Vancouver Real Estate Statistics – August 2009 | Vancouver Real Estate Blog

Monthly Vancouver MLS Statistics - August 2009

Another Record Month

It appears as though the summer of 2009 has been a good one in the Vancouver real estate market. June and July saw a record number of sales following shortly what was the slowest month ever recorded in January 2009. While August didn’t break a record, it certainly held it’s own against the strong months seen from 2003 – 2007.

For the second month in a row we saw sales dip on a month-to-month comparison. The City of Vancouver saw sales fall (-11%) from 1327 to 1181. As I reported last month, this decline is to be expected in the slower months of July and August. At the same time, sales were up significantly (+138.59%) over August 2008.

Listings are also down on a month-to-month basis (-7.26%) from 1612 down to 1495. I expect that we shall begin to see more new listings come onto the market with the beginning of the fall real estate market after the Labour Day long weekend.

Shrinking supply (new listings) and steady demand (sales) have been putting significant upward pressure on prices. All housing types are up across the board on a month-to-month basis and we are actually seeing a number of categories where they are up over the year ago period. I suspect that we shall see this continue and you will be hearing a lot about this once the general media catches on (in March Westside houses were down 22% and they are now up 2.87%).

The official line

“The return of confidence to our market has brought a high volume of home sales over the last few months and has also made determining home prices a little more challenging,” said Scott Russell, REBGV president. “The number of residential home sales this summer has been comparable to activity seen in the five years preceeding 2008. While that’s great news, from the variations in activity we’re seeing across areas I’d say the market is still trying to find its own balance.”

The numbers

There was a drop in sales (-11%) for the second time in the last six months. Year-over-year sales were up (+138.59%). There were 1181 sales in August 2009 versus just 495 in August 2008.

New listings also dropped (-7.26%) on a month-to-month basis. There were 1495 new listings in August compared to the 1612 in July 2009. Year-over-year there was a slight rise (+5.95%) from 1411 in August 2008 to 1495 in August 2009. The Sell/List ratio fell to 79% (from 82.32%).

Active listings fell for the sixth straight month to 3069. This is down month-to-month (-4.57%) as well as year-over-year (-44.75%). This is once again another new annual low for active listings.

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