Here is our update on the Edmonton real estate market. (Previous week’s numbers are in brackets). For the past 7 days:
New listings: 486 (616, 542, 450)
# Sales: 243 (300, 258, 228)
Ratio: 50% (49%, 48%, 51%)
# Price changes: 434 (478, 405, 461)
# Expired Listings: 298 (225, 692, 162)
# Canceled/withdrawn/terminated listings: 52 (60, 44, 47)
Net loss/gain in listings this week: -107 (31, -452, 13)
Active listings for single family homes: 3683 (3738, 3730, 3972)
Active listings for condos: 2454 (2503, 2466, 2661)
Sales to new listings ratio seems to be maintaining a steady course this week. One point I noticed was that this week there were a larger number of mid-month expired listings than there has been in six months. Maybe the fall back to school season is playing into that though.. The floor is open to comments!..
Prices are down more than $12000 from August,we haven’t even hit the winter months yet. The sad thing is is that I bought in July 06 and prices before you know it will be right back to those levels soon. We seen what specualtion does to the stock market, and what it is going to do to us in EREB, hey M**c lets see the positve spin you put out for September.
“Prices typically rise during the fall” M**c P****S. Pre*****t E**B
YEAH RIGHT!! The party’s over, its about time not to sugar coat anymore.
We’re in trouble folks.
P.S Im not a bubble blogger, I hope Im wrong but the writings on the wall.
Thanks John. I thought that I’m the only pessimist there. Oh well, I’m glad that you follow the bubble blogger script though: pretend that you bought at the peak then cry. So which McDonald’s do you work at so we can get together?
Brent,
Unlike you Brent you are happy that this happening, I am not, I am an actual investor who is looking at things in a realistic viewpoint, we are going to go down another 10-15 % before we stabilize, and withn that you still cant get in to the market, so go flip some burgers!1\!!
The only reason the average prices are down is that they did not sell not a single million dollar home in this month so far, ones one beind sold, average price will go up $10-15,000, just watch.
What you see, prices fluctuating from week to week, is not always your average bungalow prices going up and down.
Karl,
You are right, but median prices are also going down, which is scary.
visit Bob Truman website:
http://www.bobtruman.com/Edmonton_SFH_stats/page_1918017.html
Karl,
Usually most of the high priced housing is sold in the first half of the year. Sales in general are higher in the 1st half of the year as is the greatest chance of price increases.
What’s unusual this year is the higher number of sales we’ve seen on the low end of the price scale since July when the announcement of suspension of the 0 down option. People that were wavering on rent vs own, that don’t have $15,000 to put down, were forced to fish or cut bait.
Sales will drop by lot come mid October, but prices will likely trend back to where we started the year at.
John that wasn’t me answering your post, it’s a very upset speculator trying to intimidate me.
This isn’t the first time he’s impersonated me and it won’t be the last time. Sheldon and Sarah could delete his posts if they wanted to because they know my email address vs his.
I think he’s a sorry speculator that doesn’t like hearing reality.
To funny but quite sad too.
Edmonton SFH stat’s page according to Bob Truman
http://www.bobtruman.com/Edmonton_SFH_stats/page_1918017.html
Just like those who are pleased with the current stock market crisis because they don’t have investments, people who rent are pleased when real estate retreats.
If it gets cheap enough here again, in-migration will pick up.
Well…hmm….
all I can say is this…I have my money spread…and I listen and read the comments here….so let me tell you this…
I lost some money on realestaete in Edmonton but I bought in 2005 so I am still way ahead of the curve….so the top of my investment condo was 260 K and now it is 220K and it might be 180K in a year…but it wont go down to the 120K I paid in 2005…
On the other hand I just lost this week 20K in stocks and mutual funds – my TD fund that was 18 dollars 3 months ago – today is worth 15 dollars per fund….that is a 17% drop in my portfolio….ooohhh…and its still droping – feel sorry for the guys who invested in Russian stocks …HAHAHAHA….sorry..HAHAHAHAHA
My advisor tells me to hang on for 3 years….and my reals estate guy says the same about the Condo….so tell me wise guys – since there seems to be quite a few here…what is the better option…real estate or investing
)…
I am beign a little melodramatic…but the dark clouds are gathering and if anyoen here knows where there is a safe heaven then TELL ME ….because my grandma always told me it was real estate….
Greg,
Short selling financials is a safe bet but unfortunately you don’t have that option.
If you ask me, the US dollar is overvalued so when it come down, investments in the other currencies, gold, oil, etc. should be a viable option.
What is better real estate or investing? Real estate because you have shelter.
What is better real estate, investing, or placing you cash in a bank?
I think in times like these a bank, but I have been wrong before.
One thing I do know is mutual funds are a rip off. iunits can be your own mutual fund without the MER
It’s all to do with timing, whether your investing in the stock market or the real estate market.
Buy low and sell high.
Brent, to sell high you need someone to buy. So who are all these people buying at the top and selling at the bottom?
George Soros said he got rich by not selling at the top. You have to think about it.
The reality is nobody really knows anything. My cousin is an investment banker in Europe. One time drunk he confessed that they don’t really know what they are doing.The brokers gamble with other peoples money. Realtors will never admit to a downward trend in real estate because then people would not trade. Realtors & brokers make thier money from activity. They don’t really care whether the market goes up or down. What they fear the most is that no-body will trade.
You are right the listing sold ration looks like it is holding.
Aloha,
Keahi
Richard,
I don’t even know how to answer such a stupid question.
You think life is over at the top or bottom of any market whether it be the stock market or real estate market?
Market’s peak and market’s bottom, someone sold and someone bought at the very top and someone sold and someone bought at the very bottom. Sheeesh.
It went right over your head didn’t it! You must be so embarrased.
Your attempt at a recovery is even weaker then your question Richard. LOL
Bob Truman’s site seems to support the assumption that quite a number of people are trying to get in under the wire with 0% down and 40 years, as still recently advocated by the Real Estate Weekly mortgage editorials
Hence the drop in the median price for single-family homes.
It also seems that sales at the high end of the price scale are rather slow, bringing down the average price.
On the condo side, with the median down but the average up, it looks like a few more expensive units sold.
Overall, we may end the month with the lowest number of condo sales since February, but single-family homes will be up compared to August.
Comfree’s report for August is finally available, but the format changed, so that month-to-month comparison is not readily available.
Although the report makes a big deal of the fact that properties that were priced “right” sold faster than the rest, there is no mention of the average sales price. It would be interesting to know by how much sellers had to reduce their price for it to be “right”.
I also noticed that the Comfree monthly update, which usually has lots of numbers and stats, was basically a farce. They gave no real information other than their usual warm fuzzy spin, however I heard they are really pushing their clients to use their “independent appraiser”. It’s no secret that during the boom that Comfree sellers were asking way too much and dreaming for a big pay day. I hear that Comfree now has much stricter rules for sellers as they don’t want private listings sitting on their site for months on end. An interesting note from their “montly release” is that they said they received lots of business from sellers who were unhappy with realtors. It seems that both Comfree and Realtors are still in the middle of their PR battle.
Why do realtors allow their clients to list on Comfree at the same time as they are listed on mls with the realtor? This is where you often see the pie in the sky in some sellers’ thinking. There’s a house I noticed that’s listed on both at the moment, and the Comfree asking price is 95K above the mls asking price. Sheesh.
Comfree absolutely does not allow this practice and will immediatly drop their sellers ad when its shown they are listed on the mls also, bo money refunded. If you know of a listing like this, comfree welcomes that information. I, too, have seen this done lately with a condo in Sherwood Park, and their was a significant price difference with the comfree listing higher. I don’t know what these people are trying to pull but it’s unethical and unfair to both the mls and comfree.
I read this site at least once a week and sometimes read the comments when I need a laugh…but I hate having to scroll through stuff I’ve read previously to see a new comment. To make this site a little more user friendly maybe you could reverse the comments with most recent appearing at the top.
Hello John
Thank-you for your email. The average price of a single family home is $411,305. Because this number isn’t derived from thousands of listings, we don’t feel the sample size was large enough to release for public information as it would suggest that the market has gone up substantially, and this is not true.
COMFREE
I have a hard time believing Comfree is the author of the last message
I am seeing the mrket stabalize in the 300k to 400k. We are seeing more interest now than we have seen in a year and a half. With the drop in interest rates the variable rate is as low as 4 percent and at these rates the mortgage payment is lower than rent.
We are currently not offering as steep discounts as we were just a couple of months ago.
I regularly check with other builders also and their blow out dicounts seem to be disappearing also.
At the lowest we sold our half duplexes for 287k..now the lowest is at 307k.
I see that one of the people I suggested to read this blog listed with Sheldon.
Sheldon took amazing pictures of the townhouse and there was a parade of realtors go thru that unit and was sold with in days.
I remember reading Sheldons article on the importance of taking good pictures, and boy did that work.
our company listed another unit with a realtor and was sold in hours also.
One of my client bought one of our re sale unit and paid over list for that unit.
I guess there is still a lot of inventory, but good properties listed at a good price are moving real fast.
To me buying in this market feels like that last shot of your favorite alcohol your buddy buys you at the bar at 2 am. In the moment, it makes you feel good and smile as your intoxication is enhanced. But deep down, you know that it was a mistake and you will pay for your excesses at some point in the near future. In the back of your mind you wonder how bad the hangover could be.
I sure don’t see SFH prices stabalizing. I actually see prices dropping in bigger increments from week to week now.
http://www.bobtruman.com/Edmonton_SFH_stats/page_1918017.html
Lou,
I e-mailed Comfree and that is what they wrote back about the reson for not showing us the stats this month
If the COMFREE email is authentic, something does not add up.
If the Sales stats are correct, the sample size in August was very close to that of July (190 vs 198)
COMFREE had no problem publishing average prices when the sample size was as low as 91, in December 2007. Since October 2007, Sales were below 190 five times, with published average prices for both single-family homes and condos.
When talking about Com free it is a problem that they will not allow you to put your listing on hold. I rented one of my places that was listed on Com free so I put the price up so no one would call. When I get a call I ask are you a Realtor they admit it after telling me my price is to low. I tell them if they can get me anywhere near the list price my tenants will move immediately as I would give them 10,000 to do so. The Realtors who phone you use the same script every time even for different houses. On Comfree if you do not wish to sell at the present time and not pay twice your only choice is to raise the price to a ridiculous level so as not to get any calls. A bad deal for me and buyers. At least a realtor will cancel a listing if they are reputable.