You've spent years maintaining a family home. The kids have moved out, the stairs are becoming less appealing, and the thought of spending every weekend mowing the lawn and cleaning unused rooms no
March News! Check out my latest Newsletter!
Dated: March 18 2024
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If anything can be said about Canadian weather, its just how predictably unpredictable it so often is. Case in point: the winter season we are currently enjoying. With record setting high temperatures and a dearth of snow, the unseasonably mild start to the new year has sparked an early flurry of activity in the real estate market. The spring-like conditions have encouraged buyers out into house-hunting mode well in advance of what is typical, and when coupled with the usual inventory shortages of January and February, this phenomenon has spelled out a recipe for bidding wars and a rapid increase in sales values once again. As you will read, January sales data shows a healthy spike upwards in the average home price sale here in the Durham Region.
So is it really just all about the weather? Well, yes and no. Certainly it has played a starring role in creating the perfect conditions for selling for those lucky sellers who were already on the market or were about to come on. In real estate, timing is everything and this particular set of circumstances was impossible to forecast. However, inventory levels will increase when true spring occurs, and when they do, this micro market will undoubtedly diffuse some of its steam. Buyer confidence though, does seem to be on the rebound as the Bank of Canada rate continues to maintain its comfortable position of status quo.Buyers are trusting that rates will start to creep down sometime during this year. Is that going to happen anytime soon? No, and even when they do begin to drop, the percentage changes will be nominal and incrementally applied at best. The BOC is all about restraint and caution. However, it has been said that every 1% drop in the Bank of Canada rate will bring 100,000 buyers back into the market, and let’s face it, the rate hikes swept a huge swath of potential buyers to the sidelines, and they are tired of waiting. Overall, the current climate is showing that buyers are ready to take on mortgages at variable rates again, banking on the long term to win.
As has happened before, the current buying activity of Durham Region house hunters is flying in the face of those dour forecasts and predictions that say we haven’t reached the bottom yet. There are a lot of factors to take into account that could swing the pendulum literally either way. And as we experienced for the last two years, that pendulum moves a lot! We seem to climb in Q1 and Q2 and erode those gains in Q3 and Q4! This could be yet another year of repeats.
As always, I am just a call, text, email or visit away from guiding you and your loved ones through the single most important transaction of your life. If you are considering a move or want more information, let's sit down & talk about how that looks for you! Thank you for your trust.
Kim Susands
Kim Susands is a highly skilled Realtor based in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada, with a passion for real estate and an unwavering commitment to excellence. She is a graduate of the prestigious New York Insti....
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All information deemed reliable but not guaranteed. All properties are subject to prior sale, change or withdrawal. Neither listing broker(s) or information provider(s) shall be responsible for any typographical errors, misinformation, misprints and shall be held totally harmless. Listing(s) information is provided for consumer's personal, non-commercial use and may not be used for any purpose other than to identify prospective properties consumers may be interested in purchasing. The data relating
All information deemed reliable but not guaranteed. All properties are subject to prior sale, change or withdrawal. Neither listing broker(s) or information provider(s) shall be responsible for any typographical errors, misinformation, misprints and shall be held totally harmless. Listing(s) information is provided for consumer's personal, non-commercial use and may not be used for any purpose other than to identify prospective properties consumers may be interested in purchasing. The data relating