Housing Market Statistics

The news media have reported a few very positive facts this past week.

The Conference Board of Canada reported that Canada will climb out of recession this quarter. It further reported that the US housing and auto sectors had bottomed out and had started recovering.

Then, various reports noted the fact that Canadian existing housing sales rose 8.7 percent in June, the fifth consecutive monthly gain. In fact, economists at BMO went to far as to suggest that Canada was a sellers market.

The Central Alberta housing market has recovered too. Inventories of used homes are down, and prices have firmed. New home starts are increasing too, although there are still a lot less starts that there were a few years ago.

That Wild Rose Charm

ATB Economics recently wrote an article that discussed new inter provincial migration. The article starts by saying that the population of Alberta grew faster than any other province in the first quarter of 2009, partly due to the 7,144 interprovincial migrants. Over half of these people arrived from Ontario.

Also notable was that for the first time since 2006, more people moved to Alberta from Saskatcheqwan and BC than moved there from Alberta.

This inmigration drives demand for housing, helping to explain a resurgence in our industry.

Alberta really is a great place to live and to work and to raise a family, and it seems the rest of Canada hasn't forgotten.

Happy Birthday Canada

Happy Birthday Canada

Once a year, on July 1, we need to remind ourselves how lucky we are to be Canadian. We really are blessed to live in this great country, even if the winters are too long some years.

At Laebon we continue to see increased sales as the world economy works it's way out of last year's global recession. Our weekly sales continue to increase, and our show home traffic has been stellar.

Last week's MLS statistics for Red Deer were a good indication of the direction. The number of listings in Red Deer fell to 608 from 636 a week earlier. There were 185 sales to June 25. I look forward to seeing the June sales totals compared to a year ago; I suspect there was a big increase.

At the Laebon office we're actively working on the final design for the first phase of Timberstone; we're still hoping to complete the underground utilities for the first phase this fall.