everytime they come back to China to do their business making money, the need to apply and wait for a visitor visa from China. On the other hand, if you got HK residency first with their passport (like myself), you can get a "China Return Pass" when going to China and you don't have to give up your HK residency when you become a Canadian citizen. Up till last year (or was it earlier this year?) if you as a mainlander buy and hold a 6mil HKD property or stocks on the HK exchange, you're elligible for residency.

Originally Posted by Graeme S (Post 7457419)

I both agree and disagree with this statement. I'm a big proponent of legalizing and regulating pretty much all drugs on the same prinicple I'm there for leaving welfare in place--"Anyone who wants something bad enough will find a way". The more expensive things like education become, the more difficult it become for (for lack of a better term let's call them) "welfare children"; children whose parents have relied on welfare and government support for sustenance to the point where they will not or even cannot get a job (How many people would employ a person who hasn't had a job in 10 years a job.). If we don't provide a ladder at some point, these people will just dig themselves into deeper and deeper holes.

Originally Posted by Apparition (Post 7457470)

I'm living in that 5000 years old culture right now in Yixing, Jiangsu, China and so far I've clocked about 70,000 kms on my car to Anhui and Henan and not the mention the numerous visits to Shenzhen and Dongguan and Guangzhou. The cultural revolution that taught sons to be paranoid about their fathers and brothers to be hateful of any siblings with "counter revolutionary ideas" completely reversed said 5000 years of history.

When you see 7 series running red lights and S classes illegally parked with cops not daring to give a damn, where's the 5000 years of history and class? Gone.

When you get people who get offended when you try to tell them how to smoke a Cohiba properly (which you provided, by the way) and think because they got money, they don't need to listen to anyone and just do things their way, where's that 5000 years of culture? Gone.

Gone are the days when my parents taught us business should be done with dignity and humility. Now, the more you brag, the better car you buy with the freebie business loans from China banks, the more successful you will be.

I'm also frustrated at the disappearence of that 5000 years of history. Hopefully this trend is only limited to cities; in the rural areas, people are generally friendly. On the way to find a supplier in northern Jiangsu, I stopped at a Church to take some pictures. At first the people immediately ran out and asked me why I'm taking pictures and I told them I'm Canadian and just wanted to share the area with my friends back home. They were pretty hostile up to that point and very exceptionally friendly afterwards but you can see why the paranoia from government can destroy 5000 years of customs.

Originally Posted by Apparition

About government taking lands, it still happens unfortunately (and I'm not a China basher, on the contrary I'm mostly the devil's advocate when it comes to people and friends making negative comments about China). But take their land yes, compensate them, most of the time. China is such a large place that the central gov or the "Feds" aren't everywhere to enforce fairness. In a lot of rural areas, outsider rich guys come in with money and bribe the local officials to look the other way or even help with their police to move people out of the way for a construction project. The Feds are afraid of this getting out of hand but there's only so much they can do; it's a complicated symbiotic relationship between the Feds and the locals on how they do business with each other and the people they're supposed to look after. In a way, this prevents "not in my back yard" thinking like in North America which can block developments which is good, but sooner or later, China will have to develop a more democratic approach to land ownership (not many people OWN land in China, just years you rent it from the government).

Originally Posted by Watercloset (Post 7461288)

I believe they didn't spend too much effort trying to befriend local authorities, and they weren't very liked. One day the local government went straight into their living quarters and took all the proof of ownership from them.

Originally Posted by azndude69 (Post 7682951)

The problem is they didnt spend too much effort "bribing" the local authorities. . . . .

Originally Posted by azndude69 (Post 7682951)

The problem is they didnt spend too much effort "bribing" the local authorities. . . . .

Originally Posted by azndude69 (Post 7682948)

Most developments are carefully planned, but there's a lot that slip through the cracks and you get something that ruins the neighbourhood. There are some shoddy developers just building things as fast as they can while the market is good so they can maximize profit and dont give a shiet about the neighbourhoods etc

Originally Posted by Jun_Y (Post 7685045)

I for the longest time thought the government should tax or put an amount for new immigrants when buying new properties especially the once high end luxury homes that now are almost impossible for even locals to purchase or even bother trying to purchase.

example: all post secondaries all charge at least double the fees to international students and the ones with money pay it with no hesitation. Regardless how well they do which most can't even speak English well after the 4 or however many years they school here. The provincial/municipal government should do the same, taxing or levy international buyers or immigrants. if they want newer generations of the local society to want to stay and support their local economy rather than rely on foreign income.

My parents were immigrants, and they paid high school fees to want to live and remain here but they came here young, schooled and learned English and a skill, worked their ass off and now I did the same schooling and career process and i'm screwed where I can't go fourth to buy a house and raise a family towards another generation in my own hometown where i grew up. So sad. I want out of this shit city.

Foreigners at my work are physically useless and half ass things all the time and can't even buy skill at home depot even if they had all the money to and it pisses me off.
Seriously i need to travel more and get out while still sorta young.