Vancouver home sales surge 53.4 per cent

Vancouver’s real estate market ended 2020 with a bang, as a December home-buying spree helped the market rebound from a weak 2019, despite the COVID-19 pandemic.

Home sales jumped 53.4 per cent in the final month of 2020 compared with

December 2019, the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver said on Tuesday. The board said 3,093 homes were sold in December, up from 2,016 in December 2019 and slightly more than the 3,064 sold in November.

The board said the composite home price in Vancouver ended the year at $1,047,400, up 5.4 per cent from the same time last year.

Board chairwoman Colette Gerber said the COVID-19 pandemic brought the housing market to a “near standstill” in March, but demand for housing returned through summer, fall and winter-intensified by low interest rates.

“Robust December sales outpaced long-term averages in what’s traditionally the quietest month of the year in real estate,” Gerber said in a statement. “This was part of an unusual seasonal pattern the market followed last year, which can be attributed in large part to the pandemic.”

Indeed, December’s home sale upswing has been seen across the country, even as a second wave of COVID-19 swept through. Calgary’s home sales hit a new record for December, the strongest showing since 2007, the Calgary Real Estate Board said on Monday. On Tuesday, the Quebec Professional Association of Real Estate Brokers said that the Montreal real estate market set sales records in all areas last month.

In Vancouver, Gerber also pointed to the pandemic’s effect on “shifting housing needs,” as more buyers have searched for stand-alone homes outside downtown amid more widespread stay-at-home and workfrom-home mandates.

Sales of detached homes led the December gains, rising

71.3 per cent from December 2019 to 1,026. Apartment sales were up 40 per cent from last December, totalling 1,474. Real estate agents sold 593 attached homes, such as townhomes, in December, up 62.9 per cent from December 2019.