Despite recent predictions about the inevitable burst of the Greater Vancouver real-estate bubble, buyers last week were camped out three days before Saturday’s presale of a new Burnaby mega-project.
“We expected that people would be camped out on Friday — we weren’t expecting them on the Wednesday before,” says Macartney Greenfield, Rennie Marketing System’s project manager.
Brentwood is a 28-acre master-planned community that combines shopping in 350 stores, dining, entertainment and residences in an open-air high street and one-acre public plaza connected to transit.
Of 288 units available in the first tower of the Brentwood development at Lougheed and Willingdon — with occupancy slated for winter 2017 — all were sold on Saturday. Three penthouse units were not yet released, but likely will be in the fall when units for a second 63-storey tower will be made available.
“I think it has a lot to do with the revitalization of Brentwood as a neighbourhood,” says Greenfield. One-bedroom units were offered at $299,000, two-bedrooms at $355,000, and a handful of three-bedroom units were sold starting at $928,000. The condo units start on the 33rd floor, with rental units below.
“The buyers have lived in this neighbourhood,” says Greenfield. “We definitely saw a lot of people buying for their children, and some are just downsizing. There was a lot of local interest.”
