For years, Californians looking to escape the state's high housing prices – the highest in the country, by far – found the pickings a lot cheaper in neighboring Arizona and Nevada. Now Canadians are taking over where the 49ers left off.
According to Georgory Tsujimoto, a senior consulting with the California-based John Burns Real Estate Consulting firm, buyers from our neighbors to the north now outpace those from the Golden State, at least in the Phoenix area's Maricopa County.
Canadians, it seems, are taking advantage of their increased purchasing power to buy seasonal homes in the so-called Valley of the Sun, Tsujimoto said. Indeed, the percentage of Canadian buyers has been on the rise for two years, and now account for a larger share of the sales pie than Californians.
Their influx is being fueled by a strong Canadian dollar, the "Loonie," which reached a high against the U.S. dollar in July 2007, and increasingly affordable Phoenix housing prices, down 51% since the previous peak in 2006, Tsujimoto reported. Many Canadians are reportedly buying with all cash.
"Canadian home buyers within Maricopa County accounted for 4.2% of the total new and resale homes purchased in June 2010 in comparison to 4.1% by purchasers from California," the consultant said.
