Quote:
Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates
Do you have any stats to back this up? I don't follow the Calgary numbers too closely, but can't see this being true. Maybe 1-3% down from last year at most.
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http://www.housepriceindex.ca/Default.aspx
This is an interesting site I've just started checking out, I haven't looked at it a lot yet, so it may not be that good.
I've seen a lot of different stats. While I'm not really interested in revealing all the details of my life on a message board, (if I wanted to I'd login under my real name and have a facebook page
) I deal with housing sales/prices etc everyday at work.
I was actually just on a realtor's page (Jim Sparrow I think) and I believe he had stated that prices are down 7-9% over last year. But I guess it depends where you go for info and exactly what time frame you are dealing with. I've seen info that says a 3% reduction. If you go to Bob Truman's page (he is a realtor) up to date it looks like a 3% reduction over last year. But if you go back a few months (april) it looks like the market is down about 10% over the previous year. What I see daily looks higher than 3%, but I'm not interested in getting into a an argument/discussion about stats.
Imo it's too early to tell if the sales that occurred this summer are higher than they should be. These low interest rates may be skewing the data a little bit. I can't recall where I was reading (Maybe Bob Truman's page) that if we were in a normal market, our inventory combined with these low interest rates would drive prices up. This isn't really happening at least not by a large margin. Is it really a strong market? Or are first time buyers taking advantage of historically low interest rates, and buying during a typically busy time in the market? I guess we will find out in the fall, if sales and prices increase or decrease.
I think every post I have in this thread says to wait until fall/winter to see what happens....
It could be that first time buyers are taking advantage, buying their properties during a hot time. If sales fall off more than normal it would suggest that people got in the game earlier than they might have otherwise, to take advantage of the interest rates.
To be honest I can't recall when interest rates declined. If it was after last summer it seems to me that sales may be inflated because it's the first spring/summer period with low rates and buyers want to take advantage. Need to see how much sales taper off during the typically slower months.
So once again I'm back to my original idea of waiting until the winter to see what happens with the numbers.... It may very well remain stable, it's very difficult to accurately predict what will happen. To be honest I've had many many many discussions about housing prices in Calgary, and I'm beginning to get annoyed at myself. Just have to wait and see what happens by the end of the year. I think I may be just completely sick of talking about this stuff... Whatever happens, happens and there are people on both sides, those who think prices will rise (usually those who have just bought, or those in the sales industry), and those who don't (those waiting to buy). You won't change the minds of anyone on either side of the fence.
I hope this post makes sense, it's late, I just randomly woke up, and this whole post may be contradictory nonsense..... lol.