Blog

A Record-Breaking Month for Canadian Housing Markets

With COVID-19 restrictions being lifted across Canada, home buyers and sellers have been busy! National home sales and new listings have continued to increase since June, with July seeing more home sales across Canada than any other month in the history of the Canadian Real Estate Association’s (CREA) database–which dates back more than 40 years! 

Download our July 2020 market snapshot.

As encouraging as the increased activity may be, it’s important to note we may be seeing a rush of activity held back by the previous COVID-19 restrictions.

As always, we will keep you posted! Check back next month for our August 2020 market snapshot or look back to last month’s update.

And don’t forget, contact a REALTOR® for detailed information about your neighbourhood and its price trends.

Home prices won’t recover from COVID for at least 2 years: CMHC

TORONTO — Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. officials said Tuesday they expect real estate prices won’t return to pre-recession levels until late 2022 at the earliest.

The housing agency also cautioned that the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is unpredictable and beyond its worst-case estimates prior to the outbreak.

CMHC routinely does stress tests to estimate what could happen under various severe conditions, but chief executive Evan Siddall said the stress tests focus on what’s considered to be “plausible” scenarios.

“We did, back in January, look at a pandemic scenario that was not as severe as this,” Siddall said in a teleconference to discuss CMHC’s annual financial report for 2019.

Continue reading →

Is the bustling Salmon Arm real estate market over?

Hardly likely! With growth rate of 9.25% in 2017 alone it is the fastest growing community in British Columbia.
Cosens Team states that Salmon Arm City building department figures for July 2018 show that 79 building permits have been issued for single family residences so far this year. This is up from 73 last year which was a record year for Salmon Arm. The city also up to July has issued permits for eight buildings, consisting of 27 units. Also 67 permits were issued for additions to single family homes. The value of building permits issued by the end of July totalled $37,540,412. Cosens Team exclaims that it is the most Salmon Arm City has seen for this time of year since 2008. Also remarkably exceeding the total issued for the entire 2015. The value throughout the Salmon Arm /Shuswap area is highly desirable says the Cosens Team. Our Real Estate boards buyers survey of August 2018 reveals that 20.50% of our current buyers are from the lower mainland. With record housing prices on the coast folks are getting tired of the growing traffic congestion as well the feeling that there neighbourhoods just don’t feel the way they did, twenty years ago. They are feeling the need to slow down and enjoy a more peaceful living environment especially the Baby Boomers. Salmon Arm, with the extraordinarily beautiful Shuswap Lake at their doorstep, (#1 Boating Lake in Canada) fits the bill. Not to mention price differential between the two area’s. Cosens Team explains that the reason Salmon Arm is popular is that we have plenty of Doctors, unlike a lot of other urban areas of the province, as well low taxes and a low crime rate. Salmon Arm is well known to be one of the best places to retire in all of Canada. Our second greatest migration is from Alberta (11.91%). A great many Albertans vacation in our lush area and now upon retirement want to live in paradise. In closing the Cosens Team exclaim all you have to do is drive around this beautiful community with all of its incredible lake view properties and marvel at all the high end developments/homes being built. Salmon Arm is growing and you couldn’t live in a more beautiful community in all of Canada.