Study: Where Land Values Soar, Houses Come Down

"In the first three months of this year, residential land sales in Metro Vancouver dominated real estate investments, with $1.14 billion in transactions, according to a survey by Altus Group," reports Frank O'Brien. "Land sales accounted for 57% of the entire real estate investment market in the first quarter, noted Paul Richter, an Altus Group director."

That means a lot of deals where "owners of older townhouse or condominium projects vote to sell the entire complex for the land value." Also, most of the homes sold for land value will then be torn down.

"In the past 30 years, 26,700 Vancouver detached houses, or 40% of the all houses, were demolished and replaced, according to a teardown index study from the University of British Columbia (UBC) school of architecture," adds O'Brien. "UBC architectural professor Joseph Dahmen, co-author of the teardown study, estimated that one-quarter of the Vancouver houses being sold today will be demolished."