MARKET UPDATE BY GREATER VANCOUVER REALTOR JAMES GARBUTT

May is here and it’s time for a Greater Vancouver housing market update.

It’s been a bit of a crazy year, and between the snow and the rain, the weather has been awful and it’s held back the sales a little bit; the number of sales are down considerably compared to 2016. As of April 26, 2017, in Vancouver the number of sales of detached home is 701. Now compared to the same period of time last year, it was 1473–just under half the number of sales.

In Burnaby, we see the biggest effect: 267 compared to 1400 last year. In the Tri-Cities, 469 compared to 1098 sales. Overall, the trend is that the number of sales is down considerably and, in most cases, less than half of what they were last year. Mind you, last year was insane and this year we’ve seen some legitimately awful weather.

In terms of prices, let’s look at the sales ratio. To get a good indication of how the market doing, we like to look at the sales ratio. The sales ratio is the sales-to-active listings ratio or the number of sales that take place in a given month divided by the number of active listings. A seller’s market is considered to have a sales ratio of 21% or higher.

In the last 60 days, the sales ratio for detached homes in Vancouver is 15%; that means that of 10 active listings, 1.5 of them are selling in a given month. That’s a low figure, but when you isolate listings at $1.5 million or less, that figure goes from 15% to 38%–a strong seller’s market. When you isolate that figure from $3 million plus it goes from 15% to 9%. So the high end is really what’s dragging down the sales ratio.

And similar stats are in Burnaby, where the sales ratio is 21%, but under $1.5 million, it’s 53%, and at $2 million, it’s 9%. So the high end market is what’s struggling right now, but the entry points are quite active—they’re hot.

Some fun sales of the year:

The highest sale to date was on Point Grey Road and it sold for $17.6 million, this is from the REBGV stats. In the Tri-Cities, the highest sale was $3.4 and it was ‘Anmore‘, which is, in my opinion, one of Vancouver’s best kept secrets.

In conclusion, the weather has held the market back. I expect these sales numbers to improve in the coming months, more so in the seller’s favour. The weather’s going to get better, a lot of homes will be coming on the market and I think it’s going to be a very active time. However, a lot of people are overpricing their homes–$2.5 million homes are being priced at $3 million, or $2 million dollar homes at $2.5 million, and that is proving not to work right now. You could get away with it last year, because the market would climb until it reached that point, but this year, it’s not. We’re seeing price points similar to last year in most areas and we’re seeing prices 20% above last year’s prices. So, there’s a big gap between list price and sale price and that’s holding back the sales ratios in a lot of these places.

If you’d like my opinion, if you’re selling a higher end product:

1. Don’t list it if you’re not serious about selling.

2. Price it properly.

On the buy side, I think it’s a great time to buy higher end product, but I just don’t think the seller’s are willing to come down to your price points yet. On the sell side, now is the sweet spot to sell detached homes. May, June, July, are active months, so take advantage.

Full Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver Stat Package for April 2017

If you’re thinking of buying, selling or just curious about the value of a property, contact us today!

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James Garbutt
Greater Vancouver Realtor

CLICK HERE FOR YOUR MAY 2017 GREATER VANCOUVER CONDO MARKET UPDATE