Cape Breton residential sales down

Year-over-year numbers declined by 30.8 per cent

Residential sales in Cape Breton last month were below expectations as the year-overyear sales declined by 30.8 per cent.

According to statistics released Friday by the Canadian Real Estate Association, there were 45 homes sold in Cape Breton in March.

The average price of a home sold in March was $124,489 — an 11.6 per cent increase over the same period in 2017.

So far this year, there have been 115 residential sales on the island, a decline of 20.7 per cent from a year ago. But the price of sold homes in 2018 has remained stable at $121,074 with an increase of just 0.7 per cent.

Across the province, a total of 813 units were sold in March. This was up a marginal three per cent from March 2017, but remained above both the fiveand 10-year averages for the month.

On a year-to-date basis, home sales totalled 1,984 units over the first three months of the year. This was up 5.3 per cent from the same period in 2017 and marked a six-year high for the period.

The average price of homes sold in Nova Scotia last month was $233,515, up 4.1 per cent from March 2017.

There were 1,761 new residential listings in March. This was down 9.6 per cent on a yearover-year basis.

The Nova Scotia Association of Realtors indicated the overall supply has trended lower over the last year and is running at the lowest level for the month since 2005.

Active residential listings numbered 6,887 units at the end of March. This was down 8.1 per cent from the end of March 2017.

The total dollar value of all residential home sales in March was $189.8 million, edging up one per cent from the same month in 2017.