MARKET UPDATE – APRIL 15, 2017
RED DEER Year to date MLS sales of all property types in central Alberta are up 6.7% over the same period last year while year to date sales in Red Deer are down 13.4% It’s difficult to pinpoint the reason for the discrepancy and it is unusual that Red Deer is down when the rest of the area is up. It may be that people are being forced into the less expensive small markets by tighter mortgage rules.
The Red Deer market has not started April as well as it did last year. The number of active listings is up significantly while sales are off slightly compared to the same time last year. The comments below from ATB suggest that the economy is on the mend and some of our laid off workers are going back on the job. All good news, but they probably won’t start buying houses right away. The next few months will be used to catch up, pay bills and get some stability back in their lives. Buying a home is probably at least a few months away.
That leaves those who have maintained their jobs through the recession. Those who are thinking about a move would be well advised to do it soon, before those laid off workers get back on their feet. The situation couldn’t be more perfect to buy – low interest rates with the threat of increases soon, lots of good inventory and a market where supply outweighs demand all spell “opportunity”.
Excerpts from The Owl, by ATB Economics
Manufacturing getting a lift from stronger oil prices ….another in a string of indicators that suggest Alberta is shaking off the recession and heading towards better days in 2017. In February, the value of manufacturing shipments in Alberta rose to $5.7 billion, an increase of 1.4 per cent over January.
The news is even better than that. From its lowest point during the recession in January of 2016, manufacturing shipments in our province have now increased by 15 per cent. That’s not quite enough to get it back to the pre-recession highs, but it has been steadily increasing over the last 12 months.
Production is Up! While Alberta has oil reserves, it doesn’t mean they will be produced. Massive amounts of investment, expertise, creativity and technology are needed to locate, extract, transport and sell oil. This is a risky business that is subject to complex market forces and public policy.
In addition to those challenges, Alberta is landlocked and the oil trapped in the oil sands is not as easy to extract as conventional crude—factors which put us at a disadvantage when it comes to transforming our oil resources into viable business ventures.
Despite these challenges, Alberta produced 137 per cent more oil in 2015 than it did in 1985. In 2014, Alberta’s total annual production rose above one billion barrels for the first time and reached 1.1 billion barrels (3.1 million barrels per day) in 2015. Production fell in 2016 by 17 per cent as a result of the Fort McMurray forest fires but – barring another natural disaster — should fully recover and increase again in 2017.
