Alberta Market Report: July 2018 – Little changed from a year ago

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Residential sales activity reported through the MLS® Systems of real estate boards in Alberta numbered 5,385 units in July 2018. This was up just 1.3% from July 2017.

On a year-to-date basis, home sales totalled 33,225 units over the first seven months of the year. This was down 6.5% from the same period in 2017.

Nationally, home sales activity edged down 1.3% from year-ago levels in July 2018. The provincial average price of homes sold in July 2018 was $385,156, edging down 2.8% from July 2017.

The more comprehensive year-to-date average price was $391,952, down a similar 2.9% from the first seven months of 2017.

The national average price, by comparison, edged up 1% on a year-over-year basis to $481,429 in July 2018.

Across Alberta, monthly residential average prices were up from year-ago levels in Grande Prairie (+8.5%) and Calgary (+0.9%). By contrast, average prices declined in Lloydminster AB (-1.7%), Alberta West (-2%), Central Alberta (-3.3%), Medicine Hat (-3.5%), Edmonton (-3.7%), South Central Alberta (-8.1%), Lethbridge (-9%), and Fort McMurray (-21.7%).

There were 10,668 new residential listings on the MLS® Systems of real estate boards in Alberta in July 2018. This was little changed on a year-over-year basis, edging down just 0.3%.

Active residential listings numbered 38,945 units at the end of July. This was an increase of 14.2% from the end of July 2017.

Months of inventory numbered 7.2 at the end of July 2018, up from the 6.4 months recorded at the end of July 2017 and also above the 10-year average of 5.5 months for this time of year. The number of months of inventory is the number of months it would take to sell current inventories at the current rate of sales activity.

The dollar value of all home sales in the province in July 2018 was $2.1 billion, edging down just 1.6% from the same month in 2017.

The dollar volume of all home sales in Canada was little changed on a year-over-year basis in July.

Sales of all property types in Alberta numbered 5,715 units in July 2018, up 1.7% from July 2017. The total value of all properties sold was $2.3 billion, down 1.3% from July 2017.

There were 1,974 home sales recorded through the MLS® System of the Calgary Real Estate Board in July 2018, down 5.8% from a year earlier. The combined value of home sales activity in Calgary was $913.5 million, down 4.9% from year-ago levels.

There were 1,983 home sales recorded through the MLS® System of the REALTORS® Association of Edmonton in July 2018, down 0.4% from July 2017. The total value of home sales in Edmonton was $738.1 million in July 2018, down 4% on a year-over-year basis.

Important information

The average price information quoted can be useful in establishing trends over time, but does not indicate actual prices in centres comprised of widely divergent neighbourhoods, or account for price differentials between geographical areas.