Whats the deal with the big ugly houses in Vancouver?

They're called Pink Monsters locally. They took over from these other horrible things called Vancouver Specials. Vancouver city council seems to have very few, if any rules about preserving heritage buildings of any type. If it's old in Vancouver knock it down!

Some of them are the fault of the way the building laws were drawn up. I don't remember the details now, but because of those laws, it made sense for people to build those flat box like houses. Vancouver Specials were the result, and then came the Monster Houses you're talking about, a sort of larger and more expensive Vancouver Special. Many people build them because they are the cheapest way to get the most house space on what was an expensive piece of land. They already paid a bundle for the land, so they didn't want to spend unnecessarily on the house. Then, of course, some people actually like them. And there seem to be people who think that because Vancouver is on the West Coast that California style house designs are appropriate. You see a huge variety of house design in some Vancouver neighbourhoods, also, because of the fact that in this climate a wooden house can deteriorate very fast if it isn't maintained well, so sometimes the original older and nicer looking houses just weren't worth keeping. And again, when you pay almost a half million dollars for a lot, you probably want more than the 60 year old 2 bedroom house that was on it even if you can't quite afford a Victorian style replacement.. There's a term used pretty often in Vancouver real estate which I don't believe is used much elsewhere in Canada. A tear down. That's the 60 year old 2 bedroom house listed for half a million. When people buy them, it's almost automatic in some neighbourhoods that the house will be torn down and replaced with a Monster House.

At one time these huge houses on small lots were quite popular, especially with immigrants from Hong Kong. Many neighbours do not like them, but as long as they are the correct distance from lot lines, etc., they were legal. They were called "monster houses." I have seen a few in other places (like Ottawa), but Vancouver seems to have the highest number of them, due in part to the unavailability of building land in the city.

Believe it or not, some people think those houses are beautiful. And since they own the house, they can paint it whatever colour they wish and put on whatever kind of roofing they wish. It has nothing to do with the city council - their only input is in things like the size of the house compared to the size of the lot, and ensuring that the electricity etc. meets government standards for safety reasons.

The ugly houses are the one's where the poorer people live! It's like that in all big cities!