A report from the Globe and Mail in Canada. "Dirty money is not a problem contained to casinos and the luxury car trade. It involves billions of dollars tumbling through the real estate market - an estimated $5-billion just in the real estate sector last year."

"Bill McCarthy, a Burnaby-based real estate developer and long-time realtor, said it is an open secret in his industry that clients often try to pay deposits or even purchase a home with cash. In the end, he said, any and all professions involved in buying and selling property should report to FinTRAC because, he said, bad elements can always find willing partners."

"'I don’t think anything in the German report has surprised those within the real estate, legal and mortgage businesses,' Mr. McCarthy said. 'The scope and scale maybe, but not the details of it and that’s a problem.'"

The Wall Street Journal. "Roughly 5 billion Canadian dollars ($3.71 billion) worth of illicit funds flowed through the real-estate market last year, including in Canada’s third-largest city, Vancouver, with another estimated C$2.4 billion moving through the province’s casinos, the market for luxury cars and horse-racing tracks, according to the reports commissioned by British Columbia’s government."

"As a G-7 country, Canada has one of the world’s most advanced economies. But the country has increasingly become a target for international crime rings, which exploit regulatory loopholes to funnel illicit funds through the country’s banking system, said Garry Clement, a former officer for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who now works as a consultant focusing on financial crimes."

"'Organized crime will go through the lane of least resistance, and Canada has become that,' he said."

From CBC News. "Showing a flair for the dramatic, Attorney General David Eby borrowed from Game of Thrones to drive home his point while delivering Thursday's report on money laundering in the B.C. real estate market. 'It may be spring but winter is finally coming,' he said. 'The party is over.'"

"Eby said even without access to law enforcement and criminal databases, investigator Peter German and his team had no problem uncovering more than a few eye-popping examples of how proceeds of crime may be infiltrating all aspects of the B.C. real estate sector."

"A homemaker who bought more than a dozen downtown row houses over three years for $4.1 million. Another homemaker who bought five luxury homes in three years for a total of $21 million. A Vancouver luxury car reseller, known to police, who owns three homes in Metro Vancouver worth $8.6 million. The properties have multiple mortgages held by three numbered companies and a newly incorporated mortgage investment company. Each new mortgage was found to be at a lower rate of interest than the previous mortgage."

"A $3.5-million Gulf Island property acquired with funds allegedly embezzled from a $90-million loan fraud in India. The property is owned through a company registered in a high-risk jurisdiction using a post office box as its address. Almost 500 different properties with four to 29 mortgages each, registered and repaid in rapid succession."

"Hundreds of individuals and numbered companies that own property with only the address of a law firm on title. Eby said this was part of a larger pool of 71,000 residential properties registered in a way that makes identifying the true owner incredibly difficult if not impossible. Titles to more than 3,000 residential properties — worth more than $3 billion —  that have ownership addresses located in high-risk financial jurisdictions. Of those properties, 473 list owners' addresses in offshore financial centres and tax havens."

"In the report, German highlights some of the unique occupations listed by titleholders in the land title registry, including 'superdad,' 'funemployed,' 'wannabe ski bum' and 'trophy wife.' 'We have assumed that the four B.C. titleholders who list 'launderer' as their occupation are referring to clothing,' wrote German."

"Humour aside, Eby says the findings in the 367 page report are 'stark evidence of the consequences of an absence of oversight ... until now.' 'Criminal profiteers distorting a provincial economy is not inevitable,' he said. 'And while it may be our present, it is not our future anymore.'"

From Domain News in Australia. "The money is coming out of Box Hill, with the suburb recording one of the most dramatic shifts in house prices across Melbourne as international investors, property developers and local buyers start to look for better deals."

"Prices soared in the neighbourhood towards the end of Melbourne’s property boom, with median house price growth peaking at an eye-watering 64.8 per cent in August 2017 compared to a year earlier, Domain data showed. Over the year to March, Box Hill’s median house price has dropped 25.7 per cent to $1,237,500."

"During the peak, house and unit prices were being largely driven by foreign investors buying or developing properties in Box Hill, Domain senior research analyst Nicola Powell said. More than 30 per cent of Box Hill residents were born in China or Hong Kong, according to the latest census."

"Many Chinese developers have been attracted to Box Hill because of its bigger house blocks and developable land that, until recently, offered a way to profit. Local developer the Deague Group settled its Whitehorse Towers skyscraper in the main shopping strip 18 months ago. After arriving early in the neighbourhood’s growth spurt, chief executive Will Deague has seen prices for development sites shoot up."

"The price he paid for a site five years ago worked out to about $18,000 for every apartment he could build on it. Now, some vendors are asking $100,000. He is skeptical that all the proposed apartment blocks will be built."

"'There’s been a huge uplift for land owners out there,' he said. 'You’ve got some offshore developers who have probably entered Box Hill a little bit late, paid a little bit much for the land. And it’s harder to get sales in the current market so they’re struggling to get them off the ground.'"

"A broader drop in foreign investment was affecting prices in suburbs like Box Hill, said Dave Platter, spokesman for Chinese listings portal Juwai. Like local buyers, Chinese buyers were waiting for further drops before buying property or starting new development. The overall decline in prices would help offset the extra taxes foreign investors were being slugged, he said."

"'There’s still demand but not where it was before,' Mr Platter said."