G’day LiveKitsilano.com readers! I hope you’re getting through this June-uary knowing that a beautiful July will be here soon. It’ll be a rainy weekend, which is great for getting out to visit Open Houses.
I’ve been watching this market closely, especially since Kitsilano always seems to run at it’s own pace compared to the rest of the city. There is a lot of opportunity for Buyers, but enough activity that Sellers should be happy as well. Pricing strategy is as important as it’s ever been… some Sellers are still trying to push the envelope in price and it’s usually not working out for them. Buyers are still keen, but they’re indicating that they aren’t desperate either.
The detached market is still the market with the most opportunity for Buyers, though it’s restricted to Buyers who have enough money to either buy a newer or well maintained house, or who can afford to finance a tear down and rebuild or major reno. Financing for a house that needs major renovations is tough – not only do you generally need more down for a house that’s un-livable, but you need to be able to carry it through the permit process and get financing to pay for the renos. The benefit is that you can have the house you’ve always dreamed of owning. As they say, “Location, Location, Location”… you can never can the location (or other intangibles), but you can always change the house itself. We’re starting to see lot value homes sell for under $2-million, which is a big change from the last few years. As usual though, modern renovated homes are still a big draw for Buyers, so those properties are still seeing multiple offers.
The townhouse market is seeing a lot of activity as well, especially in the entry level market. Kits has a lot of great townhouse style buildings, so there are a lot of good options for Buyers. Considering the age of some buildings, some of the floor plans are a little curious, though they work, and they often have benefits like roof decks or loft spaces. Prices have generally stagnated, though there is a lot of variation in this market.
The condo market is busy, as usual. Prices have stagnated, and offers with “subject clauses” are common but the Buyers are there and good places will still sell quickly. I’ve seen some multiple offers situations too, but those were always on a great property – top notch building and unit, and priced right.
Interest rates are expected to increase again in July, so it might get a little tougher to afford a good property in a few months time. Talk to a mortgage broker sooner rather than later so you know what you can afford now, and how a rise in interest rates will affect you later. The big question is whether or not prices will drop, but I don’t think we’ll see any big drops for most of the market. The lower end of the market is still too busy, and I’m seeing a lot of Sellers take their property off the market rather than drop their price.
Try searching for Kitsilano properties, or sign up for our Custom MLS System if you want to start following this evolving market.
As always, if you want to chat about your real estate goals, don’t hesitate to contact me: 778-387-7371 or [email protected]. There is always a lot to know about value and building construction, so if you’re looking to buy, let us help guide you into a good purchase. With a bit more competition when it comes to selling your property, putting int those extra touches to ensure the unit shows well will be really important, as well as good marketing and top notch negotiation.
Kitsilano Real Estate Stats
Green is for Detached Houses, Blue is for Townhouses and Orange is for Condos.
Kitsilano Condo Market Update – June 2018
The Kits condo market is showing a 61% sales to active ratio: 86% for 1 bedroom condos and 47% for 2 bedroom units which is definitely still a strong seller’s market. The good news for buyers is that prices have stagnated. The HPI price is at $662,000 which is the same as is was the month before and slightly down from a high of $670,000 this year. The average price for 1 bedroom condos is $630k ($996/sqft) and the median is $641,900. The average for 2 bedroom condos is $1.05-million ($1077/sqft) and the median is $961k. Knowing that the average prices for 2 bedroom townhouses is a bit skewed, I broke it down a bit further, so 2 bedrooms under 900sqft average $876k ($1070/sqft) sale price and 2 bedrooms between 900-1300sqft average $1.12-million ($1091/sqft).
The average days on market is 9 days for 1 bed condos and 14 days for 2 bed condos. Inventory has been slowing increasing every month for condos, and it’s a lot of new listings rather than languishing inventory. The last time we saw this much inventory for condos was back in 2015.
Overall, this market is really busy, and the only thing that will really slow it down is more changes to buyers financing, unfortunately, that negatively affects the buyers too. At the end of the day, if you’re going to live in the property for a few years, now is as good a time as ever to find a good property and jump in.
Kitsilano Townhouse Market Update – June 2018
The Kitsilano Townhouse market has a 35% sales to active ratio. Breaking this down, it is 31% for 2 bedroom townhouses and 35% for 3 bedroom townhouses. There were no sales of 1 bedroom townhouses last month, but they can be quite rare.
The HPI price for townhouses was $1.114-million last month, which is a slight increase over last month, but in the same general range compared to the last year or so. The average price for a 2 bedroom townhouse in Kits was $1.23-million ($1080/sqft) and the median was $1.27-million. The average for a 3 bedroom townhouse was $1.9-million ($1137/sqft) and the median was $2.13-million.
The average days on market for 2 bedroom townhouse is a whopping 53 days! There must be a few listings that are just languishing on the market since that’s not what I’m seeing out there. The average days on market for a 3 bedroom townhouse is 15 days.
Though there are no 1 bedroom townhouses currently for sale, the total inventory for townhouses is slightly up over last month, but it isn’t much lower than the average over the last few years. We’ll need to see a lot more in order to see the numbers we saw back in 2015 and earlier.
Kitsilano Detached House Market Update – June 2018
The Kitsilano Detached market has been the slowest market over the last little while, though the most expensive market is always the one that is hit the hardest. The average sales pice is 20%, which is still mathematically a sellers market,
The HPI Price for detached houses in Kitsilano is $2.384-million, which is up from the last two months, but down from $2.6-million last September. There were no sales of new construction houses in Kits last month, so all the stats will be for re-sale properties, of which there were only 12 sales. The average price for resale properties was $3.347-million and the median price was $2.615-million. The average price was brought up by two sales just under $4-million and one just under $10-million. The other sales were under $2.6-million.
The average days on market is 40 days. The amount of inventory has been increasing since December, but that’s typical for the time of year. The total inventory is still under the highs we saw over the last couple of years.
If you have any questions on the market, or if you want to sit down with an agent to chat about everything you need to know, give me a shout: 778-387-7371 or [email protected].
