🏡 Ottawa Real Estate Insider-April

 

Hi lovely people of Ottawa, It is now time for my spring newsletter to you.

Reminders

In this unusually warm March and April, while it’s certainly delightful for us Ottawans, it also means that some of the typical May maintenance tasks need attention now. From clearing leaves and landscaping to cleaning eavestroughs, trimming trees, and checking backup generators (if you have one). It’ll be interesting to see if we get another weird spring weather like 2023. In my neighbourhood of Kanata North, we’re seeing an unprecedented number of new development proposals. I participated in an information session for one project very close to my area, and you can find the recordings here: 1104 Halton Terrace (youtube.com). City building is unfolding in real-time here in Kanata North, with projects like 555 March & 788 March shaping our community’s future. Here are some potential rebates that you can apply from City of Ottawa managed programs: Rain Ready Ottawa offers residents in priority areas up to $5,000 in rebates to help install stormwater management projects. Find out more at ottawa.ca/rain. The Residential Protective Plumbing Program provides financial assistance to qualified property owners for installing protective plumbing devices, such as sump pumps and storm and sanitary backwater valves. Discover more at ottawa.ca.

Market Update

February and March are typically the last slow months before the eventual spring uptick. However, due to a slow February in 2023, this year’s activities seem to be more rosy in comparison. OREB even used very optimistic titles in their recent market date release, which you can read here: Ottawa’s MLS® Market Activity Shows Strong Start to the Year – Ottawa Real Estate Board (oreb.ca) & Ottawa MLS® Market Shows Early Signs of a Buzzing Spring Market – Ottawa Real Estate Board (oreb.ca).

Highlights

The number of homes sold in Mar 2024 increased by 10% compared to Mar 2023, these figures were still below the five-year and ten-year averages for the month of March. But as we see over the months from 2023 into 2024, market activities are more and more aligning with pre-COVID patterns, indicating a potential return to “normal” as we once were here in Ottawa. OREB highlights the issues of affordability and supply, pointing out that many potential buyers are sidelined by high prices, with fewer communities under the $500K threshold than before. Curtis Fillier, President of the Ottawa Real Estate Board (OREB), noted a growing confidence among sellers, reflected in increased listings and showing activity. Prices continued to rise, with the overall benchmark price rising by 2.7% to reach $636,700 in March 2024. The average price of homes sold rose by 5.1% to $682,078. Inventory levels saw an uptick, with new listings increasing by 13.5% and active listings rising by 18.3% compared to the previous year. In terms of prices, we see an overall increase compared to Feb and Mar 2023 in all segments of the market. I’ve observed the return of multiple bids in some sought-after communities (like Kanata Lakes), particularly for fully renovated, move-in-ready properties. This is consistent with OREB’s assessment of the importance of neighbourhood-specific factors in shaping consumer behaviour. The significant increase in new listings compared to Feb/Mar 2023 suggests a potential uptick in seller activity. However, despite this uptick, active residential listings still fall below the ten-year average, indicating ongoing inventory constraints. The inventory metric remaining unchanged from the previous year suggests a balanced market in terms of supply and demand, with properties moving at a consistent pace. Months of inventory remained relatively low at 2.2, indicating that we are shifting gradually towards the seller's market. Several macroeconomic market factors have undergone significant changes in the past month, notably the government’s efforts to reduce the numbers of temporary residents such as foreign students, temporary workers, and asylum seekers Federal government aiming to shrink temporary residents' share of population by 2027 | CBC News). While temporary residents themselves may not directly influence real estate prices, housing demand is closely tied to population numbers in each city. The impact of subsequent decisions by both the federal and provincial governments to reduce foreign students and other temporary residents will likely impact the housing market in the coming years. Whether or not it is more important than the interest rates (which remain unchanged in March and April) is yet to be seen. In summary, my previous prediction still stands, i.e. there should not be major housing price corrections for 2024 (lower or higher) in Ottawa, as all agents in the real estate market are still trying to correct the chronic supply issue, and working on reducing demand. There could be, however, a fast and furious drive to buy homes in anticipation of the Bank of Canada’s rate decision in summer (Bank of Canada rate cut watchers starting to look past the summer | Financial Post), but I believe that variation will be short-lived as we are only expecting moderate rate cuts (0.25% at a time and at most a couple of times before the year-end). If you need some advice on your real estate needs or just want to have a coffee chat with me, please reach out!