"The real estate market in Greater Victoria is returning to a steadier pace following the strange two years we experienced over the course of the pandemic."

Victoria Real Estate Stats for the Month of June

• A total of 612 properties sold in the Victoria Real Estate Board region this June, 35 per cent fewer than the 942 properties sold in June 2021 and a 19.6 per cent decrease from May 2022.
• Sales of condominiums were down 40.2 per cent from June 2021 with 202 units sold.
• Sales of single family homes decreased 31.4 per cent from June 2021 with 302 sold.
• There were 2,059 active listings for sale on the Victoria Real Estate Board Multiple Listing Service® at the end of June 2022, an increase of 15.9 per cent compared to the previous month of May and a 49.7 per cent increase from the 1,375 active listings for sale at the end of June 2021.

Where is the market headed?

Sales have continued to drift downward steadily, consistently off by about a third from last June’s pace.  Meanwhile new listings have held up well towards the end of the month and look to be on track for a more or less normal pace for the time of year. Though inventory remains very low (the 10 year June average is 3263), we have now cracked 2000 listings for the first time since November of 2020.

More important is where it goes next.  Inventory nearly always increases from January to June but it also usually tops out around that point.  So far we haven’t seen signs of the increases slowing down, but it’ll be interesting to see if the pace of the slowdown is enough to overcome seasonal trends, or if sellers are about to take their usual summer break and keep inventory stable.

Expect the cooling trend to continue as long as rates keep rising. With credit tightening at the same time as house prices fall, I would expect the share of investor purchases to drop back to pre-pandemic levels. Theoretically this all adds up to increasingly favourable buying conditions, but of course the reason is that deteriorating affordability has pushed more buyers out of the competition entirely.   We won’t truly see improved conditions for most buyers until affordability returns to the market in some form.

MOSAIC