The new year always starts with excitement and curiosity regarding the real estate market. It’s common to see a boost in activity and buyer enthusiasm at this time of year. The rare exception was January of 2023 when we saw very few listings and a delayed “spring” market starting in late March. January 2024 has started strong, suggesting that we may be in for sales and value growth in 2024. Dare we say that the market correction is over? It appears that November was the trough in the sales cycle. December saw improvements, and as you can see below, January saw improvements as well.
We can agree that there is a pent-up demand for houses; we saw far too few quality houses in the last 6-8 months. This has left buyers ready to pounce. In one such case, recently, we saw 18 offers on the house in Roncy that hit a sale price of pre-correction values (Jan 2022.)
Condos remain a little more uncertain. We don’t see the same buyer enthusiasm as a large selection of investor-owned inventory available for purchase. Until end users (or investors return with lower mortgage rates), it will take more time to see a full recovery in the condo sector,
We have much reason to believe that a recovery is happening. The caveat is that we don’t expect double-digit percentage growth in home values but rather a balance to slightly favoured sellers’ market.
