3 Vancouver Views

3 Charts of Vancouver Housing Prices to August 31, 2016
Monthly HPI & Average vs Inflation Adjusted Projection
See also this reader supplied prescient
Elliot Wave Chart from May 13, 2016
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1) My chart based on the REBGV HPI® dataset.
SOURCE and HPI Explained

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2) REBGV Chart using average prices (not HPI®)
SOURCE

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3) Average Annual Peak Price CHART SOURCE
I think the source author is YVR Housing
​If you can confirm, please do.

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The Forces that Cause the Bubble to Burst
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The bubble bursts when excessive risk-taking becomes pervasive throughout the housing system. This happens while the supply of housing is still increasing. In other words, demand decreases while supply increases, resulting in a fall in prices.

This pervasiveness of risk throughout the system is triggered by losses suffered by homeowners, mortgage lenders, mortgage investors and property investors. Those losses could be triggered by a number of things, including:

1. An increase in interest rates that puts homeownership out of reach for some buyers and, in some instances, makes the home a person currently owns unaffordable, leading to default and foreclosure, which eventually adds to supply.

2. A downturn in general economic activity that leads to less disposable income, job loss and/or fewer available jobs, which decreases the demand for housing.

3. Demand is exhausted, bringing supply and demand into equilibrium and slowing the rapid pace of home price appreciation that some homeowners, particularly speculators, count on to make their purchases affordable or profitable. When rapid price appreciation stagnates, those who count on it to afford their homes long term might lose their homes, bringing more supply to the market.

The bottom line is that when loses mount, credit standards are tightened, easy mortgage borrowing is no longer available, demand decreases, supply increases, speculators leave the market and prices fall.

Conclusion
A simple and important principle of finance is mean reversion. While housing markets are not as subject to bubbles as some markets, housing bubbles do exist. Long-term averages provide a good indication of where housing prices will eventually end up during periods of rapid appreciation followed by stagnant or falling prices. The same is true for periods of below average price appreciation.

SOURCE Investopedia by Barry Nielsen, September 13, 2014