British Columbia

Having allowed Chinese money launderers to create a massive bubble out of the Vancouver housing market for the past several years despite loud warnings from numerous sources (this site included) until its inevitable crackdown this summer, when it imposed a tax on offshore purchases, popping the ultra high end housing bubble and sending Chinese buyers south of the border to Seattle (although after a sharp drop may be staging a quick rebound as the latest chart from the MLS shows)...

Two days ago we introduced you to "the rich kids of Vancouver" for whom the most important decision in any given day is whether to spend half a million dollars on a new Lamborghini or on an investment such as "two expensive watches or some diamonds."

From left, Loretta Lai, Chelsea Jiang and Diana Wang attended a receptionat a Lamborghini dealership last month in Vancouver, British Columbia

By now, the only people in the world who are not aware that Vancouver has been overrun by Chinese "hot money-parking" oligarchs, who rush to buy any and every available real estate leading to such grotesque charts as the following showing the ridiculous surge in Vancouver real estate prices...

“Housing in Vancouver is insane — it was insane when I left and it’s more insane now.”

That’s from 33-year-old Kevin Oke, co-founder of LlamaZoo Interactive who left Vancouver for Victoria two years ago because he couldn’t afford to buy a home in his native city even while earning a generous salary as a lead designer at a video-game company whose clients included Atari and Ubisoft Entertainment SA.  

One month ago, when describing the latest in an endless series of Vancouver real estate horror stories, in this case an abandoned, rotting home (which is currently listed for a modest $7.2 million), we explained the simple money-laundering dynamic involving Chinese "investors" as follows.