June 2019

Oversupply is slowing, but a buyers’ market remains

New listings coming onto the market continued to decline in June, which is helping to reduce the oversupply of homes in Calgary.

Year-over-year, new listings saw a decrease of nearly 19 per cent. Sales activity slowed this month compared to last year by six per cent, but the pullback in new listings was enough to cause inventories to fall by 13 per cent compared to last year’s elevated levels.

“So far, the housing market has generally behaved as expected this year. Sales activity remains just below last year’s levels, prices have eased and supply is starting to adjust to the lower level of sales,” said CREB® chief economist Ann-Marie Lurie.

“However, it is mostly product priced under $500,000 that is trending towards more balanced conditions.”

While the market still favours the buyer – with 4.3 months of supply – the amount of oversupply has eased and is slowing the decline in prices. As of June, the benchmark price in the city was $425,700, nearly four per cent below last year’s levels and comparable to unadjusted prices recorded last month.