Karly and Jeff Watts, both born and raised in Richmond, are on the move.
By every definition, they fit into what the Vancouver Board of Trade recently described as the “missing middle” in Vancouver’s affordable housing crisis — middle-income earners who don’t qualify for subsidized housing but don’t have enough money to buy adequate family-friendly housing, which is also “missing” in the region.
Karly, 33, is a childcare worker, Jeff, 35, a chiropractor. Their squirt, Rowan, is six months old. They’re being shunted from their long-term rental house as their landlord, a personal friend, now requires the home.
Enter an intense six-month house hunt for these undecided voters.
“It turned out when we started looking to buy, we could not afford anywhere near what we need — we needed at minimum a townhome to accommodate our growing family — but couldn’t find anything in Richmond, so we started to look elsewhere; Cloverdale; Langley.
“It turned out all the open houses we were going to were full of young families like us, from Vancouver from Richmond being pushed out that way. It was super intimidating,” said Karly.
What followed was a string of bidding wars for roughly five-year-old townhouses in the range of 1,100-1,500 square feet.
“Gone were the days of negotiations. Our realtor was at a loss,” she explained.
One townhouse had 11 offers. Eventually they ended up paying tens of thousands of dollars over the asking price for a two-bedroom townhouse in Cloverdale and used the provincial government’s first-time homebuyers’ loan, the BC HOME Partnership program (interest free for the first five years), for half of their down payment.
While generally pleased with their new place, it is “not ideal,” said Karly and they’ll likely need to move again within five years.
The couple initially looked at rental options but there were none.
“We’d be more worried if we had to rent. A place like this is probably $2,200 or more. That’s more than a mortgage,” said Jeff.
Karly also didn’t like the volatility of renting in this market.
“It’s not stable,” she said.
Another big problem Karly identified was the fact that the bids were coming in without subjects to inspection.
“People are allowed to buy without an inspection. I hope that’s something that changes. It’s worrisome,” said Karly.
Now that they are newly minted homeowners, they’re asked by the Richmond News how a government should address housing: Should it enact regulations to cool demand or should the free market generally prevail?
Karly leans toward more regulations while Jeff is only certain of one thing: more supply needs to be built, considering the few options that were available.
