Here is our weekly update on the Edmonton real estate market. (Last week’s numbers are in brackets.)
For the past 7 days:
# New listings: 342 (406)
# Sales: 215 (279)
Ratio: 63 (69)
# Price changes: 285 (323)
# Expired Listings: 132 (208)
# Canceled, withdrawn and terminated listings: 153 (144)
Net loss/gain in listings this week: -158 (-225)
Active listings for single family homes: 3576 (3674)
Active listings for condos: 2368 (2400)
Looks like we’re continuing to chip away at the inventory although things are a little slower this week on all fronts. Newlistings should continue to drop as we get closer to the holidayseason, and sales should slow as well. As we said last week, Sheldon and I expect to see mostof those expired, canceled and terminated listings come back on themarket starting in mid-January.
Last week there was also some questioning of the numbers… the reason you can’t take last week’s totals for active listings, and add and subtract new listings and those that came off the market, and end up with this week’s numbers is that pending listings are not included in the overall numbers. I don’t include pending listings, because many pending listings aren’t marked as such, and many pending listings end up back on the market – they are sort of in limbo, not really on the market, not really off the market, so they’re not included.
Our Experiences This Month
11 offers 1 deal…am I really this bad or are we that good atcounseling our buyers? Mark Harvey from CBC radio asked me a question for a report he’s doing for CBC radio on Monday morning on the state ofreal estate in Edmonton. He asked if the current market conditionsare harder on REALTORS. (For those that don’t know the term REALTOR is a trademark and describes someone who is a member of the Canadian Real Estate Association through this membership they are able to markettheir listings through the Multiple Listing Service or MLS). Anyway, the answer is no.
Today there are a numberof sellers under emotional duress that we and others are working with. However,6 months ago it was the buyers’ stress we were dealing with.
Mark also mentioned that we must be driving around showing moreproperties now that we were last year. This is true. But if you look at November (and this isjust for me) I wrote 11 offers for buyers. For one set we wrote 3offers but that’s besides the point. Only one of the 11 went together. February of this year I remember writing 5 offers for one buyer. Althoughwe had to show them fewer properties we had to move much much faster in orderto be successful. Now the process is taking a bit longer, which I think is more positive since the buyers have anopportunity to better discover what it is they are buying.
Back to my 11 offers that I wrote that went no where.Out of that 11, 4 were sold to other people. 1 is still in the back and forthstage and the others we were just too far apart. We were successful onone. Several of our listings have sold,and we are running with very thin inventory for ourselves . One thing forcertain is that there does not appear to be a buyer for every listing, and consideringthe seemingly large inventory 9000+ listings, some areas seem very thin onquality properties at certain price ranges while other areas arebulging.
This has definitely been my busiest November in 20 yearsregardless of what the market stats indicate. Quite a contrast towhat some people have been predicting – that this market was going to whimper into the newyear. On a side note, and this is only a personal and observationnothing scientific: I have often found that November is mirrorsFebruary. If I’m extremely busy in one I’m extremely busy in the otherand vice versa. So we shall see. I’ll have to make a note to myself andwatch.
