Not much is changing in the market in relation to sales numbers, we are seeing the total number of homes sold consistently below 2,000 since July of 2018. But on a positive note, it was the 4 straight increase month over month. Rome wasn’t built in a day nor is the Greater Vancouver housing market. The pent-up demand continues to build as a result. There were 1,850 sales in Greater Vancouver in March 2019, the lowest total for the month of April since 1995. The standoff continues between buyers and sellers as both sides are waiting for the other to blink. Increasingly sellers are starting to blink first as buyers are being very selective on what they are willing to offer on and jumping on properties that are priced well in today’s market. An opportunity that has been long sought after from buyers in Metro Vancouver.
The 1,850 homes sold in Greater Vancouver in April were up from 1,745 (6%) from March this year. This was compared with 2,631 sales (down 30%) in April last year and 3,617 sales in March 2017. This was 45 percent below the 10-year average for April. Around the region, North Vancouver and Richmond saw total home sales decline in April compared to March – while all other regions saw sales increase in April. Port Moody had the largest increase in sales in April compared to March.
On the other side of the equation, there were 5,900 new listings in April in Greater Vancouver, down from 5,943 in April last year and up from 5,057 in March 2019. The number of new listings in April were 2 percent below the 10-year average for April. There are currently 15,050 Active Listings on the market in Greater Vancouver – up from 10,474 at the end of April last year. This is the highest number of Active listings since September 2014. While Active Listings are up 44 percent to last year, this trended down 4% compared to March year over year. But clearly, the growth in listings is attributed to the lack of home sales occurring in the market. New Listings are not occurring at a higher rate compared to previous years. Buyers have a lot more choice than they have had in the past though allowing for an opportunity.
“Government policy continues to hinder home sale activity. The federal government’s mortgage stress test has reduced buyers’ purchasing power by about 20 percent, which is causing people at the entry-level side of the market to struggle to secure financing,” Ashley Smith, Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver president said. “Suppressing housing activity through government policy not only reduces home sales, but it also harms the job market, economic growth and creates pent-up demand.”
The Fraser Valley Real Estate Board processed 1,383 sales of all property types on its MLS® in April, a 13.3 percent increase compared to sales in March 2019, and a 19 percent decrease compared to the 1,708 sales in April of last year. Of the 1,383 total sales, 489 were residential detached homes, 379 were townhouses and 374 apartments. “Consumers may not have the purchasing power that they did prior to January 2018, but the desire for homeownership is still there and we’re seeing that reflected in our MLS® data,” Darin Germyn, President of the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board, said “A slower, stable market has had a positive impact on affordability in our region. Prices of typical residential homes in the Fraser Valley have decreased between 5 and 6 percent in the last year. In the last three months, benchmark prices have either plateaued or have experienced a small recovery.”