I took a look a the housing market in August and our expectation in the coming years. Last time I expected that the condos and townhouses would be in demand as the only practical alternative in today’s housing market.
This graph shows residential property sales in Greater Vancouver over the past 4 Septembers.
The number of apartment sales, and the number of townhouse sales, have been remarkably consistent for the period shown, with a small dip in 2016.*
But the number of house sales has fallen quite a bit in the last couple of years.
At the same time, the total number of homes listed for sale has risen slightly (up just 1.2% from the end of September a year ago).
Interestingly, Benchmark house prices are holding quite steady in spite of the lower sales volume, up only 2.9% in a year, while townhouses are up almost 15% and apartments up well over 20%.
See my posting last month for more details on these two distinct housing markets in Greater Vancouver.
NOTE that these stats from the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver do not include sales or pre-sales of new condos sold direct by developers, bypassing the MLS® system. Benchmark prices of a “typical” home.
