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Chilliwack lagging real estate sales mirrors provincial trend

Forecast for 2019 is a drop from 2018 but a bounce back predicted for 2020
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Real estate sales in Chilliwack in 2019 are forecast to drop by 8.1 per cent but bounce back up to 2018 levels in 2020. (Black Press file)

Provincial real estate sales numbers trended lower in June with average sale prices also falling by four per cent.

And while sales in the Chilliwack and District Real Estate Board (CADREB) area similarly dropped in June continuing a trend, the average sale price isn’t falling, in fact increasing by 1.7 per cent year-over-year.

The average price of a home sold in B.C. in June was $687,584 down four per cent from $716,045 in June 2018.

In the CADREB area, which includes Agassiz and Hope and all parts in between, the average sale prices lat month was $538,147 up from $529,157 a year ago.

• READ MORE: Balanced market for Chilliwack real estate continues

• READ MORE: June sees drop in home sales, prices for real estate across B.C.: report

To compare, the average sale price in the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board was $741,786 last month, down 1.6 per cent from $753,729. In the Greater Vancouver Real Estate Board, the average sale price of $980,635 was down 8.2 per cent from $1.069 million.

“B.C. home sales moderated lower in June after a stronger showing in May,” said B.C. Real Estate Association (BCREA) chief economist Brendon Ogmundson. “While mortgage rates offered by lenders have moved below three per cent, a static qualifying rate has limited the impact of the lower cost of borrowing.”

Five months into the year and 1,279 units sold in the CAREB area down 25.7 per cent from the same period in 2018. That mirrors a provincial trend of 23.4 per cent decline in sales.

As part of its second quarter housing forecast, BCREA estimates 2,600 sales locally for 2019, which would be an 8.1 per cent decline over the 2,829 sales in 2018. The 2020 forecast is for a bump back up of 7.7 per cent to 2,800 sales.

That compares to a pvoincewide forecast of a sales decrease of 8.9 per cent in 2019 followed by an increase of 14.4 per cent for 2020.

The BCREA continues to blame the B20 mortgage stress test for the continued slowdown, pointing to the damage it’s had in the Lower Mainland’s three markets, which make up 60 per cent of housing demand in the province.

“Millennials may be temporarily stalled by the toughest mortgage qualifying rules in modern Canadian history, but they will form households in the rental and ownership markets eventually,” according to the BCREA forecast. “The only question is whether these tough mortgage qualification policies will backfire on policy makers by slowing the expansion of the housing stock and cause yet another round of rapid price inflation in the coming years


@PeeJayAitch
paul.henderson@theprogress.com

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