Foreign buyers have little impact on housing prices, says economist Cameron Muir
Cameron Muir, chief economist of the B.C. Real Estate Association. Cameron Muir, chief economist with the B.C. Real Estate Association, has a very different take on the Greater Vancouver housing market than the take demonstrated in many media reports. For starters, he sees no evidence that foreign buyers are inflating overall housing prices, in Vancouver or elsewhere in the region. Nor does he believe that interest rates will rise anytime soon. He also expects the red hot housing market, particularly for detached homes, to continue well into 2016. He was the guest speaker at the annual meeting of the Antrim Balanced Mortgage Fund, held Wednesday at Newlands Golf Club in Langley. The Langley-based company operates a mortgage investment corporation which holds over 650 mortgages, the vast majority of them in Greater Vancouver, and has 4,500 shareholders. Full disclosure: I am an investor in the fund and have been dealing with Antrim Investments, the parent firm, for more...