Coast Market Gaining Steam

The Sunshine Coast real estate market is starting to pick up on the heels of a turnaround in the Metro Vancouver market.

“You are definitely seeing increases in activity,” said Scott Russell, president of the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver (REBGV). “You've seen the increase in the sales [on the Sunshine Coast]. It's smaller numbers, that's all.”

July sales of detached homes on the Coast are up 60 per cent year over year, echoing the Metro Vancouver market, which has seen its highest volume of July sales yet, according to an REBGV.

The Metro Vancouver real estate market has been gaining steam, following some tough months in the late fall and the beginning of the calendar year, Russell said.

“I think that the two biggest factors right now are what's happening with pricing. We've seen a decrease in prices, definitely, and the lowering of the interest rates,” he said. “It's had a big impact.”

While the Metro real estate turnaround is starting to show in the data, with year-to-date sales of detached homes up by nine per cent year over year, the Coast's numbers for that six-month period are still weighed down by the leaner months.

On the Coast, year-to-date numbers for 2009 are still down year over year, showing an 18 per cent drop in detached units sold and a seven per cent drop in median selling price.

But Bill Binnie, co-owner of Royal LePage Sunshine Coast, Royal LePage North Shore and Royal LePage City Centre, said the Coast story is in the more recent monthly data.

“The one thing that is most glaring on the Sunshine Coast is that the sales on the Sunshine Coast were up 60 per cent in July [year over year],” he said. “And it's coming on the heels of a surprisingly strong Vancouver market and it's following, as it typically does, a few months behind.”

Last year, he said, the Sunshine Coast saw a drop in the percentage of offshore buyers purchasing on the Coast, a phenomenon he links to the recession. But that trend, he said, is starting to reverse.

“So I think as those [offshore] buyers join the buyers that are already on the Sunshine Coast who are taking advantage of reduced prices and really good interest rates, that will continue to add to the Sunshine Coast real estate market and it will be good for awhile,” he said.

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