Week 30 – Market Update
Overview

The keyword of the week is consistency. For the most part, the pattern established over the course of the last month has held fairly firm for the Vancouver real estate market.

Sales are hovering at similar levels across the city for just about all housing types. At the same time, we are seeing inventory levels increase but not alarmingly.

The most significant strength is still seen in East Vancouver houses where this past week saw 50% of sales over the asking price.

Vancouver West (Westside)

Westside detached homes had another week of steady sales. Meanwhile, listing inventory rose but new listings did not flood the market. With the median price exceeding the average price for the first time this year, it indicates that for this particular week there was significantly more sales activity at the lower end of the price scale.

Meanwhile, Westside Apartments had their strongest week of the year with 49 sales (the previous high was 44). Inventory still rose...

Week 29 – Market Update
Overview

The “spring” market continues so far this summer in Vancouver,.

Overall, listings rose in just about every category across the city this past week. New listings continued to come onto the market as sellers confidence has increased in recent weeks…but the pace of new listings slowed somewhat over the previous week.

Meanwhile, sales numbers remained at the higher levels we saw in the last couple of weeks.

At this point, I think it’s safe to put any concerns about the CMHC lending rule changes behind us. This makes two consecutive weeks of solid sales number AFTER these rules came into effect.

Vancouver West (Westside)

The Westside remains the geographic division that is seeing a slower recovery.

In particular, houses on the westside are not seeing the market surge seen in East Vancouver. Listings are increasing as elsewhere in the city, but sales have not yet recovered to pre-COVID levels (albeit sales were faster this past week...

Week 28 – Market Update
Overview

The market continues to behave more like the early spring than summer. That seems somewhat appropriate given the weather in recent weeks…but it’s not typical of this time of year.

This week saw a rise in inventory levels as well as (mostly) increasing sales. New listings coming onto the market saw a bigger jump than in recent weeks. Some segments of the market had the highest sales numbers of the year in the past week (such as East Vancouver houses).

This first full week after CMHC lending rules came into effect July 1st appears to indicate sales numbers were NOT artificially inflated by this change.

Vancouver West (Westside)

On the Westside the market is flashing some signals of weakness. Houses in particular have struggled in the last couple of weeks with inventory rising, sales numbers shrinking (for two consecutive weeks) and days on market growing.

Similar weakness is showing for apartments as well as townhouses but not as significantly....

Summary

The rebounding trend that began in May continued in June.

Every indicator (except price) moved in a positive direction this past month.

Sales were up nearly 60% from last month (and almost 19% from the previous year). While new listings matched that pace up 60% over last month, TOTALl listings increased only 10% over the previous month (and -25% from the previous year).

In hindsight, it appears that the market saw an ebb in activity levels in mid-April. The trend that I’ve been noticing in my review of the weekly real estate statistics, is that nearly every week since has seen improvements in activity.

It would appear that both buyers and sellers are becoming more and more comfortable in our current environment. Messaging from government has helped to shape sentiment, but also efforts by realtors to make the entire buying or selling process safer have helped.

Parting Thoughts

I do want to point out that we are seeing an unusually disparate market. Some pockets are incredibly...

Week 27 – Market Update
Overview

Mostly, the last week saw the trends we’ve been following in the last few weeks continue. Inventory levels are levelling while sales continue to increase.

As I mentioned last week, we do need to put this activity in perspective. While sales are up, they are NOT at normal levels for this time of year…and are generally hovering around the levels we were seeing just prior to pandemic in the early spring.

I believe that the boost in sales we’ve seen MAY be due to buyers trying to get deals completed prior to new lending rules coming into effect on July 1st. The next few weeks will be telling in that regard.

Vancouver West (Westside)

Of note on the Westside, is that all categories saw a drop in inventory. Sales didn’t increase much, if at all…but they held firm across the board. The one exception to this was for Westside houses where sales fell from 25 the week before to 18 this past week.

I also found the rise and divergence...