Allen Lai says upscale Firenze was 75-per-cent sold in two weeks. CREDIT: Ian Smith, Vancouver Sun   Allan Lai is happy at rapid selling of units in the yet-to-be-built Firenze development. CREDIT: Ian Smith, Vancouver Sun

First Yaletown Park. Now Firenze and QUBE.

Vancouver’s hot condo market shows little sign — at least for now — of cooling down, with the latest entries in the apartment buying sweepstakes reporting big sales in the past two weeks, especially last Saturday when the two projects held their grand openings.

“We’ve sold about 80 per cent in a week,” says Cameron McNeill, of MAC Real Estate Solutions, which is marketing QUBE at 1333 West Georgia. “We’ve sold 155. We expect to be completely sold out in the next week or two. This is the hottest I’ve ever seen the market.”

Allen Lai, president of Henderson Development Group, Firenze‘s developer, agrees. “It’s going amazingly well,” says Lai of Firenze, a 457-unit development. “We’ve sold 75 per cent in less than two weeks. We had lineups of people [last Saturday]. For the whole day it was non stop. It’s the first time we’ve seen these kinds of sales. We should be sold out by the end of April. I’m very confident of that.”

The latest sales frenzy follows on the heels of the rapid sale of about 500 condos at the Yaletown Park project. The condo-buying frenzy hit a fever pitch Feb. 28 when buyers snatched up 494 suites in the two new Yaletown towers. It was the Vancouver record for one-day sales. The project’s third tower is scheduled to open April 24.

However, both McNeill and Lai believe the buying-spree in Vancouver‘s condo market will start to cool off in the next year or so.

“I think the market will hold its value, but supply and demand will equalize in the next year,” says McNeill. “Now it sells out in a blink. It will be more of a normal situation, in which they sell out during the course of construction.

“There’s a perception that there’s an over supply. But there’s an under supply. Demand will come down slightly and supply will come up slightly. But I don’t believe it will be a correction or a bubble bursting. I think it will get to a situation where you don’t have to be the first in the door.”

Lai agrees that things will slow down, although he thinks the city is still two major projects away from that point.

“Eventually it will slow down,” says Lai. “There was a lot of pent-up demand, but it will start slowing in a while.”

Firenze, which means Florence in Italian, will be adjacent to General Motors Place and Andy Livingstone Park. Prices range from $168,000 to $733,000 and it is expected to be ready for occupancy in late 2006 or early 2007.

QUBE is actually the landmark Westcoast Transmission office building, which is considered by architects to be one of Vancouver‘s most earthquake-resistant structures because of its unique design. It will undergo a $20-million redevelopment to convert it into an upscale residential tower.

Spurred by the current hot demand for luxury condominium living along the city’s Coal Harbour waterfront, building owner Anthem Properties plans to replace the office space inside the existing 12-storey facility with 180 state-of-the-art condos.

The Vancouver-based company purchased the Westcoast building in 1998.

It was named QUBE to reflect its unique “cube on a pedestal” shape. The over-all appearance of the building will remain unchanged.

Condo owners would take occupancy in mid-2005.

Designed by architects, William Rhone and Randle Iredale, and structural engineer Bogue Babicki, the Westcoast Transmission Building opened in 1969 as Westcoast’s head office.

The structure they adapted was that of a suspension bridge, hanging the floors from aluminum-clad steel cables draped over the top of the concrete core. This design provided greater earthquake resistance and column-free floor space.

© The Vancouver Sun 2004