Monday, October 6, 2008

What is Normal?

According to several CanWest publications Western Canada's real estate market it normal.

Victoria real estate market gets 'back to normal' as industry sees signs housing boom is over
CanWest Global's Vancouver Sun
"We're also looking over the last five or six years and what we're finding is things are just coming back to normal,"
-Victoria Real Estate Board President Tony Joe

Lower Mainland real estate market returning to 'normal' levels
Canwest Global's Vancouver Sun
"We're experiencing a return to more normal market conditions," Kelvin Neufeld, president of the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board said in a release.

Regina housing market back to normal
CanWest Global's Regina Leader-Post
The housing market in Regina was at a frenzied pace earlier this year, but during the third quarter, prices have cooled down and flattened out, says a report by Royal LaPage Realty. More available listings and less demand from buyers means the province's housing market has returned to more normal conditions, the real estate company said Monday.

Condo market returning to normal
CanWest Global's Calgary Herald
"In 10 to 12 months, the supply and demand in the condo market will be normalized. It's starting to shrink already."
-Calvin Buss, president of Buss Marketing

Levelling in real estate market sets stage for stronger 2008
CanWest Global's Edmonton Journal (from August 2007)
"I don't really want to use the word 'softening' because I think this is more of a normalizing market. We were super-heated, and now we're coming down to something that's more reasonable."

Saskatoon home prices stabilizing
CanWest Global's Saskatoon Star Phoenix

This fall, Janzen forecasts a real estate climate more in line with Saskatoon's "normal" residential sales market.
"We're more on par with 2003, 2004, 2005 - so we're indicating a return to a more normal, stable environment," he said, adding the market is expected to stay in a similar state for some time.

See previous post

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sad that a recession, if not an impending depression is considered "normal."

Anonymous said...

haha.

I think these guys have a conference call every week, and come up with a "unified" message to tell the media. This week or month, the message is "normal" or "stabalized", and they've decided against using terms like "dropping" or "softening".

"softening" was last months term, but I guess they didn't feel it portrayed the message that they wanted it to.

It's kind of sad that our mainstream media just recites whatever they are told, including the "word of the month", instead of doing actual journalism, for example challenging the assertions of those they are interviewing.

The only investigative journalism being done in Canada is by obscure, bloggers. Keep up the good work.

Anonymous said...

Hi Bearclaw,

The report on AB migration numbers show that non-permanent residents are becoming a greater slice of the migration pie. From say 5-10% of total net migration in boom years to around 30% for 2007/2008. For example first 2 qtrs 2008 migration is 31k with 11k being NPRs.

Can someone confirm my interpretation of data is correct? Can you do a post on this topic?

Also does this not mean that the turn in net migration trend may not have as much positive effect on homebuying as some may think?

Found link to report on Sheldon's blog via itchy

Cheers

BearClaw said...

Hmmm...

I agree that NPR part of the total would be less prone to buying homes. They may rent or work in camps,

The numbers were good last quarter even without including NPR.

I think it would make more sense to show a chart with a longer time frame to be able to identify how closely they are correlated. I think there were other periods of high in-migration but the 50% YOY appreciation was record setting even compared to the last boom in 80/81.

Take a look at this CBC article from 2001 with a fleet of buses for new upgrader project in Edmonton. Notice no hyped mention of real estate.
link

I think in-migration is one positive factor for real estate but it was not the sole cause for the boom.

Anonymous said...

Hi

I should have read the table more closely. There is definitely an increase in the interprovincial migration numbers.

Just curious as to how they define an interprovincial migrant. Does this include someone from another province that commutes to Alberta for work on a rotation and stays in camps? Or is it only those who reside in Alberta. I know my hometown and the surrounding towns are emptied of young and old living and working in Ft Mac camps but not paying mort/rent. Living expenses must be covered in order to make the move feasible.

The NPR seems only to include foreigners, not out-of-province Canadians.