South Okanagan real estate market continues decline to more average levels

PENTICTON – The residential real estate market in the South Okanagan continues to drop on a year-to-year basis, bringing the market back to more average levels following several years of explosive growth.

June residential home sales statistics saw a decrease of 21.7 per cent over sales from the same period a year ago, from 228 units to 176 in 2019.

Coincidentally, year over year home sales are also down, at 22.7 per cent over the same period last year, from 1,118 last year to 859 in 2019.

South Okanagan Real Estate Board President Dori Lionello says this year’s market is a dramatic change from the seller’s market of the past few years.

“It has essentially frozen prices in their tracks following a number of years of strong growth, including double digit gains in 2016 and 2017,” she said in the board’s monthly market summary.

It’s also taking longer to sell a home, as the amount of time it would take to sell current inventories rose from five months in June 2018 to 8.4 months this year.

The year to date average home price was $417,156, down two per cent from the first six months of 2018, when it was $425,713.

Sales volume also dropped compared to a year ago, with a total value of $475,947,065 in 2018 compared to $358,660,441 this year.

Active listings numbered 1,506 units at the end of June, which was 30.6 per cent more than the June, 2018 figure of 1,127, but still close to June’s long term average.

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