2007 Housing Year a Roller-Coaster

Edmonton, January 3, 2007: In the beginning of 2007 housing prices continued to climb just like the year before but by mid-year the market had turned and prices cooled as the housing inventory quadrupled. Year end figures released by the REALTORS® Association of Edmonton reveal the largest swings ever experienced in the local market. Despite the roller-coaster-like rises and falls, the market still ended up 12% ahead of last year’s prices.

“REALTORS® were assisting sellers to handle multiple offers and unbelievable short sales periods for the first half of the year,” said Carolyn Pratt, President of the REALTORS® Association. “The summer it was a buyers market with ten homes available for every buyer.” The sudden changes in market conditions made both buyers and sellers anxious and increased their dependence on solid market advice from their REALTOR®. “Now the market seems to have stabilized and returned to what we call normal,” said Pratt.

PRICES

Single family dwellings listed on the Multiple Listing Service® which sold on January 1 for $341,933 on average* were priced at $382,022 at the end of December. Although 11.7% higher than a year ago the December prices were off 11.5% from the peak prices in May. December prices were 1.5% higher than November 2007.

Condominiums on MLS® sold on average for $253,270 in December after starting the year at $227,428. They peaked in July at $271,908. Condo prices were also up 11.4% over the year and up 0.4% from last month. Duplex/rowhouse prices jumped 4.0% from $295,178 last December to $306,967 in December 2007. Duplex/rowhouse prices peaked in October at $367.964.
Despite price decreases in the last few months, year-over-year prices were up. The average residential sales price (which includes all types of residential property) was up 1.5% from last month at $329,705 and up 12.1% when compared to last December prices.

SALES

“The rapidly increases in housing costs forced more first-time buyers to consider the lower priced condominiums,” said Pratt. “As a result there has been a continuous increase in condominium sales in the past five years.” Total condo sales of 7,157 units in 2007 were up 6% from 2006 when 6,761 units were sold.

At the same time Single Family Dwelling sales on 2007 dropped back to 11,765 units sold. Sales of SFDS were higher in each of the past three years. SFDs now represent 69% of total residential sales as compared to 27% (up from 23% last year) for condos.

Total sales (including residential, commercial and rural sales) through the MLS® in 2008 were 23,333 units with a value of over $8.2 billion (up from $6.6 billion in 2006).

In December the residential sales to listing ratio was 62% with 1,388 listings and 857 sales. For the year there were 41,030 residential listings with 20,544 sales for a S/L ratio of just 50%. The average days-on-market at the end of December was 56 days with 7,094 residential units in inventory in the wider Edmonton market.

Despite the wildly dynamic nature of the market in the past 24 months, the number of REALTORS® (i.e. members of the Association) increased through the year from 3,104 to 3,241 which indicates some optimism in the market potential.