Happy February! We have made it through January and we are seeing a lot more people out looking for homes than we saw in December and the preceding months. The buyers are not necessarily buying but are definitely looking! The weather is warmer than expected and the number of buyers are higher than expected....so the groundhog may be right: we may be seeing an early Spring market. The impact ...

Happy New Year! As anyone who has been following real estate is likely aware, 2023 was a rapidly changing year in our market...it was slightly sluggish at the beginning of the year; sales took off for the Spring; activity plummeted over the Summer and Fall as the impact of the many interest rate hikes finally took hold. Rates were higher than we had seen in a decade; sales were much lower than the ...

As mentioned in the last newsletter, the usually robust Fall Market has failed to materialize this year. Many sellers have listed their homes for sale and had their homes either fail to sell or they have received lower offers than they expected. In the latter case, while some sellers have taken the offers and moved on as planned, many have taken their homes off the market. Some savvy buyers h ...

In August we saw what we expect in the summer: not much in the way of activity. Although our part of the world is gorgeous in the summer, many people leave town or spend their time at the beach. Few are paying attention to real estate. While the numbers below may be a bit misleading (they say "UP" a lot) that is because they are comparisons with last year's even slower August. While increases ...

Since the beginning of 2023, there have been a lot more buyers in the market than there have been sellers. This resulted in a substantial number of homes selling at great prices, often with multiple offers. This was in contrast to last fall where some of the same houses were not seeing any activity. By early this year buyers seemed to have recovered from the shock of higher interest rates and ...

In this newsletter last month, I noted that we were experiencing low home listing numbers and high demand AND that prices had started to inch up from where they had been. This upward price trend, while not dramatic, has continued in April. While most home prices were still not at peak levels (and in some areas still a LOT less than peak) there were also many selling at or close to where they ...

Did you know that the best times to sell a home in our area are from the end of January to the end of June and from the second week of September to the middle of December?This applies even to waterfront homes; while people often think the hot weather helps sell waterfront homes, the good weather actually lowers the demand for ALL types of homes. Many buyers are on vacation NOT looking at hous ...

The Real Estate Clock: What time is it in our Market?  Homes are selling slowly...prices continue to trend downward As mentioned in January's newsletter, last year we transitioned from one of the hottest real estate markets in history to one of the slowest. We have seen yet another interest rate increase last month and that has added to the significant declines in sales volume and prices we h ...

A lot happened last year: we transitioned from one of the hottest real estate markets in history to one of the slowest. We also saw at the end of last year andthis month, various legal changes designed to assist renters and home buyers. Please see last month's newsletter for information on those legal changes HERE December housing numbers Interest rates and lack of buyer confidence continue ...

The tax assessments are out and they are, as the BC Assessment Office warned in the news last month, higher than what homes will sell for (market value) in most cases.  Receiving a high assessed value leads some property owners to believe that their homes are worth more than they could sell for in today's market. I have had some clients calling and they cannot believe their homes would sell a ...