The September sales number in Metro Vancouver were 1.7% below the 10-year average. That is pretty close to “normal” and a vast improvement over last year. A 46.3% improvement to be exact.
This probably signals that the worse of the price drop is over; however, I don’t expect a quick bounce back in price unless a lot of Canadians return from Hong Kong.
The inventory has not changed much. 2.7% more when compared to September 2018 and 0.3% more when compared to last month.
The sales-to-active listings ratios have been the same for about 3 months now but while prices stopped dropping last month for condos and townhouses, the trend has reversed this month. For September the sales-to-active listings ratios were 12.7% for detached homes, 18.9% for townhomes and 21.9% for apartments. A balanced market is considered between 12% and 20%. A higher ratio means a more bullish market. The benchmark price of an apartment property and attached homes declined 0.4% and 0.6% respectively compared to last month, while the benchmark price for detached homes is virtually unchanged.
October is usually the last busy month of the year. Sales volumes and new listings usually falls significantly afterwards. Realtors know this and will urge clients to take existing offers if they want to sell the property this year. As such, I expect good sales volume and still lower benchmark prices this month.
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