![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.livabl.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/chinese-interest-canadian-real-estate.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nPhoto: Alkan de Beaumont Chaglar\/Flickr<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n Chinese homebuyers are showing increasing interest in Canadian real estate again \u2014 just not in the in the same places as they were before, a new report suggests.<\/p>\n Juwai.com<\/a>, a real estate portal that connects residents of China with homes abroad, says Chinese enquiries into Canadian properties increased 8 percent last year compared to 2017, when demand was stagnating in the wake of the introduction of two separate foreign-homebuyer taxes in major urban centres within a span of 12 months.<\/p>\n In August 2016, the BC government imposed a 15-percent tax on non-residents purchasing residential real estate anywhere in Metro Vancouver. Ontario followed suit in April 2017, slapping its own 15-percent levy on the Greater Golden Horseshoe, which encompasses Toronto and surrounding municipalities. Starting February the following year, BC expanded and increased its tax to 20 percent, covering a larger geographic area.<\/p>\n The moves followed media reports and other speculation that foreign nationals were driving up home prices in Canada’s most expensive cities.<\/p>\n\n The subsequent measures are one reason Chinese buyers are turning away from Toronto and Vancouver to different Canadian markets, suggests Juwai CEO Carrie Law in a statement. \u201cWith steep foreign buyer taxes and high prices in Vancouver and Toronto, we have seen an increasing number of Chinese buyers shift to other cities in Canada,\u201d explains Law, also director of the company.<\/p>\n Chinese buyer enquiries into Vancouver properties declined 2.8 percent on a year-over-year basis in 2018. Over the same period, they fell 10.3 percent in Toronto.<\/p>\n Meantime, enquiries were up 394 percent in Halifax, 234.4 percent in Calgary, 35.7 percent in Montreal and 32.5 percent in Ottawa.<\/p>\n