[zaroth]

If people want to park money in funds tied to housing (that have returns tracking real estate) then there are funds like IYR that can do that much cheaper than actually owning a house and paying property taxes!

If someone is buying real estate and leaving the property empty just to park funds... It makes me wonder if these are funds that can't be straight up invested in an ETF and are actually being laundered in some way.

[cfraenkel]

um, yeah, that's the whole point. In addition to all the empty homes, there's so many teenagers driving around in Ferraris/Lambos it's become a joke. Sometimes Mom comes with the kid, other times it's just the kid living alone (typically with a nanny). It's mostly hot money from China. Though to be fair, there are plenty of Mom+Kid from places like Korea who are here for the education & into to the 'West'.

[hhw]

The worst part is they collect social benefits like education and healthcare without paying any income taxes into the system.

[nommm-nommm]

Presumably they pay property taxes and sales taxes (if BC has that)? That should offset some of the lack of income taxes. I'm not sure you can consider them complete freeloaders.

Also, can foreign children just move into Canada without any paperwork? I guess student visas?

[hhw]

Yes, we pay 7% PST on sales tax, which doesn't apply to groceries or restaurants, where presumably a lot of their spending would go. That's a far cry from the income taxes that should be paid if they're claiming resident status:

5.06% on the first $38,210 of taxable income, + 7.7% on the next $38,211, + 10.5% on the next $11,320, + 12.29% on the next $18,802, + 14.7% on the amount over $106,543

Generally, the ones who come over here would fit in that top tax bracket. They immigrate into the country based on a loophole in the immigrant investor program into Quebec, but then end up living here in Vancouver. As soon as they get their citizenship, the husband goes back to China and the wife and children stay here and no income is declared.

Property taxes are municipal, which does not contribute to healthcare and education. They may not be paying nothing into the system, but they certainly take more out of the system than they put in.

What makes this the most egregious is that many of them claim additional low income benefits, like discounted pharma drugs and even collect welfare once they've received citizenship.

There's also several pregnant mainland Chinese women coming into the country before they show, and having their babies here so that they get Canadian citizenship and all the benefits that entails.

Yes, it's fairly easy to get a student visa in Canada. There are tons of ESL (English as a second language) schools around downtown, with tons of latin american, middle eastern, Japanese, Korean, and mainland Chinese young people. Some of those schools are designed so that they don't actually have to show up, but still show up as enrolled for student visa requirements.