Metro Vancouver home sales hit 38-year low in April, prices hold steady


Tuesday, May 5th, 2020

Last month’s home sales were 62.7 per cent below the 10-year April sales average

Scott Brown
The Province

COVID-19 social-distancing measures led to April home sales dropping to a 38-year low in Metro Vancouver, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver.

April home sales totalled 1,109, which is a 39.5 per cent decrease from the 1,829 sales recorded in the same month last year and a 56.1 per cent decrease from the 2,524 homes sold in March.

It was the lowest total for the month since 1982 and 62.7 per cent below the 10-year April sales average.

“Predictably, the number of home sales and listings declined in April given the physical-distancing measures in place,” Colette Gerber, the real estate board’s president-elect, said.

“People are, however, adapting. They’re working with their realtors to get information, advice and to explore their options so that they’re best-positioned in the market during and after this pandemic.”

Despite the slow market, home prices held steady in April, with the composite benchmark price for all residential properties up 2.5 per cent from a year earlier, and up 0.2 per cent from March, at $1.04 million.

The April benchmark price for a detached home in Metro is $1.46 million, up 2.3 per cent over last year, while apartments are at $685,500, a 2.7 per cent increase over April 2019, and attached homes sit at $795,800, up 2.8 per cent.

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