December numbers are in...

The EREB released the December resale numbers for Edmonton today. We're continuing to see the expected seasonal trends for sales and inventory, both typically dive off a cliff in December... prices largely held, except condos where they took a BIG bounce after two months of sharp falls.

With condos apparently decoupling in October and November and seeing rather large month over month declines while the rest of the market held, you had to figure either they'd bounce back up or SFH's would shortly start to follow the same trend... and we got the former, to the tune of a rather massive 5.4%. This is actually fairly normal behavior after sharp drops (>2% MoM), they'll often bounce back to their prior level or close too it. Given the holding of prices in the SFH category, and even the appreciation of prices in Calgary the condo price dive did seem to have all the marks of an abberation.

It's been an interest year, as a year ago prices were nearing their bottom before interest rates took a big dive in the spring and really spurred the Canadian real estate market. So year-over-year we're starting to see rather a decent appreciation, while over the last six months prices have merely held. Now we're left with a waiting game to see what happens with interest rates... when will they jump, and more importantly, how high.

Like I mentioned, as is usual for December inventory and sales take a big dive. Seems a large percentage of listings expire at year year, thus we typically see a big wave of delistings the last week of December... then several get relisted immediately in the new year, while others trickle in through winter and spring.

Sales also typically are at their bottom in December, and I think we could fairly safely reason that is due to the extended holiday period and everything that comes with that. Relative to past years, December '09's sales were fairly strong, high end of average.

And here we have the absorption rate. It continues to settle back towards the normal range. This will be very interesting to follow once rates start going up. That will of course soften sales, but I also suspect we could see another explosion of listings somewhere along the way when market sentiment swings. Perhaps not to the level seen in '08, but approaching that territory.

Finally, and as always, here are the hard numbers:

Sales = 948
Since two years ago = +10.6% (+91)
Since one year ago = +55.9% (+340)
Since last month = -24.8% (-313)

Active Listings = 4,037
Since two years ago = -43.1% (-3,057)
Since one year ago = -36.1% (-2,279)
Since last month = -22.8% (-1,189)

Single Family Homes Median= $351,350
Since peak (May '07) = -12.2% (-$48,650)
Since one year ago = +6.5% (+$21,350)
Since six months ago = +0.5% (+$1,850)
Since last month = +0.4% (+$1,350)

Residential Average = $319,201
Since peak (July '07) = -10.0% (-$35,517)
Since one year ago = +2.6% (+$8,227)
Since six months ago = -2.8% (-$9,098)
Since last month = +0.2% (+$719)

Single Family Homes Average = $366,761
Since peak (May '07) = -13.9% (-$59,267)
Since one year ago = +4.2% (+$14,891)
Since six months ago = -0.8% (-$3,098)
Since last month = -0.3% (-$1,257)

Condo Average = $244,174
Since peak (July '07) = -10.2% (-$27,734)
Since one year ago = +4.2% (+$9,888)
Since six months ago = -1.2% (-$2,897)
Since last month = +5.4% (-$12,490)