Weekly Market Update, Oct. 6/17

Any idea of why condos are holding their average price and SFH not?

Like this picture ,looks like pretty soon prices will be under water .

All hope is gone.
Nutley and Turdeau have succeeded in completely killing the Alberta oil industry. Their plan has worked.

the number of the jobs lost in AB will not help at all... not even speaking about TransCanada, B-20, interest rates....

Who cares about oil , we have weed .

Looks like there's a typo for home price. S/b $421K not $441K?

Yep! Thanks for letting me know, it's fixed.

Because they are relatively less expensive so there's more demand now on this segment in terms of affordability but eventually condos will go down in price as well while affordability deteriorates more. Overall I'd say the downward correction will be between 7% to 12% in the next 3 to 5 years. It could be a bit more but I can't see it going down more than 15%.

They need to market Edmonton as a retirement community for the people from Vancouver and Victoria.

A house asking for 640 in early april is now asking for 540 with no buyers. I won't be surprised that with the new mortgage rules that homes drop by an additional 10 to 15 percent.

Prices have certainly come down a fair bit recently. So I think it's a good time to buy low. I can't imagine them falling any more, a lot of people are already underwater.

Look at the house prices on the east coast. Think house prices can't drop any further?
All it takes is a concerted effort by the ruling government to destroy or chase away all industry and voila - you have house prices plunging.

Enjoy.

Let's face the facts, people.

Edmonton is not exactly a magnet for people wanting a wonderful lifestyle.
The winters are bitterly cold. There are no large bodies of water nearby. You have to drive for hours to find one. The summers are generally infested with mosquitoes.

The one thing Edmonton had going for it was the low taxes and booming economy. That has all been destroyed. So what is left?

Let me guess. Someone is going to say "The people!" Yah, well guess what. There are wonderful, kind people in every city in Canada. Edmonton is not unique in that.
Oh, but "THE OILERS!" Yah. Great. Who can afford to go see a game at $500 a night plus parking?

Sadly, the Alberta Advantage is gone. And it won't be back for decades. If ever.
At least Calgary has better winter weather and the mountains close by. Edmonton has... a pile of silver balls as its legacy.

The combination of provincial NDP and federal Alberta-hating Liberals has destroyed what was once a great place.

GM, Edmonton has Canada strongest economy (Alberta is crushing every other province for economic growth), and oil has rebounded quite well off of its lows. We will soon have the best downtown in all of Canada (outside of Toronto), with the tallest skyscraper outside of Toronto. has Canada's best festivals (we're not called the festival city for nothing!).

I hardly think a few percentage points down in plungIng! Lol

I didn't say it DOES; I said with all the new office towers and condos being planned over the next 5 years it will. Halifax, Ottawa, Montreal and Victoria have NO real skyscrapers! Those are no where close to a real big city downtown! An extra 20,000 people are moving to downtown Edmonton over the next five years. That will be insane!

http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/lonely-planet-gives-edmonton-harsh-review-city-councillors-bite-back-1.3576661

Best economy in Canada? So why are housing prices plunging then.

The Alberta economy has seen the 'best' YoY growth in Canada because last year our 'growth' was so horrendous that we literally could not do any worse, so really it should only be up from there. 3% higher than absolute garbage still isn't very impressive but people tend to forget what our current growth is being compared to.

I don't know how Lonely Planet is still in business. It seems like the writer has never been to Edmonton. Probably also written before Rogers Place opened downtown and it revitalized the area.

The quote about downtown Edmonton being for rich people and the down and out isn't wrong. Hopefully the next provincial government does something about the poverty in the area.

The truth hurts.

Who goes downtown to the "Ice District" except millionaires?
I know I certainly don't have any reason to go to that area of town. Do you?

I guess the homeless druggies like the area. I see lots of them around there.

Are you also going to deny that Edmonton is frigidly cold in winter?

The best downtown outside of Toronto? You must not have visited Vancouver, Victoria, Calgary, Ottawa, Montreal or Halifax of you think Edmonton has the 2nd best downtown core in Canada.

Oil prices will *NEVER* come back up and it has absolutely nothing to do with Federal or Provincial government. The world has passed the peak demand for oil. If you don't see it coming you are economically blind. The fact that big oil companies are stopping the projects (energy east) has nothing to do with political situations or red tape they want to attribute it too. They are big enough and have enough lobbyist to change things if they want. They just don't see it as a smart investment anymore. The fact that car manufacturers are all moving away from gas engines should be enough sign that there won't be enough demands for oil justify $100 price point.
As for diversifying the economy by government, it's best left to private sector to do it.

Prices are starting to heat up! 2018 is going to be scorching hot.

http://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/edmonton-home-prices-see-healthy-growth-in-the-third-quarter-of-2017-650554933.html

Royal Lepage , hell , I don't even read their BS .

@Andrii:

Easy, it's all about the race between population growth vs new development growth. In the past 20 years, Edmonton actually had better population growth than Vancouver. But Edmonton was able to cough up more new lots to satisfy all that demand, while at the same time Vancouver had zero new land. Imagine what will happen if, starting from today, the city of Edmonton does not permit ANY new land to be developed.

Toronto is similar, that city grew so big that the available new lots are 2~3 hours' driving away from the city core. So effectively there is no new lots.

Some of the lesser cities may experience a rising trend when there is moderate population growth but the cities weren't prepared and thus had road infrastructure lagging behind. Land with no road is not valid supply.

As I said , you believe in whatever you want to believe , ich find his own local reason why here is different and mark my word staff is always " easy " for those who doesn't understand it .

I am a born and raised Edmontonian, whom also has had the benefit in living and working in other parts of Canada throughout my twenties.

Despite being a Conservative, I did vote Liberal based on mainly based on social issues. At the time I thought although as a Conservative I desire a fiscally responsible approach to entitlements and social issues, and am completely nauseated by the Left's identity politics. However Trudeau's vision did win me over...

However I would now agree that this has spelled out to be disastrous for Canada, and more specifically Edmonton. The only property I own is a condo in Edmonton which I rent out, and recently have become very worried about the outlook of our housing market.

Despite what people want to believe, the only economy that will work for our generation of blue-collar skilled labor is the Oil Industry. There has been ZERO sustainable actions by the current Federal or Provincial government to establish any form of industry to replace our Oil Industry. Yet have taken several rash actions that ensured our Oil Industries destruction, with other form of industry to fall back on.

In addition to this people are INSANE to be paying the prices they are for the ICE district in downtown Edmonton. I love Edmonton always will, but our downtown sector will never be one that rivals other cities. You can't just build office towers, overpriced condos, and a new arena and expect surpass cities like Montreal, Vancouver, Halifax, Calgary, Ottawa, Toronto, ....

Our winters are long and cold, our location is not ideal for water recreational activities, we are much farther from the U.S Border then a lot of major cities.... list goes on and on.

Without the "Alberta Advantage" the appeal of living in Alberta over the several other options our amazing country has to offer just isn't there. I do feel home prices will correct significantly over the next few years.

Real Estate is always local, and when prices in Edmonton basically doubled over the past few years we all know it was based on our BOOMING Oil industry. All the benefits in Edmonton being able to raise a family in a safe and laid back atmosphere, with an opportunity to achieve a higher net income then anywhere else in Canada seams to be slowly slipping away.

Long story short, I think we are in for some tough times here in Edmonton. Especially when the UCP come into power, and fire the 10,000+ public sector workers which helped shield Edmonton from some of the difficulties Calgary faced over the past 2 years.

End Rant....

@Tom:

I know what projects are being planned and no, Edmonton is still no match for Calgary in 5 years.

There is no point to compare high rise buildings. Edmonton is a great city not because of these constructions. For instance, driving in Edmonton is much easier than Calgary. But that advantage is gradually gone because of Iveson and Co.'s agenda to have more bike lanes and street level rails.

I don't think you are a conservative and I am not referring to your voting for JT.

Okay, Tom.

I'll check back with you mid-2018 and see if your prediction was right.

I think you articulated the current situation really well Nick. I wouldn't normally worry much about low oil prices as I always knew that prices would bounce back up. I'm not sure this is the case any more as more car companies shift their product line to electric vehicles, and as US production continues to increase.

This could be a rough few years. Prices in the city have held up better than expected... but when you look at the number of listings that are expiring, this could be scary.

What a troll Steve is! While I do agree that oil will soon become more or less a dying industry in Alberta due to our high costs and no way to get to market, other big industries will pick up the slack (mostly construction around downtown of office towers and condos, as we are already seeing).

Also, you can't 'fire' government employee. They have union protection. Also, we have the youngest population, so that bodes well for future economic growth, unlike other old provinces.

I have so many issues with Steve's biased opinion, I don't know where to start! We have near record condo and housing starts, so developers sure think that sales and going to explode soob!

Real Estate is always local, and when prices in Edmonton basically doubled over the past few years we all know it was based on our BOOMING Oil industry
So why they double in others places , which has nothing to do with oil ? Winnipeg ,Montreal , Ottawa ? We can always find a local reason why , chinese , oil , immigration , Bombardier , good weather , lack of land , everyone wants to live in Canada but there are some common such as low interest rate , loose mortgage , obsession by real estate .

Tom, This Royal Lepage report says the aggregate price in Edmonton increased by about 4% in the 3rd quarter of 2017 year over year. So what I did is I reviewed the stats on both the realtors association of Edmonton website and Teranet house price index and found out the price is about the same or about only 1% up which is way different from the 4%. Am I missing something?

If this is true: https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/oil-crash-10-barrel-electric-110600763.html compare Edmonton with Detroit.... maybe even worse due to the weather....

I completely agree, oil probably is at its peak right now. I could definitely see $10 a barrel in the next decade.

But that being said, Edmonton has so much to offer with festivals, and the river valley, and low government spending per capita relative to other provinces (meaning it will have to catch up), that housing prices should continue to increase.

Just look at Sky Condos. They have the same prices as Toronto or LA, and they're selling incredibly well. And many more condos being built soon.

We don't need oil. BC doesn't have oil. Manitoba doesn't have much oil. We'plan be fine as long as we transition to manufacturing solar panels and wind turbines. Saudi Arabia is doing the same thing diversifying away to green energy.

I don't see any reason why our downtown can never "rival other cities." I moved here in 2005, and Edmonton (especially the downtown) has only gotten better since then. Many people are embracing our weather, I personally prefer the weather here to Southern Ontario (where I'm from). Do you know Americans consider Seattle to have the worst weather in the US? Seattle and Vancouver have basically the same climate. Scandinavian countries continually top world ranking for best places to live, and they have much the same climate as we have. We're a northern city, it's cold in the winter. It's also sunnier than most parts of Canada, and we have excellent schools, healthcare, the amazing river valley, way less traffic than most places, I could go on and on. My friends and family that have come to visit have all be pleasantly surprised by our beautiful city. Edmonton is awesome.

If you "see lots of them around there" you must go down there. Just sayin. Have you been to downtown Toronto, or Vancouver or any other major city? You'll find more "homeless druggies" there. Are you going to deny that it gets frigidly cold in almost the entire country in the winter?

Sara, I stand by my comment it is extremely naive to think Edmonton's Downtown sector will be able to rival several of the other major cities in Canada such as Toronto or Vancouver.

All the rational you provided in your response I agree with. Meaning I do think Edmonton is a nice city to live, and raise a family. However nothing that you mentioned in your response should bring a rational person to believe that downtown Edmonton will ever rival that of Toronto or Vancouver as an example.

To close... Edmonton = Good.... However people think Downtown Edmonton should merit the same price premium has downtown sectors in some of the other cities as one day it will rival them is just wishful thinking in my humble opinion....