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Hi James, I'm glad you could meet with me today. So I'm with James Garbutt with Sutton
West Coast Realty out of North Road in Coquitlam. But you cover the Burnaby and New Westminster
market. And you have been in this market for 6 years now and you also live in New West.
You've got a good idea of what's happening in the neighbourhood. I wanted to talk to
you what occurred in 2013 that surprised you.
Some of the big surprises for me was that yes it was a down year. It did improve a bit
from 2012. In terms of surprises I thought the Fall market was much stronger than the
Spring. Not just in terms of prices but in terms of ratio of sales to listings. So it
was much more of seller's market towards the tail end of 2013. Prices actually improved
a few percent in the later part of the year. Another huge surprise, according to the Real
Estate Board stats, the condos actually appreciated a little bit stronger than the detached homes
which is rare. It was pretty close but still the biggest surprise I saw from last year.
So for moving into 2014, how do you think the increase potential for the market that
you've seen in the last quarter of 2013. Is that going to continue for 2014 and how do
you think that may affect prices?
So far 2014 has just been booming. I think that we're in for a good year. Certain products
will do better than others but I think it will be significantly busier this year than
it was last year. I've seen more competing offers situation. I think we're going to see
a little appreciation in prices as well.
In terms of the pricing, I think the strata properties they'll maybe appreciate modestly.
Maybe 1 or 2% nothing overly exciting because they are still a little bit over saturated
in these markets. But detached homes I think they are going to go on a very strong run.
I wouldn't be surprised to see figures of 5 - 10% appreciation this year. But since
2011 the market has been quite down for detached homes and if we see anything to what 2011
had, I think we're in for a really good run. More so in Burnaby for the homes that are
$1million or less, for New Westminster for homes that are say $850,000-$900,000 or less.
The higher end I think will still be a strong market but the turnover ratio for a $1.5million
dollar homes is significantly lower than a $900,000 home.
So with 2013 we've actually seen less listing on the market and in fact a reduction of listings
overall year over year. Do you see that continuing in 2014. Or do you see different trends happening?
I don't see it continuing in 2014. We've already seen a lot of listings on the market. A little
less than I had anticipated so far, but I think every month moving towards June, July
we'll see more and more inventory come on the market and a lot more selection. So I
expect listing activity to be up significantly as well compared to last year.
So that sounds like some really good selection for buyers coming into the Burnaby, New West
market then.
I hope so, I think so. Definitely for condos. Houses can be a little unpredictable at times.
But the selection is going to improve for sure.
With the 2014 market on its way, what do you think is going to be hot in terms of areas
or what people may be looking for?
Well you know what, let's look at New West to start.It's become more and more popular
every year. It's a small community. I think both condos and houses will be pretty hot.
I think condos close to the skytrain downtown core will be quite popular. I think any detached
home in New West under $900,000 the North side of the Fraser River is going to be a
hot commodity. Expect bidding wars. It's just common place nowadays for homes in great neighbourhoods
at those price points. For Burnaby, I expect it to be anything under $1million I expect
it to be hot for a detached home. Condos I think they're going to increase activity I
don't necessarily expect them to be hot because there's a ton of condos in the market in Burnaby.
But the good ones don't last long. So the condo market in Burnaby is going to be healthy
but I think detached homes under a million is going to be what's hot.
And how do you think, you mentioned there are a lot of different choices on the condo
market in Burnaby. Do you think that's in part because of new development upcoming...
I guess I should rephrase that. A lot of the selection is new developments which means
they are not necessarily ready to live in right now. So it won't have as much of an
effect on the resale market in a lot of the neighbourhoods. But areas such as Brentwood
Park, they have many new towers coming up there. The actual resale market, there isn't
much of a selection. It is going to be a hot market, resale. The new construction on the
other hand, it's hard to predict. It may take time for it to absorb the amount of inventory
that is available.