The world according to Bill
Photo: Sean Kilpatrick
Each provincial economy is broken into sectors, so government bean counters can figure out which industries are producing the most revenue for each province.
Real estate has now grown to 18.4 per cent of the B.C. economy. This is a very interesting number to me, especially when you look at it next to an important number from the Alberta economy.
The 18.4 per cent share of the B.C. economy taken up by the real estate industry is actually 1.4 per cent higher than the oil and gas industry is in Alberta.
Oil and Gas makes up 17 per cent of the Alberta economy. The industry has been a decreasing section of the Alberta economy for the last few years, while real estate has been increasing in the B.C. economy.
But there’s something else to consider, as well.
The Canadian economy as a whole grew 1.4 per cent in 2016. B.C. lead the way, with a whopping 3.7 per cent growth. That growth, of course, was lead by the real estate industry.
So if Alberta is the “oil province” of the country, is B.C. then the “real estate province”?
It seems like a fair conclusion to me, and in that case, I say bring on the investors.
Bill Hubbard is a real estate broker and the owner and broker of a four-office real estate firm in the Okanagan-Shuswap. He has been in real estate for 28 years and has been an owner and broker in Vernon for 20 years. At almost 60 years old he is just as passionate about real estate as the day he started.
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