THE FIRST-TIME BUYER

Leah Bjornson Content Manager, 25

THE STRATEGY: Buy a fixerupper and ride out the market THE THINKING: As the Vancouver market began to quiet, first-time buyer Leah Bjornson picked up a 600-square-foot condo near Clark and Broadway for under $400,000 and didn’t have to weather multiple offers. The place needed extensive renos, but Bjornson wasn’t daunted by the work or by the slowing market, which she intends to ride out. “I’m not really concerned. That might be naïveté because it’s my first purchase, but we weren’t looking for a quick turnover,” she says. “We were looking at how the market is going to develop over the next 10 years.”

Even though the condo market is weakening, adds Bjornson, she feels more secure than she did in the rental market. “I’ve heard so many horror stories of people being renovicted, or having to search for a place and suddenly they’re paying $1,000 more a month,” she says. “So for me, that was a really big motivator.”

THE EXPERT: Trying to time the market is tricky, says Thomas Davidoff, director at the Centre for Urban Economics and Real Estate at UBC’s Sauder School of Business. So buying in a slowing market isn’t necessarily a bad idea—as long as you’re in for the long haul, as Bjornson described. The upside for first-time buyers is that they no longer have to push their way through packed open houses, put in no-subject offers or lose out on countless bidding wars; on the contrary, they can take their time, make lowball offers, and maybe land a good deal. The key is to find a place where they’re comfortable with the monthly payments and won’t have to sell for several years. That way, if prices dip further, they won’t lose out.

“There’s not a great deal of reason to think this is going to be a gangbusters year for price growth, so by being a tough negotiator or not compromising, you’re more likely to get some reaction from the seller,” says Davidoff. “And if you miss out on this place, there will be another one next week.”