Happy new year!
As always, the closing week of the year was one of the slowest of the year for unit sales. On the brighter side, this quiet period does typically mark the end of the declining sales cycle, and from here we can expect slow and steady increases until the market reaches its peak sales week in either April, May or June. This past week, Saskatoon real estate agents reported just 26 firm residential sales to the multiple listing service®, down 20 from the previous week, a drop of two from the closing week of 2015. New listing activity was also predictably soft with just 20 new listings being added to the MLS® for a weekly decline of 50 units. That’s also 28 fewer listings than were added during the same week last year.
There are some interesting changes to report on the inventory front. For the first time since mid-August, the total number of Saskatoon homes available for purchase on the local MLS® system finished higher than it was a year earlier. It’s worth noting that the closing week of 2015 actually ended on January 2 so all of the month-end expired listings had already come out of the totals. Still, even if all of the 112 MLS listings that are scheduled to expire today actually do expire (assuming some are not extended for a longer period before they expire) we are up on an annual basis. Today there are 1560 active residential listings on the system. At the close of this week last year those numbers had fallen to 1432. Today’s inventory includes 820 single-family homes, up from 806 a year ago. There are presently 606 active condo listings, well ahead of the 480 that could be found on the MLS at the close of the year’s final week of 2015.
Like the previous week, upper-end real estate sales carried the day. They also carried average prices for the week substantially higher. Obviously, with just 26 sales, a few big ones can really skew the data. Even while the weekly median price managed to fall lower to $331,900 the weekly average price of the homes that traded was a whopping $394,969 which is higher than it has been during any week this year. The six-week average price dropped two thousand dollars from last week to $339,630 and finished the year down by about 15K from a year ago. The four-week median price grew by $2400 from a week earlier to $338,000 and closed the year two thousand dollars behind annually.
While two sellers were lucky enough to find a buyer willing to pay their asking price, the remaining 24 had to give up some cash to close their deal. Those transactions came in below the asking price by an average of $12,976.
As we wrap up 2016, I’d like to thank those who took the time to show up here for updates on our market. I’m especially pleased that so many of you turned to us for some guidance in getting your home sold this year. It really has been a great pleasure to serve you, even during one of our more challenging markets. I expect 2017 to continue to be an uphill battle for sellers but we will continue to show up daily and do the work.
Once again, happy new year to you and yours.
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 Vidorra