Dollar volume in October down 54 per cent from a year ago
Sun
VANCOUVER – The British Columbia Real Estate Association is reporting that residential sales dollar volume on the Multiple Listing…
VANCOUVER – The British Columbia Real Estate Association is reporting that residential sales dollar volume on the Multiple Listing Service declined 54 per cent in B.C. to $1.69 billion in October, compared to October 2007.
Residential unit sales were down 51 per cent to 4,018 units during the same period. The average MLS residential price in the province was $420,259, down 6.5 per cent from October 2007.
“Housing demand was negatively affected by the global financial crisis and a sharp downturn in the equity markets,” said Cameron Muir, BCREA Chief Economist in a news release. “These events exacerbated an already low level of consumer confidence, keeping many potential homebuyers on the sidelines.”
Residential sales in October were the lowest since December 2000, on a seasonally adjusted basis. “Home sales are unlikely to fall much further,” added Muir. “While the provincial economy has weakened, the fundamentals support a higher level of home sales than experienced last month.”
Year-to-date MLS residential sales dollar volume in the province declined 27 per cent to $29.2 billion compared to the same period last year. Provincial MLS sales declined 30 per cent to 63,760 units, while the average residential price increased 5 per cent to $458,078 over the same period.
Meanwhile, the Canadian Real Estate Association reported Friday that the number of properties sold through MLS across Canada declined in October.
Seasonally adjusted residential MLS sales activity in all markets numbered 32,048 units in October 2008, the lowest level for monthly activity since July 2002, the association said in a news release.
“This is down 14 per cent from sales levels recorded in
September, and the largest month-over-month decline in seasonally adjusted sales activity since June 1994,” the association said.
“Many homebuyers across Canada battened down the hatches in October as they were concerned with dire headlines about stock market volatility and a global economic downturn,” CREA chief economist Gregory
Klump said in a news release. “Elimination of mortgage default insurance availability for purchases with less than a five per cent down
payment and for amortizations beyond thirty-five years also likely played a lesser role in the decline in sales activity.”
Activity was down from levels recorded in September in more than three quarters of Canadian housing markets,
including the five most active major markets: Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, and Edmonton. Fewer
sales in Toronto accounted for nearly one third of the decline in national MLS sales activity.
“The breadth and depth of the drop in MLS activity suggests a major downshift in consumer psychology”
Klump said in the release. “And that has moved many homebuyers to the sidelines until economic news begins to improve.”
“The gap between national sales activity and the number of new listings is at its widest since 1990,” Klump added.
“This situation is unlikely to persist for long. New listings will decline, which will stabilize the market.”