Research the property, not the market

Most of what people call research is reading about the market. That is the least useful kind, because you cannot buy the market. You buy one property, with one history, one set of documents and one street, and almost everything that will matter to you afterwards is knowable in advance if you go and look.

Assumptions are how buyers overpay. They are also how buyers walk away from the right home, which nobody talks about, because a bad assumption about a building or a bylaw kills a good purchase just as easily as it enables a bad one.

Here is what to actually research, and where each piece comes from in British Columbia.

The comparable sales, which set the price

The only reliable evidence of what a property is worth is what similar properties recently sold for. Not what they were listed at. A seller can list at any number. Only a sale price has a buyer's agreement behind it.

Your REALTOR® has board data with the sold prices, the dates and how long each one was on the market. Ask for the ones that genuinely compare: same property type, similar age and size, same area, and where possible the same building or the same few blocks. Then ask about the ones that did not sell, because a property that sat and was withdrawn tells you where the ceiling was.

This is also where an appraisal enters the picture. If you are financing, a lender sends an appraiser to form their own opinion of value, using the same kind of evidence. Knowing the comparables before you write an offer means you already know roughly what that appraiser will find.

The strata documents, which are the building's confession

If it is a strata, the documents are the property. Read them properly.

The Form B, the Information Certificate, tells you the strata fees, what is in the contingency reserve fund, whether a special levy has been approved, whether there are amounts owing on the unit, and what parking and storage actually belong to it. That last one has surprised more buyers than any other line on the form.

The council and general meeting minutes, going back a few years, tell you the story the Form B summarises. Read them for repeated topics. A roof discussed once is a roof. A roof discussed at six meetings is a roof that is coming. Look for water ingress, envelope work, elevator problems, plumbing, and any dispute between the council and an owner or a contractor.

The depreciation report tells you what major components exist, their expected life and what replacing them is projected to require. The bylaws and rules tell you whether you can have your dog, rent the unit out, run your business from it, or renovate a bathroom without permission.

The strata manager holds these, and your agent orders them. Read all of them. This is not a place to skim.

The title, which is the legal reality

A title search from the Land Title Office shows who owns the property and what is registered against it: mortgages and other financial charges, easements, statutory rights of way, covenants restricting how the land can be used, and any liens or judgements.

An easement or right of way is not necessarily a problem, but it is a fact about your land, and you should know it before you plan a fence, a garage or an addition. A covenant can limit building, use or even the type of dwelling. A lawyer or notary reviews title as part of the conveyancing, and if anything on it concerns you, that is the person to ask, before subject removal rather than after.

Zoning, and what is planned next door

The municipality holds the zoning, the Official Community Plan and the active development applications. Langley, Surrey, Abbotsford: each publishes this, and each has a planning department that answers questions.

Two things matter here. What the property is zoned for, which decides what you can do with it, including a secondary suite, a laneway home or a future subdivision. And what is planned nearby, which decides what your view, your traffic and your street will look like in a few years. A field beside a home is a field until it is a subdivision. The application for it is public, and it is usually already filed by the time a home comes to market.

The street, which no document contains

Then there is the part you cannot download. Walk the block on a weekday evening and again on a Saturday morning. Look at the neighbouring properties, at the parking, at how the light falls on the yard, at the flight path, at the noise from a road that is quiet on a Sunday viewing and loud on a Tuesday at eight.

How I handle this

For a strata I read the full document package before my client writes an offer whenever the timeline allows it, and I read the minutes first, because that is where the future special levy is usually visible years before it is voted on.

For a house I check the zoning and the active applications in the neighbourhood before we go further than a first showing. And I tell clients the thing they do not want to hear, which is that a documented, disclosed, understood problem is often a fine reason to buy at the right price, while an undocumented one is never fine at any price.

Research the property. The market is somebody else's story.

Thinking about buying or selling in the Fraser Valley? Message me and we will go through your options.