To the editor:
Re: "For $2 million, my home is yours to tear down," Aug. 10.
From the information in Sandra Thomas's column about the frenzy of interest in her $2-million "teardown" bungalow, most of the potential buyers appear to be offshore investors like the ones who have bought the rest of the houses on her block.
Assuming many of them are more interested in her property as an investment, enhanced by replacing her home with a new uninhabited "4,000-square-foot behemoth," here's a solution that would skew the market more towards making our neighbourhoods places to live in, rather than safe havens for offshore money: require any teardown to be replaced with a duplex or triplex. This would expand our housing stock, create more affordable homes in residential areas, reduce the land cost per home, create a revenue opportunity for buyers willing to invest in homes rather than empty mansions, slow down housing demand from absentee investors intent on trophyhome ownership, help neighbourhood businesses, and preserve perfectly good existing homes.
Residents would have to decide whether they prefer more neighbours actually living on their block, or more newly built, large empty homes.
Peter Ladner, Vancouver
