232696
232902
BC  

Housing sales cool

After an active summer, house sales cooled in the Okanagan-Shuswap over the month of September.

But sales of all MLS property types in September 2015 remained relatively strong despite a slight cooling trend, according to the Okanagan Mainline Real Estate Board.

“Most sectors in the Okanagan-Shuswap saw a very active summer,” says Christopher Miller, OMREB President.

“While housing demand in our board area has slowed down over the last week or two, sales activity remains relatively strong and seems to be extending into fall.”

According to the OMREB, with B.C. being “the economic growth leader among provinces” and mortgage rates remaining at historical lows, high consumer confidence continues to bolster the demand for homes in the Okanagan-Shuswap.

“The inventory of homes for sale remains at low levels with essentially no significant upward momentum over the past few months,” Miller said.

Within the OMREB’s three markets – Central Okanagan, North Okanagan, and Shuswap-Revelstoke areas – sales activity and prices, and supply and demand tend to vary among property types at different times and locations, with ups and downs experienced zone-by-zone and month-by-month.

“The Central Okanagan and Shuswap markets continue to strengthen and see an improvement year-to-date over last year.  The North Okanagan outpaced these zones with a vigorous run up of sales activity in 2014 and also saw relatively strong sales activity during 2015, but has lagged behind last year’s pace,” says Miller.

Overall sales of all property types reported in OMREB’s board area (Peachland to Revelstoke) during September 2015 dipped 9.7 per cent compared to 2014 (to 785 units from 869), but rose 3.6 per cent year-to-date (to 7,001 from 6,760).

Board-wide, total residential sales for the month slipped 8.5 per cent over last year at this time (at 714 units from 780), while year-to-date sales improved by 5.4 per cent compared to 2014 (to 6,407 units from 6,077).

Single family home sales across the board were down 11.9 per cent compared to September 2014 (to 355 from 403) while year-to-date sales were up 4.2 per cent (at 3,361 from 3,226).

The average number of days to sell a single family home in September was at 94 days board-wide, compared to 99 days at this time last year.

Year-to-date, homes are selling within 89 days compared to 104 days during the same period in 2014 (January through September).

The 1,301 new listings taken board-wide for the month were up 5.1 per cent compared to the 1,238  listings posted in September 2014, while inventory (active listings) dipped slightly (0.1 per cent) to 7,266 from 7,273 last year at this time.

COMMENTS WELCOME

Comments are pre-moderated to ensure they meet our guidelines. Approval times will vary. Keep it civil, and stay on topic. If you see an inappropriate comment, please use the ‘flag’ feature. Comments are the opinions of the comment writer, not of Castanet. Comments remain open for one day after a story is published and are closed on weekends. Visit Castanet’s Forums to start or join a discussion about this story.



More BC News

229228