According to a recent report by the REALTORS® Association of Edmonton, the local housing market remains active. There were 1,089 sales in the Greater Edmonton Area in February, compared to 1153 last year and 921 last month. As we know from our report on Friday, affordable single family homes make up the strongest segment of the market.
Our agents are finding it that is tough to find much to show buyers in the current market. Last week we tried to show a home in the west end – it was the first day the home was on the market, and when we got there we were 5th in line to get in. By the time we finished showing it, there were already offers written on the property. I think if the inventory was higher we’d see a lot more sales right now, as there are certainly plenty of people interested in buying in Edmonton at the moment.
Edmonton Real Estate Sales
The overall residential average sale price jumped in February by 4.3% over January to $342,735. This is up from $333k last year. The median sale price also rose to $326,940 from $320k last year and $315k last month.
Average Residential Sale Price
The available inventory is lower than we’ve seen for at least five years and currently sits at 4,183 listings.
President Darrell Cook said: “As usual, sales activity will continue to increase as we move into spring. The inventory of available homes has increased and we expect hesitant sellers to come onto the market in the face of continuing strong prices.”
Inventory
The number of new listings were also quite low in February at 1995, down from 2249 last year.
New Listings
Perhaps the low vacancy rate is part of the reason we are not seeing as many new listings as we would typically see at this time of year. It is very easy to rent your property out for a good rate in the current market, so many owners have probably locked themselves into leases for the near term.
About Sara MacLennan
Sara MacLennan is the Director of Marketing at Liv Real Estate and a licensed Real Estate Associate. The bulk of Sara’s experience and wealth of expertise lies in on-line technology and marketing both for agents and consumers. Sara is the former National Director for Interactive Marketing for Coldwell Banker Canada where she was responsible for an extensive training program traveling to offices across the country training agents and brokers on marketing and technology. Find Sara on Twitter @edmontonblogger.
Client Testimonial for Justin Tazi
Client Testimonial for Bill Bhamra
Client Testimonial for Mira Wannous
Client Testimonial for Nathan Mol 
Client Testimonial for Nathan Mol 
Client Testimonial for Travis Dochuk
Client Testimonial for Beverley Hasinoff
Client Testimonial for Beverley Hasinoff
Client Testimonial for Richard Widynowski
Client Testimonial for Bill Bhamra
Client Testimonial for Mira Wannous
Client Testimonial for Beverley Hasinoff
Client Testimonial for Richard Widynowski
Client Testimonial for Justin Tazi
Client Testimonial for Sheldon Johnston
Client Testimonial for Bill Bhamra
Client Testimonial for Tracy Vipond
Client Testimonial for Justin Tazi
Client Testimonial for Nathan Mol 
Client Testimonial for Bill Bhamra
Ok, if there is a shortage of supply and strong demand, prices should be rising quite dramatically and soon.
The only way they wont is if the demand is “elastic”. That is, the demand has options….or is price sensitive.
I figure there are a ton of houses in Edmonton whos owners figure are “worth” 500k plus. …but the market is willing to pay way less for.
Maybe the recent arrivals are ok paying $2500 a month for a house the owner thinks is worth $450 000 .
Anyway, if prices dont bump soon Edmonton is one strange strange place.
Maybe showing up in builders numbers? Wonder if they are raising prices?
I really only have a couple of acquaintances that work in the new home builder market and I don’t get to talk to them as much as I used to. You’re right though. You would expect price pressure somewhere if there’s a shortage of listings.
Oh, don’t worry. The builders will be there to flood the market with their crap houses as soon as there’s any sign of prices moving up.
You guys don’t think a 4% jump in one month is evidence of prices rising?
Fair enough. Normal seasonal price action may be part of it. The more interesting one is y/y of around 3% increase. I would like to see a few months of y/y increases before saying it’s a trend.
Itchy… I can go along with that!
When you say a 5% jump in one month, do you mean the actual monthly jump X 12 months=5%, or do you mean an actaul increase of $5000 per $100,000 in one month? The reason I ask is I am waiting to sell a house and have not seen the list price of similar houses go up since 2008. Maybe it is because of the area of town it is in, which is Beacon Heights.
I took this month’s average, minus last month’s average, divide by last month’s average and multiple by 100. We are also up on a year over year basis (which is really more telling than month over month). Either way, just because the average goes up or down doesn’t mean every home goes up or down in value, you have to look at recent comparable sales and listings to find your value.
More importantly, Rob, is to find out if the average PRICE PER SQUARE FOOT went up or not. Averages can move up or down wildly depending on whether one huge house sold that month or a number of condemned dumps were sold.
Price per square foot is important, but as always averages are dangerous. The larger the home, the lower the price per square foot (in general). So if the average size of homes sold changes, you can’t directly compare the average price per square foot.
Re price per sf:
As the size go up, so is the price per sf. Typically a new 4000 sf house would cost you $1.2M (including lot), which is $300/sf. If you go up further, it could be as much as $500/sf. The reason is that these houses typically have lots with views and better materials, such as concrete tile roofs.
On the other extreme, small bungalows in old areas have high price per sf. 1000 sf’er in Belgravia can fetch $400~$500/sf.
It’s the middle of the pack that’s the cheapest. Typically $450k for a 2200sf house that’s 20 years old. Turns out to be rougly $200/sf.
You’re right. I just did a quick search and found the average price per square foot for single family homes sold under $500k for the past 60 days is $253, for over $500k it’s $283 and for over $750k it’s $339/square foot.
Resale condo prices are still 30 to 40 percent below their 2007 peaks. This means this is still a real estate market in decline. If you look at mls inventory is expanding not contracting. Sales are not keeping pace with the expanding inventory. This is still a market in decline.
BMO is offering a super 5-year mortgage rate, but of course our esteemed leaders can’t allow the market to work. They have to get their dirty fingers into everything and are now thinking up ways to kill the property market in Canada, in spite of banks like BMO trying to help homeowners get attractive rates.
Relax. Bank is the government.
Some people (like Mark Carney) always talk the talk. But that’s about it.
Good point.
Bank = Gov’t
Gov’t = Bank.
I knew that already. In fact, it’s common knowledge. Just wasn’t thinking…
IMO, the reason why Mark Carney and others keep saying the Canadian house market is overpriced has very deep political roots.
As a (former) bank chief, it’s very easy to curb rising housing prices. Just raise the interest rate by 3%. And the work is done.
Question #1: why don’t they act to correct the situation, when they say it’s an issue? That’s because a rise of interest will damage the manufacturing sector in Ontario.
Question #2: why would banks prefer to lend to individuals to buy or even speculate on houses, rather than to the manufacturing sector? That’s because banks are not dumb, they believe the risk of mortgage is much lower than cooperate loans, especially those in the manufacturing sector.
Conclusion: the low interest rate was meant to “bail out” the aging manufacturing sector from foreign competition. But it has the unintended consequence of buffing the housing market. Politician will then just talk the talk, in an effort to scare away people without actually doing anything.
link to ctvnews.ca
Actually an interest rate hike would have an impact on the value of our currency…our dollar would go down. This would actually help our manufacturing sector. A high dollar is what’s impacting the manufacturing sector, not interest rates.
An interest rate hike will cause our dollar to go up.
GM is correct!