Last week was kind to the real estate market. After several weeks of dropping selling prices, we saw prices stabilize and volume grow slightly. However, we do not expect this to be the beginning of a rally. We do expect prices to stabilize or soften slightly as we had through the rest of the summer. Inventory remains high and this will have a moderating effect on pricing.
Of course, we cannot ignore the volatile stock market we have seen in the last few days and wonder what effect it will have on the real estate market. Let's look back to 2008 when we had a massive stock market crash, MUCH larger than what we have seen these last few days. After the crash, the number of buyers for homes dropped significantly, by over 30% for about 3 months. At the same time, local prices dropped by 12-15%. Keep in mind that this was also after a very long period of increasing prices so we don't really know how much of this we can directly attribute to the stock market crash. The interesting point to note, is that within 3 months of the decline, buyers returned to our local market in record numbers. The end result was increasing sales volume and prices that were even higher than before the crash. Go figure? Those that bought while others felt the sky was falling made some very quick gains. The message that I took away was that we have a very stable local economy, stable local employment, and remain the most desirable place in Canada to live. While other regions suffered greatly, our unique local characteristics protected us from the greatest impact of the recession. So far at least, this recent market correction is not even comparable to the crash of 2008 so I expect, and hope, that the impact on real estate values will also be minimal.
Over the last 30 days, 259 single family houses were sold, up by 14 houses from last week. The median price is unchanged at $543,000. The average house was on the market for 44 days.
In the same time period, 142 condos were sold, up by 3 condos from last week. The median price is up $2,500 to $292,500. The average condo was on the market for 43 days.
There are now 2,310 houses for sale, up by 22 from last week. Condo inventory has risen by 5 to 1104 suites.
