Canada's Housing Bubble

Jan 30, 2010 Julie Magee bournemouthecho.co.uk

This will come as no surprise to hard-pressed householders but Bournemouth has been named the most expensive place to live in Britain and rated number seven in an international survey of housing affordability.

The study ranks Vancouver in Canada as the least affordable place to live followed by Sydney and Australia’s Gold and Sunshine Coasts.

Conducted by Australian firm Demographia, the survey focuses on the relationship between household incomes and house prices in the USA, Canada, the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, Australia and New Zealand.

Australia is the least affordable of the countries surveyed, followed by New Zealand, Britain, Canada, Ireland and the United States. As well as Bournemouth, 19 other UK cities and towns feature in the “severely unaffordable” housing markets league including London, Plymouth, Swindon, Bristol and Bath.

The survey shows that the greatest house price declines occurred in the UK, Ireland and USA where prices had inflated to “unprecedented heights”.

It says: “In the United States and United Kingdom the house price bubble was fuelled by a relaxation of loan policies which compromised the integrity of mortgage portfolios and increased the demand for home ownership.

“In the US and the UK the ‘bubble’ markets that had ‘burst’ generally reached a trough and began rising again.”

Despite housing affordability receiving considerable attention in the UK, the survey states that “no material corrective measures have been implemented”.

While property prices have fallen, housing in the UK remains severely unaffordable with Bournemouth, and Dorset as a whole, the least affordable market.