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Saskatoon real estate week in review: May 27 – June 2, 2012

Sales of Saskatoon houses and condominiums slid lower on a year-over-year basis, dropping from 120 units for the same week last year, to 99 homes. Still, total unit sales increased by four over the previous week when Saskatoon real estate agents reported 95 firm deals to the local MLS®. In spite of the annual decline this week’s sales ranked among the top five weeks for housing sales this year.

New listings continued to come at a reasonable strong pace with 155 properties in the condo and house categories being added to the system, up five from last week and ahead of the numbers added during the same week last year by just three.

Click the image for a larger version of the graph.

The inventory of active residential real estate listings available to Saskatoon home buyers on the multiple listing service® took its first drop since late March. While marginal, it did push the totals to their lowest numbers for the first week of June in five years time. As of this morning, 1205 properties bear an active status on the MLS®. That’s down just five units from the close of the previous week but the year-over-year decline amounts to almost 200 homes. A very strong sales month in May pushed the absorption rate (total inventory divided by most recent month’s sales) to just 2.7 months. I believe that this is the smallest supply of Saskatoon homes that we’ve seen since 2007. Today, buyers find 717 single-family homes and 405 condos for sale on our system. At the close of the same week last year, those two categories saw totals of 797 and 516 respectively.

Click the image for a larger version of the graph.

The average selling price of a Saskatoon home saw marginal declines for the second consecutive week as it slipped lower by just four hundred dollar to $348,011 while the median sale price for the week declined about four thousand dollars to $341,000. Meanwhile, the six-week average price of a Saskatoon home took its third weekly drop to finish the week at $340,992 to claim an annual gain of about twenty-three thousand dollars. The four-week median price took a big jump gaining about ten thousand dollars compared to last week to finish at $325K, up thirty thousand dollars from the close of the same week a year ago.

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The majority of this week’s sales (75 of 99) were reported to have traded for less than the asking price. The average discount was $8,189. Another 18 Saskatoon home sellers managed to wrap up a deal at their full asking price. The remaining six sellers were lucky enough to end up with competing bids to close a sale above their list price by an average of $4,833.

Other notable Saskatoon real estate activity this week included 59 cancelled and withdrawn listings, just 50 properties that expired from the system without a sale and 56 price changes.

Click the image for a larger version of the chart.

Highlights from the news this past week

What lies ahead for Canada’s housing market? – Globe and Mail
Home ownership getting less affordable in Canada – Financial Post
Home affordability in top markets deteriorates: RBC – Globe and Mail
What to do with the money from selling your home – Globe and Mail
Average existing home prices to income per capita – Globe and Mail
Remai honoured with award for life’s work – Star Phoenix
City powers up plans for north downtown – Star Phoenix

A map displaying the boundaries of Saskatoon real estate areas is here.
An overview of data collection and calculation practices for our statistical reports is here.

Get the most current market intelligence with our FREE Market Snapshot including prices of homes recently sold in your area. Get it here, now.

I’m always happy to answer your Saskatoon real estate questions.  All of my contact info is here. Please feel free to call or email.

Norm Fisher
Royal LePage Saskatoon Real Estate