Canadians have been flooding into the U. S. housing market, purchasing a record number of homes south of the border, and twice as many as a year earlier.

Armed with what until recently was a strong currency, most were also paying cash, according to the 2008 National Association of Realtors annual profile of international home buying activity in the United States.

Canadians have replaced Mexicans as the top foreign buyers of U. S. properties.

The surge in purchases of U. S. properties by Canadians was due to the combination of the stronger dollar, a drop in U. S. house prices, and last winter's record snowfall, says John Clinkard, an economist with Reed Construction Data.

 

 

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OTTAWA - It's the best of times and the worst of times for Canadian cities, depending on where they're located, according to an economic think-tank that expects cities in Saskatchewan will enjoy their strongest growth, and Ontario cities their weakest performance, in more than a decade.

Western Canadian cities take the top seven spots in the Conference Board of Canada's latest Metropolitan Outlook, released Monday, led by Saskatoon and then Regina.

"Both Saskatoon and Regina are on track to post their strongest rates of economic growth since 1997, and Saskatoon will lead Canadian metropolitan areas in economic growth for the second consecutive year," said Mario Lefebvre, the Conference Board's director for municipal studies.

 

 

 

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Economic uncertainty, the U.S. housing slump, and a lacklustre local real estate environment have taken a toll on Calgary's market for luxury homes this year.
 
Luxury home sales across the country have held steady so far this year despite an overall cooling in the residential real estate market, but activity in the top end is expected to taper in most major Canadian markets in the coming months, says a report released Thursday by Re/Max.

The Re/Max Upper-End Report, which highlights trends and developments in 15 housing markets across the country for the first seven months of 2008, found Vancouver; Victoria; Regina; Saskatoon; Winnipeg; London, Ont.; Kitchener-Waterloo, Ont.; Ottawa; Halifax-Dartmouth; and St. John's, N.L., all experienced an upswing in sales activity, while declines were noted in Kelowna, B.C.; Calgary; Edmonton; Hamilton-Burlington and Toronto.

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Globe and Mail Update

September 11, 2008 at 10:15 AM EDT

The rise in new home prices continues to ease as Canada's housing market cools, particularly in the west.

Statistics Canada said Thursday prices for new homes rose 2.7 per cent in July on an annual basis, a slowdown from the 3.5 per cent pace a month earlier.

On a monthly basis, prices rose 0.1 per cent.

"The growth rate of the index has been on a downward trend since Sept. 2006, mainly due to the softening market in Western Canada," the statistics gathering agency said.
Doors of houses in Toronto's Cabbagetown

In Edmonton, for example, prices fell on an annual basis by 5.3 per cent, marking a 23-year low in change, and in Calgary by 0.3 per cent, a 12-year low.

"Markets in these cities continue to adjust after experiencing record price increases in the last two and a half years," Statistics Canada said.

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Finding hot leads is the main challenge for any real estate investor. One of the most popular and effective ways to find wholesale deals is called "driving for dollars," which simply means driving around targeted neighborhoods to locate ideal wholesale properties. Another option you can resort to is to have someone drive for you - a bird dog or a property scout. Good thing is that either way will work out depending on your resources or in other words how much time and money you have.
Gaining success in finding the right deals also depends upon how willing you are to go all the way in real estate investing. Also, you need to consider your situation. Let us say if you're a full time realtor, you can do the search yourself, find the deals on your own and discard the idea of paying a bird dog. On the other hand, if you are employed full-time, it would be difficult for you to drive for dollars and in this case you may have to hire a bird dog to do that job for you. But what really are Real Estate Bird Dogs and how can you find one?