Last month was record-breaking for the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV), which reported its highest sales ever for June and second-highest monthly sales overall.
REBGV observed a total of 4,375 Metro Vancouver property sales on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) in June 2015, a 28.4-per-cent increase over the 3,406 sales in June 2014, and a 7.9-per-cent increase over the 4,056 sales in May 2015.
June sales also represented a 29.1-per-cent rise over the 10-year sales average for the month, and is the fourth straight month in which more than 4,000 sales occurred — a first for the REBGV.
“Demand in our detached home market continues to drive activity across Metro Vancouver,” said Darcy McLeod, REBGV president, in a press release. “There were more detached home sales in the region last month than we’ve seen during the month of June in more than 10 years.”
The MLS Home Price Index composite benchmark price for all residential properties in Metro Vancouver currently sits at $694,000, a year-over-year increase of 10.3 per cent.
“Housing market activity comes in cycles; we’re in an up cycle right now that looks similar to the mid-2000s,” said McLeod. “It would be easy to point to one factor that’s causing this cycle, but the truth is that it’s a number of different factors.”
McLeod points to low interest rates, a declining supply of detached homes, a growing population, a provincial economy that is outperforming the rest of Canada, pent-up demand from previous years and the highly desirable Metro Vancouver region as factors of the record-breaking sales last month.
Last month saw 5,803 new listings for detached, attached and apartment properties, an 8.7-per-cent increase over the 5,339 new listings in June 2014.
“We’re seeing a steady stream of new listings entering the market, but the overall number of homes for sale is not keeping up with buyer demand,” said McLeod.
In June, there were 12,181 properties for sale on Metro Vancouver’s MLS, which is a 23.9-per-cent decline from June 2014, and a 1.3-per-cent decline from May 2015. This marks the lowest active listing total in the month of June since 2006.
Metro Vancouver is still in a seller’s market, with sales-to-active-listings reaching 35.9 per cent in June, the highest it has been since June 2006.
Sales of detached properties reached 1,920, an increase of 31.3 per cent over June 2014, and a 74.2-per-cent growth over June 2013. The benchmark price for a detached property reached $1,123,900, a year-over-year increase of 14.8 per cent.
Sales of apartment properties reached 1,774, 35.6 per cent higher than sales in June 2014. The benchmark price of an apartment property currently sits at $400,200, an increase of 5.3 per cent over June 2014.
June also saw the sale of 681 attached properties, an increase of 7.1 per cent over June 2014. The current benchmark price of an attached property in Metro Vancouver increased by 7.1 per cent year-over-year to $506,900.
