The number of homes sold through the MLS® system of the BC Northern Real Estate Board totalled 410 units in September 2017. This was an increase of 7.9 per cent from the previous September and stood above the same month in 2015 as well.
On a year-to-date basis, home sales totalled 3,346 units over the first three quarters of the year. This was up 1.2 per cent from the same period in 2016.
“Home sales bounced back in September following a quieter than normal summer owing to the wildfire situation in many parts of the Cariboo region,” said John Evans, President of the BC Northern Real Estate Board, in a press release. “With new listings trending at below average levels, the market is tightening back up.”
The average price of homes sold in September 2017 was $262,345, down 0.2 per cent from September 2016. The less volatile year-to-date average price rose 5.8 per cent from the first nine months of 2016 to reach $278,777.
The board cautions that the average residential price is a useful figure only for establishing trends and comparisons over a period of time. It does not indicate an actual price for a home due to the wide selection of housing available over a vast geographic area (the board serves an area covering over 600,000 square kilometers or 72 per cent of the province).
The dollar value of all home sales in September 2017 was $107.6 million, climbing 7.6 per cent from the same month in 2016.
There were 512 new listings on the board’s MLS® System in September 2017, edging down 13.9 per cent on a year-over-year basis. This was the lowest September level since 2003.
Active residential listings on the Board’s MLS® System numbered 2,541 units at the end of September, a decline of 8.3 per cent from the end of September 2016. This was the lowest level for active listings at this time of the year in a decade.
There were 6.2 months of inventory at the end of September 2017, down from 7.3 months at the end of September 2016 and above the long-run average for this time of year. The number of months of inventory is the number of months it would take to sell current inventories at the current rate of sales activity.
Sales of all property types numbered 456 units in September, falling 0.9 per cent from September 2016. The total value of all properties sold was $117 million, up 3.5 per cent from September 2016.
