The year has started off strong for home sales, according to the most recent information from the Chilliwack and District Real Estate Board (CADREB).
Home sales jumped 67.5 per cent compared to January 2023, at 201 units. The average price of a home sold this January was $719,509, a modest gain of 3.5 per cent from January 2023.
The report from the board lists comparable stats over a number of time frames. For example, January home sales were 5 per cent below the five-year average and 9.9 per cent above the 10-year average for the month of January.
“Sales activity went through a huge upswing to kick the year off, coming in much stronger than we anticipated,” said Brad Latham, president of CADREB. “There was an idea that demand would gradually pick up towards the spring as buyers got more comfortable with where interest rates were settling and even perhaps a hint of a first cut from the Bank of Canada, but unless January turns out to be an anomaly it appears that they (the buyers) are done waiting. New listings dropped compared to the same time last year, so inventories were down considerable from last month, but we’ll have to see if this continues and how sellers respond.”
The news release explains that the MLS Home Price Index (HPI) tracks price trends far more accurately than is possible using average or median price measures. The overall HPI composite benchmark price was $705,900 in January 2024, a modest gain of 1.7 per cent compared to January 2023.
The benchmark price for single-family homes was $850,100, nearly unchanged, up only 0.9 per cent on a year-over-year basis in January. By comparison, the benchmark price for townhouse/row units was $592,500, an increase of 5.1 per cent compared to a year earlier, while the benchmark apartment price was $410,300, a sizable gain of 10.1 per cent from year-ago levels.
Some more stats from CADREB:
– The dollar value of all home sales in January 2024 was $144.6 million, a substantial increase of 73.4 per cent from the same month in 2023.
– The number of new listings saw a big reduction of 17.7 per cent from January 2023. There were 343 new residential listings in January 2024. This was the lowest number of new listings added in the month of January in more than five years.
– New listings were 16.4 per cent below the five-year average and 8.5 per cent below the 10-year average for the month of January.
– Active residential listings numbered 787 units on the market at the end of January, decreasing by 5.5 per cent from the end of January 2023.
– Active listings were 16.9 per cent above the five-year average and 9.9 per cent above the 10-year average for the month of January.
– Months of inventory numbered 3.9 at the end of January 2024, down from the 6.9 months recorded at the end of January 2023 and below the long-run average of 4.7 months for this time of year. The number of months of inventory is the number of months it would take to sell current inventories at the current rate of sales activity.
TORONTO – One expert predicts Ottawa‘s changes to mortgage rules will help spur demand among potential homebuyers but says policies aimed at driving new supply are needed to address the “core issues” facing the market.
The federal government’s changes, set to come into force mid-December, include a higher price cap for insured mortgages to allow more people to qualify for a mortgage with less than a 20 per cent down payment.
The government will also expand its 30-year mortgage amortization to include first-time homebuyers buying any type of home, as well as anybody buying a newly built home.
CIBC Capital Markets deputy chief economist Benjamin Tal calls it a “significant” move likely to accelerate the recovery of the housing market, a process already underway as interest rates have begun to fall.
However, he says in a note that policymakers should aim to “prevent that from becoming too much of a good thing” through policies geared toward the supply side.
Tal says the main issue is the lack of supply available to respond to Canada’s rapidly increasing population, particularly in major cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 17,2024.
OTTAWA – The Canadian Real Estate Association says the number of homes sold in August fell compared with a year ago as the market remained largely stuck in a holding pattern despite borrowing costs beginning to come down.
The association says the number of homes sold in August fell 2.1 per cent compared with the same month last year.
On a seasonally adjusted month-over-month basis, national home sales edged up 1.3 per cent from July.
CREA senior economist Shaun Cathcart says that with forecasts of lower interest rates throughout the rest of this year and into 2025, “it makes sense that prospective buyers might continue to hold off for improved affordability, especially since prices are still well behaved in most of the country.”
The national average sale price for August amounted to $649,100, a 0.1 per cent increase compared with a year earlier.
The number of newly listed properties was up 1.1 per cent month-over-month.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
MONTREAL – Two Quebec real estate brokers are facing fines and years-long suspensions for submitting bogus offers on homes to drive up prices during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Christine Girouard has been suspended for 14 years and her business partner, Jonathan Dauphinais-Fortin, has been suspended for nine years after Quebec’s authority of real estate brokerage found they used fake bids to get buyers to raise their offers.
Girouard is a well-known broker who previously starred on a Quebec reality show that follows top real estate agents in the province.
She is facing a fine of $50,000, while Dauphinais-Fortin has been fined $10,000.
The two brokers were suspended in May 2023 after La Presse published an article about their practices.
One buyer ended up paying $40,000 more than his initial offer in 2022 after Girouard and Dauphinais-Fortin concocted a second bid on the house he wanted to buy.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
