East Vancouver Detached House Market Update – October 2017

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East Vancouver Detached House Market Update – October 2017

The Detached House Market in East Van shows an 11% sales to active ratio. One thing to note is that the sales to active ratio is at 20% for 3 bedroom detached houses and 10% for 4+ bedroom houses, so the cheaper houses (under $1.5-million) are still in a Seller’s Market. This is significantly lower than it has been since 2014, though prices have generally continued upward, aside from a dip after the Foreign Buyers Tax was announced last summer. The average price of a house in East Van is $1.658-million (about $769/sqft), though it’s $1.485-million for 3 bedroom detached houses and $1.716-million for 4+ bedroom detached houses.

Inventory is high right now, with just over 800 houses for sale in East Van (contrast this with 50 townhouses), though keep in mind a lot of these houses are not in livable condition and need some big renos, so Buyers will need a little more money, in addition to down payments needs, in order to afford these properties.

One key factor that anyone who’s looking to buy or sell a detached house should be watching is a proposed mortgage rule that will require anyone with over 20% down (an “uninsured” mortgage) to satisfy an interest rate “stress test”. This means that Buyers will have to qualify for a mortgage based on the stated interest rate (which is near 5% right now) rather than the lower rate they will actually agree too. This stress test ensures that Buyers can withstand an interest rate hike, which are inevitable in the future. Without knowing exactly how the proposal will be structured, people are predicating that Buyers affordability can drop hundreds of thousands of dollars. If that many home buyers are affected financially, it’s inevitable that prices will drop, but it will likely take a while to get to that point and the amount by which prices will drop remains to be seen. At the end of the day, detached houses will always hold their value long term, and it’s something I would look seriously at jumping into if the market slowed down even further. Unfortunately, I don’t think this mortgage rule change will do much to change the condo market, though the entire Real Estate Market might slow down for awhile while Buyers “wait and see” how everything ends up, before picking up again like it normally does (it’s always been ebbs and flows, the tough part is timing the market properly).

East Van Detached House Stats

Sales to Active Ratio – 3 Bed vs 4 Bed Detached Houses:

Average Sale Price – 3 Bed vs 4 Bed Detached Houses:

Don’t hesitate to contact us if you are starting to think about sale of your home in East Vancouver and want to chat about your options – there is a lot to consider and with hundreds of sales under our belt (from tear downs to moderate family homes to beautiful new builds) we’ve done it all.