City vs. ‘Burbs: the Rebuttal

I take serious issue with the Province’s Sunday print edition cover story. Unfortunately, it seems to be print-only, so I can't link to it here.

Update: it is online, see it here. When I searched earlier I could only find the teaser, not the article itself. It is missing the comparison chart that the print edition has though, and that's where I drew my numbers from.

City vs. ‘Burbs
Where does it cost less to live? The surprising answer inside. By Lena Sin.

Hardly. The teaser by-line basically gives it away. Everyone assumes the city costs more than the suburbs, so of course the “surprising” end result will be that the city comes out cheaper.

Living in or near Vancouver means this is a topic we hear about daily; city vs country, the cost of commuting vs the value of a backyard, the carbon footprint that each lifestyle offers. I know few people that haven’t debated moving to one from the other or vice versa.

I’ll admit it up front: I am a country girl. When I was eight, my parents decided that the street we were living on in Maple Ridge (207th, in Hammond), was getting to be too busy, so we left one heritage home for another, and moved to the house I still have managed to not be kicked out of, in Ruskin, Mission. With a park right next door, a frog- and fish-filled pond in the backyard, over half an acre of fenced space for us and the dogs to roam, and a view of the river across the street, it’s absolutely picture perfect.

When I was younger, weekends and summers were filled with unchaperoned trips to the river, block parties, and adventures with the other neighbourhood kids. We were picked up by a yellow school bus right from when I moved here in grade three through to the end of high school, with John the bus driver (who knew each one of us by name) dressing up as Santa and handing out candy canes on the last day of school before Christmas break.

Living in the city has its advantages. I know this better than many, as when I was working in Gastown I was spending over three hours a day commuting. Even with how nice the West Coast Express is, a commute like that takes its toll, and if I were to work downtown again I’d absolutely be moving to cut down on time spent on travel. Not to downtown, mind you, but to somewhere a little friendlier on the commute, like Port Moody or Coquitlam.

I love the country, and anyone who knows me knows this.

But what do I love more than the country? Unbiased, well-researched journalism.

City vs. ‘Burbs: the article

The article depicts a family of two parents and their young child, and compares two lifestyles: one in an 800 sq ft condo in Yaletown, and another in a 1,940 sq ft house in Coquitlam’s Burke Mountain.

Condo price: $639,000
House price: $629,000

Wait, what? $629,000 for a house outside of the city? That can’t be right, and is absolutely not an accurate depiction of an average single-family home in the Lower Mainland, new or used. $639k for a downtown condo probably is average; $629k for a suburban house is way off the mark.

Don’t even get me started on how few families could afford a condo or house that expensive to begin with.

According to my primitive internet research, around $640,000 is an average price for a house in Coquitlam, so the article’s $629,000 isn’t unrealistic by any means. But that’s Coquitlam, and its prices are going to be much higher than Aldergrove, Maple Ridge, Abbotsford or Mission. If you’re not dead-set on new, there’s a cute, well maintained, four-bedroom, two-bathroom 2200+ sq ft house built in 1950 for $524,900 in Coquitlam.

Condo living: $3,602/month
House living: $4,440/month

A couple I know recently purchased their first house: a newer, recently-renovated, four-bedroom house (three bedrooms on main floor, one in basement suite) in central Mission for right around $400,000. They have a basement suite tenant whose rent contributes to their mortgage payment, and their backyard is plenty big enough for their two German Shepard-cross dogs. When they have children, they will have ample room for them, and if they choose to move it will be because they want to, not because they’ve run out of bedrooms and are forced to.

I don’t know what their monthly mortgage payment is, but I can do the guesswork. Even if they didn’t put any money down on the home – which wasn’t the case – their monthly mortgage payment is still only ~$2100*, which is $329 less than the mortgage payment estimate in the article. Subtract another $700 that they net monthly from their tenant, and their payment is down to $1400/month. With a difference of over $1000 in mortgage payments, monthly living in the house in the suburbs is now cheaper than the condo in the city by $231.

Of course, this increases other costs. The monthly West Coast Express pass increases by about $120/month when riding from Mission to Waterfront, rather than from Coquitlam ($298.50 vs. $178.75). They may find themselves driving further when transit isn’t an option, but that is offset slightly by the cheaper gas prices found out this way. But other expenses, like groceries and dining out, not to mention property taxes (about $3500 for their place, compared to nearly $5000 for the article’s house), are less expensive here than in the city.

I couldn’t determine the specific house plan that the author used in her comparison, but I know the type: cookie-cutter, often strata-regulated, vinyl-siding, personality-free homes. These developments abound, and there are similar ones in Maple Ridge (Silver Ridge, for example) and Abbotsford (Auguston). Curious to know what 1,940 sq ft will get you, I did some research.

Basically, for any house over 1600 sq ft, you get at least three bedrooms and two and a half baths, plus an unfinished basement that can likely be converted into more.

An 800 sq ft condo in Yaletown? At best it’s two bedrooms, two baths, with zero room to expand.

She also didn’t include lot size, which is a little unbelievable. Lot size hugely affects a property’s price, and is one of the major factors in buying a house rather than a condo, if not the major factor. If this house is situated on an acre of prime real estate, then its high price makes a little more sense, but again, that’s not a realistic portrayal of average suburb living.

Why Ms. Sin didn’t choose to use comparable homes in her example is beyond me. If this family is planning on having more children, then they are going to need to move to a larger, and thus more expensive, condo in Yaletown. If this family isn’t planning on procreating any further, then they didn’t need to buy a three- or four-bedroom house; a 1200 sq ft two-bedroom, two-bath house would have been sufficient, and would have come at a substantially lower price.

And while a family’s budget for a home may be $639,000, there isn’t a rule saying that they have to or will spend that amount. I wouldn’t spend that much on a house in the Valley if I had a million dollars at my disposal, because it just isn’t necessary. Quality homes on spacious lots come at lower prices than that.

This says one of two things: either the author was determined to prove a point and found a house expensive enough to back up her claims, or she has no idea what qualifies as a solid representation of suburban living, and didn’t bother to research otherwise.

Either way, this is incredibly poor journalism.

And what’s the value of quiet? Of having a backyard? Of being able to just open the patio door when Fido needs to whiz, rather than having to take the elevator down eight stories and walk two blocks away to the dog park? Of letting your kids run around the street without fear of them being hit by a bus? Of sending them down to the basement where you can’t hear them when they’re rambunctious and it’s pouring rain outside? Of being able to see the stars at night? Difficult things to put a price on.

The article echoes the same sentiment that everyone, including myself, will agree on: obviously more is involved in the city vs. suburbs decision than the dollars involved.

But this article is a poor representation of the cost of living outside of the city, and I’m disappointed in the Province’s obvious bias.


*Thank you RBC mortgage payment calculator.