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Housing Speculators Refuse to Pay Taxes - 3,700,000 $ HOME - Combined Yearly income of 16k a Year!

446 views · Published 15 September 2017 · 4:52 · Indexed 21 October 2026

Channel: Mike Martins · 2017 · News & Politics

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Douglas Todd: Tax avoidance behind Metro's disconnect between housing, income
After census figures this week revealed alarming gaps between housing costs and average incomes in Metro Vancouver, a veteran real-estate analyst blames the disparity in part on tax avoidance.

After census figures this week revealed alarming gaps between housing costs and average incomes in Metro Vancouver, veteran real-estate analyst Richard Wozny is preparing a speech for B.C. politicians that blames the disparity in part on tax avoidance.

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A reason why residents of Metro Vancouver municipalities with expensive housing tend to report lower incomes than people in less-costly municipalities is that many of the former avoid declaring their total wealth, said Wozny, whose company has produced 1,200 studies on real-estate trends in Canada and the U.S.

“Canada has become a freeloader society” in which some mansion owners have found ways to avoid reporting their total incomes to the Canada Revenue Agency, said Wozny, who will speak on Sept. 25 at the convention of the Union of B.C. Municipalities in Vancouver.

Census figures released this week show Metro Vancouver, which has one of the world’s most expensive housing markets, lags behind 14 other Canadian cities on average wages.

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The census also exposed an apparent contradiction: Residents of Richmond, Burnaby, the city of Vancouver and West Vancouver — which have the most expensive housing costs in Metro — also claim on average the highest rates of poverty.

The census data highlights “inappropriate reporting of family incomes” by many property owners in Metro Vancouver’s well-off neighbourhoods, says Wozny, head of Site Economics Ltd., who said governments need to crack down on residential property speculators.

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