Vancouver home prices keep rising in Oct 2009
REBGV release – Strong demand has led to a steady rise in Greater Vancouver home prices compared to last year.
Over the last 12 months, the MLSLink® Housing Price Index (HPI) benchmark price for all residential properties in Greater Vancouver increased 6.8% to $553,702 from $518,668 in October 2008.
“While home prices have been rising in 2009, they have not eclipsed the peaks reached in early 2008,” Scott Russell, Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV) president said. “We’re coming off several months of unseasonably high sales levels, which has allowed for a gradual increase in home values this year,”
The REBGV reports that residential property sales in Greater Vancouver totalled 3,704 in October 2009, an increase of 4.1% from the 3,559 sales recorded in September 2009, and an increase of 171.6% compared to October 2008 when 1,364 sales were recorded. Looking back two years, last month’s sales increased 22.3% compared to October 2007 when 3,028 sales were recorded.
“High confidence and low mortgage rates are continuing to drive the activity we’re seeing in the housing market today,” Russell said.
New listings for detached, attached and apartment properties in Greater Vancouver totalled 4,977 in October 2009. This represents a 2.3% increase compared to October 2008 when 4,867 new units were listed, and a 13.4% decline compared to September 2009 when 5,764 properties were listed on the Multiple Listing Service® (MLS®) in Greater Vancouver.
At 12,084, the total number of property listings on the MLS® decreased 4.1% in October compared to last month and declined 37% from this time last year.
Sales of detached properties increased 201.6% to 1,487 from the 493 detached sales recorded during the same period in 2008. The benchmark price, as calculated by the MLSLink Housing Price Index®, for detached properties increased 7.7% from October 2008 to $749,808.
Sales of apartment properties in October 2009 increased 148.4% to 1,607, compared to 647sales in October 2008. The benchmark price of an apartment property increased 6.3% from October 2008 to $380,975.
Attached property sales in October 2009 are up 172.3% to 610, compared with the 224 sales in October 2008. The benchmark price of an attached unit increased 4.6% between Octobers 2008 and 2009 to $468,798.
The Vancouver Real Estate Archive is a website where stories reflecting action or sentiment in the Vancouver RE market are collected. The site is designed to add to the RE discussion going on at blogs such as ‘Chinese in Vancouver’.
Please take a look at the site, and, if you can, post an interesting RE-related story either at the site (http://vreaa.wordpress.com/) or via e-mail to vreaa (vreaa@hotmail.com)