Residential sales on par with 2015 activity – but prices way higher than even 2016
Greater Victoria saw 790 property sales in July, 751 of which were residential units, according to new data released by the Victoria Real Estate Board (VREB) August 1.
This is a drop in home sales of more than 18% compared with in July 2016, and nearly 22% lower than June this year. However, the board said it considered this to be a good showing for July, which is typically a slow month for real estate sales. This July’s sales are similar to activity seen in July 2015, which at the time was considered a very hot market. See a detailed infographic of July's VREB stats.
“The activity level in the Victoria real estate market continues to be brisk, though we always expect a slowdown in the summer months,” said Ara Balabanian, VREB’s 2017 president. “We anticipated at the beginning of the year that we would see another busy market – without the record-breaking numbers we saw in 2016 – and we are seeing exactly that.”
The “brisk” activity was particularly evident in the condo market, where many units sold in multiple-offer situations and the benchmark price jumped by nearly 3% in a single month, reaching a new record at $433,200.
VREB July 2017 Body
There were 1,921 properties listed for sale (all property types) at the end of July 2017, an increase of 0.3% since June, but 11.1% lower than the 2,161 active listings at the end of July 2016.
Balabanian said, “The surprise has been the low inventory levels, with listings for sale consistently below 2,000. The good news is that compared to the start of the year we have 26.7% more listings on the market, but that supply is still lower than we expected, which puts pressure on pricing and availability.”
Home Type Breakdown
Some 359 detached homes within the Greater Victoria area changed hands in July, which is 20% lower than in July 2016 and 24.6% down from June this year.
Townhome sales dropped 14.9% year over year to 80 units – a monthly decline of 12.1% compared with June.
After a very busy June, condo sales dropped 20.8% month over month to 243 units. However, this property type fared best on an annual basis, at 10.3% lower than July 2016’s condo sales.
Balabanian added, “This July, we saw a strong focus on the lower priced end of the market, with condos and townhomes and single family homes listed for under $700,000 in high demand. Many of those properties saw multiple-offer situations.”
VREB Tease Out Stat July 2017
July’s MLS® Home Price Index benchmark price for a detached house in the Greater Victoria area was $700,800, which is 15.5% higher than a year ago and 1.4% up since the previous month.
The price of a typical Greater Victoria condo has leaped by 23.7% year over year to stand at $433,200 as of July 2017 – a rise of 2.9% in a single month since June this year.
As happened the previous month, Greater Victoria townhome prices in July were considerably up from a year previously, rising 14.4% to $542,200, but declined again on a month-over-month basis, this time by 0.3% since June.
Home sales and prices vary widely throughout the Greater Victoria region. For detailed information, go to the full July 2017 VREB statistics package.
