Greater Vancouver/ Lower Mainland relocation tips

Hi everybody,

There's a better than even chance my company is going to relocate my family and me to the greater Vancouver area. While my work won't be tied to any fixed address, the customers I support are scattered around the Lower Mainland area (Burnaby, Richmond, downtown Vancouver) as well as across the way in Victoria (though living there likely isn't an option for us). I also will have some travel required about once a month or so to Salmon Arm and Vernon.

A friend has told me that in Canada, real estate and school district are nowhere near so strictly tied as they are in the States. Can anybody confirm or deny that?

Any/all suggestions on the area are welcome! Thank you for your insights.

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Originally Posted by Don Corleone

Hi everybody,

There's a better than even chance my company is going to relocate my family and me to the greater Vancouver area. While my work won't be tied to any fixed address, the customers I support are scattered around the Lower Mainland area (Burnaby, Richmond, downtown Vancouver) as well as across the way in Victoria (though living there likely isn't an option for us). I also will have some travel required about once a month or so to Salmon Arm and Vernon.

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Real estate prices in Greater Vancouver are bit screwed up due to wealthy Chinese persons buying condos and letting them sit empty. Only occupied if a family member, or they themselves, is having a baby. So a show box house on a postage stamp lot is worth 3.5 million in the city of Vancouver. So depending on your resources for home buying and how long you might stay you might end up fairly far afield from where you'd be working. Like West Vancouver or North Vancouver.


Also avoid rural highways in the north of BC, people tend to get murdered out there. Like a lot.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Don Corleone

A friend has told me that in Canada, real estate and school district are nowhere near so strictly tied as they are in the States. Can anybody confirm or deny that?

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Can confirm, schools are NOT funded by property taxes. Their mostly funded by the Federal, and partly by the provincial, governments. And they're run by the provincial government. School boards being answerable to the minister of education, not the local mayor. That's not to say that an urban school and a sub-urban school won't be different. They will be. Going by my switching of high schools from urban to sub-urban. It's just all schools start from a more even place.

A lot of people these days (including me) work in the LMD and commute in from the Fraser Valley. Things are insanely expensive everywhere, but Vancouver is out of my reach, and Richmond where I work even more so. I gotta commute 1.5 hrs each way. Not sure what your level of resources is (and the USD is very strong) but if you have to come take a look at Chilliwack. It's a nice town, but now very busy compared to what it was 10 years ago. Honestly there are lots of good things about the LMD but I wouldn't live or work here if I didn't have to. If I was an American (or if I was given the option) I would move to Blaine WA or Point Roberts WA, get a Nexus pass and just commute across the border rather than live in BC.

Thanks for the info and suggestions guys! Vancouver proper is definitely out. Most likely Richmond, Burnaby and Delta are as well (price wise).

I haven't made up my mind yet on Surrey... I hear mixed things online about it. My family and I don't have an issue w/ being a minority, but from what I understand if you're not South Asian, you'll never be accepted. Any thoughts on that? We've gotten shunned enough here in North Georgia for not being Evangelical Christians.

So far, I'm looking at Port Moody or Coquitlam. Pitt Meadows/Maple Ridge and Langley seem a little further, but still do-able drive wise (roughly 45 minutes to Richmond/Burnaby outside of rush hour. 1 hour to the airport or downtown). Am I right in that?

I've looked a fair amount at Mission Kurando, but Chilliwack seems too far. Part of my job responsibilities would require me to entertain customers and colleagues late into the evening, and be back at the site for 7:30ish the next morning. Can't see how I could possibly make that work in Chilliwack.

Tsawassen seemed nice, but it's on a tidal plain... I'd be concerned about safety should a good sized earthquake or tsunami hit, which seems more likely going forward.

I may not have this quite right, but I believe the BC Provincial government established a 20% foreign buyer tax on real estate. I'm not sure how long you have to be living in BC to avoid this, but there's no way I'm paying an extra 20% for property in one of the most expensive real estate markets in the world. That does complicate things however as now I need to find a rental property in a neighborhood that has listings of the sort I would eventually buy. Happy to hear that education selectivity need not be quite such a driving force as it is here in the US.

That 20% foreign buyer tax is aimed at encouraging wealthy Chinese to look else where for property investment. Anyway Bill 28 (British_Columbia deets here. If you scroll down, it only applies to none permanent resident foreigners. Permanent resident is Canada's equivalent of "green card." So the foreign buyer tax doesn't apply to you.

It won't after a while, once my family and I achieve Permanent Resident status. But we won't have it upon arrival, correct? I was under the impression that it takes months to process.