Here and there

According to the latest statistics from the Central Okanagan Real Estate Board, the market is showing healthy signs in the single family and town home products and stabilizing in lots, condos and mobiles month to month. Quite a different story from a year ago when inventory was much higher and sales much lower.

On closer inspection, residential sales year to date (Jan.—Oct.) increased a mere 3% over 2008 sales (1674 / 1622 units sold respectively) yet year to date the sales volume was down over that same time period by 6.5% ($770,588,736 / $823,915,072).

Unlike the significant 136% increase comparing October 2009 residential sales (215 units sold) with October 2008 (91 units sold) and an even heftier increase (143%) in volume ($102,320,744 / $42,063,828).

In comparison the condo market shows a completely different scenario. Condo sales to date in 2009 show a drop of just over 15% compared to the first 10 months of 2008 (639 / 755) and sales volume indicating a more substantial decrease of 25.5% ($162,822,128 / $218,739,200)… yet October 2009 over October 2008 paints a different story. Last month’s condo sales were up 115% over October of 2008 (73 / 34) and monthly sales volume up by 124% (18,858,052 / 8,421,400).

The sweet spot appears to be the townhouse market that is significantly up. Year to date sales show an increase of nearly 25% over 2008 (485 / 389) and a 12% increase in sales volume ($169,359,024 / $151,177,840). October of this year is overflowing with a 211% increase in townhouse unit sales (56 / 18) and a dramatic 254.5% increase in volume (20,153,750 / 5,684,300).

--Ron Marak Royal LePage Kelowna

--------------------

A total of 690,000 new vehicles were sold under the Cash for Clunkers program in the USA last summer, but only 125,000 of those were vehicles that would not have been sold anyway, according to an analysis released by the automotive Web site Edmunds.com.

Still, auto sales contributed heavily to the economy's expansion in the third quarter, adding 1.7 percentage points to the nation's gross domestic product growth.

The program gave car buyers rebates of up to $4,500 if Americans traded in less fuel-efficient vehicles for new vehicles that met certain fuel economy requirements. A total of $3 billion was allotted for those rebates.

The average rebate was $4,000. But the overwhelming majority of sales would have taken place anyway at some time in the last half of 2009, according to Edmunds.com. That means the government ended up spending about $24,000 each for those 125,000 additional vehicle sales.

In order to determine whether these sales would have happened anyway, Edmunds.com analysts looked at sales of luxury cars and other vehicles not included under the Clunkers program.

Using traditional relationships between sales volumes of those vehicles and the types of vehicles sold under Cash for Clunkers, Edmunds.com projected what sales would normally have been during the Cash for Clunkers period and in the weeks after.

The whole purpose of the program was to provide some kind of catalyst to kick-start the economy, and by all accounts the extra production that was added this year was a boost to the economy.

--------------------

Nearly half of British workers say mid-morning on Tuesday is the moment when they feel most stressed at work, a study suggests.

Polled were 3,000 adults and the study found most workers coast through Monday getting their brain in gear and catching up with gossip from the weekend through social networking sites.

But everything comes to a head at 11:45 AM.

Tuesday at 11:45 AM seems to be the time in the day when the real workload for the week hits employees and as a result stress levels rise. The study also revealed Tuesday as the day when workers are most likely to work through their lunch break due to the realization they have a busy week ahead.

More than 53 per cent of those polled admitted cruising through Monday and one in 10 said they further delayed their tasks for the week by logging onto Facebook to view photos from their weekend antics.

Almost one in five employees will leave the office late on a Tuesday as they work after hours to salvage their week after putting in a poor effort the day before.

Over half of Brits also said they regularly felt stressed at work with the average employee experiencing eight hours of mental or emotional strain during a typical week.

Worryingly, nearly a quarter (23 per cent) of people said they felt stressed every day. About the same number also blamed heavy workloads, and one in five said stress was simply part of their job.

More than one in 10 (12 per cent) admitted it was their boss who caused them tension in the office and nine percent blamed their colleagues.

Okay what do we do now? I have convinced myself that Monday and Friday are bad days and now I have to include Tuesdays? What does that give me, two days to get everything done?