Monday, April 16, 2018

Links to LNG cancellations seen in Prince Rupert's latest real estate market findings

The fist quarter results from the Northern British Columbia Real Estate Board find a cooling trend continuing on for the Prince Rupert realty market, with a drop both in listings and the selling price marking the shift from the more speculative days of a few years ago.

The Board released its latest review of the Northern British Columbia realty scene and for Prince Rupert much of the change is being attributed to the fading prospects for LNG development, with a number of high profile proposals now part of our past having been put aside by their proponents.

Something that received a short mention as part of the overall Northwestern BC review:

"Prince Rupert’s sales and listings have dropped. The decrease in sales activity is likely linked to Petronas’ cancellation of their LNG project. Prince Rupert’s economy has been benefiting from the substantial activity at the Port. 

Terrace and Kitimat have seen an increase in the number of sales and a decrease in inventory. In Smithers, there has been a decrease in the number of sales and listings. Smithers also has lower inventory year-over-year"

When it comes to the nature of housing in British Columbia, depending on what kind of housing you are seeking, the Northern Real Estate Board notes that the market across the region remains one which is very affordable compared to most areas of the province.

Though as they noted in this report from earlier this month, there are some communities, including Prince Rupert with higher affordability issues of would be buyers to be aware of.

As for the Prince Rupert numbers the compilation of data as of March 31st delivered the following snapshot:

48 properties worth $13 million were sold through the MLS process so far this year, Of those 48 properties, 32 were single family residential properties and 8 were parcels of vacant land.  As of March 31st, there were 180 properties available for purchase through MLS in Prince Rupert.

Those numbers  compare to last year at this time, when 58 property deals had closed, worth close to 15 million dollars.

This years inventory to March 31st for Prince Rupert marks a jump of fifteen from the 170 had been listed to March 31st of 2017.

For the rest of the Northwest the results look as follows:

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Terrace is registering the highest volume of Sold properties with 56 having been delivered to new owners by March 31st an increase from the 44 of this time last year. The value of those Terrace properties was 14.5 million dollars, a jump from the 11.5 million of this time in 2017

Since January 1st, 29 single family homes, 6 manufactured homes have changed hands

This years numbers for Terrace show that there are 200 properties of all types available for sale in the Terrace Area. At this time in 2017 the Terrace market had seen 212 properties listed.

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Kitimat has also seen an increase in sales for the first quarter.

32 properties worth 7.5 million have been reported sold in the first three months, that's up from the 2017 levels of 14 properties sold for 3 million dollars. Of the 32 properties, 21 were single family homes, 4 were half-duplexes and 5 were townhouses. 

As of March 31st there were 60 properties of all types available for sale through MLS in the Kitimat area, that number is down from the 102 that were listed at this time one year ago.

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Smithers mirrored the trend from Prince Rupert of a decline in listings for the first three months of the year.

The numbers as of March 31st show that in the Bulkley Valley community 42 property listings had been sold worth 13.6 million, marking a decline in volume from 56 of a year ago, while the amount generated by the sales this year was almost the same dollar value as last year.

15 single family homes were sold in the Smithers area in the first three months, along with 7 parcels of vacant land, 11 homes on acreage and 2 manufactured homes in parks, while 3 manufactured homes on land changed hands this year.

At the end of March, there were 144 properties of all types available for purchase through the MLS system in Smithers. That compares to the 185 properties that had been listed at this time in 2017.

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The full report from the Northern BC board, including the latest number out of the largest market in the Region found at Prince George  can be reviewed here.

For more items of note related to Real Estate in the Northwest see our archive pages listed here.




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