CREB Now April 2022 Market Update: Sellers’ market conditions continue in April
Following an all-time record high month of sales in March, activity slowed down in April. However, with 3,401 sales, it was still a gain of six per cent over last year and a record high for the month of April.
“Despite some of the monthly pullback, it is important to note that sales remain exceptionally strong and are likely being limited due to supply choice in the market,” said CREB® Chief Economist Ann-Marie Lurie. “While further rate increases will likely start to dampen demand later this year, more pullbacks in new listings this month are ensuring the market continues to favour the seller, resulting in further price gains.”
New listings trended down relative to last month and levels recorded last year. With the sales-to-new listings ratio remaining above 74 per cent, there was not much of a shift in overall inventory levels.
With 4,850 units in inventory, we are nowhere near record low inventory levels, however, levels are far lower than what was recorded in April since 2014. What has changed in the market is the composition of the inventory levels. When comparing inventories today to what was available in 2014, we can see that detached homes comprise of a smaller share of the inventory levels especially for properties priced below $500,000.
Overall, the Calgary market has seen the months of supply remain below two months since November of last year, placing significant upward pressure on prices. The benchmark price in April reached $526,700, which is nearly two per cent higher than last month and 17 per cent higher than last year.
Detached
For the first time since spring of 2020, year-over-year sales slowed down. While sales have dropped, it is important to note that with 1,815 sales, this is still far stronger than long term trends. A decline in sales occurred for homes priced under $600,000. This pullback in sales for lower priced homes was likely related to further supply declines driven from reductions in new listings in those price ranges. Inventories in the detached sector have not been this low for the month of April in nearly 15 years.
While the slightly slower sales compared to inventory levels did help push the months of supply back above one month, conditions continue to remain exceptionally tight with 1.3 months of supply. This continues to place upward pressure on prices, but at a slower pace than the last three months. The detached benchmark price rose to $628,900 in April, which is 19 per cent higher than last year.
Semi-Detached
A decline in new listings in April likely contributed to slower sales compared to last month. However, sales are still relatively strong and on a year-to-date basis and remain nearly 30 per cent higher than last year and nearly double the long-term average. As the slower pace of sales was met with a decline in new listings, there was little change in the inventory situation and this segment continues to favour the seller.
Tight market conditions caused further price gains in the semi-detached sector. In April, the benchmark price reached $487,900, nearly two per cent higher than last month and over 16 per cent higher than last April.
Row
While levels trended down from the previous month, new listings reached 781 units this month. This is a year-over-year gain of 24 per cent and the highest level ever seen in April. The improvements in new listings helped support stronger sales activity which rose over last year’s levels and set a new April high. This boost in new listings did cause inventories to trend up compared to earlier in the year, but it was not enough to pull the market out of the sellers’ market conditions.
With just over one months of supply, persistently tight market conditions continue to place upward pressure on prices. Thanks to gains across every district, row prices rose by over two per cent compared to last month and are nearly 17 per cent higher than last year.
Apartment Condominium
Like other property types, apartment condominium sales did ease relative to last month’s record highs. But with 642 sales this month, activity still improved by over 46 per cent compared to last year reaching a record high for April. This in part was possible thanks to the 893 new listings that came onto the market. While it was not enough to dramatically change the supply levels in the market, the months of supply did edge up to nearly two months.
Tighter market conditions continued to cause prices to trend up in April. The apartment benchmark price rose across all districts and currently sits eight per cent higher than levels recorded at this time last year. The strong price gains over the past three months have helped narrow the spread from the 2014 record high price.
REGIONAL MARKET FACTS
Airdrie
Once again, sales nearly surpassed the level of new listings coming onto the market in April, causing further declines in inventory levels and ensuring the market continues to favour the seller with less than one month of supply. This is the sixth consecutive month where the months of supply has remained below one month.
The benchmark price reached $480,600 in April, reflecting a year-over-year gain of 29 per cent. Prices have improved across all property types, but the largest gains are in the detached sector with an April price pushing just above $550,000. This is nearly 33 per cent higher than levels recorded last April.
Cochrane
A slight pullback in sales relative to the new listings helped push the sales-to-new listings ratio below 80 per cent. This is the first time that has happened since March of last year. While this did support inventory levels that were better than anything seen since November of last year, conditions still remain exceptionally tight and favour the seller.
While the pace of growth has slowed slightly compared to the last few months, the April benchmark price in Cochrane reached $530,900, over two per cent higher than last month and 21 per cent higher than last year’s levels. Price gains in Cochrane have been driven mostly by the detached and semi-detached sector.
Okotoks
The boost in new listings last month did not continue this month, as April sales exceeded the number of new listings coming onto the market. This caused further declines in inventory levels and the months of supply. This is the fifth consecutive month where the months of supply was below one month, which is continuing to weigh on prices.
The benchmark price in April rose to $538,300, reflecting a year-over-year gain of 13 per cent. Like many other areas, the strongest price growth has occurred for both detached and semi-detached homes.
Click here to view the full City of Calgary monthly stats package.
Click here to view the full Calgary region monthly stats package.
https://www.creb.com/News/CREBNow/2022/May/April_monthly_stats/
Pete and Katelyn’s Market Update:
Pete: So hard at working with an amateur. Hey, it’s Pete young here with Katelyn Brecio and we want to give you a market update for Calgary for April of 2022. Then they’re going to do the main lady is going to do a little intro
So here’s the update from from Calgary for April of 2022. What we saw was prices continue to increase. So in terms of the prices, what they’ve done is pretty astonishing. Maybe not with respect to what you’re seeing in Toronto or Vancouver, but for Calgary over the last few years, we’re just happy to see this.
We’ve seen a price increase of nearly 17% in the last year. So that’s 16.9% increase.
Katelyn: Yeah. So that’s an average price of about 526,000.
Pete: Over 500,000, we’re up to 5 26, 5 26, 7. Even something like that. Detached prices of course have been the ones driving this market prices in the detached market are up 20% are actually 19.1, if you want to be exact, but a 19.1% increase in the detached price.
Katelyn: That’s an actual average price of around $628,000.
Pete: And as you get a smaller and smaller place, it seems like the increases in prices are actually smaller as well. So whether you’re looking at townhouses or semi detached, they’re about doing the same. They’re seeing price increases of about 16 and a half 16.2, 16.9, somewhere around there is where they’re all ending up at.
Katelyn: Yeah. So average price for that is actually around $487,000.
Pete: Yeah. $487,000 for the detached, semi detail.
Katelyn: Semi detached, yes. And then if we look now at the row prices that is actually an increase of about 17%.
Pete: Yeah, 16.9. So they’re now at 3.43. So those ones are kind of tracking along the same in terms of price, like percentage price increases.
But of course the values of the semi detached house, which would include some of these the new infields and stuff like that, that are selling at a million that drives them up. So their average price is closer to $487,900. Apartments are up as well. They’re up 8%. Which is good. But like, I always say you gotta break the apartments down, cause it really depends on where the apartment is and whether it’s a two bedroom or a one bedroom and that kind of thing.
So, yeah. Yeah. So average price for that is actually looking around $272,000.
Yeah it’s a substantial increase. 8%. And the, you know, but I will say that, you know, when I talk to realtors or clients from Toronto or Vancouver, like, isn’t it fun to tell them that the average price of a condo here is , and they go, wow.
That’s like, you can’t get anything for less than $272,000 and some of these other markets. So it’s a great time to be moving to Calgary folks. If you have friends or relatives in Toronto or Vancouver as our premier says, it’s a pretty simple IQ test. Now. It’s like, where’s the work? Where’s the cheaper housing and everything else. It’s all Calgary. This is where you go.
Katelyn: Yeah, exactly.
Pete: So now let’s talk about what’s going on in terms of sales numbers. This is unit sales and there again, we’re still seeing we’re still seeing some really positive news. If you’re a seller, if you’re a buyer, you still might want to get off the couch and get moving before the, the train has left the station.
So in terms of sales, and again, this is year over year. So this is April, 2022 versus April, 2021. We saw sales increased by 6% over last year. And last year, things were actually starting to starting to increase even around this time of year.
Katelyn: So that’s about an average of 3,400 sales year over year.
Pete: Yeah. In their month. Yeah. The month the month’s worth of listings is actually down not bad, like not as bad as we’ve seen lately. So listings are only down about 2.1% versus last year, but again, we’re last year is number.
Katelyn: Yeah, exactly. So that’s about an average of 4,500 new listings.
Pete: Yeah. So, you know, you know, when we’re seeing new listings come on at 4577 and sales are at 3401. That means that we could actually see the market turn a little bit. It could soften a little bit. So we’re seeing inventory pick enough seeing inventory pickup, but we’re seeing inventory drop off at, at a lower rate than we had, and we’re seeing sales pickup, but again, we’re still seeing more new listings and we’re seeing sales for the month.
Lately we’ve been tracking in an absorption. You know, 90% in greater, it’s been incredible. That might be coming down a little bit here in the next little while, just because the number of listings coming on I will say that overall, our inventory compared to last year is still down 20% from last year. So it’s still significant shortage of supply.
Katelyn: That’s actually sitting at about 4,800. Year by year for the month.
Pete: So, 4540, 4600 and new listings in a month, which leaves you a total inventory of 48. I mean, it kind of shows you how many homes were selling in a month. Our month supply is down again from last year, it’s down almost 25%. It’s like down 24.3% or something like that from last year.
That’s still, we don’t have a lot of inventory. We have about a month and a half. What is it? How many months of why is it?
Katelyn: Yeah, 1.43. So yeah, that’s like a month and a little.
Pete: Yeah, just over a month. Yeah, almost a month and a half supply. So again, what that means is if people stopped listing homes in a month and a half, we’d be out, we’d be out of listings.
So it’s still a shortage of supply. You’re still gonna see some you’re still going to see a lot of competing offers and that kind of thing. It’s not as exciting as it had been in February, March. But, and whether this is going to stick around like this or not as really the question is, is this a slight dip in the market?
Are we going to come back up or is it the beginning of a trend? Are people going to start believing the the media with respect the national media and saying that sales are dropping and inventories piling up? When really when the national media talks about that, they’re talking about Toronto and Vancouver.
They’re not talking about Calgary. So if you’re going to be reading about real estate stats, read your local media, or, you know, watch our stuff, get ahold of Katelyn get ahold of me, we’d be happy to talk to you about real estate anytime. You can follow either one of us on Instagram as well or. Call us or text us, right?
Katelyn: Yeah!
Feel free to ask us any questions at all about real estate. We’re happy to help out any way we can and otherwise until next time, take care and bye bye. Buy houses. No. Yeah. Anyways, have a great month. .
