Have you ever dreamed of owning a brand new home?  Have you imagined a home of your own, with that "new house" smell, a home where no one else has lived before you, where you can create your own special space?  Have you saved for decades for your dream?  Maybe your dream is to have a nice new Townhouse in Vancouver's Westside, because a detached house is just out of reach.  Maybe you can actually spend up to $1.3 million, a dream many Canadians could never achieve.  After all, you have worked hard, and saved for decades.  Now consider this.  The 12% HST on your new $1.3 million home works out to $129,500 (net of the maximum rebate), and the Property Transfer Tax works out to $24,000, or a total of $153,500 in taxes to buy the dream you have worked your whole life for.  Wow, $153,500 might actually be your annual salary!  You just can't afford the extra taxes, but maybe, just maybe, because you have saved a good downpayment, you can add all those taxes into your mortgage.  In today's mortgage climate, you can probably even get a 5-year fixed term mortgage for around 3.69%.  What this means, is that the HST + PTT will cost you $784/month extra on your mortgage.  Then you start to look at the impact of compounding interest on these taxes, and your dream turns into a financial nightmare.  Would it be better to leave this huge chunk of money to your children or grandchildren?  Will they ever be able to afford a home?  These are the questions that buyers ask me every day.

How will you vote in the upcoming Referendum on the HST?