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A few items to consider, as prices in Victoria swim ever higher.

Courtesy of the BBC - Are global markets set to blow?

On the lighter side, an unknown Canadian is credited with fronting Casey Serin some money ($1000), which he used to dump his wife and flee to Australia - or, alternatively, Casey is focused on finishing a foreclosure book and has gone on a business trip.

I promise it wasn't me.

Meanwhile, the inexorable unwinding of the the Canadian Housing Bubble has begun. Interest rates have started up, and the chorus of concerns begins - conveniently after the rates already started moving.

Of course, there is still debate about whether there even is a housing bubble in Canada - much as there was debate in the US two years ago, when the idea of a bubble was generally discussed but dismissed by the MSM as just a lot of hot air.

In Time Magazine , a passage illustrates the mania in effect before (or after) the housing crash in Florida, complete with foreshadowing from the tech stock crash (which was of course disregarded):

"Zealous new investors going into a hot field, chasing market momentum and betting huge sums on the belief that this may be a new era: it sounds disquietingly like the late-'90s day traders who went the way of the Pets.com sock puppet. Does the parallel bother Keith Weaver, who is contemplating ditching his job as General Mills operations manager for the real estate biz? Nah. "We might be riding that wave," he says. "But the wave is there. So I'm going to get on it." Weaver's plan is to ride south, into the Florida market. Max Kaiser, make room."

And further on:

"But there are troubling aspects to the real estate boom. At the stock market's peak, 1% of investors controlled about 33.5% of stock wealth; the top 1% of home-equity holders have only 13% of housing wealth. In other words, a broad drop in home values, should it happen, would affect a far larger cross section of Americans than did the NASDAQ bust."

Date of publication of this story - June 5, 2005.

The MSM continues to report that in Canada, the basis for the boom is far more sensible and sustainable, so there just can't be a reversal like in California.

Sales are better than ever, as noted in this article in the Toronto Star.

On the other hand, in mature real estate markets in British Columbia, where big run-ups in prices occurred earlier and over a longer time frame, sales volumes are now not keeping pace with inventories, which continue to climb.

"New listings for detached, attached and apartment properties increased by 6.2 per cent to 6,149 units compared to the 5,789 units listed in May 2006. The total number of active listings increased by 23.4 per cent to 11,749 units when compared to May 2006's 9,524 units." -- Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver

"There were 963 sales through the Victoria Real Estate Board’s Multiple Listing Service® (MLS®) in May, up from the 909 sales in the same month a year ago. There were 898 sales in April of this year. Meantime, the number of properties available for sale on MLS® also continued to increase. There were 3,462 properties listed for sale at the end of last month, up 19% from the 2,903 properties in the same month a year ago." -- Victoria Real Estate Board

In the Okanagan, there was a 23% increase in the number of listings available in May compared to a year earlier. Must be those Alberta buyers enticing too many new sellers!

Now, CIBC warns that the rest of Canada is not doing that great these days, bracing for the effect of interest rate increases.

"Canada's central bank has to exercise caution or risk "devastating" the regions of Ontario and Quebec, Mr. Tal said.

"Canada is actually not doing great if you take Alberta out of the story. Quite frankly, if there was a Bank of Canada minus Alberta, it would not be talking about higher interest rates ... and might even be suggesting rates should be going down."

The next few months should see the introduction of the dreaded foreclosure word in a smoking hot real estate market that will of course just simmer down as interest rates go up, making current prices less affordable, in an environment where there is already a shortage of buyers - so it's all good^TM.

In the meanwhile, grab some Mentos, swill some Diet Coke, and enjoy the Dance of the Cola Spritzers out on your summer lawn.