Sanity returns to real estate
After a frenzied few years, the South Okanagan real estate market has finally settled back to prepandemic sales numbers.
There were a total of 344 residential sales in the region through the first quarter of 2023, not far off the 336 recorded in the first quarter of 2019, according to data provided by Deborah Moore, broker-owner of RE/MAX Realty Solutions in Penticton.
As the pandemic raged in the intervening years, sales peaked at 932 in 2021 and receded somewhat to 609 in 2022.
“This is a really normal real estate market and the only reason it isn't as high… is because interest rates have certainly thrown some cold water on prices as they were intended to do,” said Moore.
“You see a little bit of erosion to the average sale price across the province, about 5.6%, and in the South Okanagan it’s closer to a decrease of 11%, but that only makes sense because consumers only have so much money at the end of the day and it either goes to the home seller or the bank.”
Also helping stabilize the market, according to Moore, are locals who she estimated make up about 60% of buyers here.
“These are our local residents who have maybe down-sized into a strata for a more maintenancefree lifestyle from a single-family home, or a first-time home buyer going out on their own,” she explained.
Another 20% or so come from the Lower Mainland and the balance from further afield, many of them looking to cash out of markets elsewhere to buy retirement homes here.
Moore said single-family homes remain the busiest market segment in the South Okanagan, but noted “smart consumers are looking long and hard at those townhomes and duplexes because of pricing pressures.”
Finally, she urged anyone still sitting on the sidelines to get into the market now.
“The only regret you will have in buying if you’re thoughtful – and if you're working with an experience real estate professional, you should be in good hands – is that you're going to regret that you didn't buy sooner,” said Moore.